Harry just decided to postpone his own training until later in the day. They started with wingardium leviosa, as they had been working on for the past two sessions. Ginny continued to improve in her abilities. She was nowhere near the control that she possessed with a wand, but after an hour of work she was able to make the quill levitate pretty steadily for as long as she liked.
Harry told her that she would still need to work on improving her control, but that they should move on to another spell. She could practice that one on her own now. They decided it was probably best to move onto Transfiguration material, since their ultimate goal was based heavily in Transfiguration. Harry conjured a needle and instructed Ginny to transfigure it into a thimble.
She did it with her wand first, as Harry ordered, to feel the difference between the two types of magic. And Ginny was actually surprised to feel that there was a noticeable difference. She figured that her magic would feel the same and that it was just her intent that would have to change to alter the spell, despite Harry's explanation to the contrary. But there was a difference: slight, but definitely there.
Ginny's progress on this project was a little quicker than it had been for her first wandless spell. At first she had called forth the magic to levitate the pin while telling it to change into a thimble. The result was that the pin just vibrated in its place. Harry guessed what she had done, and she sheepishly admitted that he was right. Her next attempt was a little more successful. The pin began to morph and change shape, but it never made it fully to a thimble. Somewhere along the way she lost her focus and was left with a deformed mess.
"And that's why we start small and not on our bodies," Harry had commented dryly, earning him another slap on the arm. She had a tendency to hit him in the exact same spot every time she did that, and it was actually starting to hurt a little, though he wasn't about to admit that to anyone.
By the time lunch arrived and the two departed to meet their friends in the Great Hall, Ginny had managed to make the transformation from pin to thimble and back to pin again a couple of times. She asked him if that meant they could go back to practicing the animagus transformation. Harry wasn't sure if she was being entirely serious, but he stressed to her the importance that she get a better understanding of how wandless magic works and the subtle differences in casting different spells before she tried anything on herself. He made her promise that she wouldn't try to make any changes to herself until he deemed her ready, to which she reluctantly relented.
The next day brought with it Harry's duo of double HA lessons. The BHA was picking up the pace. They were well on track to not only start, but probably finish Patronuses by the time the winter break set in. Harry would then basically repeat the lessons that he gave to the IHA this term to the BHA next term. He was glad that he had written up and organized his lessons for the IHA this term because it now saved him the trouble of doing it again next term for the BHA.
The IHA that day was primarily practicing the cutting curse, lacerus. It worked similarly to the severing charm, diffindo, but it was much more powerful. Used on a human, diffindo would leave only a thin, shallow wound. Lacerus, on the other hand, would penetrate more deeply, causing real damage to the victim. It was the first spell Harry had taught that could easily be considered lethal.
Harry did not take the curse lightly, and he made sure that none of his students did either. He had them each working in their own circle, protected by a shielding spell set to absorb the cutting curse should anybody misfire. He did not want any accidents in this class. Warding that many separate areas against a curse that powerful took something out of Harry, but he considered it a necessary precaution.
Even with that safeguard, Harry stressed to his class how dangerous the curse was. He impressed upon them the severity of the situation. This curse was not to be used lightly. One should only use it in a life or death situation, and even then you should be careful with it. You could intend to cut someone to injure them, maybe aim for their wand arm in an effort to essentially remove the threat of attack, but you could accidentally miss your mark and end up killing your target. You might even miss your target entirely, or they might dodge it, and if any innocent bystander was nearby, they could easily be maimed or killed. The atmosphere was grave after Harry's stern warnings, but they all practiced the curse diligently.
The mood remained heavy as the class shuffled out of the room at the end of the lesson. He hated to leave them all like that, but he knew that he had to make sure that they all took his warnings seriously. He noticed, much to his consternation, that Cho was not among the crowd of students on their way out. She remained behind, standing by herself, waiting for the room to clear out. Harry sent a look over to his group of five friends, the same group that had fought with him in the Department of Mysteries last June, which Hermione interpreted as she ushered the rest of them all out of the room to leave Harry to deal with Cho on his own. He had actually been silently pleading with his friends not to abandon him, but he knew deep down that it was better to get this out of the way as soon as possible.
As the door closed behind Hermione, Cho moved toward him. "That was an interesting lesson, Harry," she said softly and warmly.
"Thanks," he replied earnestly. "I just hope they all took my warnings seriously."
"I think that's a safe bet," she returned coyly.
"You think?" he asked.
"Oh yes," she assured him. "Couldn't you tell?"
....
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