Chapter 14: Potions With a Pestered Conscience.
As if a dark cloud had fallen over Hogwarts, the mood between the three friends became dark and gloomy. So much promise had presented itself, on this the first day of their last year, and even though they knew that class with Snape was inevitable it came far to soon. Glumly they walked through the dark, cold castle toward the dungeon.
Harry, on the other hand, had a completely different, sinking, feeling in his stomach. He was aware that Snape had overheard prophesies but to be involved in them, as he was now, was a completely different avenue. Everything was, and had happened for a reason for the past six years and possibly before that but now, how would the prophesies play out? Would they mean anything to Snape? Would he find it, still, hard to trust Snape as Dumbledore had proved him to be a trust worthy man. Would Snape himself be able to put the past behind him and work with Harry. The sinking feeling in his stomach was telling him that life with Snape wasn't going to be any easier than it had been. Harry almost felt sympathetic toward Snape, knowing that once the Dark Lord marked you as dead, there was no escaping your fate.
"Well, you should look on the bright side," Hermione said trying to act cheerful as they stood in the queue, waiting for class to start.
"Oh really, Hermione, and what could possibly be the bright side of this situation?" Ron asked grumpily.
"Well, at least he's back to teaching potions and not the DADA," she said.
"Yeah, we may have a chance of passing our N.E.W.T's with a different professor in Defense Against the Dark Arts," Harry said almost happy, "but we can kiss a potions N.E.W.T goodbye."
"We'll never be Aurors now," Ron sighed.
"There other careers out there," Hermione said rolling her eyes.
"None that would help as much with a death omen from the Dark Lord as Harry has. You would think, knowing how much you've neem through, that they would be begging you to be one," Ron said.
"They do want him," Hermione said, "just as a mascot for the ministry of magic."
"Maybe I don't want to be an Auror anymore for that very reason," Harry said remembering his last meeting with the minister of magic, "there are to many clueless people working for the ministry," he said, then covered his mouth as Ron glared at him, "I didn't mean your dad, Ron."
"Yeah, I know," Ron said laughing, "but Percy falls under that category."
"Oh yeah of course he does," Harry smiled.
"You don't think Dumbledore would want you to be an Auror?" Hermione asked as Ron and Harry got too carried away, making fun of Percy.
"I don't think so, Hermione," Harry said mater of factly, "I'd bring to much danger to the ministry just being there, like I bring to Hogwarts," he said.
"Perhaps you should leave then," Snape said behind Harry's back as they noticed that the rest of the class had already entered the dungeon classroom, "I'll take ten points from Gryffindore for your tardiness," he said with an evil smirk.
Harry, Ron and Hermione said nothing as they walked passed him and toward a table at the back of the class.
The classroom looked as it always did, dark and vial. There were less students in the seventh year potions class then any year. Harry, Hermione and Ron were the only Gryffindore students. Two Ravenclaw students, including Raelyn and two Hufflepuffs, including Alisianelle were among them. There were no Slytherin students left to take part in the advanced potions class, in fact, there were a very few Slytherin students left at all. During the sorting, of the previous evening, only twelve of the first year students were placed in Slytherin, with a great number of students going into Gryffindore, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff.
It almost seemed like a waist of time to have an advanced potions class with so few, only seven, students and this was clear in Snape's attitude and actions, even before he had begun to speak to the class, the students could tell it was going to be one of their worst potion classes ever.
"Everyone, move up," Snape said angrily as every student had settled themselves around the potions classroom, "as there are so few of you, this year, I will be spending much of my time working with individuals and so I would like for the seven of you to occupy the three front tables, at all times," he said and waited as the students, grumpily, packed up their things and moved to the front of the classroom. Once they had all settled, for the second time, he looked up at them once more.
"I will not be surprised if I loose the few of you I have, this year, as this will be the most difficult year in potions any of you will ever have. These potions are dark in nature. They take a long time to brew and even more concentration then any of the potions you have already been introduced to. These potions, though unlikely that most of you will ever encounter them, are some very dangerous potions if consumed and more than likely fall under favorites of the Dark Lord. I know this because I helped him make them."
A great gasp rose from the few students in the dark class room. Everyone had known about Snape's past but they have never heard him mention it around the students.
"Many of you will never have to face any of these, but, as dark times are all around us, and none of us are really safe anymore, you will all learn how to recognize these terrible potions and you'll know what to do should you or anyone you know ingest any of them. It is going to be difficult and it is going to be trying on all of you. I demand the utmost attention and concentration when working with these potions and should you not pay attention, well let us use something simple for you all to understand," he said stopping an looking arrogantly at them, "I'll use four letter words to help explain this as clearly as possible. If you should screw around in my class you will FAIL, there is the first four letter word," he yelled it into Alisianelle's ear, "but if you pay attention and WORK," he hissed at Ron, "you'll PASS," he said, "and if things go well, you just might LIVE through some of the Dark Lord's trick. Do I make myself clear?" he was speaking slowly and strictly and yet there was an air to him that said he didn't care.
The students nodded up at him as he walked up and down the front of the class room, staring harshly from one to the next. A sudden wave of his wand plunged the classroom into total darkness. At the front of the class a cauldron, smaller than any they had ever used, appeared. The contents glowed green, casting sick shadows around the front of the class room and over Snape's stone cold features.
Harry's heart sank into the pit of his stomach as he viewed the green of the potion and the darkness of the class room. It was quiet and a strange chill covered him from head to toe. He remembered so clearly the scenes that had played out only hours before Dumbledore's death, mere months ago.
"Can anyone tell me what this is?" Snape asked into the darkness, "Miss Granger?"
"I'm sorry sir," Hermione said her voice shaking as they could hear pages rustling in the darkness.
"You'll not find it in you text book, Miss Granger," he said.
Hermione stopped and closed her book, she remained as silent as the rest of the class.
"You will however find an antidote in the book," Snape said as the candles were lit around the room once more, "but what good is an antidote if you don't know what you are up against?" he asked.
He paced the front of the classroom, in silence for another moment, seemingly thinking very hard on what he was going to say next. Then he spoke, "this year, we will be spending most, if not all, of our time on the most advanced potions known to wizard kind. I hope that through your education here at Hogwarts you have gained enough knowledge to handle what I have in store for you. You'll need to identify and counter act the effects and symptoms of these very dangerous potions. Many of these potions will be very hard to decipher," he said and two more cauldrons appeared before the class, each looking exactly like the next.
All three cauldrons were quite small, all three contained a potion that glowed green and not one of them seemed to give off any fumes or odor.
"Despite what you may think, each one of these potions are different. Each with different effects and each needing a very different antidote," Snape said as he paced at the front of the room, "and each of these, will cause irreversible damage if not treated right away."
All of the students, in the class, looked extremely worried as they listened to their professor. Never had he or any others shown them something so similar before. Every other potion had been very different and identifiable but these were not.
"I would like you to each stand, bring with you the text book and your wand and come and join me around the cauldrons," Snape said as he stepped up and around the cauldron to the left most side of the room.
The seven students walked forward, cautiously, their advanced potions text in one hand their wands, at the ready, in the other.
"Now who can tell me what is the first thing one would do to try and figure out what the potions is if it is not in a text book?" Snape asked.
No one moved.
"Not one of you knows?" he asked again.
Hermione hesitated the raised her hand.
"Miss Granger?" Snape asked with a smirk.
"Rule out what it is not," Hermione said quietly.
"A very basic and the bare minimum, but not practical when you are all alone facing dangerous situations, without a library full of resources but the practical answer non the less,"he said and watched as Hermione turned red, "so what is it not?" he asked.
"Well, its odorless, and the liquid is cloudy. The liquid in the cauldron is an orange colour but it gives off a green glow," Hermione said.
"So what potion does that rule out?" Snape asked sarcastically.
"Anything any of us have ever seen in a potions lesson thus far," Ron whispered into Harry's ear.
"Care to share your observation with the rest of us, Mr Weasley?" Snape snapped.
"I just said it is not a potion we have ever seen in any potions lesson, not with you or with Professor Slughorn, sir," Ron said turning as red as Hermione.
The statement wasn't all together true, Harry had seen a similar potion before. He knew it wasn't the one in this cauldron, as the liquid had been a clear, sick green and glowed just as this one did, but he remained silent.
"Yet another very basic and practical answer," Snape sighed, "but correct. Someone who spent the long months brewing this potion would not be using it with students that were not of age wizards, but as you are all now in your seventh year and I assume you are all now seventeen, I feel that it is time for you to familiarize yourselves with the dangerous potions you may encounter, as we are all at war and the rules have changed as to what we are to be teaching you. So how, then shall we determine the contents of this cauldron?" he asked.
There was much silence before he went on. Taking his wand and lighting the tip so that it glowed red with fire he placed the tip into the cauldron. The liquid fled from the fire not wanting to touch the wand. He plunged the wand deep into the center of the small cauldron and the students watched as the potion rose us the side of the black cauldron but would not touch the flames.
"Different potions act differently to different element. Earth, fire, wind and water are the most important things when testing portions and they can normally be obtained very easily. All of you know how to produce fire, water and wind with your wants I assume?" he asked.
The students nodded.
"Good, and earth is normally a neutral when it comes to potions," he said as he pulled a rock from his pocket and dropped it into the potion. Nothing happened to the rock. "So what does this tell you?" he asked lighting the tip of his wand again.
No one spoke.
"It means should you come across a potion like this, even if you don't know what it was, you could protect yourself with fire, and fire is the key to the antidote. But why is fire the key?" he asked.
Hermione raised her hand.
"Miss Granger," Snape said coldly.
"It is either because of the light or the heat, but as the class is light and the cauldron continues to remain stable and glowing I would have to conclude that it is the heat that the potion is reacting to," she said a little more confidently.
"Correct," Snape said as he transfigured an ice cube in his hand, "what will happen if I introduce cold to the equation, Miss Granger?" he asked.
"I don't know," Hermione said softly.
"I suggest you all produce fire with your wands as protection." he said and watched as great amounts of fire burned bright around him. Suddenly he dropped the ice into the small cauldron. Bubbles began to rise quickly and violently in the orange liquid. It began spitting itself all over the floor but it fled if it came to close to the fire.
Finally when the ice had melted, the cauldron became still once again.
"What antidote would you first try if you came across this potion?" Snape asked suddenly looking from one student to the other, "if you were to hazard a guess, not knowing what it was but knowing how it reacted to heat and cold?"
"A warming drought," Hermione said flipping to the antidotes portion of the text book.
"Why?" Snape asked.
"Well, it would push the potion back," Hermione said.
"Correct, you would want to expel the potion as quickly as possible," Snape said.
Quickly he turned away from the orange cloudy potion and moved to the far right hand side of the class room, to another small, green glowing potion. His students followed him and assembled quietly around the cauldron.
"What is different?" he asked.
"Its black as tar,"Raelyn said as she stared into the thickness of the potion.
"Correct, and yet it still glows green," Snape said, "so what to do first?"
They only watched him as he lit his wand on fire again and moved it close to the cauldron. Sparks of red came from the murky potion as it reached out of the cauldron and up toward Snape's wand.
"It thrives on heat," Hermione gasped as she watched the potion multiply an nearly overflow from the cauldron as the fire of Snape's wand touched it.
"It does, which makes it very dangerous for humans, why?" he asked.
"Because we are warm blooded, meaning our body temperature is very high," Hermione said, "It would take over."
"So you stop it how?" he asked.
"Freeze it," Ron said an a jet of blue flew from his want and formed a solid slab of ice over the top of the cauldron. But the ice didn't last long, it melted away at the heat of the potion.
"Not quite, Mr Weasley," Snape smirked, "what else could we try?"
"Wind?" Alisianelle asked.
"No," Snape said, "the potion is to thick for the wind to do anything to it."
"Earth," another Ravenclaw student said.
"Correct," Snape said and produced a mountain of dirt on in his hand.
"But what do you do if the potion is ingested?" Hermione asked, "you aren't going to force someone to eat gravel are you?"
"No," Snape said, "is an external predator, the dirt will remove it from the skin but you will still have the damage that the potion has done to which you would apply cold until you could use a healing drought."
Finally Snape moved to the middle of the room and stood by the first potion he had place before them. The gathered around and Harry saw immediately a potion he was sure he had seen before. It was a sick, clear green potion.
"So?" Snape asked, "what first?"
"Water," Harry said softly not even realizing he had said it.
Snape looked at Harry silently for a long moment then splashed water from the tip of his wand. The potion turned clear as the water touched it.
"The water has neutralized the potion," Snape said not looking at Harry again, "the problem with this potion is its very quick moving. If it is ingested it moved quickly to the central nervous system. Water will neutralize anything that is left in the stomach but if it has gotten into the blood stream as it quickly does, then the drinker loses much of their strength and mental functions within minutes."
With another wave of his want the cauldrons were gone and the students stood still around the front of the class.
"Please take your seats," Snape said moving toward the black board, "I want each of you to write one piece of parchment for each of the potions we looked at today. Finding the ingredient lists and the proper antidotes to use on such potions."
A large sigh rose from the class.
"The potions we viewed today were, in this order, number one, the orange cloudy potion was enchanted sleep, number two, the black tar like potion was a flesh eating potion also known as, spastus fascia, and our third and final, the green clear potion, was a living nightmare," Snape said as he turned back to face the class, "three rolls of parchment, one per potion for next Monday," he added and returned to his desk.
"We'll be spending hours in the library," Ron sighed as he pushed his potion text back into his bag as the bell rang.
The seven students wanted nothing more than to leave the potions classroom. They rushed to the door at the far end of the room as Snape stared on. Harry, Ron and Hermione were the last to reach the door.
"Potter, a word," Snape called from the front of the room.
Harry stopped just as he reached the door. Hermione gave him a sympathetic look but hurried off to her Ancient Runes class.
"I'll meet you in the courtyard," Ron said as he turned to leave.
Harry sighed heavily to himself and turned back toward the front of the class room.
There, ahead of him, where it had first appeared the cauldron was back in its place glowing greener than before. Snape sat silently at the front of the room, next to him the cauldron glowed, but silence was everywhere. Harry walked slowly back to the front of the room.
"Water, eh Potter," Snape said looking toward the potion.
"Dumbledore told me, sir," Harry said not wanting to look at either Snape or the potion.
Snape stared at him for a long moment. Harry could feel him reading his thoughts, digging deeper and deeper into his mind. He didn't want Snape to see what he had done, what Dumbledore had forced him to do.
"You've been practicing," Snape said lowering his eyes finally, "you do not want me to know what happened in that cave, but I know very well without seeing it in your mind," Snape said.
"You aren't R.A.B are you?" Harry blurted out before he could stop himself.
"No, Mr Potter, I am not," Snape said giving Harry a questioning glare.
Harry felt his heart sink again, for a split second he wanted to blame Snape for more than he had already done but he could tell, just by the look on his Professors face, that he was as lost to the subject as Harry was.
"You'll be facing much more than a potion of nightmares, Potter," Snape said after a long silence, "as will I, unfortunately. Dumbledore has requested that I teach you.."
"Not more occlumency, I am terrible at it, we know that lets just leave it," Harry said feeling upset.
"Not, occulmency, I refuse," Snape said with a twisted grin, "Dumbledore wants you to know as much about the dark magic that Voldemort is using," Snape said coldly, "many of the potions he has employed, I've helped him with, and many of potions we'll never cover in class as they are too dangerous and should be illegal just as the unforgivable curses are, but it is Dumbledore's wish that before I am subdued by the Dark Lord, that you learn as much as you can about the potions and curses he is employing," Snape finished and sat back at his desk.
"Alright, Professor, when do you want to start?" Harry asked, not really happy about the private potions lessons but he knew it was beneficial to his survival.
"Sundays," Snape said tapping a book on his desk, "afternoon."
"Alright," Harry said.
"You may go now," Snape said and turned his back to Harry.
Harry walked slowly down the length of the class room and towards the door once more. He stopped, with his hand on the door and turned back toward the front of the class, "professor," he said into the silence.
"What is it Potter," Snape asked sounding annoyed.
"Do you know anything about Voldemort's Horcruxes?" he asked knowing he needed all the help he could get.
"I don't know what they are, if that is what you are asking," Snape said as he walked the length of the room and met Harry at the door, "I do, however know how to destroy them, if you do find them."
"Will I be learning that?"
"Yes, first and most importantly you'll be learning that," Snape said, "as I will not always be here to get you out of trouble, Potter," he said and walked passed Harry and out of the Potions Class room.