Chapter Fourteen – O What a Fun Day

With about twenty minutes left in class Professor Lynch stopped the class and had everyone retake their seats.

"Not bad for your first day everyone," he stated. "For homework I want an essay on what makes a creature a dark creature, and the length should be between 500 and 750 words in length, which will be due first class next week. You name, the date, class title, and my name do not count in the length of the assignment."

Quills were heard scribbling down the assignment while Professor Lynch waited silently.

"Now I know that you all have questions for me but I would rather wait until our next class which will be a double period. Instead I want to talk to all of you about a misconception that I find despicable."

Here the class raised some eyebrows wondering what Professor Lynch could be talking about.

"In Britain there is the false belief that Merlin actually existed and was in fact the world's greatest wizard ever to live. This is a lie that has existed for far too long and the fact that it has been allowed to continue let alone change society to the point that it has I find disturbing."

At these words it looked like several people if not most of the class wanted to object, while Harry just leaned back waiting to see what would happen next. It was something that Narcissa and he had talked about over the summer and they had both come to the belief that there was no actual proof that Merlin existed. Studying history was something that Narcissa did so as to help her with business decisions as well as when dealing with the ministry.

"Everyone settle down and listen to the facts before you try something that you will fail to accomplish. The legend of Merlin and King Arthur were brought over to Britain by the Normans shortly after 1066, which coincidently was after the founding of Hogwarts."

"With the Normans taking control of Britain all culture that might have developed was squashed and in fact there are very few things today that could be considered originally from Britain, but I digress. Anyways with the arrival of the legend of Merlin and King Arthur existing in muggle Britain the witches and wizards of the time had a way to help introduce magic to muggleborns. It was a lot easier to bring someone into the world of magic if you told them that Merlin existed and that he was the greatest wizard ever. So by creating the Order of Merlin as a way of keeping the Merlin idea present the pureblood wizards allowed a concession, which has over the years been forgotten."

"Now I know that some of you may argue this by saying that there are images of Merlin in the wizarding world of Britain, but I can counter this point. The image that is on things such as chocolate frog cards are simply the way that they are because in all the tales of Merlin he is described as an old wizard with a white beard, and from that point it does not take to much effort to be able to create a believable image for portraits. This is then coupled with an enchanter so as to create a life like image that no one has really challenged over the years."

The class sat stunned at what they had just heard. Nobody could believe that a Professor would say something so controversial let alone during the first class of the new school year.

Professor Lynch on the other had seemed perfectly at ease leaning against his desk at the front of the class. He then looked at his watch and said, "Well seeing as how I have now shocked you senseless I shall allow you to leave five minutes early so that you all have some time to get to your next class and to try and prepare yourselves for that class."

As everyone slowly left the class room, Hermione decided to vent some frustration about what was just stated by one of their new professors.

"I can't believe that he would say something so utterly ridiculous. Everyone knows that Merlin existed and that he was the greatest wizard to have ever lived and that he was so great that even muggles know that he existed."

Ron just nodded his head and looking as if he completely agreed with her about the subject as well as several others that were around.

Harry figured that it might be fun to knock down Hermione a peg or two said, "Actually Professor Lynch is completely right."

Here Hermione whipped her head towards him getting ready to give a full retort about how she could not possibly be wrong because several books stated that Merlin existed.

However Harry had figured that someone would say something otherwise so he just continued to speak, "I mean if you really research Merlin you will find that there are no books that actually state any time period when he might have existed. Second there isn't a shred of information about what exactly Merlin did that can be called credible. Really any evidence that Merlin existed is like saying that house-elves want to be free and be paid and that they hate doing household chores and caring for families."

Finishing his statement Harry left a completely shocked Hermione Granger in his wake before moving along to charms.

Charms class was much the same as DADA, which meant to Harry that it was fairly boring, so when the class ended Harry was extremely grateful for it being time for lunch.

As he was making his way towards the Great Hall he heard a commotion behind him so he turned around to see what was happening, and to his surprise he saw Draco Malfoy stuck to the wall spread eagle, while a Hispanic individual dressed in black robes had his wand out.

Soon Professor Lynch had appeared and he looked at the situation before turning his attention to the stranger and saying, "Hello Orlando… so I take it you were hired?"

The man turned his attention towards Professor Lynch and said, "Of course… I mean like they would really turn down a fully qualified instructor that has been recommended by someone on the staff."

"So your girlfriend still in Japan?" asked Professor Lynch, who seemed to completely forget about the fact that Draco was stuck to a wall.

"She is just clearing up some issues before she moves," he replied. "Your mustang in the country yet?"

"No, no I left it in the states so that way I have a car when I go and visit either my brothers or the folks. Anyways my little brother might use it a few times while his RX-7 gets its new parts put in and properly tuned."

"When did he get that?"

"Just after he graduated with his masters in structural engineering and transfiguration," replied Professor Lynch.

All of the sudden Professor McGonagall came and looked at the situation before turning to Professor Lynch and saying, "What exactly is going on here Professor? Why is Mr. Malfoy sticking to the wall and are you doing nothing about it? As a Professor you punish a student by giving them a detention and taking away house points."

Professor Lynch turned to look at his friend to see his amused look before turning back to Professor McGonagall and replying with, "Why should I punish the whole house by taking away points? I mean that isn't really fair to the house that because one person decides to act in a negative manner that they all should suffer. Besides I happen to think that there is nothing wrong with him being stuck to a wall as I'm sure that my friend had a perfectly good reason for placing him against the wall and holding him against said wall."

McGonagall turned to Professor Lynch's friend and said, "Now who are you to do such a thing and why are you in Hogwarts?"

"Allow me to introduce myself… I am the new dueling Professor just hired by Professor Dumbledore today, Orlando Martinez. I stuck this young man, I think that you called him Mr. Malfoy, to the wall because he was harassing some of your younger students. Personally I thought that this would be a better punishment then a detention because it shows a direct consequence to an action instead of a delayed response where he might argue with myself about my status."

"Make no mistake we will have a talk about this later Professor," replied the deputy headmistress. "Now release him from the wall so that the headmaster may make the announcement of a new dueling teacher."

With a flick of his wrist the new Professor dropped Draco from the wall to his feat where the blond boy stormed away looking furious that someone had even dared to do something against him.

Harry just grinned at the whole situation before turning and walking to the Great Hall feeling that this day just kept getting better and better. First a teacher that appeared to be competent at the very least was running DADA, then Draco was humiliated, then he knew that there was now a Dueling Professor, and this was all before lunch!

Shortly after he arrived at the Gryffindor table Harry looked at the head table and saw the new dueling Professor engaged in what could have been either a lively conversation with Fleur or flirting between the two of them, while Professor Lynch was seated at his other side talking rather closely to Professor Sinistra.

As the Headmaster stood up the noise in the Great Hall slowly settled down as the expected announcement of the new Dueling Professor was to begin.

"Students, it is my great pleasure to introduce a new Professor to everyone, Professor Orlando Martinez. He also comes highly qualified from the United States just like Professor Lynch. His dueling class will be an optional class for those in their third year or above and this addition to the number of classes comes from the idea that some changes should be made so that way those that might choose careers involving dueling will be better prepared for life after Hogwarts. Now I hope that everyone will make Professor Martinez feel welcome. Those that wish to sign up should tell their head of house by giving them notification on a piece of parchment and by next week the class will start with those that are able to attend."

"Now everyone get to their lunch as there are still classes this afternoon."

The Great Hall turned back into its rather boisterous self within no time as people at every table were commenting about the new dueling class.

During lunch Harry talked a little with Ron about quiditch tryouts Katie Bell came over and talked about what to do with the chaser line. While she did not want to be captain she suggested that in order to better counter the Slytherin tactics it would be a good idea to add a stronger player that might be less polished in the air because with practice they could always become better but size and strength could not be solved by practice alone.

As Harry and Hermione walked towards potions Harry mulled over this idea that Katie had given him. It would definitely be a good thing to add some size to the chaser line because there would be no way that the chaser group could work as well as it had in the previous years that Harry had played on the team. The three prior to this year knew exactly what to expect and worked together seamlessly which gave Gryffindor not only the most talented chaser group of all the teams but also the group that worked together the best and by losing two of the three of them there would be no way to regain that cohesiveness.

The door to the dungeon classroom was open so Harry and Hermione entered and began to sit down when Fleur, no Professor Delacour, entered the room and said, "Do not sit down as I 'ave chozen seats and partners for 'ze year."

"Goldstein and Malfoy," stated Fleur pointing to a table in the front left of the lab.

"Granger and Li."

"Greengrass and Potter," she said while motioning the station in the front corner opposite of the entrance.

Harry took his seat next to the strawberry blonde haired Slytherin female that he knew almost nothing about other then she was a Slytherin.

While Professor Delacour assigned seat to the rest of the class Harry took the chance to get a look at his partner's appearance. As he looked her over quickly he came to the realization that she was fairly attractive but with the school robes and the fact that she was in Slytherin she would be able to avoid notice of those that she was not interested in having a relationship with.

This was something that Harry had picked up from one of the few times that he had talked with Andromeda Tonks. Most females in Slytherin usually liked to avoid notice as most were purebloods and would either have an arranged marriage or they would avoid most of the boys in Hogwarts so that they could pick out their desired partner for an arranged marriage.

"You were assigned these seats because based on everyone's' previous grades and OWL results I have figured where people would best benefit," Professor Delacour stated.

"I 'esire everyone to learn as much as possible while they are in my class and I feel the best way to achieve this is by assigning partners. Your assigned potion for the day is on the board so everyone get started immediately. This potion is designed for me to observe everybody's skill level as well as to see what I need to cover in addition to your N.E.W.T. preparation."

Fleur walked around the room making notes of every ones progress while also stopping partners if she noticed something was wrong with the potion. For some reason unknown to Harry she did not stop at Daphne and his station once, but Daphne just instructed Harry on what he needed to do to make the potion up properly.

Finally as the class was ending Fleur said, "Mr. Potter and Ms. Greengrass please wait here a moment I would like to talk with the two of you alone."

After everyone left the class she began by saying, "Mr. Potter, or if I may call you 'Arry" here she paused for a moment before Harry nodded his head indicating that she could call him by his first name. "For the rest of your time at Hogwarts I would like for you to be taught by Ms. Greengrass. This is because she is the top student in potions that this school has seen in almost a decade and she is working towards becoming a potions Mistress and in order to do so it is in her best interests to be tutoring a student personally for the N.E.W.T. in potions. You are the only student with an EE on your OWL for potions that did not have an EE for a class average previously and as such I felt that you would be the best person to receive such private instruction."

"Now what this means is that you will not officially be my student but you will attend the class and follow the work that Daphne assigns for you to cover, but you will still be taking you N.E.W.T. for potions. The reason that you two will be in class is that way I will be able to keep an eye on Ms. Greengrass so as to observe her teaching methods. It is up to the two of you but I would recommend that Ms. Greengrass and you meet someplace so that she may test your knowledge as well as teach you things that she believes will help you in potion making."

Daphne and Harry were dismissed a minute later and had walked out of the room before Daphne said, "Meet me in the corner farthest away from the entrance to the library tomorrow evening Potter at 7:30 sharp. From there we can work on arranging future meetings depending upon how much help you actually need with potions because I know for a fact that Snape was in no way fair with his assessment of your actual skill."

On that note she just turned and walked away from Harry leaving him to shrug his shoulders before heading to the tower so he could drop his bag off in his dormitory. Upon reaching the Great Hall later for dinner he sat down with Ron and Hermione so to show them that while he was ticked off at them for betraying his trust they were still friends even if he could never trust them the same way. After all Harry reasoned it was rather hard to just stop being friends with his two first friends.

During dinner the conversation was simple talking about things like the new professors and how different this year seemed to be looking, as well as Quidditch although it was amusing to see Ron's shocked face when Harry announced that as a Tornadoes fan that he more then liked their chances for winning the league this season. Ron actually managed to control himself enough to say that he thought that Harry was a Cannons fan.

"No… that was you assuming that I was a Cannons fan and me not having a team at the time," replied Harry calmly. "I found out from Remus this summer that the Potter family has a twenty percent ownership stake in the Tornadoes so that makes me a fan of their team by default as when they do well I make more money."

Ron was able to accept this as it was and allowed Hermione to steer the conversation away from Quidditch as getting into a rant about the Tornadoes was not the best idea. The rest of the night was fairly quite as they hung out with most the people in their year in the common room before heading to bed later.

Author's note: I wanted to put this in to explain Harry and Narcissa's relationship properly. They are in a more physical relationship as Harry is a teenage male and Narcissa was in a state of near celibacy while being married to Lucius. In that manner it is mutually beneficial because they both are being physically satisfied. They are not in love but are close friends and in a way you could think of it as friends with benefits except that they are married.

O yeah I will not be surprised if there are flames about the whole Merlin thing and I am not going to take them personally. I have researched the origins of the King Arthur legends and thought that it would be interesting to go against cannon in this case. I do not know the reason why Madam Rowling decided to make it so that Merlin did exist in the HP universe but I figured that with all these fics that talk about Merlin in such high regard it would be amusing to see someone say that he did not exist.