94 Diagon Alley

The female Auror smiled and winked at her, but after looking around for a week, she stopped smiling.

"Gwen, Harry wasn't with you?" She walked over to Gwen and asked in a low voice.

Gwen had a bad heart, six or seven of them were almost the last students to walk out of the platform, and hurriedly told Tonks that he hadn't seen Harry since lunch.

The roots of Tonks' gray hair were gradually turning red, when something shook in the shadows nearby, which startled Gwen and Ginny.

"You go first, girls." Tonks pushed them towards the castle, then put on his hood, and slipped a wand from his sleeve through the half-open school gate slipped out.

Ginny made up her mind to wait here for news from Harry, Ron and Hermione took the freshmen into the Great Hall early because of their prefect duties. When Gwen was struggling with what to do, she felt a hair on her back, and she turned sharply to see Professor Snape stepping out of the shadows.

"Why are you still standing here stupidly?" His slow voice was like a venomous snake sliding across the ground, "Are you going to take the train straight home? I have no objection..."

Ginny kept her mouth tightly shut and Gwen subconsciously glanced at his suitcase - which contained Dumbledore's custom-made fake wand.

"You should be glad that school hasn't started yet, otherwise I'll deduct ten points for each of you." Snape said coldly, "What kind of eyes are you looking at? Ollivander?"

Ginny wanted to fight for Gwen, after all, in her opinion Gwen did nothing, which was purely Snape's provocation.

At this time, Auroro Lux and Filch were checking the students' luggage. Malfoy's exquisite and expensive large suitcase was just opened, and there was some dispute with them. Gwen looked that way because the next suitcase to be checked was hers. The Aurors were bound to unpack every piece of luggage, and if they found themselves bringing two wands to school, they would cause unnecessary trouble—because Dumbledore had instructed Gwen not to let anyone know of that. Mr. Orodrex, as far as Gwen knew, should not be a friend of the Order of the Phoenix.

Fortunately, Snape seemed to react faster than her, and he stood in front of Malfoy in a single step.

“What is this stick for?” Filch asked.

"It's not a stick, it's a cane, idiot," said Malfoy impatiently.

"Then why are you bringing this cane?" Filch pressed step by step. "I suspect this could be used to attack..."

"It's all right, Mr. Filch," Snape said. "I can vouch for Mr. Malfoy."

Malfoy snatched the cane back, but didn't flatter his beloved Dean as usual.

Before Gwen felt strange, Professor Snape's gloomy eyes and sneered sneer came in her direction, "On the contrary, I think this luggage is more suspicious." Delix and Filch quickly opened Gwen's box, waved his wand, and dropped a box of candy with a big W written on it.

Snape clicked his tongue, "Effective skipping candy, contraband. Does your grade allow you to skip class? Ollivander?" Then he shoved Gwen's suitcase over her In the arms, "Go to my office on Monday to close the confinement."

Gwen, like an honest sparrow, agreed obediently, bowed her head, held her luggage, and trotted away with Ginny.

"What's the matter with you?" Ginny couldn't help asking. "Fred and George have at least eighty ways to hide their products."

"Innocent girl." Gwen said calmly, "Skipping candy is just a trick, give them a handle to let other things pass smoothly - a dozen Peruvian stealth smoke/fog/bombs It's hidden under my sweater, wasn't it brought in by me?"

Ginny slammed her mouth, walked to the long table in Gryffindor, and sat opposite Hermione. "The price is a day of confinement."

"Come on, Ginny." Gwen also took his place and snatched a beautifully fried sun egg from Katie's plate, "Since I've seen life at the Ministry of Magic, After the brains, there is no potion material that can scare me. Speaking of which, who of you know what those brains are?"

Ron, whose mouth was full, stretched his neck and swallowed hard. Hermione didn't seem to have eaten at all. She spoke quickly: "I don't know, Gwen. I checked it out on vacation. A lot of data, but no results."

After she finished speaking, she frowned and stared at Ron, who was enjoying the meal, and suddenly picked up the not-so-thin book from her knees and hit Ron's back hard: " Can you stop eating it? Your best friend is gone!"

"Hey!" Ron cried out in pain, "Please look back, little lunatic."

Harry hurried in from the entrance of the Great Hall in embarrassment.

"There's blood on his face, why is he always in the paint?" Ginny also looked back.

Ron became serious, "Looks like his own blood."

Gwen glanced back, Gryffindor suddenly lost a lot of gems.

Harry sat down opposite his two best friends. Ron asked anxiously, "Where have you been - what happened?"

"We'll talk about it later." Harry took the full plate of meat that Ron had left for him - Gwen's highest camaraderie - in front of him.

Hermione raised her wand and read into Harry's face, "Whirlwind!" The dry, hard blood scabs were sucked away.

Ginny took out a handkerchief out of nowhere and helped Harry wipe off the remaining blood.

"You didn't even put on your robe?" Gwen gasped.

"Forget it." Harry finished eating a lamb chop, took a breath, imitating Snape's low and sarcastic tone, "Gryffindor deducted fifty points for being late. Also, let me think about it, because you're wearing Muggle clothes, and another 20 points are deducted. I don't think any house has been deducted points since the beginning of the term - before the dessert was served. You probably It's a record, Potter."

Gwen and Ginny looked at each other and decided not to tell Harry tacitly that Snape only served him the starter of the opening dinner.

"Did you see Snape? How could it be?" Ron asked when he saw Harry coming back, relieved, and gobbling up the cake.

"Just bumped into him," Harry said vaguely.

At this moment, Dumbledore stood up behind the staff table, and the chatter and laughter echoing in the Great Hall died down almost immediately.

"Good evening everyone!" he said with a kind smile, spreading his arms as if to embrace the entire auditorium.

"His hands aren't ready yet?" Hermione asked in surprise.

She was not alone in noticing this. Dumbledore's right index finger was still as charred and dry as it was at the end of last term. There was murmur in the auditorium. Dumbledore knew what everyone was talking about, he just smiled, shaking the purple and gold sleeves, covering the injured hand.

"Don't worry." He said lightly, "Okay... New students, welcome to school; old students, welcome back to school! What awaits you is a new school year of magic education—"

"The hand looks like it's dead." Hermione said with a distressed look on her face, "Some wounds can never be healed... ancient spells... and some potions are not The antidote..."

"—Administrator Filch asked me to tell everyone that this year, students are absolutely prohibited from bringing any joke merchandise purchased from Weasley's Witchcraft and Wizardry." Gwen snickered.

"We are delighted to welcome a new teacher this year. Professor Slughorn," Slughorn rose, his bald head glistening in the candlelight Shiny, the big belly in the vest casts a large shadow on the table, "It's a former colleague of mine who agreed to resume his old job as a potions teacher."

The word "potions class?" echoed throughout the auditorium, and everyone wondered if they had heard it wrong.

"Potions!" said Ron and Hermione in unison, both turning their heads to stare at Harry, "but you said—"

"Meanwhile, Professor Snape," Dumbledore raised his voice over the crowd, "will be the teacher of Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"No!" Harry's voice was so loud that many heads turned towards him. But he didn't care, he just stared angrily at the staff table. How did he end up giving Snape the Defence Against the Dark Arts teaching position? Didn't everyone know over the years that Dumbledore didn't believe he was up to the job?

"But, Harry, you said Slughorn was going to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts!" said Hermione.

"I thought it was him!" said Harry. He tried desperately to remember when Dumbledore had told him, but now that he thought about it, he couldn't remember at all that Dumbledore had told him which class Slughorn was going to teach.

Snape sat on the right side of Dumbledore, he did not stand up when he heard Dumbledore mention his name, but raised a hand lazily, indicating that he heard The cheers at the Slytherin table had a smug look on his face.

"Fine, there's a little benefit to this," Harry said through gritted teeth, "Snape will be out in less than a year."

"What do you mean?" Ron asked.

"That job was cursed. No one lasts more than a year..."

"Harry!" Hermione scolded in horror.

"A sweet tip, you have to go to the old Bat's new office for detention." Ginny whispered to Gwen.

Gwen smiled reluctantly at Dumbledore