Potions lessons took place in one of the dungeons. It was colder here than up in the main castle and would have been creepy enough without all the pickled animals floating in glass jars all around the walls.

Snape, like Flitwick, started the class by taking attendance, and like Flitwick, he paused at Harry's name.

"Ah yes," he said softly. "Harry Potter. Our new-celebrity."

Draco Malfoy and his friends Crabbe and Goyle sniggered behind their hands. Snape finished calling the names and looked up at the class.

"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making," he lectured. He spoke in barely more than a whisper, but they caught every word-like Professor McGonagall, Snape had the gift of keeping a class silent without effort. "As there is little foolish wand-waving here, many of you will hardly believe this is magic. I don't expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses...I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death-if you aren't as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach."

More silence followed this little speech. Gryffindors Harry and Ron exchanged looks with raised eyebrows. Hermione Granger was on the edge of her seat and look desperate to start proving she wasn't a dunderhead.

"Potter!" Snape started. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood."

Harry shrugged, looking confused.

"I don't know sir."

Snape sneered, "Tut tut-fame clearly isn't everything.

He ignored Hermione's hand.

"Let's try again. Potter, where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"

Hermione stretched her hand as high in the air it would go without her leaving her seat, but Harry didn't have the faintest idea what a bezoar was. He tried not to look at Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, who were shaking with laughter.

"I don't know, sir."

"Thought you wouldn't open a book before coming, eh, Potter?" he scolded Harry.

Snape was still ignoring Hermione's quivering hand.

"What's the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?" he quizzed Harry.

"I don't know," Harry protested. "I think Hermione does, though, why don't you try her."

Snape glared at Harry. "Sit down! Granger, you will answer these questions."

"For your information," Hermione began. "Asphodel and wormwood make a powerful sleeping potion called the Draught of Living Death. A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat and will save you from most poisons. As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the same plant which also goes by the name aconite."

"Precisely so," Snape said. "Well? Why aren't you all copying this down? 20 points to Slytherin. A point will be taken from Gryffindor House for your cheek, Potter."

There was a sudden rummaging for quills and parchment and the students copied the information Hermione said.

Snape put them all into pairs and set them to mixing up a simple potion to cure boils. He swept around in his long black robes, watching them weigh dried nettles and crush snake fangs, criticizing almost everyone except Malfoy and Hermione whom he seemed to like. He was just telling everyone the perfect way Malfoy and Hermione stewed their horned slugs when clouds of acid green smoke and a loud hissing filled the dungeon.

Neville had somehow managed to melt Seamus's cauldron into a twisted blob and their potion was seeping across the stone floor, burning holes in people's shoes. Within seconds, the whole class was standing on their stools while Neville, who had been drenched in the potion when the cauldron collapsed, moaned in pain as angry red boils sprang up all over his arms and legs.

"Granger," he ordered. "Since your potion is done, can you test it on Longbottom here so we don't have to take him up to the Hospital Wing?"

Hermione did so and the boils were gone after Snape with a flick of his wand cleaned the floor of Neville's botched potion and repaired Seamus' cauldron.

Meanwhile, he rounded on Harry. "You Potter, why didn't you tell him not to add the quills? Thought he'd make you look good if he got it wrong, did you? That's another point you have lost for Gryffindor."

An hour later, they climbed the steps out of the dungeon for lunch except for Hermione.

"Hermione," he said. "Come here."

"Your potion worked. For the rest of this week, I want you to work on the harder first-year potions and if you succeed, I will tutor you on the second-year potions and so on," he finished.