'Scourgify!'

Manuél cast the cleaning spell on the bed for the fourteenth time in as many minutes. It didn’t do anything this time, either. There was nothing left for it to physically clean.

Manuél clicked his tongue at the bed, irritably. He had known it would be difficult moving into the office which had last been occupied by a Death Eater. He had accepted it– he hardly felt that he could call in any favours and move his office anywhere else, considering how much of a risk the Hogwarts staff had taken in hiring him. He shuddered as he imagined how controversial it would be to parents everywhere that a renowned former Death Eater would be teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts.

And today, moving into his new home, he had been doing well. He had removed all the implements of torture that Amycus Carrow had set up in the room. He had updated the plaque on the door to read Professor Manuél, Defence Against the Dark Arts. He had even magically painted over the black walls in light blue. In short, he had done everything he could to make it look, if not like home, then at least comparatively pleasant.

But the inherited bed, which had had so many cleaning spells cast on it that there couldn’t be an iota of it that wasn’t wholly sterile... this bed just felt dirty.

Perhaps it was that the evil little fat man had slept in it every night for the whole year, Manuél mused. Maybe there was still some imprint of his sadistic self on the great eight-poster bed. Perhaps – and this was more likely, come to think of it – perhaps it was merely that this bed had been used by Professor Quirrell all those years ago when he was possessed by Lord Voldemort himself. Either way, there was no way Manuél would be able to sleep in it.

He sighed as he vanished the bed. He would just have to order a new one when he got his first pay-cheque from Hogwarts. At least he could sleep in his rented room at the Hog’s Head until then.

Still, he had come here today to make the room more habitable, and he had done so, however minimally. He shrugged, summoned a bottle of Butterbeer from the bag he had brought with him, and took a satisfied swig from it.