Chapter 2
"The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires." - William A. Ward
The next morning, Civia was so anxious that she had to force herself to eat breakfast.
In the dungeon classroom, she prepared for her first class: the Gryffindor and Slytherin first years.
Timidly, the small students—though only a bit shorter than she—came into the room, seating themselves, speaking in soft whispers, clearly nervous and frightened. They seemed confused by the layout of the desks and chairs, all arranged in a circle in the large classroom, around a single, large cauldron in the very center of the room.
When the bell rang, she set her quill down and rolled up the piece of parchment she'd been writing on. With the students silently watching her, she went to the window and gave the scroll to a school owl lingering outside, and turned her attention to the attentive class.
All were sitting ramrod straight in their seats, books out, as well as quills and parchment. Anxiety and unease was upon every face.
She chuckled to herself but spoke reassuringly as she smiled kindly to them.
"If any of you have heard rumors of a horribly despicable Potions professor, you needn't be nervous. That would not be me." True to her word, they breathed in relief, the tension draining slightly from their stiff postures.
"I am Professor Potter," she introduced herself, "And, hopefully, I will be better than my predecessor at this. I'm new to Hogwarts as well," she said, trying to offer a bit of comfort, then amended, "at least, as a teacher. This is my first year, so I suppose I'm a bit like you. I need to get used to it and everyone.
"Now, if any of you are of wizarding parents, you know what potions are. You've seen them, I'm sure, and probably have taken a couple. But if you are muggleborn, don't worry," she soothed, "Think of Potions as a cooking class: you prepare ingredients, put them together, and it is drunk by another, if it is well made. Though the results in here will certainly be more magical than in a kitchen.
"But unlike typical food, Potions are something incredibly unique. You do not need to be magically talented—or magical at all—as long as your ingredients have already been properly collected. You don't need a wand…for now at least. Should you advance to the NEWT level, you may.
"Every potion is unique. Each has different ingredients or a different brewing process. Each has unique effects. Each has different appearances, textures, scents, and tastes.
"For our first potions class, we will be making a very simple potion to cure boils and other stubborn forms of acne.
"Now, if you turn to page twenty in your textbook, who would like to read the first step?"
An eager pink-faced girl raised her hand. "What's your name?" Civia asked.
"Angela Green," she replied enthusiastically.
"Alright, Angela, go ahead."
"One – Heat cauldron until base of Agrippa turns red."
Civia nodded, "Would you care to demonstrate, here?" She motioned to the cauldron in the center of the room, as she sat on the edge of her desk, which was included in the circle of desks. The little blond-brown haired girl bounced from her seat to the cauldron, set it up and waited…
"Very good. Two points for your house."
At the third step, a boy—Mark Hatch—poured the appropriate amount of flobberworm mucus in, until the potion was pink, and so on and so forth, until a Slytherin girl added porcupine quills.
"Do any of you know why you must take the cauldron off the fire before you add the quills?" the Potions Mistress asked.
"If you don't, you'll get boils all over when it melts the cauldron!" exclaimed a girl.
"Correct. Four points for your house."
When the finished the potion, Civia filled a small vial of it, corked it, and held it up to inspect it.
"Well done, class," she said, causing many to beam with pride. "Now, next class, you'll be brewing this potion in pairs. Having done it already, it should be easy.
"I hate to say this, but it is essential. You won't be getting much homework for a while, though, if you will open your textbook to page thirteen, you will see a small list of different categories of potions: a brew, concoction, draught, draft, elixir, philter, poison, and tincture. I want all of you to flip through the text and find an example of each of these and explain why it is so. For example…the Draught of Living Death. What makes it specifically a draught?
"This will be due next class, but should be fun and easy enough."
They all looked fairly eager at the easy assignment.
"Now, gather your belongings if you haven't because the bell should ring in…three…two—" She was cut off by the bell.
"Have a good day, everyone!" she called as they filed out, chattering animatedly about the lesson.
The next first year class—Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws—went just as well.
Then she had a free period, lasting through lunch. Having no paperwork to do, she grabbed her notes, stuffed them into a pocket in her outer robes, and warded her office and private laboratory.
She opened a window, then, leapt into the air.
After hardly a second, the petite woman was gone, with a feathered bird in her place.
The owl was tiny—it was only about six inches tall—with tawny red-brown feathered wings and head; with white around its golden eyes and streaked along its body. It was tiny and sleek, agile.
Stroking rapidly with its wings, the owl rose soared from the classroom up to the staffroom window.
Deliberately, it delicately knocked its beak against the closed window.
There was only one person in the staffroom at the time.
Severus Snape, ex-Potions Master, current Defense teacher, was sitting in an armchair, writing all over students' essays with brilliant red ink. He looked up when he heard the noise, scowled, but opened the window reluctantly.
The owl flew in, but instead of landing, paused mid air, and transformed gracefully into Civia Potter.
The scowl on the DADA teacher's face deepened. "Potter," he sneered.
"Professor Snape," she greeted softly, shyly, as her face flushed crimson.
"Well, you seem, like your cousin, to have quite the flair for dramatics," he observed, sneering.
She flushed more, but this time in anger. "James wasn't my cousin," she corrected irritably. "He was my brother—my older twin."
His eyebrows went up in surprise. "You look—remarkably—different."
Civia snorted to herself and muttered, "He got the Potter family genes and I got the Black family genes—and the thinking genes, as well."
"He most certainly lacked all, as you call them, thinking genes," Snape sneered.
Civia's wisteria eyes flashed dangerously, but she simply pursed her lips and seated herself at a desk, pulling her notes and quill out of her robe pockets.
She had been called by many, to both her embarrassment and her pride, the best Potions Mistress of the age, and she prided herself in doing her best to qualify as such. Almost at a maniacal rate, any records of her contributions to modern potioneering grew swiftly.
While she was known as the best Potions Mistress, the best Potions Master was the one before her.
As she retreated to her work on counteracting the after-effects of the Cruciatus, Civia was very aware of her colleague's piercing, curious—though thoroughly annoyed—stare.
Finally, when the bell rang, other teachers came in, filling the awkward silence between the two Potions masters.
