Ron-Weasly book 1

"Oh, the music! — he exclaimed, wiping his eyes: it looks like Dumbledore shed tears of emotion. "Her magic overshadows what we do here. Now go to sleep. Trot — march!"

The freshmen, led by my brother, walked past the seniors still chatting at their desks, left the Great Hall and went up the marble staircase.

My legs felt like lead again, but not from excitement, but from fatigue and fullness. I was very sleepy and completely oblivious to the fact that the people depicted in the portraits hung in the corridors were whispering to each other and pointing at the freshmen with their fingers. I took it for granted that Percy had taken us through secret doors twice, one hidden behind sliding panels and the other hidden behind a long tapestry hanging from the ceiling. Yawning and barely able to move our legs, we climbed one staircase after another. I waited patiently for us to reach our destination, and then Percy suddenly stopped.

I shook myself and froze warily.

Crutches floated in the air in front of us. As soon as Percy took a step forward, the crutches turned threateningly in his direction and began to attack. But they didn't hit him, but stopped a few centimeters away, as if saying that he had to leave.

"This is Peeves, our poltergeist," Percy whispered, turning to us. And then he raised his voice: "Peeves, show yourself!" A long fart answered him.

"Do you want me to go to the Blood Baron and tell him what's going on here?"

There was a pop, and a small man with unpleasant black eyes and a big mouth appeared in the air. He was hanging cross-legged between the floor and the ceiling, and pretended to be leaning on crutches, which he clearly didn't need.

"Oh-oh-oh!" he drawled, with a malicious chuckle. "Little freshmen! Now we're going to have some fun."

A man hanging in the air suddenly swooped down on us, and everyone ducked their heads together.

"Get out of here, Peeves, or the Baron will find out about this, I'm not kidding!" Percy said sharply.

Peeves stuck out his tongue and disappeared, dropping his crutches on Neville's head. We could hear him walking away from us, banging something on the knight's armor displayed in the corridor out of spite.

"You should watch out for him," Percy warned as we moved on. "The only one who can control him is the Bloody Baron, and Peeves doesn't even listen to us elders. Here we are."

And the bloody baron only helps Slytherins. Сool. Well, I'll consider it a workout. I wish I could remember the way.

We were standing at the end of the corridor in front of a portrait of a very fat woman in a pink silk dress.

"The password?" the woman asked sternly.

"Kaput Draconis," Percy replied, and the portrait slid aside, revealing a round hole in the wall.

Everyone made their way through it on their own, only the clumsy Neville had to be pushed. The round, cozy Gryffindor Common Room was filled with deep upholstered armchairs. Percy showed the girls the door to their bedroom, and the boys entered through another door. We went up a spiral staircase, the room was in one of the towers, and finally we found ourselves in a bedroom. There were five large four-poster beds, covered with dark red velvet curtains. The beds were already made. Everyone was too tired to talk about anything else, so we silently pulled on our pajamas and climbed into bed. I settled down next to Harry's bed. He chose a bed next to the window. That's a jerk, it's going to blow there.

"We had a great meal, didn't we?" I muttered, behind the heavy curtains. I stare at Skabers in disbelief. So, are you hungry? Get out of here, you Skabers! Can you imagine, Harry, he's chewing on my sheets!"

Chapter 7 the first lessons.

Harry has become my friend, but it's exhausting. Every time we left the classroom, there was a huge crowd of students staring at him in the hallway. They stared, pointed, and wouldn't let him pass. There were constant whispers and we had to make our way through the crowd. I moved like an icebreaker and dragged the embarrassed boy along with me. Well, at least he moves his legs fast, his escapes from his cousin have an effect.

There were one hundred and forty-two stairs at Hogwarts. Some of them were wide and spacious, others were narrow and shaky. There were stairs that took us to a completely different place on Friday than they did on Thursday. There were stairs where several steps suddenly disappeared at the very moment when I was going down or up them. So, going up these stairs, it was necessary to jump.

There were enough problems with the doors, too. Some of them did not open until they were politely requested. Others opened only if they were touched in a certain place. Still others turned out to be fake, but in fact there was a wall.

It was very difficult to remember the location of stairs, doors, classrooms, corridors and bedrooms. It seemed that everything at Hogwarts was constantly changing, and today everything was different from yesterday. The people depicted in the portraits went to visit each other. And I was convinced that the knight's armor standing in the corridors was capable of running. Well, the upperclassmen gave us a map in the living room that shows the main routes to the classrooms where classes are held.

Ghosts also added to the hassle. There have never been any problems with the Nearly Headless Nick, the ghost of Gryffindor Tower and, therefore, our ally. On the contrary, he was always happy to show the freshmen how to get where they needed to go. But Peeves was more dangerous than two closed doors and a staircase leading nowhere-especially if you meet him when you're late for class.

Peeves dropped paper baskets on freshmen's heads, yanked carpets out from under them, threw pieces of chalk at them, or, thanks to his invisibility, sneaked up unnoticed and suddenly grabbed their noses with a hoarse cry: "Gotcha!".

It seemed that nothing and no one could be worse than Peeves, but it turned out that this was not entirely true. Argus Filch, the school's caretaker, turned out to be a much more unpleasant person. On the very first morning, Harry and I caught his attention-unfortunately, in a bad way. Filch caught us trying to open one of the doors. Unfortunately, it turned out that it was behind this door that the corridor on the third floor, which Albus Dumbledore had mentioned at the banquet, began. Filch refused to believe that we were just lost. The caretaker was sure that we specifically wanted to enter the forbidden territory, and threatened to lock us in the dungeon. But at the most critical moment, Professor Quirrell, who was passing by, saved us.

That old fart. No, to take us to class, he also detained us.

Filch had a cat named Mrs. Norris, a skinny, dusty-gray creature with bulging, glowing eyes, almost the same as Filch's. She patrolled the corridors alone. As soon as she noticed that someone had violated the rules — had taken at least one step beyond the forbidden line — and she immediately disappeared. And two seconds later Filch would appear, snuffling heavily. Clearly a familiar. And he's chasing her like a young man. Is he even human? Filch knew all the secret passages better than anyone else at school — with the possible exception of my brothers-and appeared as suddenly as if he were a ghost. We hated him, and for many it was the limit of their dreams to dare to kick Mrs. Norris.

But finding the right office was still half the battle, because classes were sometimes much more difficult than finding a particular room. Magic wasn't just about waving a wand and saying a few strange words.

Every Wednesday at midnight, we looked at the telescopes, studied the night sky, wrote down the names of different stars and memorized how the planets move. Three times a week we were taken to the greenhouses located behind the castle, where a short, plump lady, Professor Sprout, taught us herbology, the science of plants, and told us how to take care of all these strange plants and fungi and what they are used for. I paid attention, just like I did when caring for magical creatures. Although it was conducted on a case-by-case basis. The professor was already old and sick. I guess I'll have to teach the animals from the pictures in Scamender's book.

The most tedious subject was the history of magic, which were the only lessons the ghost taught. Professor Binns was already very old when he fell asleep one day in the staff room right in front of the fireplace, and the next morning he came to class without a body. Beans was talking in a terrible monotone and without stopping. The students hurriedly wrote down names and dates for him and confused Emerick the Evil with Urik the Strange. Unfortunately, he delivered his lectures in such a monotonous voice that it took a terrible effort to stay awake. I'll teach you from the textbook. He's only talking about goblin rebellions anyway. The book is much more interesting, I've read it.

Professor Flitwick, who taught spells, was so tiny that he stood on a stack of books to see the students from behind his desk. It is said that he is a half-goblin who has become a master of dueling in Europe. They say he was a member of the fighters' guild. Should I ask him to join the dueling club? Oh, fuck, it's been shut down. At the very first lesson, he got acquainted with the course, took a magazine and began to read out the names in order. When he reached Harry, he squeaked excitedly and disappeared from sight, falling off his stand. Is he making fun of Muggleborns? Children from magical families all take him seriously.

But Professor McGonagall was completely different. I was right when I saw her and told myself that it was better not to mess with her. Smart but strict, she gave a very harsh speech as soon as we came to her class for the first time and sat down. And Harry and I were also late because of Filch.

"Transfiguration is one of the most difficult and dangerous areas of magic that you will study at Hogwarts," she began. "Any violation of discipline in my lessons, and the offender will leave the classroom and will not return here. I've warned you."

After such a speech, everyone felt a little uneasy. Then Professor McGonagall went into practice and turned her desk into a pig, and then back into a table. Everyone was terribly amazed and began to ache with the desire to start practicing themselves as soon as possible, but soon realized that it would be a long time before we could learn how to turn furniture into animals.

Then Professor McGonagall dictated to us some very incomprehensible and confusing sentences that we had to memorize. What a nightmare. Okay, I also understood what she was saying, as did Hermione. But Harry was sitting with glassy eyes and blinking uncomprehendingly. I need to give him a hint about languages. Let him learn them in the summer. Hmm, but the school librarian should have an artifact for the most common languages. Then McGonagall gave each of us a match and said that we should turn these matches into needles. I wish I knew what this needle looks like. I tried to remember what my mother used. By the end of the lesson, only Hermione Granger's match had changed shape slightly — Professor McGonagall showed the whole course Hermione's match, which was sharpened at one end and covered with silver, and smiled at her. This smile amazed everyone no less than the transformation of the table into a pig, because it seemed that Professor McGonagall did not know how to smile at all.

We were all looking forward to Professor Quirrell's defense against the Dark Arts class, but Quirrell's classes were more like a humorous show than something serious. His office smelled like garlic, which Quirrell hoped would scare away the vampire he'd met in Romania. The professor was very afraid that he was about to come to Hogwarts to deal with him.

The turban on Quirrell's head didn't add to his seriousness either. The professor claimed that this turban was given to him by an African prince, whom he helped to get rid of a very dangerous zombie. But no one really believed in this story. Firstly, because when Seamus Finnigan asked how Quirrell defeated the zombies, Quirrell blushed and started talking about the weather. And secondly, because the turban smelled strange, and the twins assured everyone that it was not a gift from an African prince, but just a precautionary measure. According to them, Quirrell was covered with garlic cloves under his clothes, and garlic was also hidden in his turban, because the professor, fearing vampires, wanted to be completely protected. He even slept in what he wore to school, so that the vampire wouldn't take him by surprise. Considering the smell that came from the professor, I agreed with them.

During the first few days of my studies, I became convinced that I was learning no worse than others, even without looking at the wand. Many students were born and raised in Muggle families and had no idea who they were until they received a letter from Hogwarts. Besides, the freshmen had so much to learn that even I, who was born into a family of wizards and had five older brothers besides my parents, didn't have much advantage over the others.

Friday was a great day for Harry and me. We were finally able to go down to the Great Hall for breakfast, never once losing our way.

"What do we have there today?" Harry asked, sprinkling sugar on his oatmeal.

"Two potions classes — we'll study with the Slytherins," I replied. "Professor Snape is teaching the classes, and he is their dean. They say that he is always on their side in everything, protecting them from the rest of the teachers and giving them the best marks. That's just how we'll see if that's the case."

"I wish McGonagall would always stick up for us," said Harry thoughtfully.

Professor McGonagall was the dean of the Gryffindor faculty, but that didn't stop her from giving us a huge homework assignment the day before yesterday. If she protected us like Snape protected his snakes, it would be good. And the tasks, well, fuck it, magic is interesting. I need transfiguration in the future.

While we were having breakfast, the mail arrived. During breakfast, at least a hundred owls flew into the Great Hall with loud hoots. They began circling the tables, looking for their hosts and dropping letters and parcels into their laps.

This morning, Hedwig landed between a sugar bowl and a saucer of jam and dropped a sealed envelope into Harry's plate. Harry immediately opened it. Before that, she had never brought him a single letter and lived in an owl house, sometimes flying in to visit her wayward master.

Harry borrowed a pen from me and scribbled on the back of a letter:

"Yes, I'd love to, see you later, thanks."

He handed the letter to Hedwig. After finishing, we went to the dungeons to Snape's office.