The Warming Potion Incident Chapter one: The Initial Skirmish, a harry potter fanfic

Title: The Warming Potion Incident

Author: Chaos Rose

Rating: Softly R-ish for F/F arse-grabbing, implied patronage of a bordello.

Category: Snape/OC. Humor and a little bit of backstory for 'Through the Longest Watches of the Night.'

Summary: For those who asked: The initial skirmish.

Disclaimer: I'm playing in J.K. Rowling's sandbox.

The Warming Potion Incident

The snow fell quite prettily on Diagon Alley, dusting the shop canopies and streetlights with an ornamental highlighting of white. The windows displayed a wealth of holiday goods from robes that wrapped the wearer in golden light to My First Broom Kits for little children. People hurried from shop to shop, with almost a forced gaiety - who knew what might come with the setting of the sun?

Times were dark. Not as dark as they had been, but the darkness at the edge of the streetlights reminded some all too much of the siege that had been lifted a little over three years ago.

A girl in a red cloak paused under one of the street lamps, pushing her bronze wire-rimmed glasses to a more comfortable position on the bridge of her nose as she peered up at the sign of a shop. Chestnut curls had escaped her combs, and the wind plucked back her hood to play with them. Under the curls was a slightly triangular face with a prominent chin, a full mouth, and a pair of sharp hazel eyes. Her cheeks were pink with cold, as was the end of her nose, but even more annoying to her - her hands were freezing!

Her gloves were in one of the shops she had visited and the warming spell on a pair of stones in the pockets of her cloak had worn off some hours ago. Now as she peered around in the murk, she debated whether heading back to the Stag and Moon. There was still some shopping to do for her school chums, but her hands were so cold that they ached.

"The shops here aren't as nice, anyway," she murmured, shifting her Cache & Carry-It-All on her arm. The entire day's haul was in that bag, and it had been by far the best thing that she had bought. The shopgirl had not been exaggerating when she claimed you could hide a body in there.

Emily Mayborne pulled the hood of her cloak back up and turned to go back to the better-lit part of Diagon Alley when a flood of light, laughter, and scent caught her attention. A particularly merry crowd of shoppers was exiting a storefront across the street, carrying many brightly wrapped packages and singing somewhat off key as they turned up...

Oh, dear. Aunt Meridy would have an eternal snit. "You're only just fourteen, dear! I don't want you exposed to those people and neither would your parents!"

Emily mentally kicked herself for not watching the shop signs. Her aunt had given specific instructions that she was not to go any farther than Miss Chuff's Accessories and Gadget, MacGuffin, and Widgets Books and Rarities; yet, here she was right on the corner of Knockturn Alley.

The shop windows glowed with a more subdued light than their fellows up the street, but sparkled nonetheless. Tiers upon tiers of glass bottles and jars filled the windows, their contents refracting the light in a stained-glass effect upon the sidewalk.

Wondering if it was a new perfumery, Emily darted a nervous look up and down the street before stepping of the curb and hurrying across. Peering in the window, she smiled in utter delight as she read the label on the bottle.

"The very thing!"

But... Knockturn Alley?

The last time she had been in down this far, she had met Lord Malfoy, who had insisted on walking her back to the Stag. He tucked her arm though his, strolling back along the alley with her, stopping occasionally to brush a curl back from her face and comment on what a pretty little thing she was.

She really did not want to meet him again. Not in the dark.

And not when Artemisia Malfoy, his daughter and Emily's friend and year-mate at Hogwarts, had warned her never to be alone with him. Ever.

Peering around one last time - and telling herself that the shop door was on Diagon, not Knockturn, really - she pulled it open and went in.

The shopgirl looked up at the sound of the bell and smiled. "Come on in, miss! Will ye have a cuppa or are ye lookin' for something a lilly bit warmer?"

It was warm in here, and all the reds and pinks made it seem too warm by half. The shopgirl did not seem to mind, though, as she was wearing a dress that bared her shoulders and a significant décolletage. Her brassy blonde hair fell in artistic ringlets seemingly placed as much to draw attention to her chest as to distract from her rather hard face.

"Thank you, but I just came in for the warming potion, please?" Emily pointed at the display table with its tiers of bottles. "Does it moisturize, as well?"

The woman goggled at her for a moment before putting on a smile that reminded her of the uppers about to pull a joke on an ickle firstie.

"Oh, yes, luv! It does wonders!" Coming out from behind the counter, she put her arm around Emily's shoulders in a very familiar manner and herded her to the display. "I reckon you've never felt anything quite like it."

Uncapping one of the bottles, the woman caught Emily's hand and turned it palm up to catch a thick amber drop before rubbing it in expertly. "See, Miss? All tingly, innit? Getting nice and warm for ye?"

Emily cooed as warmth returned to her fingers and the ache faded. "Oh, that feels lovely! The scent is a bit strong..." And it was strong - heavily floral with a musky, smoky undertone to it. Maybe she could thin it out with some sweet oil?

"Oh, it settles a bit, but we have some lovely scents! Look! Here's OmniBerry, and Butterbeer, and Gingerlily, and..."

In the end, Emily wound up with five bottles of Warming Potion in various scents, a jar of Vanilla Cookie Body Butter ("For that narsty winter-dry skin, dearie.") and a few tubes of fruit-flavored Lip Smackers for good measure.

"Now remember, lovey, just rub the potion into the bits you want to keep all warm and tingly." The shopgirl chortled as she rang up Emily's purchases and wrapped the items in red paper. "Have a lovely Christmas!"

Delighted with her warm hands and her purchases, Emily wished the lady a happy Christmas as she closed the shop door behind her.

The glitter and lights of the season faded into a very bitter and stormy January. The winds howled around Hogwarts' many towers like banshees - and there might have been one or two in the mix, at that.

While the dorms, common rooms, public rooms and most of the classrooms were warm, there were some notable exceptions. The main part of Hogwarts had been built during the middle ages, and while it kept out the rain and snow, the hallways were very drafty.

Then there were the dungeons.

Used as classrooms for the more hazardous courses, the dungeons were bitterly cold. Most had some sort of heat source, but for one notable exception.

The Potions master - a man with a mysterious past, a graduate of Hogwarts, and a Slytherin to the core - never had a fire in the grate of either his classroom or office. With long, sleek, black locks and sharp features, Severus Snape swept about the lower levels of Hogwart's, scowling and solitary. If his features were sharp, his tongue was twice that - he honed it on his students from morning to night and used the rough edge to take strips off anyone he caught out after hours.

Those who had his classes in the morning could be seen trooping down the staircases, bundled up as if readying for a trek across Siberia. Those who ended the day with him came up sweating from exposure to the heat of his temper.

This morning, a day when visibility was limited by what the students of had come to call snot storms - 'S'not rain an' s'not snow' - one could easily see one's breath in the dank stone corridors in the foundations of the school.

The weather seemed to match Professor Snape's mood, as well; cold and throwing as much unpleasantness as he possibly could upon those whom had to brave his wrath.

The fourth year Slytherins and Ravenclaws filed in, each wrapped in as many layers as were required to stave off the damp, bone-penetrating chill of Snape's domain. Soft murmurs punctuated by yawns filled the classroom, soon joined by the rustling of scrolls and the thumps of books hitting worktables.

"So how was your holiday?"

"Chasing tree frogs all over Borneo..."

"And then they wouldn't kiss! Stood there for hours..."

"Turned him blue! Hair and all."

"We covered that I think. Let me look at my notes."

"Chocolate-Mint Bombs all over the nursery..."

A tall, willow-slender girl in the green and silver of Slytherin entered the room, her white-blonde hair in a thick, waist-length braid. The murmuring dropped a notch as Artemisia Malfoy took her seat at the third worktable in the front tier. Some contended that the Malfoys must have the blood of high elves somewhere far back in their line and Artemisia gave credence to that rumor - her skin was pale, her grey eyes large, her features delicate enough to suggest fragility.

Nothing could have been further from the truth.

Artemisia LeStrange Malfoy held her position in the Slytherin hierarchy through steely will, a sound sense of alliances and utter ruthlessness. Even seventh-years regarded her with some trepidation.

Opening her book bag, she laid out her parchment and quills, placed the textbook in the holder then promptly stuffed her thin, elegant hands into her armpits and shivered.

Staring resentfully at the empty fire grate, Artemisia considered casting a quick flammus. Cold was one thing she hated above all else and from January to March it was a pretty good guarantee of a bad temper. The corner of her mouth twitched into a scant smile. Most people thought that was her usual temper in any case - why break their precious illusions when they were so useful?

Students were still filing in as she weighed the consequences of the flammus. Snape was Slytherin and (so to speak) a friend of the family - he would never take points from either her or Slytherin, but he might deduct points from Ravenclaw for not stopping her.

If the other House had been Gryffindor, she would not have hesitated a moment. Hufflepuff lost no opportunity to savage Slytherin when it could - only a fool thought that Hufflepuffs were duffers - so even her one friend in that House knew the status quo and could be quite creative.

A brunette with disorderly curls and a too-full book bag banged through the door and made a marginally controlled descent to the first tier. Under her black school robes, she wore the blue and bronze of Ravenclaw - and looked the part with her glasses slightly askew on her nose and her wand poking out of her skirt pocket.

Artemisia smiled outright now, watching her friend, Emily Mayborne. Certainly she looked the very model of a bookish and distracted Ravenclaw, but her wits were sharp and the impression of scarcely controlled chaos was a veneer over a very ordered - if somewhat innocent - mind.

The bag of books hit the floor next to Artemisia's feet, and the brunette began to set up a pewter cauldron in the middle of the worktable.

"I missed you on the train."

"Drake wanted me to himself for a bit, the little snot missed me, so Mummy sent my trunk ahead and broomed me up." Artemisia spoke with deep affection. Drake - more properly, Draco - was her six year-old brother. The adoration was mutual and she spoiled him rotten, though as the Malfoy heir, odds were that the boy would get everything he wanted anyway.

Emily shook her head as she took her seat. "The little snot shows an early aptitude for blackmail, deception, and thievery. When he got my whole box of Peppermint Frogs..."

"He had a stomachache for three days and was so afraid of you after you threatened to kiss him in front of his mates..." She reached out to straighten Emily's glasses and began to tuck the stray curls back into order. Leaning in close, Artemisia took a deep sniff of her friend. Sugar cookies? "Mmm! You smell fresh from the oven, not the bath. What is that?"

"Oh! I found a new cosmetics shop on Diagon when I was doing my holiday shopping! Wait!" The overfull book bag was dumped across the desk and Emily began looking through the debris until she found an oddly shaped bottle, holding it up triumphantly. "Here!"

Artemisia looked at the label. Warming Potion? She'd never heard of the maker, either. "What? Do you have to drink it? Honestly, if it's not in a book you just fly right by! Emmy, if you've been letting people feed you strange potions..."

"Hush, Missy! I'm not that oblivious! It's for keeping your hands warm!"

Artemisia bowed her head in an utterly false show of penance and then threw herself on her friend, slipping her hands under Emily's school robes and grabbing a soft double handful of Emily's fundament. "But, sweeting," she said, brimming with mischief. "I've already got a lovely way to keep my poor hands warm."

Tittering filled the classroom. Artemisia grinned at her friend, then kissed the end of her nose.

Emily gave her a long, exasperated look. "I do realize that, Missy, but I doubt that Snape would ever approve your taking up residence in my robes just to keep warm. Now get your hands off my arse, you wicked creature!"

The room howled with laughter as Artemisia made a pouting show of disentangling herself.

"See? You don't love me! Leaving me to freeze to death in a dungeon!" She mock-swooned onto the desk, wailing. "Me, your dearest friend..."

"Bloody mad Malfoy!" Emily growled. Pulling the stopper out of the bottle she caught a wayward hand, poured out a dollop of the amber liquid into the palm, and rubbed briskly.

Lovely, tingling warm spread through Artemisia's hand and she cooed in pleasure. "Oooh! Emmy!" Wiggling her fingers, she noted that the skin was now flushed a warm shell-pink. It felt heavenly! "Please...?" She held out her other hand, and Emily obligingly rubbed the oil in.

The room was now silent. Artemisia flexed and wiggled her fingers as a strong, floral scent bloomed in the cold air.

"It lasts about an hour." Emily pulled a dropper and vial from her bag, put a little of the potion into it, capped it and handed it to her. "Use this if it starts to wear off."

The whole room stared in astonishment before bursting into a chorus of pleas.

"Can I have a bit, Emmy?"

"Oh, please, Emily! My fingers are always falling off halfway into the lecture?"

"Please, Mayborne? I'll let you ride my new Nimbus! Whenever you want!"

"I don't care how it smells! I'd put my hands in a dragon's arse if it would keep them warm!"

The bottle made the rounds of the room, each user rubbing a little into their hands and taking a bit for later. The students were wiggling their fingers happily and, even as their breath plumed into the air in wispy clouds, all was well with the world.

The door to Professor Snape's office opened and Emily immediately saw that not only had Professor Snape not had a merry Christmas, but a vile New Year's as well. He entered the room like an ill-tempered black cat, his glittering black eyes sweeping the assembled students with disdain.

"I hope that you all found time to study your antidotes over the holidays. As the year goes on it becomes a greater temptation to poison the lot of you." In the midst of his stalk to the lectern, he paused, sniffing the air with a look of absolute offense. "What. Is. That?"

The room was silent.

"What, you idiot children, is that smell?" Snape demanded as he swept from the podium and stalked up to the first tier, nostrils flaring. "It smells like a bloody wh... Miss Proudfoot!

Marcella Proudfoot, a plump, olive-skinned Slytherin in the second tier, nearly fell out of her seat at Snape's bellow. Clutched in her hand was the bottle of potion, which she had tried to surreptitiously slip into her bag. Snape snatched it from her hand as her fingers wilted open.

"Madam Plushbottom's Warming Potion?!" Snape turned on Marcella as the girl looked about to dive under the desk and pull the dustbin over her head. A vein throbbed in his temple as he clenched the bottle in a white-knuckle grip. "Miss Proudfoot, from where did you obtain this... concoction?"

Marcella opened her mouth but was interrupted as Emily leapt to her feet. "It's mine."

Snape was a bully, not to mention rude, nasty, sarcastic, and a general all-purpose bastard - but if his delicate sensibilities had been offended, then let him take it out on her. After all, she had been the one to bring it in.

For a moment, Emily wasn't sure that he had heard her and ignoring Missy's insistent tugging at her skirt, opened her mouth again. "I said..."

"I heard you, Miss Mayborne." Snape's voice took on the silky tone that indicated an incipient skewering as he turned his sharp gaze upon her. "I now ask you the same question that I asked Miss Proudfoot; from where did you obtain this?"

Feeling the trap under her feet, and knowing that there was no escape, Emily opened her mouth to explain and was quite surprised to hear her own voice say, "That, sir, is none of your bloody business."

The collective gasp from the class made the torches flicker.

In a blur of black, he was in front of her and glaring down his aquiline nose. "Would you care to repeat that, little Ravenclaw chick?"

Something boiled to life in her blood, stiffened her knees and spine, and brought her chin up. "I said, 'none of your bloody business.'"

Snape's tone was as intense as a shout, "You will smooth your feathers and your tongue with me, girl! You blithely come into my classroom, bearing a potion of dubious origin, and tell me that it is none of my business?" The dark-clad man's voice was cold rage. "Ten points from Ravenclaw, and another ten if you do not tell me immediately where you obtained this... stuff."

Well, in for a knut - in for a galleon. Perhaps she could get a little of her own back. In a dispassionate voice she asked, "Am I to understand, Professor Snape, that you wish me to tell you where to go?"

"That is my demand, Miss Mayborne."

Emily took her seat and smiled up at her professor. "In that case, sir, straight to hell would do nicely."

Possibly TBC.