Professor Joan Watson

Joan is currently a Professor of Advanced Combat Magic at Hogwarts.
== Biography ==
=== Early Years ===
Born March 30th, 1974 to a muggle-born father and pure-blood mother in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
=== Academic Career ===
Enrolled in Hogwarts 1985, she was almost immediately sorted into Gryffindor within a second of the hat touching her head. It wasn't until the spring of her first year that she met Paul Wickham, a quiet third-year Hufflepuff who guided her back after she was accidentally lost in a restricted wing of the castle. 
Joan was a good student but her talents truely showed through once she had joined the duelling club, becoming a fierce duellist and often known for her vicious offensive style. She later graduated in 1992.
=== Post-Schooling ===
After graduation, she joined an exclusive team for sport duellists and ranked one of the top-ten in the world before she left the sport to become an Auror with Paul when there was a rise in Voldermort-supporters. 
=== Auror Career ===
Joan and Paul worked well together as a pair. They had an uncanny knack of knowing where the other was at all time and it had been commented that their fighting style was immensely fluid. They had been part of the Anti-Deatheater task force, something that later brought them to the Battle of Hogwarts in 1998. That battle would be their last together as Paul was gravely injured and lost his leg. The ministry later retired him from the department and he left the magical world. 
Quietly heart-broken but her skills still very much needed, Joan continued on as an Auror. Talented in her own right, she was sent on numerous highly-dangerous assignments over the years, often with those she mentored in-tow. Joan was often described as determined, fearless, and eager to face danger head-on by peers and mentees. 
What ultimately ended her twenty-year career was an injury in the field that rendered her left arm permanently damaged from shoulder to elbow while on assignment in December of 2013. As she was left-hand dominant, this made it difficult for her to cast and she was forcibly retired from the Ministry in early 2014.
=== Teaching Career ===
Seeing an opportunity for her particular skill set, Joan was hired on as a special-topics professor at Hogwarts in the Fall of 2014. What initially started as a short lecture series became a full-blown course for sixth and seventh-years who were pursuing the desire to become Aurors. It was during this time that she befriended Abigail "Abby" Hill , a fellow professor and they became close friends.
== Current Timeline ==
Joan returned in the fall of 2019 once again to teach after a summer sabbatical to further develop her curriculum. It was then that she learned her closest friend, Paul Wickham would be a fellow instructor. Their friendship rekindled and turned to something much deeper.
=== Hogwarts Evacuation (#hogwartsevacuation) ===
Joan played a minor role in aiding the evacuation, partnering with other professors and acting as tactical point to lead the group safely to The Forgotten Camp in the woods. From there she fought Death Eaters to return to the castle, receiving minor injuries. When Paul saw these injuries, he was distressed and while healing Joan, confessed his love for her.
=== Hogwarts Nightmare (#hogwartsnightmare) ===
Around the same time that Paul and Joan returned to Hogwarts, various professors, including the pair began to be plagued with nightmares from a mysterious being. At first it was shrugged off by the individuals before they realized that they had them in common. The group collectively became known as "The Sleepless", it was during this time they began to discover more about what this Nightmare was. Joan, in conjunction with Abby summoned a shield on the Astral plane to protect The Sleepless but unknowingly this trapped some professors on the Astral plane.
It was later confirmed to the group by Joan that the nightmare was seeking reincarnation. Privately, she revealed to Paul that she was starting to remember past lives. In these memories, the Nightmare (revealed to be a woman named Wylena) was an adversary and was there to target Joan. Unknowingly, Wylena inhabited the body of Professor Hawkwaithe.
Hogwarts Masquerade (#hpmasquerade)
(Occurs during the timeline of #hogwartsnightmare). Newly in a relationship, Joan and Paul attend the Masquerade together as Persephone and Hades. It was there that Paul proposed to Joan, fearful that it would be his only chance to do so with the ever-present chaos of Hogwarts. This was somewhat prophetic as he was later taken by Wylena. Their chance to celebrate was cut short as Malekif attacked the masquerade and Joan, along with several others stepped in to fight, sending Paul to help support in healing.
After the Masquerade, things escalated. Wylena found Joan and delivered the message that Paul had been taken to the Astral plane. Joan and Wylena fought, and while it came out even, Joan sustained severe injuries. Professor Nova tended to her, and it was then that Joan revealed her past lives that intertwined she and Wylena. She revealed that they had been among the first magic users, originally a friendly rivalry, turned sour as Wylena was corrupted by her magic that ultimately resulted in the earliest known killing curse, used against Joan. It started a spiraling fate of reincarnations finding and killing one another until Wylena ultimately had become trapped on the Astral plane.
After Joan was rested and tended to by Nova and later healed some by Professor Avellan, they joined with Professor Fyfe and the other members of the team tasked to rescue Paul. Using a tracking spell, they found Paul in the Forbidden Forest, All wasn't as it should be...and Wylena, previously ejected from Hawkwaithe's body was now occupying Paul's empty form.
Wylena (In Paul's body) and Joan fought, seriously injuring Joan and others. The Origin eventually came to Wylena, deciding the corrupted witch had gone too far, ripping her magic and thus, Wylena herself from Paul's form, taking his magic with him. 
=== Recently ===
With Wylena defeated, Joan and Paul navigated their relationship in a time of peace, they opted not attend the Yule Ball but Joan spearheaded the Professor's Hogsmead Pub Crawl. Without active threats, Joan was allowed to reconnect with former Auror-protege and fellow professor, Marco Pearce. Friendship grew between him and the couple which lead to Pearce returning Joan and Paul's Auror Identification Cards. While it had encouraged the latter to take a stand in the budding plot with infamous Archer Diggory, Joan found having the card dredging up a more emotional experience. 
Paul later sought out Pearce and inquired as to what had happened to Joan that forced her out of the Ministry. Pearce revealed that Joan had been hit with a killing curse, it had almost cost the auror her arm at the moment but also lead to the curse festering instead of killing her outright, the pendant she wears tempers the curse but it cannot be removed or the curse may take her life. 
Secrets revealed for the couple, they forged stronger than ever and in a quiet, tiny ceremony, they married in front of a small group of friends.
== Skills ==
Joan Watson is an accomplished duelist and combatant. While she was known mostly for her aggressive offence-heavy style, during her time as an Auror she developed a method for chaining offence and defensive spells together to increase speed and reduce casting time Despite now being forced to use her off-hand as primary casting, she is still a force to be reckoned with. 
Thus far she has created one spell:
* Protego Sentiaculeus The "Bramble Wall" or "Stinging Shield", a defensive spell that when attacked, will reflect intense, painful energy back to the assailant. It was often used by Joan to widdle down a target's resolve to take them in peacefully. Due to the nature of this spell, it requires sustained focus and energy and is not used as a long-term protective shield spell.
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