That morning, Ariana had woken with certainty that today would be wonderful.
She'd finally escaped the monotonous, isolated existence that had defined her afterlife for so long. Now she'd been reunited with family she'd thought lost forever. And thanks to Tom's help, she'd successfully enrolled at Hogwarts as an actual student, attending real classes with real people who could see her and talk to her and treat her like she belonged.
Most importantly, beyond this afternoon's Herbology lesson, Gryffindor and Hufflepuff shared another class together this evening!
For someone not in the same House as Tom, these joint classes represented precious opportunities. Aside from mealtimes and free periods, shared lessons were the only guaranteed chances to spend time together. Each one felt like a small gift, something to look forward to and treasure.
She'd been so excited about it. Had spent the afternoon anticipating how much fun the evening class would be.
Professor Sprout's gentle warmth during Herbology had certainly reinforced Ariana's hopeful illusion that all Hogwarts classes would be equally engaging and pleasant. But when evening arrived and the joint class finally began, that beautiful fantasy shattered like glass hitting stone.
Because tonight's lesson was History of Magic taught by Professor Binns.
If the student body held a vote for Most Hated Class excluding Slytherin, whose votes would unanimously go to any class not taught by Snape, the other three Houses would dump their ballots overwhelmingly on Potions. Snape's dungeons would win that honor by a landslide, no contest at all.
However, if you removed Potions from consideration, and set aside Defense Against the Dark Arts with its wildly inconsistent teaching quality that varied year to year depending on which temporary professor Dumbledore had managed to trick into the cursed position... then all four Houses would unite in perfect harmony to declare History of Magic the absolute worst class at Hogwarts.
The subject matter itself should have been magnificent.
Magical history encompassed centuries of fascinating events—goblin rebellions, giant wars, the International Statute of Secrecy, the rise and fall of dark wizards, the evolution of magical law and society. Stories of triumph and tragedy, brilliant innovation and catastrophic mistakes, heroes and villains who'd formed the wizarding world.
But in Professor Binns' hands or rather, in his ghostly, monotonous, utterly uninflected delivery, even the most dramatic historical events transformed into the verbal equivalent of sleeping draught. His teaching style could make dragon attacks sound boring. He could render the most epic magical battles as dull as reading a Potions ingredient list.
And scheduling this particular class in the evening, after students had already endured a full day of demanding lessons? That was educational cruelty.
By the time young witches and wizards dragged themselves to Binns' classroom, they were already mentally and physically exhausted. Their brains had absorbed Transfiguration theory, survived Potions under Snape's hostile scrutiny, wrestled with Charms pronunciation, and handled volatile plants in Herbology. They had nothing left. They were running on empty.
So, when Professor Binns began his lecture in that flat, droning voice that never varied in pitch or pace, that suggested the speaker had given up on life sometime in the fourteenth century and never recovered, students didn't stand a chance.
Within fifteen minutes, the classroom transformed into an impromptu dormitory.
Hannah's head drooped lower and lower with each passing minute, her chin was nearly touching her chest. The quill in her hand continued moving across parchment purely through muscle memory, producing an endless series of meaningless waves and loops that bore no relationship to actual words.
Across the room, Harry and Ron had long since surrendered to unconsciousness. Both boys were slumped over their shared desk, heads pressed together at awkward angles, breathing in perfect synchronization.
Even Hermione who was stubborn, dedicated, rule-following Hermione who took notes in every class regardless of circumstance was struggling. Her hand still moved mechanically, transcribing Binns' words, but her eyes had gone slightly glassy.
And Ariana, who as a ghost technically didn't require sleep at all, found her eyelids growing mysteriously heavy. The weight of Professor Binns' voice seemed to press down on her consciousness like a physical burden, dragging her toward some ghostly equivalent of sleep despite her nature.
Making matters worse, Professor Binns unlike even Snape, who at least noticed when students existed, appeared completely oblivious to the presence of two new students in his classroom.
He showed zero interest in reviewing previous material to help them catch up. He simply continued droning through his lecture exactly where he'd left off last session, as though the composition of his audience was utterly irrelevant to his teaching.
Which, to be fair, it probably was. Professor Binns would have delivered the exact same lecture to an empty room with identical enthusiasm or lack thereof.
'This is so boring...' Ariana thought muzzily, fighting the urge to let her consciousness drift away entirely.
"How boring…this professor's lecture isn't even as interesting as the little stories in The Quibbler."
Tom was sprawled across his seat, propped his chin on one paw and listened to Professor Binns explain the origins of the goblin rebellions. His tail swayed in a lazy, irregular rhythm, occasionally smacking the desk behind him—coincidentally (or not) startling the student there back to wakefulness just as they began sliding into sleep.
'(￣ω￣) Is there any way to make this class even slightly interesting?' Tom wondered.
He glanced at Hannah, who'd finally succumbed completely to sleep, her head pillowed on her folded arms. Then at Hermione, whose eyes had gone unfocused and distant, clearly seconds away from joining the ranks of the sleepers despite her best efforts to remain attentive.
Meanwhile, Professor Binns continued his lecture with all the passion of someone reading a tax document:
"During the goblin rebellions, the rebel forces employed a particular weapon—a fire-breathing copper cauldron. This device came to be known as the fire-pot, and the military campaign utilizing these weapons was subsequently termed the 'Fire-Pot Offensive' in historical records."
The information itself was actually quite interesting. Fire-breathing cauldrons as weapons? That had potential for drama, for exciting storytelling, for capturing student imagination.
But Binns delivered it in the same flat monotone he'd use to announce that it was raining outside.
'Wait...' Tom's ears suddenly perked forward as a memory came in his mind. 'Binns never actually notices or cares what students do during class, does he?'
The ghost professor had a reputation for complete obliviousness to classroom activities. Students could sleep, play games, have entire conversations, practice wand movements for other classes, and Binns would never register their existence. He was the teacher equivalent of a pre-recorded lecture, playing on loop regardless of audience.
Which meant... possibilities.
Tom's whiskers twitched with inspiration. He sat up properly, glanced at Professor Binns to confirm he was still facing the blackboard and droning into empty space, then reached into his mysterious storage and pulled out a copper cauldron.
Tom produced a slip of paper, scrawled a few characters on it with quick efficiency, and stuck it to the cauldron's side: [Fire-Pot: Reproduction Model]
Then, as drowsy students began paying attention with growing curiosity, Tom positioned the cauldron on his desk, took a deep breath, and exhaled directly into it.
Fwoosh!
Golden flames erupted from the cauldron's mouth—crackling, sparking, beautiful tongues of fire that sprayed out in all directions like a metallic dragon's breath. The flames arced through the air, glittering as they flew.
Students who got hit by the fire spray jerked back with gasps of alarm then realized, with relief and growing amusement, that the flames were purely visual. They looked impressively dangerous, complete with realistic crackling sounds and light effects, but carried absolutely no heat.
"Whoa!" someone whispered in excitement breaking through the sleepy haze.
The exclamation triggered a ripple effect. More students lifted their heads, craning their necks to see what was happening. Suddenly everyone was awake, alert, watching Tom with fascination.
Tom glanced up at Professor Binns, confirming that he showed absolutely no reaction to the magical fire show happening in his classroom.
Satisfied that he had free rein, Tom pulled out several sheets of blank parchment and began folding with remarkable dexterity. His paws moved with precision while creasing, folding, tucking, shaping. Within seconds, he'd produced two small armies of origami figures arranged in opposing lines across his desk.
On the left: paper goblins with pointed ears and sharp angular features, each no more than two inches tall, formed into neat military ranks.
On the right: paper wizards with tiny robes and long thin sticks representing wands, positioned in defensive formation.
Then, as students leaned forward with increasing interest, speech bubbles appeared above the origami goblins' heads, translucent clouds containing scrolling text:
"Down with wizard tyranny! Magic belongs to goblins!"
"For our treasures! For our freedom! Charge!"
The paper wizard army responded with their own floating speech bubbles:
"Eliminate the goblin insurgents! Stop the magical creature rebellion!"
"Wands belong to wizards! And also, those treasures we PAID for!"
"Pfft! Hahahaha!"
Hannah somehow jolted awake by the commotion, or perhaps by Tom's tail smacking her desk couldn't contain her laughter. The sound burst out before she could stop it, and she immediately clapped both hands over her mouth in horror, her shoulders were still shaking with suppressed giggles.
Hermione, drawn by the disturbance, turned to observe Tom's impromptu theater.
Her expression cycled rapidly between several conflicting reactions: 'This violates classroom rules!' warring with 'But this is genuinely hilarious...' Her eyebrows scrunched together as she wrestled with her conscience, unable to decide whether to disapprove or enjoy.
Meanwhile, Professor Binns continued lecturing to the blackboard without so much as turning his head, utterly oblivious to the entertainment unfolding behind him:
"Subsequently, the goblins attempted to use the fire-pot to breach Gringotts' defenses and seize treasures stored within the vaults."
The moment those words left Binns' ghostly mouth, Tom's origami goblins scrambled toward the copper cauldron in synchronized movement.
They positioned themselves around its base, adopting exaggerated pushing poses as speech bubbles appeared above their heads:
"One, two, three—PUSH!"
The cauldron, being a genuine copper vessel weighing several pounds, didn't budge even slightly. Meanwhile, the paper goblins being literal paper cutouts with basically no mass wobbled and fell over from their own effort, collapsing in theatrical defeat.
The physical comedy of paper figures trying to move real metal was absurdly perfect. Several students had to stuff their fists in their mouths to avoid laughing out loud.
Professor Binns' monotone voice droned on, completely unaware that he was narrating:
"Due to timely intelligence from wizard scouts, the goblins' offensive ultimately proved fruitless. However, some historical sources suggest the goblins failed primarily because they constructed the fire-pot at such excessive scale that after their dragon transports were defeated, they physically lacked the strength to move the massive cauldron."
He paused, not for dramatic effect, but simply because he'd reached the end of that section in his notes.
"Of course, that comes from unofficial anecdotal sources. Moving forward, we shall discuss the stalemate period during the later stages of goblin rebellion."
But not a single student in the classroom heard that transition. Not even Hermione, who normally absorbed every word.
"Wait," Harry whispered from his position across the room with disbelief. "Did the Professor just... accidentally narrate Tom's performance?!"
"Pfffft—AHAHA!"
Someone lost control completely. Then another person. Then another. Laughter resounded through the classroom like wildfire, students were dissolving into giggles and snorts and guffaws.
Even Hermione ducked her head, her shoulders were shaking as she tried and failed to maintain composure. She couldn't quite identify whether she was laughing at Tom's ridiculous origami theater or at Professor Binns' completely sincere "narration" that had perfectly synchronized with the comedy playing out on the student's desk.
The combination was just too much. The perfection of timing destroyed any remaining pretense of seriousness.
For the remainder of the class period, Professor Binns continued delivering his lecture in that same soporific monotone that could put dragons to sleep. But the classroom atmosphere had transformed.
Students were no longer fighting losing battles against unconsciousness. Some giggled quietly, sneaking glances at Tom's origami army.
Others began folding their own paper figures, attempting to recreate the theater or invent their own scenes. A few particularly artistic students started drawing cartoon versions of goblin rebellions in the margins of their notes.
Regardless of method, everyone's interest had been thoroughly captured. The abstract, distant events of magical history suddenly felt alive, tangible, and entertaining.
And in that newly energized atmosphere, even Hermione, the paragon of proper behavior, defender of classroom rules couldn't resist. She carefully tore a small strip of parchment from her notes, wrote a quick message in her handwriting, and subtly passed it to Tom:
[I know I shouldn't condone this, but I have to admit: this is genuinely the most interesting History of Magic class I've ever attended.]
Tom's whiskers twitched with pleasure. He flipped the note over, drew a simple but recognizable copper cauldron with flames coming out, and pushed the parchment back toward Hermione.
The History of Magic lesson continued around them—Professor Binns was still droning, students were still secretly entertained, the evening slowly was darkening beyond the castle windows.
The material itself remained as dry as ever in Binns' delivery. But somewhere in that tedious recitation of dates and treaties and battlefield formations, Tom had managed to inject something special.
When the bell finally rang to signal class dismissal, several students actually looked disappointed that the lesson was ending. They'd been enjoying themselves and were wanting more.
In the entire history of Hogwarts, across centuries of History of Magic classes taught by the ghost Professor Binns, this was absolutely the first time any student had ever felt reluctant to leave.