When the door was closed and the last

When the door was closed and the last student had sat down on a tree stump beside the wastepaper basket, Firenze gestured around the room.

‘Professor Dumbledore has kindly arranged this classroom for us,’ said Firenze, when everyone had settled down, ‘in imitation of my natural habitat. I would have preferred to teach you in the Forbidden Forest, which was—

until Monday—my home ... but that is no longer possible.’

‘Please—er— sir—’ said Parvati breathlessly, raising her hand,—why not? We've been in there with Hagrid, we're not frightened!’

‘It is not a question of your bravery,’ said Firenze, ‘but of my position. I cannot return to the Forest. My herd has banished me.’

‘Herd?’ said Lavender in a confused voice, and Harry knew she was thinking of cows. ‘What— oh!’

Comprehension dawned on her face. ‘There are more of you?’ she said, stunned.

‘Did Hagrid breed you, like the Thestrals?’ asked Dean eagerly.

Firenze turned his head very slowly to face Dean, who seemed to realise at once that he had said something very offensive.

‘I didn't—I meant—sorry,’ he finished in a hushed voice.

‘Centaurs are not the servants or playthings of humans,’ said Firenze quietly. There was a pause, then Parvati raised her hand again.

‘Please, sir ... why have the other centaurs banished you?’

‘Because I have agreed to work for Professor Dumbledore,’ said Firenze. ‘They see this as a betrayal of our kind.’

Harry remembered how, nearly four years ago, the centaur Bane had shouted at Firenze for allowing Harry to ride to safety on his back; he had called him a ‘common mule'. He wondered whether it had been Bane who had

kicked Firenze in the chest.

‘Let us begin,’ said Firenze. He swished his long palomino tail, raised his hand towards the leafy canopy overhead, then lowered it slowly, and as he did so, the light in the room dimmed, so that they now seemed to be sitting

in a forest clearing by twilight, and stars appeared on the ceiling. There were oohs and gasps and Ron said audibly, ‘Blimey!’

‘Lie back on the floor,’ said Firenze in his calm voice, ‘and observe the heavens. Here is written, for those who can see, the fortune of our races.’

Harry stretched out on his back and gazed upwards at the ceiling. A twinkling red star winked at him from overhead.

‘I know that you have learned the names of the planets and their moons in Astronomy,’ said Firenze's calm voice, ‘and that you have mapped the stars’ progress through the heavens. Centaurs have unravelled the mysteries

of these movements over centuries. Our findings teach us that the future may be glimpsed in the sky above us—’

‘Professor Trelawney did astrology with us!’ said Parvati excitedly, raising her hand in front of her so that it stuck up in the air as she lay on her back. ‘Mars causes accidents and burns and things like that, and when it makes

an angle to Saturn, like now—’ she drew a right-angle in the air above her ‘—that means people need to be extra careful when handling hot things—’

‘That,’ said Firenze calmly, ‘is human nonsense.’

Parvati's hand fell limply to her side.

‘Trivial hurts, tiny human accidents,’ said Firenze, as his hooves thudded over the mossy floor. These are of no more significance than the scurryings of ants to the wide universe, and are unaffected by planetary movements.’

‘Professor Trelawney—’ began Parvati, in a hurt and indignant voice.

‘—is a human,’ said Firenze simply. ‘And is therefore blinkered and fettered by the limitations of your kind.’

Harry turned his head very slightly to look at Parvati. She looked very offended, as did several of the people surrounding her.

‘Sybill Trelawney may have Seen, I do not know,’ continued Firenze, and Harry heard the swishing of his tail again as he walked up and down before them, ‘but she wastes her time, in the main, on the self-flattering nonsense

humans call fortune-telling. I, however, am here to explain the wisdom of centaurs, which is impersonal and impartial. We watch the skies for the great tides of evil or change that are sometimes marked there. It may take ten

years to be sure of what we are seeing.’

Firenze pointed to the red star directly above Harry.