Messer heard a loud creak sound, he guessed it was came from the door and somehow it remind him of horror movies. Let's just hope the school ghosts won't show up. That would be really creepy.

His eyes went back to Professor Romanos when he heard her instruction. Lotus Position? Okay, he could do that. The third year stretched out his legs in front of him then he used his hands to draw his heel towards his abdomen, and place his right foot on the top of your left thigh and for his left foot, Messer pulled his other heel up towards his navel and rest it on the top of his right thigh. He looked to his friends, it seems Alec already on the lotus position but unfortunately not for Alice, it seems the Gryffindor had a little trouble with the lotus position.

Messer attention went back to Professor Romanos. That's a bit confusing. So they need to find another answer when they want to answer the question? This is a bit confusing.

Messer was thinking about the second instruction when the Professor asked them the first question.

Dark Arts.

So he needs to give her a different answer yes? Umm.."Its something that produced without the use of light."

Obvious question, but Theo wasn't going to answer it right for reasons.

"Painting pictures only using blacks and browns." He said quietly. His eyes were still closed as he pictured the lovely fields and butterflies. Come to think of it, the music was kind of loud and it was distracting him completely from the actual lesson. He opened his eyes sharply. Right, his answer, what was it again?

Oh, dark ARTS.

HA.

Ouch. Maybe she should have done a little bit of yoga during the holidays, for when she got into the lotus position it was a little awkward. Indiana was clearly losing a little bit of flexibility. But now she turned her attention back to the question. Dark arts? Well she had been attending these lessons for 3 years now so she hoped that she knew a little bit about the dark arts. The way they had to answer the question was a little weird though. She put her hand up, but then tried to clear her mind. This was just all full of strange. Her attention was caught by someone else answering, and Indy did have to laugh. That was good. Taking the dark arts literally. She liked that.

She turned her head, and grinned at the little second year. That was a good one. But now back to the question. Ooh. She had a new answer in her head now. "The dark arts are acts of magic which are dark in intention wanting to cause harm or destruction."

Laura looked at the Professor and smiled, she was about to say not much when she suddenly remembered what the Professor had said, clearing her mind she thought about what she wanted to say and changed her mind. "Professor I know about Dementors they are dark creatures and have a black cloak." Laura smiled.

Yoga turned out to be the easier part of the lesson, after all. But not being able to voice their first thought...Ari had always been one to say the first thing that came to mind. Which, admittedly, was a big disadvantage sometimes. The girl did see a point in this exercise. Restraint and thinking things through could save oneself from a lot of embarrassing situations. Extrapolated, when fighting against the Dark Arts, it would be an advantage to be less predictable.

That was the first thing that popped into her mind about the Dark Arts. But she wasn't allowed to say it out loud. Fiiiiine.

Then...'The Dark Arts are a branch of Magic generally considered illegal, which can encompass spells, but also potions, for example, used to bring harm to other people.' Ariadne replied after putting her hand up. She already started to hate the Lotus position. Something new, please?

Why was it that she asked the exact same question every term? Shifting awkwardly in her lotus position, Elise raised her hand. Taking a breath to clear her mind, she pushed her usual answer away from her mind. Instead, an art term appeared.

"Chiaroscuro," she grinned. Light and shade. Then realized that that was a really silly answer. Blinking, she corrected herself quickly. "It's magic with the intention of hurting something."

Well, she'd rephrased her original answer.

Angel was somewhat glad at not being able to say the first thing that came to mind... considering it could be summed up quite simply into the word 'nothing'.

The more she sat focussing on her breath as she held the pose she finally came up with an idea and almost jumped up and threw a little victory dance... almost. "Any spell used for dark intentions... though curses are more commonly linked to the dark arts because they generally can't do anything good but you could also relate a normally harmless spell if the intent was evil" the first year said, the last bit more of an afterthought.

Mentally she thanked anyone and everyone for muggle books about sorcery!

So that was the reason behind confusing her brain. Seeing new horizons? Lex wasn't so sure just how well that would work, seeing as she had a one track mind but she would try it...and she would try this yoga thing too. That being decided, she folded her legs and got into the lotus position like the Professor had told them to do however long ago; this one wasn't such a hard position thankfully.

Oooo! She knew the answer--Wait....no blurting the first response. Though an answer had come to the tip of her tongue she swallowed it and tried to think of a new one...

....

...............

This was harder than she thought.

"Ummm, it's very powerful magic that's used to used cause harm...maybe..." This was why she preferred blurting; the other answer would have been much better--to her anyway.

Yoga.

Again.

Not very happy about this, but not against it either, Gwendolyn just listened to the Professor talk before trying to imitate the lotus position. After attending to so many Defence Against the Dark Arts classes which involved yoga, the fifth year was a bit surprised to see that she still hadn’t really got used to it. Mehh.

She drew her attention back to Professor Romanos just in time to hear the first question. Hmm. Dark Arts. What did she know about this subject? While thinking of an answer, the fifth year heard another Ravenclaw give the definition of the dark arts. Oh well, no need to repeat that, then. Something else…‘Bewitching any items to cause harm is an act of dark magic’, she heard herself saying. 'One example for that would be cursing books in order to make the person who starts reading never to be able to stop'

Okay. That was a reasonable explanation but.. Abby raised her hand again. "But Professor, when we face the bad guys in the real world, we should be able to defend ourselves." They should be concentrating on brushing up their magic, learn physical combat.. UGH. Honestly, if she'd known DADA involved yoga, she wouldn't have even bothered to attend this lesson. It was a waste of time.

And.. Dark Arts? The first thing that came into her head was Dementors.. for some weird reason. But thankfully, they were NOT supposed to say that. So, she remained quiet for a moment before she raised her hand again. "Magic that's used to inflict harm on others?"

Minerva went to put her hand up, but then put it back down and cocked her head a bit thinking. If she is suppose to not say her first answer then she would have to think a bit about the question. What did she know about the dark arts, Well she knew that it was magic that could hurt or kill people, she knew it was dangerous, and scary, BUT if she was going to think of something else what would it be. Putting up her hand again, "Professor dark arts can range from people to animals that have intention to harm." Putting her hand down she thought that was a pretty good second thought, well she hoped so at least.

Kurumi rolled her shoulders and tried to relax into the position a little more, but it was becoming more and more difficult as the seventh year tried to rethink and rework her initial answer. What did she know about the dark arts? Her initial response was to give an almost textbook definition of what it was. The dark arts are any type of magic that is mainly used to cause harm...wait, who was she kidding? That WAS a textbook answer and they hadn't actually been asked to define the dark arts but to say something that they knew about it.

Oh, hey, look at that. Stopping and reexamining ones response was actually paying off this time. Which somehow also helped Kurumi relax into her yoga position a little more, her shoulders relaxing and her chest opening up a bit to allow herself to breathe a little more easily.

"The dark arts are not just spells, but encompass dark creatures as well. Their existence and breeding them."

Anyone who had been around last term knew a lot on the subject seeing as they had all given speeches or performed skits on them.

Louisa's eyes snapped open when Romanos explained the purpose behind her request, and quite honestly Louisa was convinced. She nodded in agreement to that, but in the dark it was most likely unnoticed to the others.

Then came the question. It wasn't unexpected, Louisa was about to raise her hand and say 'Illegal branch of magic includes items, spells, creatures including humans'. Instead, she closed her eyes and tuned out the students' answers while focusing on the one that isn't in her head yet.

This made her subconscious bring out images and emotions of a certain dark incident with a dark wizard. She didn't want to remember, mention, or use it as a reference but in order to experience new horizons, but Louisa's mind opened up to the experience and slowly she raised her hand. "Bad." Clearing her throat, she continued seriously, "Nothing good could come out of anything dark. Dark arts only result in misery, loss, and trauma." Firsthand experience and even if there were exceptions, Louisa was not seeing them.

Taking a deep breath, Cassia tried to convince herself that she could do this. It wasn't that dark and there were candles. The second-year squared her shoulders and dismissed the pessimistic thoughts. Now they had to do YOGA.

Catching up with what Professor Romanos was saying. It was like last year though Cassia hadn't well so fantastic considering she finds trouble keeping her mouth shut. However, she was going to try harder this lesson.

Dark arts…Dark magic and dangerous spells. Don’t say that…

Raising her hand slowly, Cassia said in a low voice. "It means magic used for healing patients." Heh. She'll get better….hopefully.

The feared look on the boy's face was momentarily replaced with an look of curiousity when Kurumi whispered to him. Meet her after class? Raising an eyebrow , Daichi continued to look at the Prefect. "O-okay" he whispered just as quietly when the Professor had started the class.

He felt a bit embarrassed that he had not greeted the woman and when she had greeted him he actually felt a little guilty. There was no time to answer her words of greeting though for the first question already came.

To be honest, the Slytherin did not get ANYTHING what she was saying so he decided to stay quiet. If he didn't say anything and kept still he wouldn't be labeled as stupid when he said something right?

Seated in the lotus position, Daichi looked at the candles , closed his eyes and took a deep breath. If this wasn't a mandatory class he would have been out of this class in a second.

As the second question came, Daichi listened to the question and opened his mouth to answer it. Only the words "T-the d-d-dark a--" came out of his mouth and he quickly shut it close again. He was suppose to say something else than the first thing that came to his mind right?

"Da-dark arts is not..uh...light arts?"

Made sense right?

Taylor thought about the question and raised her hand. She was about to speak the answer when she remembered that she had to change her answer as well. Tay thought about it and then said, "Dark arts is when you paint with dark colors in a bad mood." Stupid answer but it was the next thing after a correct answer.

Yoga......? They did this last year, right? Sigh. She wasn't very good at it. Thank goodness this was an easy pose! If it was all crazy like a backbend or something, she would not be doing so well.

Cardigan, in the Lotus position, mulled over the professor's first question, only having to put a little bit of thought into it. She had learned some over the years, some from this class and some from homeschooling way back when. Hmm, might as well say what she knew. Raising her hand, the young snake said, "Dark Arts is like something made out of evil or used for evil, like Horcruxes or the Unforgivables.." Well, it was true.

Something about the dark arts?

Kind of an easy question. For Jennifer, anyway. Dark arts were bits of magic magiked up by evil people. Illegal bits of magic. And then some good guys, aurors or something, would come along and fix everything. Everything was fine again and it was all in the Prophet the next week. Yeah.

"It's bad, illegal magic, magiked up by bad witches and wizards. Like the, uh, unforgivable curse thingimabobs." Quite well summed up if Jen did say so herself.

Sierra was still adjusting her body into the lotus position when the professor starting speaking again. ARGH. The lotus position. Why not the 'seated in a desk' position? Or the 'armed and ready in the arena' position? Sierra was started to dread the sight of these purple mats. At least they weren't yellow, though. That'd kind of be the icing on the cake.

Once in position, she glanced up at the professor, trying to focus on what she'd been talking about. Okay, so she needed to wait before answering. No complaining there. When the question asked, she raised her hand in the air. Then she did the whole 'stop and wait' thing the professor had asked them to do.

"Well, you've got to be pretty selfish in order to get yourself involved in it," she said. "I mean, no one ever got involved in a form of the dark arts without first thinking of themselves. Unless they were forced to get into it, that is."

Yay. Jogging! West got up and immediately began jogging on the spot. Much better than sitting in weird positions for the whole lesson.

Dark Arts! Aurors fought the--- oh. Rewording. Different answer. He was crestfallen and then brightened up immediately, mid jog. Hand up. "My dad is a Curse-Breaker - most of the time, sometimes he's an Auror, and that counts too- but in his job, he comes across lots of dark curses and has to know how to avoid them or disable them." His dad was awesome and tough! "And some of the curses have been there for thousands of years and are still dangerous and deadly, like its objects and stuff what have been cursed, not just spells flying about."

There. That wasn't his original answer. West kept jogging.

So its an exercise on lateral thinking?

Greatttt... for all his brilliance, Vickers does have trouble with that...

So what were the Dark Arts? Knee jerk reaction had him nearly shooting his hand up and recite the textbook, but he remembered what the Professor said about NOT spouting off the first thing that comes to his head....

Gosh this is haaarrrdd...

"The Dark Arts are.... what we're defending against."

Boring. Boring. BORING. Were they going to start learning how to curse someone's legs off?

And they were doing YOGA?

O_________O

Merlin, Hogwarts had become very muggle-friendly.. She was no pureblood, infact she was only a quarter-magic, since her dad was a halfblood and her mum a muggleborn, but she really didn't understand all this crisscrossing of muggle and magical culture. She sat on the purple-y mat and folded her legs, but decided not to bother with any of this weird stuff. And then some kid asked a question she liked. WHY?

"Oh, but Miss, I know my plan will go completely and utterly right. I'm going to get a galleon and then practice a duplication spell, and just keep doing it forever and eventually I'll be a galleonaire. I'mma have a huge mansion and a fancy muggle car and loads of random useless expensive stuff." She didn't care if Mrs. Professor had been talking to another kid. "Oh, and Lex can have some galleons too, and come live with me in my big mansion, but only cause she's my BEST FRIEND FOREVER. But no-one else." Seri added, winking at Lex.

As for her other question? "The Dark Arts are a load of spells and potions for killing and hurting people. Right? They do all kinds of horrible things, my brother told me about a curse he heard of and it makes people's - Seri stopped, as that wasn't something the whole class would want to hear. She thought she was right. "Anyway, they're really powerful, and so we have to learn some really good curses and hexes, so when someone does try and get us, they'll be the one on the floor!" Seri chuckled to herself.

Beezus had been doing the Lotus position as Professor Romanos had told them too. It was one yoga stunt that she liked actually, it required flexibility of the legs and complete body balance so you won't fall on your back. Plus, the stunt didn't bring any offense to her aching ribcage just yet.

A brain exercise, hmm? By formulating a completely new answer to the one you had originally thought about. For her, it wasn't as difficult, as long as you had plenty of ideas on your head, then you were good to go. The Ravenclaw nodded. The woman was right, it was always good to think right outside of the box, and have back-up plans. You will never know when certain spells would fail you.

Okay, okay. She will be testing with how they deal with this by asking less-hard questions.

Something about the Dark Arts! Well, it was a type of magic that was illegal and.... shooo! shoooo! erase, erase... With a somewhat hesitant raise of the hand, she spoke, "Ermm. Over all Dark Arts isn't exactly defined as evil magic. In fact, there are ethical considerations in which it can be used for good as well." Like when Albus Dumbledore asked Severus Snape to kill him?

Jory raised his hand but just in time he remembered he had to give a different answer. So the boy dropped his hand and pondered on something else.

"The Dark Arts consists of anything that can cause harm,'' he said his hand in the air once again.

Something about the dark arts. Cora's first thought was to call out "They are scary" but since that wasn't an option anyway, and she was also supposed to think of something else before calling out, Cora paused to think.

And then, still a bit nervously, she replied "The dark arts are for intending harm on another."

I would never use them whatsoever, she thought. She had huge issues with hurting others. She liked healing them or making them feel better. Now she knew what Elliot meant about her being too nice. Most of the others here would probably use darker curses if they had to. She would work on that.