A clock chimed loudly, almost making Emma jump out of her skin in shock as she hadn't realised that there had been a clock in the room in the first place. However, looking up, she now saw it hanging in front of the four Champions so they could see how much time they had left.
"The time limit is your friend," she remembered Mal saying in a letter. "It's there to guide you through, it is not there to intimidate you."
Emma nodded at her Godmother's words, she probably looked strange doing so but it didn't matter. It was time to start the challenge. However, the sheet of parchment in front of her remained resolutely blank, it looked the same as when Headmistress McGonagall had handed it out. To Emma's surprise, the other champions were already weighing out ingredients. She was behind already!
"Fuck's sake," Emma murmured quietly before she picked up her wand and tapped the page, "revelio." Slowly, golden ink started appearing line by line on the parchment, showing the instructions of what was needed. "Vicki, you are brilliant!" Emma cheered quietly as her friend had predicted the task perfectly.
On the sheet of parchment, there were two potion titles, the Draught of Living Death and the Wiggenweld potion. They had to concoct the first to knock out the mandrake and revive them with the second. While the ingredients were listed, for some, the correct amounts were missing. For example, Valerian roots were listed but not the fact you needed three. There were also a few steps missing on the instructions.
Instead of starting to brew immediately, Emma pointed her wand at her cauldron to start a small fire as the heat needed to be low, she quickly picked up the quill that was resting on the table and dipped it in the ink, filling in the gaps that she could remember so that she didn't have to think while preparing. Taking a sneaky look around, she saw that no one else had done that.
As she looked up, she realised that the judges were no longer in their seats. Each one had stood up and they were making their way around the room, looking at everyone's potion and taking notes on the stages and how they had gone about doing so.
Hermione was currently standing beside Elsa and was looking very impressed. The Ravenclaw looked like she was already part way through the first potion as she had pink whispers of smoke circling the cauldron which was step five. It didn't surprise Emma in the slightest that Elsa hadn't needed to fill in the gaps in the potions. She was sure her cousin would be able to remember the potions without even needing to look at the instructions. Elsa was after all the oldest of the Champions and had the most experience with potion brewing as a result.
Draco was making his way toward the Slytherin table with his clipboard in hand, making notes on the representative from his House. Regina was also getting on with her work as she was slicing up her ingredients instead of brewing straight away. She didn't seem bothered that the judge was standing beside her, it was no big deal to her. However, Draco still looked impressed as if that was how he would have started this task had he been competing.
Suddenly, Emma realised that there was someone standing beside her. It was Penelope Clearwater. Up close her face was even more familiar and she suddenly remembered where she'd seen her before. It was during the summer when she'd been in Diagon Alley with Mal. They had bumped into her but Mal had taken Penelope to the side to talk to her, excusing herself from Emma by stating that it was to do with work. Emma hadn't bothered to listen in as a consequence, she knew better than most what it took to be an Unspeakable, after all, it was her own preferred career choice. Not to mention that she gotten distracted by the new model of Cleansweep brooms in Quality Quidditch Supplies and by the time Mal had returned, Penelope had gone.
However, Emma realised that she needed to stop thinking about events in the past, it didn't matter where she'd seen Penelope before, she needed to get back to work. She checked her list of ingredients and realised she'd written down the wrong number of drops of Essence of Wormwood and quickly scribbled out the twelve and changed it to ten. From the corner of her eye, Emma saw Penelope smile as she wrote something down on her sheet before walking away.
Once she was alone again, Emma released a slow breath. She was doing well. Risking another glance up, she saw Justin shaking his head as he walked away from Mary Margaret. The Hufflepuff looked like she was struggling already. Her hair was sticking up all over the place and she looked even paler than usual, even a little big green.
"Focus," said her Godmother's voice in her head.
Emma continued filling in the blanks on her parchment until she was happy that she'd remembered everything. Glancing up, she saw that fifteen minutes had already passed her by. She had time left, there was no need to worry overly much. Both potions took an hour to prepare and brew so that left fifteen minutes to spare for any emergencies or accidents. It was time to begin.
Time seemed meaningless to her as she sliced, diced and measured out all the ingredients she needed. The judges continued to walk around, making notes on what she was doing but she ignored them. They weren't important in what she was doing, she had to concentrate.
She leant on her knife to crush the Sopophorus beans before squeezing the juice directly in the potion as she had been instructed by her Godmother before stirring in a clockwise stir after every seventh anticlockwise stir, something she had tested after Harry's suggestion. After she did, she realised that Hermione was standing beside her, scribbling frantically on her clipboard before she walked away to murmur something to Harry. Emma just hoped that she wouldn't be reported as cheating, but then again, Hermione had also provided suggestions after Victoire had written to her.
However, Emma shouldn't be concentrating on that. She wasn't cheating, nor had she cheated. She had simply listened to advice given to her freely, which arguably is what textbooks also did. The pressing point was her potion and it was progressing beautifully. Finally, an hour into the task, she could feel the excitement starting to slowly build.
It really was like a Quidditch match, she thought. She had the competitors from a different House that she wanted to beat. She felt like her Chasers had just scored their first goal, putting them in the lead and they were on the way to scoring the second one after getting the Quaffle successfully from the opposition.
As she was onto stirring her potion to the right consistency, she saw that Elsa was already making her way towards her mandrake, pouring the blackberry coloured liquid over to the top. A small scream emitted from the dirt below and all the leaves fell off as the plant looked to have died. Emma could see that her cousin looked a little apprehensive before shaking her head to start work on the antidote.
Five minutes later, Regina walked forwards and copied what Elsa had done. However, she didn't look apprehensive in the slightest, she had concentration plastered all over face and Emma was surprised to realise just how attractive a determined Regina Mills was.
"There's a time and place," said Mal's voice in her mind. Emma hadn't noticed until now how much her Godmother's influence on her had made her who she was. Mal was the voice of reason in her head when she needed to concentrate.
Emma shook her head to centre her thoughts as she returned to her potion. When she was satisfied that it was ready, she picked up the small leaf beside her to test it. Dipping it in the potion, Emma watched with worry as it burned away and turned to ash just as it was meant to. It was done.
Therefore, she poured a sample out and walked over to her own mandrake. She inhaled deeply and shut one eye, squinting with the other as she poured the liquid over the mandrake. As with the previous two times with the Champions from Ravenclaw and Slytherin, when the Gryffindor Champion poured the potion over the plant, it emitted a small scream and she opened her eyes to see that the leaves had died and dropped off as they were meant to. She had done it successfully but that was only one potion out of the two. She grinned as she returned to her desk.
They were halfway through the Quidditch match now and she was ten points behind. She had decided that the fact that both Regina and Elsa were ahead of her meant she would be missing out on two points as she would presumably finish in third place. However, that didn't mean she couldn't still win. Elsa may be quick, but her potion quality could be subpar. It wasn't likely as she was a brilliant potion maker, but Emma could only concentrate on that small glimmer of hope in that moment. She could still win if she caught the Golden Snitch.
At this point, she cleaned out her cauldron and looked back at her instructions. She was less confident with this potion as the list of ingredients was smaller, but it was more precise. She weighed out all the different phials of salamander blood which needed to be added at separate times. However, as she was about to weigh out the phial, Draco Malfoy walked over to her for the first time during the task and with a sudden onslaught of nerves, she accidentally dropped the phial she was holding as it slipped through her fingers. It dropped to the floor and smashed, splashing blood everywhere and somehow (probably due to her screwed-up luck), on her face.
Fortunately, Emma was used to her clumsiness and instead of panicking, she simply picked up her wand and waved it over the flask and repaired it wordlessly and with another wave and a mutter of "tergeo", she siphoned the liquid off the floor so that she didn't slip over it and placed it back in the flask. However, she then moved both to the far side and poured out a new batch in case the first batch had become contaminated from being on the floor.
Suddenly her aunt was beside her, checking her over frantically for injury.
"Emma, are you alright?" She asked.
Emma looked up alarmed. "I'm fine, why?"
"I heard the smash and saw blood all over you!" Her aunt said with a panic as she wiped at the blood on Emma's face.
"It's salamander blood for the potion," Emma assured her aunt, pointing to the phial in front of her. "I dropped it and it smashed. I'm all good."
"Oh, sorry," Daphne said, flushing pink, although the return of colour to her ashen face was a relief. "I'll leave you to it." She flashed Draco a quick smile who seemed to be chuckling quietly. Emma just hoped that it was at his old school friend rather than because of Emma's mistake.
Emma shot her aunt a reassuring smile, silently thanking her for her care before she walked back to where she had been standing with Madam Ella, allowing Emma to return to her work.
Turning back to her potion, Emma could still feel a presence beside her and realised that Draco had not left. However, she couldn't concentrate on that and ignored his presence so she wouldn't be distracted before she added the first phial of salamander blood and cranked up the heat on her potion. By the time she looked up a few minutes later, the Slytherin had disappeared.
The room was starting to heat up quite considerably, not just because they only had an hour left, but because the Wiggenweld potion require a very high heat to curdle the first batch of blood they had placed in the cauldron. The second and third phials needed to be added in at room temperature but with the cauldron fire being amped up after each addition but the fourth and final–
"Merlin," Emma muttered to herself as she checked her instructions. She'd forgotten part of the instruction while faffing over the broken phial of salamander blood. The final sample had to be added in an almost frozen state, but she'd forgotten to add the blood to the ice bowl that had been provided.
However, there wasn't enough time to add the phial to the bowl for it to drop to the correct temperature in time. Thinking quickly, she picked up her wand and pointed it at the last phial. "Glacius," she murmured and the bottle turned to iced blood. In practice, she hadn't used such a harsh charm, having had the time to chill it for longer but time was of the essence so the freezing charm would have to do. She knew that it wasn't the most traditional way of doing things, but it would work in a pinch. She placed the now frozen phial of blood just beside the cauldron so that it would melt a fraction and not be quite so cold when it was added and she hoped it would work. She would soon find out.
After simmering the third amount of blood and turning down the heat, she tipped in the final phial of the almost frozen blood and crossed her fingers. As it dropped in, it quickly turned the shade of turquoise which she was hoping for. Silently she let out a cheer as she turned the heat down even further and started to stir clockwise four times and anticlockwise once. Once done, it was time to sit back and allow it to simmer for ten minutes.
Looking up, she saw that there was just under fifty minutes left on the clock. It meant she was running on time as the potion needed to simmer for around thirty minutes when it was brewed along with being cooled before it could be used. She noted the time that was currently showing and muttered a spell to her wand that would make it vibrate once the ten minutes were up. All that was left to do was sit down for the first time in the task. Her legs were thankful for the respite once she was seated, she must have been running on adrenaline because she was suddenly aware of the lack of feeling in her legs.
Deciding it was safe, she looked up to see the stages of the other Champions. Elsa was still working, clearly ahead of Emma's ten-minute wait as she was already sprinkling lionfish spines into her potion which was the next ingredient. Regina wasn't that far ahead of Emma as she was sitting and waiting, but instead of looking around, she was staring inherently at the clock as if watching it count down. Perhaps she wasn't aware of the time keeping spell, or maybe her preference was to have intense staring competitions with timepieces, who knew?
Mary Margaret had finished the first potion, looking at her mandrake. It was in the same state as the other three, but she looked like she was only on the first step of the second potion. She would need to speed up if she was to finish on time.
Emma couldn't help but cheer silently that someone was struggling. As the youngest student, she hadn't experienced any of the NEWT potions, whereas the others had. However, looking at Mary Margaret, Emma had realised that just because the others were in older, it didn't mean that they had chosen to continue studying Potions. Mary Margaret was proof of that as she was struggling more than Emma was. It was clear to see that the Hufflepuff had not taken NEWT potions, Emma also wondered how well the Hufflepuff had even done in her OWLs given her struggles.
The judges seemed to have decided it was time to confer as they were sitting in the far corner murmuring to each other. Hermione was shaking her head at something Penelope was saying and pointing firmly at her clipboard. It would sure be an interesting Tournament if the judges couldn't reach a unanimous decision as unlike the Triwizard Tournament where they each awarded a score out of ten, this time the judges would have to agree on a score between them, before adding the time points afterwards. At least in this First Task that was the way the points would work, Emma had a sneaky suspicion that it wouldn't be the case for the other tasks, because chances of agreement in all tasks were slim to none.
Emma glanced back up at the clock and saw that she'd had five minutes of the ten that she had to wait. Instead of gazing aimlessly around the room, she looked back at her instructions to ensure that she didn't miss out any further steps going forward.
She looked at her ingredients to see that she had two sets of five lionfish spines which needed to be added at separate sections, much like she had had to do to the salamander blood that needed different temperatures of blood. In the case of the lionfish spines, they needed to be added in when the potion was at different simmering stages.
After the spines, it was Flobberworm mucus, never a nice ingredient but bizarrely very common and very useful. She had her Flobberworms at her station, but she couldn't extract the mucus just yet, as freshness mattered, the fresher the mucus, the better the results. During practice, she had made that mistake and made the entire potion turn to concrete and wasted her time, still it had been a valuable lesson, one that had helped even Vicki and Ruby who had never seen those results before.
She had the honey water ready to add along with the boom berry. During practice, she had practised different amounts to add as the instructions just said a few, leaving the actual number to the brewer's own judgment. She had split her potion into four and added three to six drops in each and decided that five was the best amount as that amount had made it turn a beautiful deep turquois that the potion needed.
Her wand then started to buzz indicating that the ten minutes were up. She picked it up which turned off the alarm before she got back to work. Cranking up the heat once more while she stirred the potion anticlockwise, Emma reached over and added the first batch of lionfish spines. She kept increasing the heat as she stirred until the potion turned a bright yellow before lowing the heat once more and adding the second set of five lionfish spines.
This was when she needed to act quickly. Placing her wand down, she picked up the first flobberworm and pinched its head and pulled, extracting the mucus. She did it twice to reach the desired deep purple for the potion before she started stirring again. Her actions repeated but this time with an addition of two flobberworms until the potion turned orange. Four clockwise stirs later, it turned yellow once more.
She allowed it to simmer for two minutes before it was time to lower the heat for the final time and add the honey water. This cooled the potion rapidly so she had to keep an eye on it until it started to simmer again before she added the drops of boom berry juice. She pinched the pipette carefully before allowing five small drops to fall into the potion.
For the final time, she stirred, twice anticlockwise and once clockwise, before it was time to wait for the longest part of the task. She set her wand for thirty minutes and sat down, for the second time since the task had begun and her legs thanked her for it. There wasn't really anything she could do; McGonagall hadn't said they needed to do anything. Then again, she wasn't sure if McGonagall had had much to do with selecting the challenge. No, this had Gold all over it. Then again, she had no proof that he'd selected the task, she would have to wait and see what the others were like before she could make her decision on that. Although, to be fair, potions were a key skill, so it was understandably a part of one of the tasks.
Thirty minutes was a long time to wait but Emma had always been easily distracted, especially if there wasn't anything in particular for her to be focusing on. She soon found herself, unconsciously, watching Regina. The Slytherin was also at the waiting stage but she was starting at her desk instead of the clock. At this point, Emma really wished she could read minds, not to cheat, but in genuine curiosity. Regina looked like she was in deep thought and Emma wasn't fully sure it was about the task at hand with the way she was worrying at her lip. Perhaps that was how she got the scar on her lip? No, that couldn't be possible as it was too deep.
Regina's hair had grown back well after Emma had jinxed her bald at the start of the term. She still didn't regret that. No one could get away being cruel to Ruby even if Emma did like Regina.
Emma's eyes flashed opened as she realised what she'd just admitted to herself. It was like Teddy had said but she didn't want to accept it. It wasn't that it was unheard of, even the great Albus Dumbledore was rumoured to have liked the same sex, but Emma didn't want that. She just wanted to be a normal girl. Not that there was anything abnormal about her feelings, but it wasn't all that common in Hogwarts.
What baffled her more than anything was the minor questioning about her relationship with Teddy and for it to have come from Regina herself. That was the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard and she'd heard a lot of ridiculous things in the past, just like the idea that her grandfather had paid the school for her to be the Quidditch Captain. Then again, perhaps she had only said it to throw Emma off the challenge, but that didn't seem right, especially given that Regina had given her extra information to help her with it. The girl was starting to confuse her even more than she had been already.
However, now was really not the time to think about this all. She had a task to win. Looking up, she saw that her daydreaming had passed fifteen minutes which she wasn't complaining about but there was still another fifteen minutes to go before she was done with the wait.
Emma glanced around the room again, but this time she kept her eyes away from the Slytherin corner. She looked at where Mary Margaret was frantically stirring as she added different phials of blood. It looked like she was doing everything correctly, she was just behind everyone else. Emma checked the clock, it would be touch and go for if the Hufflepuff Champion would finish in time.
She then turned to Elsa who, to Emma's surprise, was standing up and making her way towards her mandrake with a phial of green liquid. Elsa took a deep breath before she poured the liquid over the plant. Immediately the dead leaves rose until they were bright green and thriving once again. The mandrake was almost singing as a branch started to slowly grow. On the end of the branch there was a bud. As it bloomed, it opened to reveal a folded piece of parchment. Elsa picked it up and but didn't unfold it. Instead she exhaled and smiled with relief. Clearly, she had just finished the task successfully.
Another five minutes passed and Regina followed what Elsa did and received the same piece of parchment from her own bud. She too smiled before she sat back down at her table. Her smile was breath-taking and Emma was starting to get distracted but her wand vibrated, pulling her out of her reverie.
She picked up her wand to stop the alarm and stood up. Her potion had turned the prefect shade of green and she grinned. She picked up her ladle and spooned a portion of her potion into a clean phial. It was time.
It felt like time slowed down as she walked towards her mandrake. She inhaled slowly before she poured her phial onto the plant. Withing a few seconds, the leaves turned green and the branch started to grow as per Elsa and Regina's reactions. The small piece of parchment was revealed and Emma now realised why neither of them had opened it. In golden letters read:
Open after the Task. You have finished. Congratulations.
Unable to help it, Emma released her breath and grinned, just as the other two Champions had. She had completed the potion and she had finished the First Task. Looking up at the clock, she saw that she had ten minutes to spare, it had been timed perfectly. She could relax. Instead of staring around the room again, she simply sat down and watched the clock count down the last ten minutes.
She had finished in third position in terms of timing, but that didn't necessarily mean that she would end up in third place. It would depend on how the judges scored her. She could only hope that she did enough to get second place. There was no way that Elsa wouldn't win this round, no matter what Emma had told Regina before they started.
It was the end of the Quidditch match and she'd forgotten the score but was tired and just wanted to finish. So, she had been on the lookout for the Snitch to end it on her terms and she'd caught it successfully. She just needed to wait until she saw the scores to see if she'd done the right thing.
As the clock started counting down the last minute, Mary Margaret suddenly shot from her table and poured a slightly dull green potion over the mandrake. Whilst it wasn't completed perfectly, it was good enough and the mandrake awoke and provided a slightly more charred flower but there was a sheet of parchment nonetheless.
The clock then chimed to signal the end of the First Task and McGonagall walked back into the room with the four Heads of House following her.
"Congratulations Champions!" She called. "You have all completed the First Task and will move on to the next round. The judges will now decide their scores which will be revealed in ten minutes."
The Heads of House started heading towards their Champions so that they were with them when the scores were revealed.
Professor Longbottom made his way over to Emma and beamed. "I'm so proud. You did brilliantly!"
Emma smiled softly. "I did my best."
"That's all you can do," Professor Longbottom said. "That's all we're asking of you. Plus, you recovered quickly after you dropped the phial while there was a judge beside you. I'd have gone to pot then but you took it in your stride."
"The perks of being a klutz," Emma chuckled, "I'm used to dropping things and needing to recover."
Before Professor Longbottom could say anything else, Professor McGonagall walked away from the judges, smiling. She pulled out her wand and waved it towards the sound barrier which rippled and dispersed so that they could hear the spectators once more. Once completed, she placed it against her throat, "sonoros."
"The judges have made their decisions," she called out. "Firstly, as per the order the Champions completed their potions, Elsa Nolan has received four points, Regina Mills has received three, Emma Swan has received two and Mary Margaret Blanchard has received one point."
After each announcement, everyone received a round of applause. Emma was glad that hers had gotten louder after everyone had seen what she had accomplished in the last two and a half hours.
"The judges have also scored their points regarding the Champions' methods and capabilities during the task along with the quality of their potions," McGonagall continued. "Therefore, the points have been awarded as follows:
"Elsa Nolan had received nine out of ten. Regina Mills has received eight out of ten. Emma Swan has been awarded nine out of ten and Mary Margaret Blanchard has been awarded six points out of the potential ten."
Emma heard the scores and her eyes widened in shock. She had been scored higher than Regina, however, as she finished after her, she had been a point lower. Now, however, they were equal! She grinned as she realised what was going on.
"Therefore, the winner of this task is Elsa Nolan of Ravenclaw!" The Headmistress called and all the Ravenclaws went wild.
Daphne grabbed her daughter and hugged her tightly, causing her to blush in embarrassment, the red standing out against her pale skin. However, when Emma and Regina were announced as joint second, Emma was scooped up by her aunt as well as she hugged her.
"Oh, my girls, I am so proud!" Daphne said as she pressed a kiss to both her daughter's and her niece's temples.
They were interrupted by Professor McGonagall calling an end to the task and announcing that the Second Task would be announced closer to the relevant date.
For now, Emma could relax. She wouldn't open the parchment until she was surrounded by her friends and after she had talked to her parents about the First Task. She could forget about that for the moment. Instead, she accepted another hug from her auntie and her cousin and another from Harry as he came over to celebrate.
She would be able to celebrate with her friends later. For in this moment, she felt so relieved that she could pass out. Sure, she hadn't won, but she'd always known that that would be the case. However, she hadn't come in last as she had panicked that she would and, in a way, she had come joint first. Elsa had only won because she finished first. Regina had come in joint second because she'd finished second. It was a score she could work with.
However, now she couldn't quite compare it to the Quidditch match any more as she'd never drawn in a match. It had always been win or lose. Then again, it was part of a tournament and Gryffindor had been in second place the year before after the first match of the season as Ravenclaw had beaten Hufflepuff with a bigger lead than Gryffindor had defeated Slytherin.
But this wasn't Quidditch. It was the Interhouse Tournament that she needed to concentrate on. For now, she had three months until she had to worry about another task, two months until the next Quidditch match and well over a month before she needed to worry about the Hogmanay Ball. She could relax.