SUSPENDED DISBELIEF

Tiptoeing inside the common room at midnight, Hermione quickly found the bag, lying on a table that was already piled high with books. She had selected those very books earlier for Harry and Ron's benefit, and it looked like they'd barely been read. With trembling fingers, she unfastened the straps and dug her hand inside to find rolls of parchment, quills and mounds of unidentifiable rubbish… Typical.

What if it wasn't here?

But no, it had to be. Hadn't she pretended to check Harry's Transfiguration essay yesterday just to ensure herself of its whereabouts, much to Ginny's apparent confusion? Sighing in impatience, she pulled out her wand.

"Accio Potions Book," she whispered.

Advanced Potion Making flew out, smacking her square in the face before dropping onto the floor. Suppressing a cry, she picked it up, and then glanced behind her. No one. A shadow near the stairway might have retracted suddenly, but that must surely be the fire, down to its dying embers.

So this was the book that had dragged Harry from mediocrity to legend. A wave of annoyance threatened to engulf her as she considered Vanishing the book and then feigning innocence when Harry discovered it missing. After a moment, however, it passed, leaving her staring at the cover as though anticipating something… A curse, perhaps? No, Harry would have died long ago if so. As it happened, he'd been able to switch the covers without any consequences whatsoever.

A clever idea, actually. When his newer copy of "Advanced Potion Making" arrived, she had been sure- evidently too sure- that Harry would return the Prince's copy, thus giving her the chance to investigate it in secret. Alas, he had no intention of relinquishing the book, leaving her no option but to rifle through his bag at night like in Muggle detective fiction.

Did this shabby book really matter? Chewing her lip, she glanced round and saw the staircase shadows shift again.

The Prince had produced, according to an ecstatic Slughorn, some of the best results he had ever seen, reminiscent of Harry's mother. Oh yes, every time Harry did so much as read annotations in the margin, he was channelling the brilliance of Lily Evans.

"Oh, alright: it does matter," she said, flicking over the front cover in impatience.

True to form, every page was covered in scrawls, crossings out, directions, diagrams… Even some allegedly invented spells that surely weren't worth consideration- at least not until she had ensured they were legal first. Unlike Harry, she always checked with the official authorities when confronted with new magical knowledge. If Borage hadn't written it, then she had no business indulging the Prince's creative whims.

She rolled her eyes, riffling through another couple of pages so invaded by spidery handwriting that in the weak light everything just melted into one black square. Rubbing her eyes, she realized she had been staring at the same words, "sliced garden sorrel" for a while. Apparently the Prince thought little of using powdered mint leaf and had crossed out several lines altogether. She might have scoffed at his arrogance, had not Slughorn praised Harry to the heavens yesterday for thinking of sliced garden sorrel and rewarding him once again with top marks.

Brushing aside a whole chunk of pages now, she found nothing more of note. The same arrogance, the same sarcasm. On a page about Amortentia, the Prince had crossed out almost all the instructions and scrawled "Love is useless enough already without trying to fabricate it."

Hermione raised an eyebrow. Well… love potions did more damage than good in her view, if what she had read in "101 Greatest Fatalities in the Magicking World" was reliable. Insanity, rage, loss of reputation, the like. Nodding reluctantly, she turned the page, now paying closer attention.

"Love is useless enough already…" Something about the tone- so bitter, so forlorn- nagged at her mind a moment. No, it didn't matter. Instead, she noticed another annotation to a Potion that would alleviate flying sickness. "Do not give to arrogant Quidditch superstars who think they own the universe."

And then Hermione smiled.

Forgetting her previous scepticism, she sat down in a chair close to the fire. How on earth did he know how many times to stir, or when to change direction? Just keeping up with the added instructions made her feel dizzy. Ah, so frogspawn was invaluable for gelatinous potions. Well yes… that did make sense. Funny that Borage didn't include it, but perhaps he simply overlooked this. However, the Prince wasn't so forgiving, scribbling "How could he forget frogspawn?!" in the margin.

Turning back another couple of pages with renewed interest, she lost sight of time altogether. Only when the last glowing ember fizzled out, plunging the room into near darkness, did she glance up.

"Lumos." She then bewitched the wand to stay suspended in mid-air, casting an eerie glow like a halo over the book.

And then she returned to the Prince. For once, Hermione felt completely immersed inside another world, rather than absorbing the book page by page, as was her usual method. Every pen stroke seemed superior to Borage's instructions and she struggled to keep abreast of his notes.

Or her notes. Just because Harry insisted otherwise didn't make the assumption of masculinity true- particularly when he barely set foot in the library outside of schoolwork and trying to broker peace between her and Ron.

Come to think of it…

Hermione gasped, staring at the shadowy wall in front of her. Suppose… Yes, it all made sense: the Prince's skill, Slughorn's constant praise, the direct line between mother and son… Harry had assumed that his father owned the book, but what if it had belonged in fact to his mother ? Wouldn't that explain why Slughorn burst into eulogies for Lily Potter every lesson, and connected Harry's alleged success to her without a second thought? Yes, suppose Harry's mother, well-liked by Slughorn for her natural ability in Potions had authored this book. Smiling to herself, Hermione continued to read, her resentment abating somewhat.

But after a few moments, her smile faded. Why would Lily Potter call herself a Prince? And had she been a Half-Blood?

Drumming her fingers against the pages, she realized that other things, subtler things stood out whilst reading. Much as she hated to admit it, the nickname sounded too masculine. As much as she loved books, she could not imagine calling herself "The Muggle-born Prince" without cringing. No, this name belonged to someone infatuated with their own genius and power. Unless of course, Lily had been incredibly idealistic… Or it was another girl with no such embarrassment… Yes, it could still be a girl.

She found herself reading about antidotes a while later, nodding as she recognized Golpalott's Third Law. Good, solid theory; the Prince hadn't made any presumptuous additions there. Frogspawn and sorrel might be debatable, but not basic arithmancy. Smiling in approval, she was just leafing through a list of antidotes when a single sentence caught her eye.

"Just shove a bezoar down their throats."

By now, Hermione did not expect to sleep without having taken copious notes. Given the mounting danger surrounding Hogwarts, an encyclopedic knowledge of antidotes would be invaluable.

On the verge of summoning parchment, quill and ink, she frowned.

Bezoars. She had read of them, of course, but had also heard someone mention them. Who had- ah yes, Professor Snape, right in their first ever Potions lesson, where he had belittled and humiliated Harry for no reason whatsoever.

And then she remembered what had struck her before when reading; the Prince's sarcasm. It had sounded familiar. Now, where had she seen it? Riffling through the pages with more impatience than attentiveness, she wasn't at all surprised to reach the back page without having found anything noteworthy.

On the inside back cover, she reread the inscription that had sparked her curiosity weeks before. "This Book is the Property of the Half-Blood Prince."

A shiver ran down her spine and she snapped the book shut.

Whatever had struck her could wait. Yes, the Prince might have been intelligent, might have opened her mind somewhat, might have some good advice… but she didn't know him. What if he was… You-Know-Who?

Then again, You-Know-Who protected his own belongings with curses. The Basilisk, Tom Riddle's diary... Besides, there was a marked lack of spite in any of the Prince's additions- putting the editorializing aside, she had detected hints of melancholy, if she dared make so bold an assumption. She knew, at least, that he didn't believe in love from his dismissal of Amortentia.

Against her better judgement, she opened the book again, deciding not to write anything down until after further investigation.

And that was how she found Levicorpus .

Should she just…? No. Absolutely not. What kind of person spent their time devising such spells, anyway? If not for the fact that she obeyed rules, if not for the fact that she was a Prefect of all people, she had no business indulging the spiteful whims of this so-called Prince- boy or girl. Besides, the spell seemed to have no reversal… She flicked through some more pages, determined to prove herself right.

But then she found Liberacorpus.

Surely this was nothing but a prank, with Harry and Ron only exaggerating to irritate her? In which case, the best way to crush her aching curiosity was simply to try it out, satisfy herself that the Prince's warped sense of humour held no merit whatsoever and then return to bed.

Mind made up, she stared at her arms.

Levicorpus.

And she was sitting, still.

In mid-air.

Harry's Potions book dropped off her lap, landing on the floor with a dull thunk. Hermione gasped, staring all around her in a mixture of fascination and fear.

It could not have worked. Trembling hands reached out, only grasping at thin air. Her body was entirely rigid, as though shackled by chains. This was… Well, there was no explanation. She, Hermione Granger, was clueless, and could only thank fortune that no one else had witnessed this moment. If Harry had known, he would have revelled in her astonishment. That being said, should she tell anyone? The library beckoned to her, but this spell hadn't been invented by the approved list of curriculum authors.

Liberacorpus.

She landed on the floor in a heap and couldn't withhold a cry of pain. But after waiting to see if any other Gryffindor had heard the noise, and hearing only silence, her grimace melted into a grudging smile. Standing up, she gripped the armrests and nearby table as though requiring proof of her return to ground. Amazing.

Should she admire the Prince, or recoil in fear? Neither a yes or no seemed satisfactory in this context. Picking up the book, she flicked through to the inside back cover, rereading the inscription as a fresh idea formed in her mind.

Harry would be furious. Worse, he might stop speaking to her, and his reaction would be entirely justified. The safest option would be to simply return the book (she couldn't bring herself to acknowledge it as his) and go back to sleep, a wiser and astonished girl. But then what of the Prince, the mystery, the knowledge that flowed from his fingertips with ease as though it were predestined, and he simply a vessel containing it? And Harry himself was desperate for answers, though doing remarkably little to find them. Yes, in investigating, she would be doing Harry a favour.

Without awaiting an answer, she grabbed her wand, extinguished the light, and tapped it against the book. An exact copy appeared with a quiet pop and an excess of sparks. Whoever invented that Charm had a good sense of humour.

There was another rustle from somewhere in the room.

"Lumos." The wand flew out of her hand again and floated in mid-air, illuminating both books and nothing else. Shaking her head, she returned to the books. No matter how many fearsome adventures she had faced, nothing quite unnerved her as sounds in the dark.

She turned over the inside front covers. On the original, sitting on her right, she saw the name "Roonil Wazlib" scrawled there. Snorting, she pointed her wand at the same space in her duplicate copy and the words "Wazlib Roonil" appeared. Now she would know the difference- probably an unnecessary precaution, but worth taking all the same. She couldn't help smiling at her mastery of Duplication Spells. Professor McGonagall had hinted that these might be in next week's lesson, and Hermione could already hear "ten points for Gryffindor, Miss Granger" from afar.

Standing up, she yawned and dumped both books on the floor in a pile. What time was it? Three? She had double period Arithmancy at nine… With a renewed sense of urgency, Hermione shoved Harry's possessions back into his bag, forgetting their previous order. Oh, well. Harry rarely ever cleaned out either his bag nor his trunk and wouldn't sense anything amiss. Fatigue made her hands clumsy as she tried fastening the straps again. Why was the bag so light?

"Oh!" Hermione turned to see both Potions books on the floor behind her. Grabbing one, she shoved it back into Harry's bag, right at the top. By now, she could barely keep her eyes open, grabbing the other book and her wand, and stumbling back towards the girl's dormitories. Double Arithmancy tomorrow. No, today. And after that, Double Defence Against The Dark Arts…

She stood still, halfway through another yawn. Suppose she asked Professor Snape about this book? After all, he knew about non-verbal spells, had been former Potions master, had a marvellous contempt for anything sentimental… Best not to give him too many details about the book itself, in case he confiscated it, but wasn't it worth a try? Since the Professor possessed an all-consuming love for the Dark Arts, it made sense that he might understand the kind of mind which delighted in suspending people mid-air. And despite Snape's frequent attempts to belittle her, if she came armed with politeness and patience (both skills Harry lacked when confronted with Snape), she might get some answers.

Nodding, she traipsed towards the staircase. And then something stopped her again.

Harry really would burst into flames if he discovered that not only had she gone through his possessions and stolen his book in effect, but also planned to discuss its contents with his nemesis. Now, in the early hours of the morning when Hogwarts slept, she had a chance to avoid any impending fallout. Glancing back at his bag, which she had left on the chair, she chewed her lip. Perhaps she could make some atonement without him even noticing, like assisting with his essays. McGonagall had given them a paper on three-point transfiguration and she appeared to be the only one who had finished it in advance. Harry would, of course, be grateful for her assistance, and he need never know that she had a copy of his book.

Then again, why was she doing this? Curiosity? Or maybe it was intrigue. After all, Slughorn had never derided her ability in Potions, even in the spare moments he had for the rest of his class. He had never questioned her status as a student even though Harry received better results. Did she really need to go through all this subterfuge just to satisfy herself? No, to satisfy Harry . When he found out that she had discovered the Prince's identity (hopefully having found incontrovertible evidence that this Prince, no matter the quirks, was a girl), he would never condemn her meddling.

But you couldn't call it meddling when it was for the common good, right? Even if the common good happened to coincide with-

-She heard a noise upstairs.

Someone was stirring. Shaking her head, she fled back up to her dormitory, stuffed the book under her pillow and collapsed into bed, her heart pounding. Sleep claimed her within minutes, her mind filled with potions ingredients, ink and the faintest whisper of Dark Arts.

She didn't see Ginny lying wide awake in bed wearing her dressing gown.

Moreover, she didn't realize her copy of Advanced Potion Making said "Roonil Wazlib" on the inside front cover.