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"Defend! Defend! Defend! I didn't tell you lot to duck and scatter like frightened mice!"
Kestrel stood high upon a chair, her voice slicing clean through the wind and snow. "Listen up! Whoever manages to land a hit on me with a snowball will have the honour of taking over command of this great snowman. You can control it yourself and give our friends from the other house a proper 'entertainment!'"
The moment the Gryffindor and Slytherin students heard this, they went wild. A blizzard of snowballs flew toward her from every direction, each one carrying the pent-up "affection" that had been simmering throughout the entire lesson.
With the lightest flick of her wand, Kestrel sent each incoming shot spinning away with a perfect Shield Charm. A few slipped past her defences, grazing the edge of her cloak or brushing her sleeves, yet even those only seemed to fuel her. Her laughter rang out louder, and her counterattacks came faster, each snowball she hurled curving through the air in wicked, unpredictable arcs.
At last, she gave her wand a quick, decisive sweep. A massive shimmering shield sprang up before her, a gleaming wall of magic that swallowed the storm of projectiles in an instant.
"Yes! Just like that!" she called, twisting aside in a graceful spin to dodge three snowballs in quick succession. "Precision, timing, and… oh, for Merlin's sake… stop hitting your own teammates!"
She had barely finished the words when a Slytherin, who had been trying to sneak in a flanking attack, took a giant snowball full in the face — courtesy of a rather overenthusiastic Gryffindor "ally." The poor boy staggered backward and toppled headlong into a snowdrift, vanishing almost entirely. Only two kicking legs stuck out from the mound, flailing uselessly against the white.
A brief, suppressed burst of laughter rippled through the crowd, quickly swallowed by the renewed and even heavier 'firepower.'
Then, in the middle of the chaos, inspiration struck one of the Slytherin boys. Rather than wasting energy flinging snowballs at random, he pressed himself flat against the shelter of a stone statue, one that had been knocked askew earlier by the rampaging snowman. He stayed there, perfectly still, holding his breath, eyes locked on his target.
The moment Kestrel leapt down from her chair to avoid a volley from the front, her back turned to him…
"It's now!" someone shouted from somewhere in the crowd.
The young wizard lunged forward, using every scrap of strength he had, and hurled a snowball packed so tightly it might as well have been a stone. Hidden within its frozen shell was a shard of ice, adding weight and sting to his shot.
The snowball traced a near-perfect arc through the cold air, cutting straight toward its mark before landing with unerring accuracy against the back of Kestrel's head.
Thump!
It exploded against her deep crimson hair, scattering icy fragments that slid down the back of her neck and slipped beneath her collar. She froze mid-motion.
Every single student on the field halted mid-throw. The storm of snowballs died in an instant. No one dared to move, and even breathing seemed suddenly too loud. All eyes turned toward the Slytherin boy, each gaze layered with a strange mixture of emotions: half a warning that he had just brought disaster upon himself, half the grudging admiration one reserves for a bold fool who somehow pulled off the impossible.
Even the two enormous snowmen paused in their rolling of fresh ammunition. Their massive carrot noses seemed to tilt ever so slightly, as if they too were puzzled by what had just occurred.
Slowly, Kestrel turned to face the crowd. She reached up, brushed away the snowmelt clinging to her cheek, and for a brief moment the air seemed heavy with suspense.
Then, instead of anger, a radiant grin spread across her face, wide enough to show a gleam of perfect white teeth that seemed to shine against the snow.
"Brilliant!" Her voice rang out, carrying not a trace of resentment, only open, unrestrained praise. "Slytherin earns twenty points for that. For such a precise and… well… let's call it a clever strike! What's your name, boy?"
"Mike… Mike Warrington, Professor," the small boy stammered, his face flushed scarlet with excitement and embarrassment.
"Good, Mike…" Kestrel lifted her wand and pointed toward the towering snowman that had, until moments ago, been relentlessly chasing Gryffindors into shrieking retreat, making them cry for their parents. "It's yours now. Go on… give your Gryffindor 'friends' a proper, warm Slytherin greeting!"
The young wizard had barely begun to process what she meant when a sudden, cold surge of magic brushed into his mind. It was a strange, weighty presence, like holding the reins of a creature far larger and stronger than himself.
Awkwardly, he raised his wand and, imitating the way Kestrel had done earlier, pointed it toward the Gryffindor side.
"Uh… snowman… attack?" he said uncertainly.
The colossal snowman turned with a grinding crunch of packed snow, its hollow coal eyes 'locking' onto the cluster of Gryffindor students.
Then, under Mike's hesitant and clumsy command, it began to move. Its heavy snow-packed legs lifted one after the other, each step landing with a soft crunch. Its movements were awkward but carried an oppressive sense of inevitability, like an avalanche that could not be stopped. The younger Gryffindors screamed and scattered, their boots kicking up sprays of snow as they fled in all directions.
"No, Mike!" one Gryffindor wailed, a boy who, only minutes earlier had been pelting the Slytherin side with great enthusiasm. His protest was cut short when the towering snowman, with surprising gentleness for something so massive, rolled a fresh snowball and pressed it into his chest. Snow enveloped him up to the shoulders, leaving only his head poking above the surface. His muffled shouts continued for only a moment before the snowman, as if to finish the job properly, added another snowball squarely to his face.
Kestrel planted her hands on her hips, shouting across the chaos.
"See that? Controlling power is obviously a lot harder than just getting power. Hey? Mike? Where's your Shield Charm?"
"Gryffindors! Throw up an Impediment Jinx, trip it up a bit, stop wasting your breath just screaming!"
"Slytherins, stop standing there grinning like fools… help your ally! Defend, work together! Otherwise the next one turned into an ice sculpture will be one of you!"
The students, caught between confusion and laughter, began firing off every spell they could think of.
The Gryffindors instinctively cast Scourgify on their half-buried classmate, then quickly followed with a barrage of Impedimenta to slow the snowman's advance. At the same time, they scrambled to control their own snowballs, pelting them toward Mike in a desperate attempt to break his focus.
Mike was in a whirlwind of trouble, flustered and breathless, trying to keep the snowman on the attack while also fending off the random, vengeful snowballs that came flying his way.
For the first time in his life, he truly understood how hard it was to split your attention on a battlefield, to control magic with precision while chaos roared all around.
When at last the shrill peal of the end-of-class bell cut through the wintry air, the field looked as though a storm had torn through it.
Both giant snowmen were riddled with gaping holes, their once solid bodies reduced to sagging, lopsided heaps. The students looked no better. Each one resembled a drenched cat dragged out of a snowdrift. Some had faces blotched blue and purple from repeated snowball hits. Others had hair and eyebrows glittering with sharp, stubborn icicles. Yet without exception, there was a strange light burning in their eyes, a mix of bone deep exhaustion and wild, inexplicable excitement.
Kestrel hopped back up onto her chair, clapping her hands together. Her voice still rang with the same boundless energy as when the lesson began.
"All right, rookies, not bad at all…"
She let her gaze sweep over the bedraggled group, and with a bright, dazzling smile, she gave her wand a lazy flick. "But I'll warn you now, if by the next lesson there's still anyone who can't even manage these basic defensive spells…" She paused, a mischievous glint in her eyes as the corners of her lips curled into something almost predatory. "Heh-heh."
Then, with the same fierce energy she had carried all lesson, the young professor threw her arm in a grand flourish and called out, her voice ringing across the field, "Class dismissed!"
The grounds immediately erupted into a jumble of voices, a mix of groans, laughter, and the rustle of students clambering to their feet. They brushed snow from each other's shoulders, linked arms to steady bruised legs, and argued animatedly about who had cast the most timely spell and whose butt had taken the hardest kick from a snowman.
"That was insane!"
"So exciting!"
"When's the next Defence Against the Dark Arts lesson?"
"I blocked at least three tracking snowballs!"
The excitement was tangible, warming them almost as much as the castle's fires would. For all the chaos and minor disasters, each student could clearly feel that those dry and lifeless defensive incantations from their textbooks had never etched themselves so deeply into their minds as they had today.
By evening, the hospital wing was overflowing with students. Ankles twisted from running too wildly, fingers red and swollen from frostbite, noses bloodied by snowball impacts, and more than one unfortunate soul flattened under a snowman's clumsy tackle. Madam Pomfrey would almost certainly be working through the night.
Yet despite the bumps, bruises, and sniffles, spirits ran high. Many had discovered they could now cast spells even while running at full tilt; Angelina from Gryffindor had even managed, for the first time, to perform Impedimenta without uttering a word.
High in the castle, Sargeras stood at a tall window, his face calm and unreadable as he looked down at the scene below. The students shuffled off the snow-covered field, still chattering breathlessly, and that one figure stood on a chair, hair mussed and sprinkled with melting flakes, grinning like a prankster whose plan had gone exactly right.
He let out a quiet sigh, but a small curve played at the corner of his mouth.
Kestrel might still be far from the most conventional of professors, yet there was no denying the surprising effectiveness of her… unconventional methods. And truth be told, only she could throw herself so completely into the chaos and somehow bring the students along with her. If it had been Snape… Sargeras' mind conjured an image of the Potions Master's dark, withering glare, and he swiftly cut the thought short.
That very afternoon, in Sargeras' theory class, the number of young wizards auditing in to listen broke all previous records. Word of Professor Lumina's "brilliant" teaching approach had spread like wildfire, and the younger years, determined to master Impedimenta and Protego, threw themselves into their studies with unprecedented urgency.
After all, in the coming Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons, knowing the spells meant one thing: keeping the upper hand. And failing meant only one thing… getting beaten up less!
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[Chapter End's]
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