The silver ladle swished around the contents of the cauldron with only a trace of resistance to mar its passage. A soft and slightly visible fume exuded from the potion. The girl pursed her lips carefully as she gave the ladle three more turns around the simmering liquid before allowing a smile to flash upon her lips for an instant. The consistency had developed nicely, and she could detect a faint whiff of the shredded newt legs.

Her eyes quickly skimmed the open page in front of her.

200 grams of fennel root.

Lily's hand automatically reached for the spot where the root had been sitting awaiting its destruction only a moment ago. Her hand found nothing. Confused, Lily's attention was diverted from the wafting fumes as she frantically scanned her work desk, searching under and around books and other ingredients.

"10 minutes until judgement time!" Slughorn's ever-jovial voice boomed around the dungeon.

Lily swore under her breath, now bent low rummaging through her ingredients store, searching for a spare root. No luck.

A loud squelching sound came from above her head, causing her to immediately pop her head above the desk and stare, with a sinking heart and a rising panic, into the cauldron, the contents of which had now turned purple and was bubbling dangerously. Lily grabbed the ladle once more and began to frantically zoom it around the cauldron in a fruitless attempt to reverse the effects of over simmering.

Across the room, a pudgy boy leant on a bench staring wide-eyed and gaping mouthed at the boy next to him. In contrast to Peter's own, long forgotten, sickly green coloured potion, the potion his friend was casually stirring was coming along nicely.

Laying down the ladle, he took a long, exaggerated sniff of the fumes, wafting them towards his nose with his hand. He grinned and his hand pushed the dark hair that had been falling across his forehead upwards before he reached for the root that was now sitting on his work desk.

His companion's gape, if possible, widened. "But I thought you were out of fennel root?"

Another grin flashed the dark haired boy's face. "Was, my charming friend, was out of fennel root." He dropped the root into the cauldron and began to stir in zigzagged patterns. "'Was' being the key word there." He added with a sly grin.

"Time is nearly up!"

With one last decisive sniff of his potion, the boy surreptitiously pulled a silver flask from his bag and filled it with the potion that was now omitting a very faint glow.

"And ladles down!"

Slughorn beamed around the room, apparently expecting more than the dishevelled faces appeared to be offering. Peering into the cauldrons of those around him, the dark haired boy could not see any reason for the professor's optimism. There was a variety of different coloured liquids omitting unpleasant smells, however, very few looked remotely similar to the description given of a correctly brewed euphoria potion in their books. Especially not the vile smelling purple substance that was bubbling over the rim of the cauldron Slughorn was disdainfully inspecting. The frantic student beside him tried desperately to explain that it had been going perfectly until some of her ingredients had disappeared.

The boy turned as a parchment bird rammed into the back of his head, sweeping out of reach of his hands, did a somersault, then returned for a second attack. He caught it mid-flight and unfolded it beneath the desk.

A single word was written on the crinkled page in messy, loopy writing.

'Well?'

He looked over to where his dreadlocked friend was sitting looking expectantly at him, wand still dangling in his fingers.

Seizing his quill, he grinned back and wrote the words 'It's perfect' on the parchment before sending it back with a flick of his wand and a muttered incantation.

Avoiding the attempt to dive bomb his dreadlocks, his friend caught the bird on it's upward swing and unfolded it. His face broke out into a mischievous smile and his eyes flashed.

Next to him, he heard Peter whimper as Slughorn peered cautiously into his cauldron and withdrew hurriedly in a fit of coughs. When he had sufficiently recovered, he turned to face James with a slightly less optimistic look on his face than when he had first surveyed the array of cauldrons.

"Let's see, Potter," he said, taking up the ladle and stirring the liquid. "Will you be the one to turn this class around? …Well, I say! This is quite an attempt!" He lifted the ladle to his nose. "Perhaps a little stronger than I would have liked…" He took another sniff and let out an involuntary giggle that he attempted to cover with a cough. "Yes, perhaps a lot stronger… I suspect the drinker of this potion would be er… quite content for quite a long time."

The boy put on his best sheepish face, but snuck a grin at his dreadlocked friend when Slughorn's attention was off him once more.

"Well class," Slughorn boomed, his words echoing slightly around the stone walls. "I do believe we have found a winner in Mr Potter! The Bicorn horn is yours!" He said as he presented a rather yellowish, tusk-like object to James. "An excellent addition to any advanced wizard's store, or simply a pleasing artefact. Quite an interesting story behind these horns, actually, just received a crate from my good friend Gerald Finch-Fletch–"

The sharp ringing of the bell saved the class from an irksome story about tusks, and inevitably, the man who gave Slughorn the tusks.

The noise of cauldrons being drained and ingredients bring packed up filled the room. James made to go, sweeping the contents of his worktable into his bag with his wand.

"Good work today, Potter, very good work indeed." Slughorn said to James as he magically drained his cauldron.

"Thanks, Professor. That means a lot." He said in what sounded like a sincere voice, pulling his bag onto his back and mentally calculating the best possible route out of the dungeon that would most subtly avoid him being drawn into a conversation.

"Of course, it's hardly surprising, though is it? Generations of great wizards in your family of course, and witches too of course. Naturally I knew your father when I was at school… Much talent there, much talent. All goes to show, doesn't it? Good blood and all…"

"Oh look, Professor! My friend Peter's bag's just split!" James interrupted suddenly, hastily hiding his wand in his sleeve. "I'd better go help him. Thanks for the er… tusk-thing." He said as he bounded across the dungeon to where Peter was standing looking shocked at his bad luck.

James quickly repaired the bag. "Sorry about that, chap. Slughorn was starting another rant."

"You… did that?" Peter looked from his bag to James and back again.

"Had to. Matter of self-preservation. It was either that or set fire to my boots, and these are real dragon hide. Come on."

Hastily exiting the dungeon he quickly spotted Sirius further down the corridor and caught up with him, clapping him on the back.

"Sirius, my man, mission accomplished." He said, absentmindedly passing him the horn and pulling out the silver flask he had filled during Potions, waving it under Sirius' nose. "How lucky you are that you are so blessed in your choice of friends that they are so witty, talented, quick thinking and resourceful enough so as to accomplish the arrangement of tasks that so ensure our constant schedule of … mayhem making."

Sirius raised an eyebrow and shook his head disbelievingly, making his dreadlocks dangle. "Resourceful? Quick-witted? My dear James, you cooked up a potion, you didn't invade a small country."

"Yeah, but he still had to come up with the fennel root." Piped up Peter, coming up behind them.

Sirius raised his eyebrows.

"That's right, Sirius. Things were looking extremely bleak for a moment. The potion was congealing nicely , twice the usual amount of grasshoppers' legs had been added, but alas, there was no root of fennel to be found!" He cried dramatically. "Luckily, yours truly is not one to be easily defeated. He spotted a vacant root on a nearby desk and one simple 'accio' later he had a terrific potion that's guaranteed to make even McGonagall dance around the great hall."

Sirius grinned and gave an exaggerated clap of his hands. "We'll have to see about that last part. In the mean time, if you're done bragging, would you mind very much if we hurried along to the Great Hall?"

James smiled. "But of course."

His smile dropped as a red headed girl shoved roughly past him. "Hey!" He called out angrily, but the girl disappeared behind a corner without turning. "Well that's nice." He said to the others.

"Well, from behind anyway." Sirius said with a sly grin. He pulled aside a tapestry and motioned towards it. "Come along, children."