Story Notes: Sequel, sort of, to Never the Twain Should Meet. I believe they both can stand alone. Again not too much info on the world of HP, mainly because I'm not that familiar with it.
A/N: I just couldn't leave it alone. Some of my reviewers were horrified that I'd imply a Buffy/Snape pairing. Well, I ain't just implying now. ;) Completely unbetaed, as usual. Apologies to all for any grammatical errors or just plain wrongness. Feedback is always appreciated.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Not gonna be mine. Not making a profit here either.
Dawn peered nervously around the room, before turning to her new friend. "This is bad."
The red-head hunched into herself and mumbled; she'd thought it was a bad idea from the start.
"We'll have to tell Willow what we did so she can fix it. Anyone could've picked up those glasses."
"What you did," Ginny said mutinously.
"Well, I wouldn't have had to do anything if your brother wasn't an idiot," Dawn insisted.
Ginny considered family solidarity for only a moment before nodding. "He is being a big girl's blouse. You didn't have to do anything about it, however."
Dawn turned away to scan the hall one more time, hoping fruitlessly that she would finally be able to see a visible effect of her spell. "I was helping," she said absently, standing on tiptoes and turning left, then right, then left again.
"Oh, thanks ever so," Ginny said sarcastically. "I'm sure Ron could have messed this up on his own."
"I haven't messed it up- for Ron anyway."
Dawn's eyebrows remained delicately arched and perfectly plucked, despite the hexing heat of Ginny's glare. "Unless Hermione got one of those glasses and Ron didn't; unless Ron got one and Hermione didn't."
A strangled meep and renewed rubbernecking was Dawn's only response.
A bout of frantic eye contact with Willow ten minutes later caused the young woman to break off her furious herbal debate with one of the professors and start frantically pushing her way through the crowded room.
"Dawn Summers, what did you do?" Willow demanded when she reached the girls standing at the edge of the crush.
A wave of blushing pink clashed terribly with innocent-as-a-lamb eyes. "I didn't do anything," Dawn insisted automatically before grunting and lurching to the side with the force of Ginny's sharp elbow to her ribs.
"I know that look, that's the 'I don't want to get in trouble but I did something I shouldn't and it's all gone mushroom cloud-shaped and now I don't know what to do' look. And you gave it to me so it's either really bad and the others would ground until you're eighty or it's magical."
"Or it's both," Ginny chimed in helpfully. "Dawn brewed a love potion, and then she lost it. Someone's sure to have drunk it by now."
Willow flushed, paled, grabbed her throat and then started hyperventilating- which is right about the time Xander came rushing up to smack her between the shoulder blades. He looked around wildly, finally focusing on the two pale-faced girls standing in front of his best friend.
"What happened? What's she choking on? Do you know CPR?" He shook his head. "Never mind, I know CPR. Saved Buffy with it. Took a class in it. Oh God, I think my certification has expired." He speared the girls with a glare. "Don't tell anyone. I'll renew it later."
Willow came back from her panic attack to find herself on the floor half in Xander's lap with his lips being entirely too friendly with hers and did the only thing she could think of under the circumstances. The piercing scream that echoed through the hall stopped conversations and created a new interest in the corner Ginny and Dawn were trying desperately to hide from prying eyes.
"You bit me!"
Willow flushed and stood, brushing herself off. "You had your lips on me! And that doesn't really matter 'cause we are in soooo much trouble and hey, Xander, wanna know what Dawn did?" Willow asked sweetly.
Bewilderment evident -and privately wondering if the finger cakes had been a little 'funny' because things were getting a whole lotta weird- Xander said slowly, "Oookay."
"Dawn brewed a love potion and let it loose in the room."
The three women watched in fascination as Xander paled, flushed, paled again, started sweating, grabbed his chest and backed slowly into the wall. His eye bulged out and started rolling in its socket. A tic developed in his right cheek and moved down into his neck, across his shoulder, down his arm and into his hand which clenched and unclenched convulsively.
"What's wrong with him?" Ginny whispered.
"Xander knows what happens when you mess with love spells."
"Badness," he moaned, "and axes."
"It wasn't really a love spell," Dawn hedged. "It was just a potion to make R- uh, two people see all the good qualities in each other."
"That's not too bad," Willow allowed.
"Wait for it." Xander sighed fatalistically, still leaning against the wall. "We are talking about Dawn here."
Ginny shared a commiserate look with the seasoned Watcher.
"Well, there might also have been a spell on the potion and it might have made the potion increase in strength from the time it was taken until the, um, two people declared their, uh, secret feelings for each other."
"What does that mean?"
"Which part?"
"Dawn!"
The sharpness in Xander's voice startled her into tears. "I was j-just trying to he-he-help," she wailed.
"Do you have a copy of the spell and potion you used?"
"I've got it." Ginny pulled a square of paper from her robes and handed it to Willow. "This is every ingredient we used and how we used it and every word we said."
"At least one of you has more sense than the Goddess gave a dill weed."
"And again I say, wait for it."
Brow furrowed in concentration, lips barely moving, Willow read. "Protective Circle…chant to the four directions and the four elements…good…rose quartz, copper, lavender oil, beeswax candle…open wide, open hearts, open minds/ open wide, open to see, open to feel/ open wide, open chains, unbound…triangle of red candles, empty cup in the center, hibiscus flowers, ground ginger…let them drink and drink and drink deeper still, an ocean to quench their thirst…Oh dear Goddess, that doesn't sound good…Ylang Ylang oil, rainwater, fennel, pure tallow candle…grant them pleasure upon pleasure, free from question or doubt…blow out the tallow candle, blow out the red candles, blow out the beeswax candle…" Willow looked up at Ginny and Dawn with dazed eyes. "Do you know what you've done? This is a Banishing of Inhibitions potion, an Increasing Desire spell and an Uncover Hidden Desires spell. You've brewed a Cup of Lust! Of all the irresponsible- at least you only did one cup."
"Think again, Wills."
Dawn sniffled into her chest and hiccupped guiltily. Ginny sidled up to Xander's side. "Are you a seer?"
Xander flinched and sighed. "No, I just know Dawn."
"I had everything under control until Faith came along," Dawn insisted.
"Well, what the hell'd I do now? Hey, you guys having a meeting without me or something?"
The little group whirled around, all but Xander who just closed his eyes and thought really hard about how he could be sitting at home right about now eating Cheetos and watching something on TV that he'd forget thirty seconds after it hit his rapidly numbing brain instead of finding himself smack dab in the middle of another situation that had all the earmarks of doing a major FUBAR.
Dawn crossed her arms and pouted. "You took my drinks tray."
Faith wormed her way into the group in the corner, smacking Xander with a softly rounded elbow of steel. "So? I was helping."
"Famous last words," Ginny drawled.
Xander suddenly felt really old and really tired. "No," he said to Faith, keeping her firmly in his blindside, "you were trying to get Hagrid to talk to you."
A wicked smile crawled across Faith's mouth. "Strictly research. Heard the man's supposed to have 'magic hands.' Thought it'd be worth looking into."
Twin waves of red swept across Willow's and Dawn's faces.
Ginny just looked confused. "But that's only with animals and you guys don't do animals, right?"
Three different hands all came slapping across Faith's mouth at the same time.
"What did you do with the drinks, Faith? Dawn, Xander, let her talk."
"Well, H an' the head dude were talking an' I came up and then the head dude took the tray and me an' H took our drinks and the old guy went off to talk to," Faith's eyes rolled up as she thought a second, "Xander an' B."
"The Headmaster gave Buffy the tray," Xander said with slowly mounting horror, "and he took a drink and gave one to me and asked Buffy to take the tray to…crap, somebody, I didn't catch it, but I do know he also told Buffy to give someone a note."
"Giles," Willow stated. "He gave Buffy a note for Giles. Giles asked me to go upstairs and get one of his books. I don't know what happened to Buffy after I left, but Giles and Dumbledore were talking alone when I came back down."
As one the group of young people speared across the hall, uncaring of the consternation of the other partygoers as they barreled their way through to Giles. One look at the unhappy faces of four of the people heading over to him and Giles knew that one of them had managed to fall into something. It wasn't entirely unexpected, it was even one of the reasons they were invited to the school to begin with. Things had a way of turning in unforeseen directions wherever any of the Sunnydale group went. The effect was only magnified the more of them that were brought together. They also had a very high success rate and a very low body count considering the work they did. Giles was certain their propensity for supernatural trouble had something to do with the time spent on and in the Hellmouth. There was really no way to prove that but the shear mountain of circumstantial evidence would be enough to have a saint hanged. And it looked as if another piece of that evidence was heading towards him at a remarkably fast clip.
Dawn put on a final burst of speed and reached Giles just ahead of the others. She immediately launched into her version of the tale- stressing the apparently extremely important distinction between lust and love.
Giles sighed heavily. Presumably Dumbledore would be pleased; they were certainly shaking things up. "Are you certain that the last two glasses held the spells? None of the rest of you are feeling any differently?"
The group looked around at each other. Heads shook and shoulders shrugged.
"You will all stay here while I will attempt to find the Headmaster." Pivoting around on his heels, Giles came spectacles to spectacles with the object of his very short search.
"I say, you are a quick one aren't you, Rupert? Got me in one, didn't you?" Dumbledore smiled and rummaged around in his robes, finally pulling out a handful of black tar that had been rolled into long strings. "Licorice whips anyone?"
"No, thank you, Headmaster. Have you seen Buffy this evening? There seems to be a bit of a situation."
The Headmaster nodded his head genially. "Of course. The last time I saw Miss Summers- lovely girl by the way Rupert, very bright- she was chatting with my Potions Professor. I believe I sent them both to the dungeons for that scroll I told you about." Dumbledore's eyes twinkled as he smiled. "I haven't seen them since, but I can't think there is anything to worry about. Professor Snape is a very handy wizard with his wand."
"Oh Goddess," Willow whispered.
Xander moaned, cradling his head in his hands. "There is no way this will end well."
A/N #2: I did quite a bit of research on different love and lust spells and then just took what I liked and twisted it. The pieces of spell wording I completely made up. The herbs that I used for the three fold spell are all listed in herblore as aphrodisiacs, as inducing lust, or just increasing blood flow to certain body parts- even the common dill weed and licorice root.