A/N: Wow. It's been awhile. I apologize for that! I will try to keep this going, but I'm afraid I can't make any promises. But thanks for reading! Anyway, to the story...

"...And that's about all you need to know." Dumbledore finished. Hinata nodded, realizing that the information she had received was very valuable, especially to the enemy. She would not let it fall into the wrong hands. She also accepted that while she was here she would have to do everything in her power to protect the boy of the prophecy, his friends, this school and, the most imortant to her, the twins.

She left Dumbledore to himself and made her way to Hagrid's cabin, where the Gryffindor kids and the Slytherin brats were gathered. She arrived just in time to hear a blond-kid's tirade.

"Well, I can certainly see why we're trying to keep them alive. Who wouldn't want pets that can burn, sting and bite all in one?"

"Just because they're not very pretty, it doesn't mean they're not useful," Hermione replied. Hinata turned to the box of animals they were caring for. Some had stingers, and others had suckers. Hinata activated her byakugan. Very slight flow of chakra...magic.

After lunch, for which she was able to sneak into the kitchen with the strange little people and cook her own meal, she was able to leave the castle, since she had no business inside. She wandered around for a bit, and eventually found herself in the forbidden forest. Akamaru barked at her side. It reminded her of the Forest of Death, only then she had been with Shino and Kiba, and her safety had been ensured. Now, save for Akamaru, she was alone. She did not fear the possibility of dying at the hands of a wizard, but rather suffered from loneliness. She missed her friends. She missed Naruto, even though she knew he was still away...

"Hinata." she turned. For a moment she was in shock. Before her stood one of the professors. Severus Snape, if she was not mistaken.

"H-Hello...professor Snape." she greeted.

"I have something to tell you."

Hinata returned to the dining hall just in time to hear the end of an argument.

"Don't you dare insult my mother, Potter." the blond kid from earlier snapped. Hinata had a brief flash of her own mother, for the second time that day. Her kind face, admirable blue hair... The role model for any good mother. Hinata was pulled out of her reverie by the new professor Mad-Eye Moody. The blond kid was gone, and in his place was a strange white animal. Hinata stepped forward to intervene, but before she could, a new professor, McGonagall, began to reprimand the teacher. Hinata allowed a ghost of a smile to pass over her. Then she walked away. Mad-Eye would definitely be her downfall.

Two days later, Hinata had the great honor to attend Defence against the Dark Arts. She took her seat behind Harry so she could keep an eye on him. Then she turned her attention to the front of the room. Class started.

"Right then," the teacher, Professor Moody said, "I've had a letter from Professor Lupin about this class. Seems you've had a pretty thorough grounding in tackling Dark creatures - you've covered boggarts, Red Caps, hinkypunks, grindylows, Kappas, and werewolves, is that right? But you're behind - very behind - on dealing with curses. So I'm here to bring you up to scratch on what wizards can do to each other. I've got one year to teach you how to deal with Dark -"

"What, aren't you staying?" the Weasley Ron interrupted.

"You'll be Arthur Weasley's son, eh? Your father got me out of a very tight corner a few days ago...Yeah, I'm staying just the one year. Special favor to Dumbledore...One year, and then back to my quiet retirement."

No...Something's wrong...he's lying...about something. Hinata thought, her byakugan activated. The Professor continued.

"So - straight into it. Curses. They come in many strengths and forms. Now, according to the Ministry of Magic, I'm supposed to teach you countercurses and leave it at that. I'm not supposed to show you what illegal Dark curses look like until you're in the sixth year. You're not supposed to be old enough to deal with it till then. But Professor Dumbledore's got a higher opinion of your nerves, he reckons you can cope, and I say, the sooner you know what you're up against, the better. How are you supposed to defend yourself against something you've never seen? A wizard who's about to put an illagal curse on you isn't going to tell you what he's about to do. He's not going to do it nice and polite to your face. You need to be prepared. You need to be alert and watchful. You need to put that away, Miss Brown, when I'm talking."

A girl up front jumped. Hinata ignored her. The speech had made sense to her, but the customs he talked about did not. It seemed to her that curses were like jutsu, except there were some that were illegal...and that the children were unable to learn. But why? The point of jutsu is to protect the village. So why not teach them, and why not demonstrate them? And why make some illegal? Jutsu were not illegal. But it seemed that in this strange world, curses were not used to protect, after all. It did not make sense.

"So...do any of you know which curses are most heavily punished by wizarding law?"

Law. That bothered Hinata as well. Why rule over which curses are used to protect...so long as they're being used to protect. The Hokage would not punish anyone for using a certain jutsu, unless said jutsu were used to harm an innocent being.

Hinata guessed that at least one being in the room was not innocent.

"...Imperius Curse, or something?" Ron finished.

"Ah, yes. Your father would know that one. Gave the Ministry a lot of trouble at one time, the Imperius Curse."

Moody revealed a jar of three spiders. Hinata straightened. These aracnids were beyond Shino's ability to control. Also, a man with aspects of a spider had nearly killed Neji. That had been an emotional jolt for Hinata, almost as bad as when her mother had died...

Moody now held a spider in the palm of his and. He pointed his wand at it.

"Imperio!"

The spider jumped from Moody's hand on a thread of silk and began to swing. It strethed out its legs, backflipped, and landed on the desk, where it proceeded to cartwheel. Then it rose to two of its feet, and started to dance.

The class roared with laughter. Hinata stared with her byakugan at the spider. Moody had captivated it with his chakra...magic.

Genjutsu. She concluded. This is some type of genjutsu.

"Think it's funny, do you? You'd like it, would you, if I did it to you?" his growl ended the laughter. "Total control. I could make it jump out of the window, drown itself, throw itself down one of your throats...

"Years back, there were a lot of witches and wizards being controlled by the Imperius Curse. Some job for the Ministry, trying to sort out who was being forced to act, and who was acting of their own free will.

"The Imperius Curse can be fought, and I'll be teaching you how, but it takes real strength of character, and not everyone's got it. Better avoid being hit with it if you can. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!"

Everyone jumped. Hinata remained still. Either this professor was unnaturally strong, or these students were unnaturally weak...almost like citizens...

Moody threw the spider back into the jar. Hinata winced as it hit the glass. Being around Shino must have given her some sympathy for small creatures.

"Anyone else know one? Another illegal curse?"

"Yes?" Moody's eye landed on Longbottom, Neville.

"There's one - the Cruciatus Curse."

"Your name's Longbottom?"

Neville nodded. Dumbledore had told Hinata about this boy, how his parents had been tortured, and now were in a comatose state. This fate was much worse than even some ninja faced...Many ninja still had both parents alive and well.

"The Cruciatus Curse," Moody said, setting another spider on the desk and pointing his wand at it, "Needs to be a bit bigger for you to get the idea. Engorgio!"

The spider grew.

"Crucio!"

Now the spider's legs curled in, as it rolled over and began to twitch and rock. The shuddering intensified until...

"Stop it!" Hermione cried.

It's like being bombared by taijutsu... Like Lee's...or Neji's...

"Pain," Moody said. He had already put the spider back in the jar. "You don't need thumbscrews or knives to torture someone if you can perform the Cruciatus Curse...That one was very popular once too.

"Right...anyone know any others?

"Yes?"

"Avada Kedavra." Hermione whispered. Hinata's spine tingled. There was a note of foreboding in Hermione's voice...and in the air.

"Ah. Yes, the last and worst. Avada Kedavra...the Killing Curse.."

The last spider resisted as Moody set it on his desk. It tried to run, but Moody pointed his wand at it...

"Avada Kedavra!"

A flash of green light similar to the glow of Mystical Palm Technique jolted from Moody's wand. The sound of something filled the air...like the sound of ninja rushing through trees. And the spider died instantaneously. Moody brushed it onto the floor.

Ninjutsu...to the extreme. Hinata thought. But still...better than getting tortured. Better than the possibility of being forced into betraying your comrades. This is the gentlest curse...or would be in my world...

"Not nice. Not pleasant. And there's no countercurse. There's no blocking it. Only one person has ever survived it, and he's sitting right in front of me."

He's like a jinchuriki... Hinata thought as her gaze fell upon Harry. He had two chakras circling inside of him. His own...and the own that reminded her of Orochimaru...Voldemort. No...he's more like Sasuke...A boy, powerful on his own, with the extra bit from an evil snake.

"Avada Kedavra's a curse that needs a powerful bit of magic behind it - you could all get your wands out now and point them at me and say the words, and I doubt I'd get so much as a nosebleed. But that doesn't matter. I'm not here to teach you how to do it.

"Now, if there's no countercurse, why am I showing you? Because you've got to know. You've got to appreciate what the worst is. You don't want to find yourself in a situatiohn where you're facing it. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!

"Now...those three curses - Avada Kedavra, Imperius and Cruciatus - are known as the Unforgivable Curses. The use of any one of them on a fellow human being is enough to earn a life sentence in Azkaban. That's what you're up against. That's what I've go to teach you to fight. You need preparing. You need arming. But most of all, you need to practice constant, never-ceasing vigilance. Get out you quills...copy this down..."

Hinata did not copy but instead reflected on the class.

If used on another human being, even evil? And what if it were used on somthing else...like a ninja dog? Or whatever the equivelant is here. Little things such as this bothered Hinata, but perhaps the thing that bothered her most was: If a wizard had the full power of all three curses...would he be a match for even a shinobi?