The quill scratched across the parchment with a faint shimmer of silver ink, sealing my name beneath Dumbledore's elegant signature. The contract glowed faintly for a moment — a binding of old Hogwarts magic — and then the glow faded, leaving nothing but parchment and ink.
"Well then," Dumbledore said with a twinkle in his eye, "Professor… it seems official now."
I smirked slightly. Professor. The title still felt strange, but not unpleasant. "Good. I'll make sure your students learn something actually useful for once."
He chuckled, clearly used to my bluntness. "And I trust you have a reading list ready?"
"Of course," I replied, handing over a neat stack of parchment. "These are the books I want bought by the students this year. I made a few adjustments to the usual Defence curriculum — less 'textbook theory,' more practical spellwork and dark magic countermeasures. I don't believe in sugarcoating."
Dumbledore scanned the list, his eyebrows raising at some of the titles. "Advanced Counter-Curses of the Twelfth Century… Rituals of Protection and Baneful Warding… You certainly have ambitious tastes."
"Students should be prepared for what's really out there," I said flatly. "Not just grindylows and pixies."
He sighed with a knowing smile. "I'll see what I can do, Professor Potter."
With that, he departed — and I finally had a moment to breathe. But that peace didn't last long.
The instant I stood up, a faint tingle rippled down my arms — a sensation like static crawling beneath my skin. My instincts screamed. I closed my eyes, focusing, and the world changed.
The veil between the visible and the arcane lifted, and I saw it — a faint green shimmer coiling around my body like smoke, runes flickering in and out of sight. A curse.
"So this is the infamous Defence Against the Dark Arts curse, huh?" I muttered, narrowing my eyes. "How quaint."
The magic was ancient — elegant, yet brutish in its purpose. Designed to doom anyone who dared teach this position for long. But to me, it was little more than an annoyance.
I reached inward, channeling the fusion of my two souls — the raw, chaotic magic that had long since become my second heartbeat. The curse flared in resistance, but I wove through it like a serpent through grass, unraveling its threads with ease. With a simple gesture, the green glow shattered, dissolving into harmless wisps of light.
"Nice try," I said quietly. "But you'll have to do better than that."
When I returned to my office, the room was filled with the faint smell of smoke — not from any spell, but from the pile of glowing ash on the floor.
I smiled. "So you finally decided, huh?"
The ashes flared, and a small burst of flame erupted, swirling in brilliant gold and crimson. From it rose Sol — newly reborn, radiant and magnificent once more. She trilled proudly, her voice echoing through the room like sunlight breaking through clouds.
"Welcome back," I whispered, watching her stretch her wings. "It's good to see you again… really see you."
For the first time in a century, both of us — the witch and her phoenix — had been reborn.