"An aging potion, that's the only thing that seems to work." George was whispering. He, Fred, and Lee had stayed up the entire night trying to figure out how they could slip their name into the goblet of fire.

Tori was right. They asked her to help. "Come on, Tori. Your the only one who's taking O.W.L.S. potions." Tori rolled her eyes, sighing. She too had spent a good chunk of the night awake. She had been reading anything she could find on the Triwizard Tournament.

"Why can't you ask Angelina? She's taking potions." Tori asked, gesturing to her friend. "Angelina's not going to help us. She's already been bragging about how she's of age."

It was true. Angelina was about to be of age a few weeks before the deadline. Tori sighed as she took a bite of her toast, "Guys... the tournament is extremely dangerous... people have died! And all for what? Money? If you need money—"

"Tori, we've told you this. We don't want your money. We want to earn it. Besides, how dangerous can it be? Please, Tori, please!" Fred said, causing Tori to sigh. "Fine."

✧    ✦    ✧

They hurried into their Defense Against the Dark class right in front of the teacher's desk, took out their copies of The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection, and waited, unusually quiet. Everyone was unsure how to feel about their new teacher. Soon they heard Moody's distinctive clunking footsteps coming down the corridor, and he entered the room, looking as strange and frightening as ever. They could just see his clawed, wooden foot protruding from underneath his robes.

"You can put those away," He growled, stomping over to his desk and sitting down, "Those books. You won't need them." They returned the books to their bags, Angelina looking excited.

Moody took out a register, shook his long mane of grizzled grey hair out of his twisted and scarred face, and began to call out names, his normal eye moving steadily down the list while his magical eye swiveled around, fixing upon each student as he or she answered.

"Right then," He said, when the last person had declared themselves present, "I've had a letter from Professor Lupin about this class. Seems you've had a pretty thorough grounding in tackling Dark creatures – you've covered Boggarts, Red Caps, Hinkypunks, Grindylows, Kappas, and werewolves, is that right?"

There was a general murmur of agreement.

"But you're behind – very behind – on dealing with curses," Moody said. "So I'm here to bring you up to scratch on what wizards can do to each other. I've got one year to teach you how to deal with Dark Arts. So – straight into it. Curses. They come in many strengths and forms. Now, according to the Ministry of Magic, I'm supposed to teach you counter-curses and leave it at that. I'm supposed to show you what illegal Dark curses look like since you're in the sixth year.

"So, how are you supposed to defend yourself against something you've never seen? A wizard who's about to put an illegal curse on you isn't going to tell you what he's about to do. He's not going to do it nice and polite to your face. You need to be prepared. You need to be alert and watchful. You need to not put your gum on the bottom of your seat, Miss Campbell, when I'm talking."

A Ravenclaw girl jumped and blushed. She quickly stopped what she was doing, sticking it in her a parchment of paper before tucking it away. Apparently, Moody's magical eye could see through solid wood, as well as out of the back of his head.

"So... do any of you know which curses are most heavily punished by wizarding law?"

Several hands rose tentatively into the air, including Fred and George's. Moody pointed at Tori, though his magical eye was still fixed on the Ravenclaw.

"The Imperius curse," Tori said tentatively.

"Ah, yes." Moody eyed her. "Last name, Silvers, aye?" Tori nodded weakly, gulping. She never knew who exactly had hauled her grandpa into Azkaban, but she wouldn't put it past Mad-Eye Moody to be the one. She was almost praying he wouldn't say anything.

"Interesting... Gave the Ministry a lot of trouble at one time, the Imperius curse." Moody got heavily to his mismatched feet, opened his desk drawer, and took out a glass jar. Five large, black spiders were scuttling around inside it.

Moody reached into the jar, caught one of the spiders, and held it in the palm of his hand so that they could all see it.

He then pointed his wand at it, and muttered, "Imperio!"

The spider leaped from Moody's hand on a fine thread of silk, and began to swing backward and forwards as though on a trapeze. It stretched out its legs rigidly, then did a backflip, breaking the thread and landing on the desk, where it began to cartwheel in circles. Moody jerked his wand, and the spider rose onto two of its hind legs and went into what was unmistakeably a tap dance.

Everyone was laughing – everyone except Moody. "Think it's funny, do you?" He growled. "You'd like it, would you, if I did it to you."

The laughter died away almost instantly.

"Total control," said Moody quietly, as the spider balled itself up and began to roll over and over. "I could make it jump out of the window, drown itself, throw itself down one of your throats..."

"Years back, there were a lot of witches and wizards being controlled by the Imperius curse," said Moody, and everyone knew he was talking about the days in which You-Know-Who had been all-powerful.

"Some job for the Ministry, trying to sort out who was being forced to act, and who was acting of their own free will. The Imperius curse can be fought, and I'll be teaching you how, but it takes real strength of character, and not everyone's got it. Better avoid being hit with it if you can. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" He barked, and everyone jumped.

Moody picked up the somersaulting spider and threw it back into the jar. "Anyone else know one? Another illegal curse?"

Angelina's hand flew into the air this time. "Yes?" Moody said, his magical eye-rolling right over to fix on her.

"There's one – the Cruciatus curse," Angelina replied, her voice a little small.

Moody was looking very intently at her, this time with both eyes. Moody nodded and made no further enquiries. Turning back to the class at large, he reached into the jar for the next spider and placed it upon the desktop, where it remained motionless, apparently too scared to move.

"The Cruciatus curse," said Moody. "Needs to be a bit bigger for you to get the idea,' he said, pointing his wand at the spider. "Engorgio!"

The spider swelled. It was now larger than Lee's old tarantula. Abandoning all pretense, Tori heard several students pushed their chair backward, as far away from Moody's desk as possible.

Moody raised his wand again, pointed it at the spider, and muttered: "Crucio!"

At once, the spider's legs bent in upon its body; it rolled over and began to twitch horribly, rocking from side to side. No sound came from it, but Tori was sure that if it could have given a voice, it would have been screaming. She watched in horror, staring at the creature.

Moody did not remove his wand, and the spider started to shudder and jerk more violently. Tori has gone rather pale by the time he was done, but she wasn't the only one. The class had gone completely silent, staring at their teacher.

"Right... anyone know any others?"

Tori looked around. From the looks on everyone's faces, he guessed they were all wondering what was going to happen to the last spider. Fred's hand shook slightly as, for the third time, he raised it into the air.

"Yes?" said Moody, looking at him.

"Avada Kedavra," He whispered. Several people looked uneasily around at him, including Tori.

"Ah," said Moody, another slight smile twisting his lopsided mouth. "Yes, the last and worst. Avada Kedavra... the killing curse."

He put his hand into the glass jar, and almost as though it knew what was coming, the third spider scuttled frantically around the bottom of the jar, trying to evade Moody's fingers, but he trapped it and placed it upon the desktop. It started to scuttle frantically across the wooden surface.

Moody raised his wand, and Tori felt a sudden thrill of foreboding. "Avada Kedavra!" Moody roared.

There was a flash of blinding green light and a rushing sound, as though a vast, invisible something was soaring through the air – instantaneously the spider rolled over onto its back, unmarked, but unmistakably dead. Tori stifled a cry, while Angelina had covered her mouth. Fred and George both glanced at each other uneasily. Moody swept the dead spider off the desk onto the floor.

"Not nice," He said calmly. "Not pleasant. And there's no counter-curse. There's no blocking it. Only one known person has ever survived it, and he's in this school."

Tori's mind immediately went to Harry, and she could tell everyone else's did to. "Now, if there's no counter-curse, why am I showing you?" Moody asked the silent class. "Because you've got to know. You've got to appreciate what the worst is. You don't want to find yourself in a situation where you're facing it. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!" He roared, and the whole class jumped again.

No sooner class had ended had they had been down in the Great Hall. Fred sat right in front of Harry and Ron. "Moody!" He said. "How cool is he?"

"Beyond cool," said George, sitting down opposite Fred. Tori took a seat next to him will Lee slide next to George.

"Supercool," He agreed. "We had him this afternoon," Tori told Harry and Ron.

"What was it like?" said Harry eagerly.

The four of them exchanged looks full of meaning.

"Never had a lesson like it," Fred nodded.

"He knows, man," Lee agreed.

"Knows what?" Ron asked, leaning forward.

"Knows what it's like to be out there doing it," George sighed, impressively.

"Doing what?" Harry asked.

"Fighting the Dark Arts," Tori replied, shaking her head. "I really liked Professor Lupin, but Moody... he knows everything about the dark arts. Maybe I can get extra tips for being an Auror."

"He's seen it all," George nodded.

"'Mazing," Lee agreed, starting his lunch.

Ron dived into his bag for his timetable. "We haven't got him 'til Thursday!"He said in a disappointed voice.

hey guys.
i don't know if i'll be able to post tomorrow.
i have the chapter done, but we don't have any power as of the time i'm writing this note.

it sucks.