"But you have three classes at nine o'clock!" Ron said in disbelief. "I know you're brilliant, but even the most brilliant person can't be in three classrooms at once—wait, why are you taking Muggle Studies anyway?"
"Don't be daft, I can't be in three classrooms at the same time," Hermione said curtly. "I chose Muggle Studies because seeing things from a wizarding perspective can be really fascinating."
"She's gotta be mental," Ron muttered, shaking his head.
Cohen didn't get a chance to ask Hermione to borrow her Time-Turner because she scarfed down her breakfast and then hurried out of the Great Hall. Ron bet she'd gone to class early.
Not long after, Hagrid arrived in the Great Hall, wearing a long moleskin coat and swinging a dead polecat in his hand.
"Got my first class this afternoon!" Hagrid stopped by the Gryffindor table, beaming at Cohen and the others. "You can come after lunch! I was up at five this morning, getting everything ready—hope it goes alright... I'm a teacher now..."
Hagrid happily continued towards the staff table, swinging the dead polecat so hard it looked like a fan.
"What do you reckon Hagrid's gonna have for us in the first lesson?" Ron said worriedly.
"Hope it's not some dangerous creature..." Harry thought back to the Chimera he'd seen in Cohen's trunk over the summer. "Especially one that looked like a mix of different giant beasts..."
"That lion's always been a bit dopey," Cohen explained to Harry. "It mostly just wants to play with you. At least the goat can always keep it in line—"
"What lion and goat?" Ron asked curiously. "Cohen, what have you got now?"
"A Chimera," Cohen said. "If you want to see it, I can take you to the trunk after class this afternoon. I also need to explain the unicorn situation in the forest to Hagrid—he doesn't seem to realize I'm the one who took them."
Or maybe the excitement of becoming a professor had made Hagrid forget—Cohen had expected Hagrid to ask him at the start of term why he'd taken all the unicorns from the Forbidden Forest.
"A Chimera?!" Ron's eyes widened.
"Keep it down!" Cohen hissed. "If I end up in Azkaban because of you blabbing, I'm definitely dragging you down with me."
"Hagrid will be thrilled when he sees it," Harry said. "He loves those dangerous animals... but I hope he doesn't ask to borrow your Chimera for a teaching aid..."
After leaving the Great Hall, they needed to hurry to their Divination class.
Trelawney's classroom was in the North Tower. Harry and Ron had never been there before, and Cohen had only been once last year, so they still weren't very familiar with most of the way.
Thanks to Cohen's presence, they didn't encounter any helpful ghosts along the way.
After climbing many floors following a crazy little knight named Sir Cadogan, they finally reached the floor below the Divination classroom and climbed a self-propelled silver ladder up to the attic-like room.
It was crammed with grubby little tables, chintz armchairs, and poufy little ottomans. The whole room was filled with a dim, reddish light.
"Looks pretty superstitious..." Cohen remarked, clicking his tongue.
Most of the students had already arrived. They sat down at a round table where Hermione was already seated. She was still quite interested in this subject at the moment.
"Welcome!" Professor Trelawney said from the shadows in a soft, misty voice. "So good to see you at last in the physical world."
"The physical world?" Hermione frowned.
"Welcome to Divination," Professor Trelawney said, sitting by the fire. The smoke enveloped her, making her look quite like one of those witches from the deep woods. "I am Professor Trelawney. You may not have seen me before. I find that descending too often into the hustle and bustle of the main school grounds muddies my Inner Eye."
Then, she gracefully adjusted her shawl.
"So, you have chosen to study Divination, the most difficult of all magical arts. I must warn you beforehand that if you do not possess the Sight, there is nothing I can do to help you. Books can take you only so far in this field..."
"Meaning this class is mostly about natural talent," Cohen said to a bewildered Hermione.
"If a class only relied on talent and couldn't be learned, it wouldn't be a class!" Hermione whispered to Cohen.
"Many witches and wizards, though perfectly competent in the ordinary sorts of magic, have no gift whatsoever when it comes to seeing into the veiled mysteries of the future..."
After Trelawney gave a long spiel about the course, she began to make "predictions" for almost every student in the class.
Things like, "Neville's grandmother will have an accident," "Parvati, beware of a red-haired man," "I myself will lose my voice around February," "Around Easter, one of our number will leave us forever," "Lavender's worst fears will happen on the sixteenth of October"...
And...
"You..."
Trelawney leaned in close to Cohen, her enormous, glittering eyes behind her thick lenses, and said to him sadly and pessimistically:
"Sorrow and regret hover around your head. I see something you desire slipping through your fingers..."
"Like what?" Cohen asked.
"Ah, the future is not spoken of lightly..." Trelawney floated away, pacing like a ghost.
"'Ah, the future is not spoken of lightly,'" Hermione mimicked Trelawney's voice in a low tone to Cohen. "I think she's just putting it on, Cohen. Don't believe her."
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"Indeed,"
Cohen said.
Trelawney only made accurate predictions when she seemed to be "possessed." Cohen certainly wouldn't believe her pronouncements in her normal state.
He'd rather just try the crystal ball himself than believe that...
Cohen shifted his attention to the crystal ball on their table, which was covered by a square of cloth.
While Trelawney was busy giving terrifying predictions to the other students, Cohen began to idly touch the crystal ball—he'd occasionally tried it at home before, but had never been able to get the prophetic scenes to reappear inside.
But this time was different—
Cohen just touched it, and the mist inside the crystal ball began to spin rapidly, as if a large hand were stirring it from within. Finally, the mist was pushed to the edges, and a dark, somewhat eerie scene appeared in the center of the crystal ball.
A filthy, disheveled, and emaciated person was being held down in a chair by Dementors. One of them removed its hood, revealing the "Dementor's mouth" beneath.
Sirius had his soul sucked out by Dementors?
This was the future?! He was planning to save him—things shouldn't have turned out like this...
Cohen carefully made out the surrounding scene. The Ravenclaw table in the background, numerous blurry portraits on the walls... it looked like the Headmaster's office, but Dumbledore wasn't there. A few feet away from Sirius and the Dementors was a plump man—
Was that Fudge?
"Cohen? What are you looking at?" Harry turned his head and noticed Cohen staring intently at the inside of the crystal ball.
"The future."
Cohen looked up,
"Wait, can't you see what's in the ball?"