Writing Hagrid is hard, I see why the other guy didn't bother including him. He simultaneously talks like a rube, but generally says insightful things.

Hagrid's new class inspired even more gossip when it was revealed that all houses would be taking his class together. Since the first and second years didn't take Care of Magical Creatures, or Magical Brethren as it was now being called, the fourth years were going to be among the first to discover exactly what that new name meant. Not a single student was even late, much less missing, from the gathering outside Hagrid's hut. Right when the bell from the tower in the castle rang indicating it was ten o' clock he came out, with a stunning woman who Gabrielle recognized as Rachel Berceau, in tow behind him. Hagrid stood in front of the assembly and launched into a speech a little hesitantly. Hagrid had never been the best public speaker.

"Now me and Dumbledore spoke over the summer and he wanted me to, well he thought with everything going on it would be better if I focused on, ah, I dunno if I know the polite word for it." Hagrid stopped and attempted to ask Rachel quietly how to phrase "half-breed" in more nice terms, but his whispering voice was still loud enough for the class to easily hear it. Professor Berceau gently indicated she could take over and Hagrid smartly stepped back and let Rachel address the students. She introduced herself, and then launched into her own, more succinct speech.

"Now, Professor Hagrid has kindly volunteered his class time to provide you with a unique opportunity. Too few wizards get a chance to meet the diverse races that inhabit the magical world. Each week, he intends to invite a different guest speaker in the hope that it will build understanding between the magical races." Berceau said diplomatically.

"I'm already familiar with the Veela that attend this school, and Harry Potter, of course, but we thought it was prudent that I be your first guest speaker so you could ask me any questions you have and spare your fellow students having to answer them personally." Rachel took a breath and then continued. "Although it's crude terminology, half-breed accurately describes both me and Hagrid, since we each have parents of two different races. I think you all already know Hagrid's mother was a giant, whereas my mother was a Veela. This makes me half Veela, and Hagrid a half-giant."

Already a hand went up and when Rachel called on the student, the question asked was:

"What happens if a werewolf and a Veela had a kid would she give birth to a fucked up wolf that was really sexy or what?" Gabrielle noticed that question seemed to startle Rachel a fair amount, but she was saved from having to answer by Hagrid growling and taking twenty points from Ravenclaw for "a ruddy stupid question."

Another hand went up, a Hufflepuff girl this time. "I read in Witch Weekly that Gabrielle Delacour is a quarter-veela, what's the difference between a half and a quarter, Professor?"

Immediately, almost all the eyes in the class glanced over at Gabrielle. Noticing this, Hagrid strolled towards her, Ginny, and Luna while Professor Berceau was answering.

"You girls mind joining me in my hut for tea?" Hagrid asked, again attempting to speak quietly. The trio nodded and they broke away and followed Hagrid into his hut. Once he had the door closed he started speaking normally again.

"Sorry 'bout that, but Professor Berceau can probably handle herself now and I reckon you don't need her 'ter explain a Veela to you." Hagrid said warmly. "Expect you don't got no luck keeping secrets from Ginny and Luna here neither."

"That werewolf question seemed to bother her, do you think she's dating a werewolf, Professor Hagrid?" Luna asked while casting her ethereal gaze around the hut. At that, Hagrid just shook his head and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like "it's worse than I thought". They all pulled out a chair for themselves and sat around Hagrid's table, leaving the sturdiest one that was clearly designed for a larger man for Hagrid, which he occupied after readying a tray of tea and biscuits to share.

"So, your brother's back to teach, that should keep the boys off your back." Hagrid said to Ginny, but it was Luna who answered. "Ginny wants the boys to come after her to help her get over Harry."

"Aye, heard about that before school ended. Tell you one thing Ginny, it might be a blessing, I don't think Harry'd be easy 'ter date."

"Why?" Ginny asked.

"Betcha you were right jealous when Gabrielle started dating Harry?"

Ginny's ears went red and she looked between Gabrielle and Hagrid, uncertain of what she should say. Hagrid held up his hand "You don't need 'ter answer, just think about how jealous you'd be if your boyfriend had a habit of rescuing damsels instead of just your friend." Hagrid turned his eyes to Gabrielle. "Hope you aren't the jealous type."

Luna spoke up again. "Harry saved me over the summer, but Gabrielle didn't seem to be jealous."

Hagrid chuckled at this. "Shoulda known, a year hasn't gone by without Harry saving someone's life since he started here. Wish he didn't have to spend each summer with those ruddy Dursleys. I've tried talking Dumbledore into hiring Harry as my assistant while school's out, but..." He trailed off.

"He didn't stay with ze muggles very long zis summer, and we stayed with him to make sure they couldn't hurt him." Gabrielle answered.

Hagrid frowned. "You three stayed with the Dursley's? Why did he need protection?"

"Hagrid, have you been reading ze news?" Gabrielle asked.

"Stopped my subscription after they ran Skeeter's article about me. Had a busy summer too, no time for reading." Hagrid shrugged. Gabrielle realized that Hagrid hadn't been filled in on anything going on with Harry for months. So she dove right into explaining everything that happened, she could feel Harry's trust for Hagrid and knew it wouldn't be an issue.

Hagrid was astonished when he found out about the triple bond, but when she got to the part about why they needed to stay at Privet Drive during the summer, a look Gabrielle could recognize easily appeared. She'd seen it on her bondmate's faces several times. Hagrid was about a second away from storming out to go find Vernon Dursley.

"You're too late Hagrid, Professor Lupin, Sirius Black, Fred and George Weasley and my sister and my father have already paid a visit to Privet Drive."

"Fred and George? His face softened. He seemed to consider the vengeance those two could dole out far more severe than anything a prisoner of Azkaban could pull off.

"Gabrielle, would you mind telling Harry how sorry I am for leaving him at Privet Drive. I knew those ruddy muggles were no good-"

"He doesn't blame you Hagrid." Gabrielle interjected. That seemed to be the wrong thing to say and set Hagrid off babbling.

"Course he don't blame me. Harry's too-blimey, he's the reason I'm not in Azkaban right now, don't even act like he did me a favour. Saved Ginny, saved Gabrielle." He looked around. "Saved us all."

"Arry saved you from Azkaban?" Gabrielle asked with surprise. That hadn't been mentioned to her before. She saw Ginny give her a quick nod of confirmation. That put a damper on conversation for a while, while Gabrielle furiously tried to come up with a new topic to cheer Hagrid up. Then she remembered that Hagrid was the name Fred(Or maybe George)said was the real winner of the lottery to guess when Harry would start dating Hermione.

"Well, you must know 'arry very well because you guessed ze date 'arry and 'ermione would start dating, now zat you're back, I'll talk to Fred and George to get your prize." Gabrielle said. A great big smile suddenly appeared from Hagrid's shaggy face and he grabbed all three of the girls round the table in a massive bear hug.

They chatted a bit more, but classtime was dwindling, so Hagrid escorted them back outside in time to witness the Professor display her transformed Veela shape. Gabrielle had a feeling she wasn't going to be pestered very much while at Hogwarts.

Fleur was also instructing outside on the grounds, though far away from Hagrid's hut. She had barely bothered with the essays, she skimmed them and then just had it announced over breakfast where and when she could be found by those who met the entry "requirement".

The assembled group of students was from all years and houses, mostly third year and up because of the necessity for students having a spare class in order to find time to attend, and the fact first and second years were adequately being taught by Bill. Fleur was just beginning her introduction when a hand went up.

"How am I supposed to believe that a girl two years older than me is qualified to teach a class?" The boy called out. Before Fleur could answer, jeers from the crowd were already defending her.

"Read a bloody book McLaggen, don't you know what she's done?"

"Aye, I've read what the prophet said. The only thing you're good at is getting rescued by Harry Potter. Order of Merlin Second Class because Potter saved your life and second place in the Triwizard Tournament because Potter helped you through the maze and the only reason you even made it that far is because Potter saved your life in the second task." spat the student apparently named McLaggen.

Fleur didn't really feel the anger the boy desired to create in her. All he was really doing was reminding her how wonderful her mate was. She decided to ask him a simple question.

"Do you think you can beat me in a duel?" She said to McLaggen.

"As long as you promise to keep Harry Potter from butting in."

"I promise." Fleur said, and then added: "To make things fair for you, I won't be using a wand for this duel." That drew some eyebrows being raised. Some of the students didn't need to have attended Hagrid's class to tell them what this likely meant. Fleur looked towards the crowd of students and beckoned one of the girls forward.

"What is your name?" She asked the student.

"Susan Bones."

Fleur held out her wand to Susan and said: "Please hold onto this. And do you know duelling ettiquette?" Susan nodded, and Fleur then asked Susan to call out the movements for them.

Fleur then raised her voice and told everyone to back up much farther so that no one else would get hurt. Finally, she turned to face her challenger who was looking rather less confident than before.

They bowed to eachother, and turned and paced twelve steps each, and spun around on Susan's command. McLaggen was fast on the draw, but Fleur's allure was not to be trifled with when she chose to radiate it. His eyes glassed over before he could utter a single word. The bemused crowd watched as Fleur simply strolled up to her opponent, plucked the wand from his hand, used it to transfigure the boy's robes into a girl's clothes, gave him a dash of lipstick and lengthened his hair a little to complete the look.

Then she walked back easily to her starting position and let her allure fade away. Some of the crowd looked stricken from second hand embarrassment, imagining how they'd feel if they were in his place, but mostly, it was grins as they watched him try to cast a spell only to realize he wasn't holding his wand, but when he glanced down to see where it had gone, his face turned scarlet when he realized what he was wearing.

He looked back towards Fleur, who had helpfully conjured a mirror so that he could see the extent of his wardrobe makeover and he took off running towards the castle to get out of sight. Peals of laughter chased after him.

Her class went easy from there, having earned rapt attention from the students for how roundly she had dispatched a challenger. It was such a fortuitous occurrence on her first lesson, she almost suspected Hermione of orchestrating it somehow even though she knew there was no way her bondsister could have pulled something like that off without Fleur knowing about it, and it didn't feel like Hermione's style. Fleur shrugged. Maybe McLaggen was really just a brash boy.

In the observation point high above the grounds, the tip of one of the castle's towers, two twins were somewhat disappointed at how easy it had been to goad McLaggen into that display. They only had to claim that Veelas were honour bound to kiss anyone who defeated them in duel. It felt wonderful to actually use their mischief to help a friend out.

Bill was leaning against the front of his desk as the Fifth-Year Gryffindors filed in. The unenthused murmur of "Morning Professor" coming from some students as they entered.

"You can just call me Bill, and I've taken a year off my regular job as a curse-breaker at Gringotts to help out Professor Dumbledore. Now, who here is planning on attending Professor Delacour's optional Defence class?"

Every hand in the class shot up, with the exception of Harry and Hermione. Bill nodded with no surprise at the response.

"Harry Potter has the fortune, or misfortune, depending on your point of view, of having had a crash course in defence against the dark arts. I'm not surprised he's had enough of it. The only reason he's not teaching that class himself is because he hasn't graduated yet."

"Now Harry, would you please go open that door." Bill pointed to a closet on the right hand side of the classroom. Harry took one look at the door and shook his head. Bill smirked. He addressed the rest of the class, asking:

"Put your hands up if you would open the door."

Harry looked around and saw that Hermione, and not quite half the class had their hands in the air. Bill waved to indicate they should drop their hands, and then walked over to the door and opened it. Inside the closet was well lit, but completely bare. He shut the door again.

"Now who is willing to open the door?" Bill asked. Nearly every hand in the class went up this time, though a few students noticed Harry was still keeping his hand down and decided to copy him.

Bill pointed at one student with his hand raised and asked him his name.

"Seamus Finnigan"

"Alright Seamus, please open the door." The hands in the class descended once more as everyone watched him approach and reach out to grasp the doorknob. To the class, it looked like he touched it, but Seamus knew his hand never even felt the metal before he was blasted backwards and away. He landed on something soft and realized that Bill conjured a mattress as a landing pad for him. He quickly scurried back to his seat.

"So Harry, why didn't you want to open the door?" Bill asked.

"For one, anyone at this school should know better than to trust the older brother of Fred and George, for two, the last Defense against the Dark arts teacher was evil, for three, it was obvious the door was a trap."

"Relying on your instincts is great, but not really something I can teach. Does anyone know how they could tell a door was a trap otherwise?" Bill asked. Not even Hermione put her hand up for this one.

"Well, that's what I'm here to teach you. Duels and battling are one way to defend yourself against the dark arts. But what are you going to do to protect yourself if a Dark Wizard spies on you going to work every day and decides to put a curse on, say, a galleon in the road? Are you going to think twice about pocketing that?

A few students nodded, but it was clear they all agreed. Bill continued.

"I put a minor curse on that door, nothing really harmful, just so you could get the idea between the difference between a ward and a curse. If I warded the door, it would merely keep people from entering, but they could stand there and take their time trying to undo my spells. If my door was cursed, it would disable anyone who tried to gain entry, because I guarantee you, the type of people who curse doors instead of warding them aren't going to let you off with just putting you on your rump, your best case scenario is a trip to St. Mungo's."

Then Bill stopped and waved to another closet door, this time on his left hand side. "I believe in ingenuity and figuring things out for yourself. You need it if you're going to make it as a curse-breaker. The assignment for the rest of the class is to use your textbooks and concoct a way to open that door. I'm not even going to say if I've actually cursed this door or not, but I would not recommend the strategy of trying the door and hoping you get lucky. You should be very sure the handle is safe to touch before trying anything."

Then Bill simply went around his desk and sat down and observed the hesitant students gazing around, some gingerly opening their books. They'd seen a lot of things in DADA classes before, but self-directed learning was new to them. Harry, however, wasn't even bothering to open a book, he was just staring at the door. He took out his wand and without even getting up, fired a reducto spell at the door, blasting it apart. There was no more door, just a hole in the wall leading to another empty closet.

"I opened the door, Bill." Harry said simply. Bill was choking with laughter while he wordlessly repaired the wall and returned the door to its original state. Hermione was glaring at her mate for solving it quicker than her without even resorting to the book. "Well, that's one way to do it, ten points to Gryffindor. Now open that darn book before Hermione bites your head off."

The class went on , with a few others standing up and giving their best go at the door. One student attempted wearing a glove to get past the door's defenses, but got blasted back just like Seamus. Before Hermione even got her shot at the door, a knock at the real classroom door interrupted their lesson. Bill answered it, but the visitor remained in the hallway out of sight. Who had come calling became very clear when he told Harry and Hermione to pack up their things and accompany the headmaster to his office.