Hogwarts Gets Wild!
Machiavella of Kingsport
Chapter 3: Love Potions and Secret Lusts
For the next month, Divination was the same—Harry, Ron, Seamus and Dean sat through boring, sweltering classes learning about the zodiac signs as well as hearing (though however cleverly they were disguised) complaints about Trelawney's dangerous crush on Snape. She endlessly compared the qualities and attractions and disagreements between those under the signs of Capricorn and Taurus. ( And of course, every time a disagreement was mentioned, a sad, dreary look overtook Trelawney's face.) Ron and Harry were so bored of it all that they ran out of jokes to crack in whispers as the professor droned on and on.
They and Seamus and Dean were in rapture when the first visit to Hogsmeade was announced. All four of them were at the head of the line heading down, but Hermione was strangely missing.
"Wonder what she's up to," Ron mused, a finger poised on his chin in thought.
"She said something about studying for the O.W.L.s, but those aren't until the end of the school year…" Harry muttered, staring off into space. Ron was jerked out of his reveries.
"What? She's WHAT?! Oh, don't tell me you just said that she's studying already…Blimey, she's more insane than I thought she was! Dear god!" Ron kneaded his forehead in frustration. "Just what are we going to do with that girl? First she dates some Dark Evil Bulgarian Quidditch player, then she goes and studies for tests that are eight months away!"
Harry, Dean, and Seamus shot each other looks at the mention of Viktor Krum. Dean glanced at him questioningly.
"He…well, he's kind of jealous about Krum, I think," Harry whispered, "But he refuses to admit it." Ron's ranting and raving stopped abruptly so that he could yell, at the top of his lungs,
"I AM NOT, FOR THE LAST TIME, JEALOUS OF VIKTOR KRUM!" The crowd of students fell silent, and all eyes were upon him, some amused, some worried. "I did NOT just yell that out loud…"
"Ron, my friend, I'm afraid you did," Seamus patted him on the shoulders consolingly. "But remember, your secret's safe with us."
"What secret? I don't have a secret!" Ron whispered defensively, glancing around in paranoia that someone else might hear.
"Listen, we all know you like her. Just get over it, because, if she's still with Krum and he's like a thousand miles away, she obviously doesn't like you," Dean added.
"Tactless," Ron muttered, staring at the ground as they neared the village of Hogsmeade. "Utterly tactless. And I am NOT crying…"
Coming out of the Three Broomstick, warmed with butterbeer, Harry brought up the subject of Trelawney's crush on Snape. Immediately, Ron, Dean, and Seamus shook their heads sadly.
"Poor old bat…she'll never manage to get him," Ron sighed. "I almost pity her but for the fact that it's Snape…"
"Ah, she loves from afar, yet will never ensnare the heart of that the one so treasured…" Dean sighed, clasping his hands over his heart in a melancholy gesture. "I also read too much Shakespeare." He smacked himself on the forehead. No one laughed; everyone was too busy thinking of ways to get Trelawney's mind off of the potions master. And, all at once, realization dawned upon Harry as they traveled down the muddy street.
"We could modify her memory!"
"What, and lose our teacher?" Dean countered. "Wait a minute, that's a good thing…"
"It's kind of mean," Seamus added.
Ron was still deep in thought, staring moodily ahead. A smile spread slowly over his face, mischievous and cunning. He giggled slightly. "Lockhart…"
"Oh, no," Harry began, backing away. "If you're thinking of bringing him back into the picture—no. No way are we going to see him again!"
"No, not that," Ron said impatiently, waving his hands. "See, he was always so obsessed with popularity and looks and love and stuff…like on Valentine's Day…and he had the little cupids with arrows! If somehow, we could make a tiny little bow and arrow and put a love potion on the tip and shot it at Snape, maybe he'd fall in love with Trelawney and they'd both be happy for the week it lasts."
"No, see there, Ron—there's one problem." Seamus shook his head. "When cupid shoots his arrow, the target falls in love with the very next thing it sees. For all our chances, Snape could fall in love with a beaker of armadillo bile and get married to it!"
Dean broke into insane laughter. "And while it might not carry out our purposes, it would serve him right!"
Ron was still concentrating heavily. At last he spoke again. "Well, we could make the potion with something added to it that is part of Trelawney—like a piece of hair or a nail clipping or spit or something…"
"Ron, you're a genius! Just like in Polyjuice potion!" Harry cried. Several passersby in the street gave the four boys rather odd looks and hurried on their way. "We could make up the potion ourselves, like we did with antidotes last year."
"Sure…and we are smart enough how?" Dean asked, eyebrows raised.
"It's simple…" Harry said. "Ask Hermione."
"You have brains, thought you might like to know," Seamus stated, patting him on the back. "Let's get to Honeyduke's before it's too late, now."
Harry, Dean, Seamus, and Ron rushed to Hermione the very moment they arrived back at school. Breathless, they found her in the library, hunched over a table full of books.
"Go away, I'm studying!" She whispered harshly, not looking up.
"No, no, we need your help!"
She looked up at this, because the speaker was Ron. "Oh, you're talking to me again? Well, then."
"Never mind that," Ron gasped, clutching a stitch in his side. "We need your help making a…a love potion." He said that last part quietly so that Madam Pince wouldn't' hear and report them. Hermione raised her eyebrows dubiously, her forehead creasing.
"It's against the school rules, you know that," she scolded.
"We don't care! Just…just shut up and hear us out, okay?" Ron requested, glaring balefully at her. "Listen, Trelawney has a major crush on Snape. She won't stop talking about it a single second of class! It's horrible." He shuddered. He worked up the courage to continue. "We figured if we gave Snape a small dose of love potion to last a week, he'd fall in love with her and then she'd stop complaining about her unrequieted love and such."
"So you need help making it? That's simple, just add the ingredients, boil it for four hours, feed Snape." Hermione shook her head exasperatedly. "Really, no common sense…"
"No, no," Harry corrected, his breath regained. "See, we have to make it specifically so that he falls in love with only her. Basically, we need to actually design the potion and add, I guess, a small bit of Trelawney so that it works, like in the Polyjuice Potion."
"Sounds logical…" Hermione replied, staring off on a train of thought. Harry could almost hear the gears grinding away in her brain, racing for the answers. "I might as well stop studying, I guess," she said at last, looking regretfully at her books. "Sit down and I'll help you get started."
Seamus, Dean, Ron, and Harry pulled up four chairs to her table, leaning forward expectantly. Hermione rolled up her sleeves, pulled out a fresh piece of parchment, and began to scribble down a series of hurried notes. "Lamb's ear you'll definitely need, you have it in your personal stores, most common ingredient…um…cinnamon, for figurative flavor—adds natural feeling of zing, makes the person affected feel as though it's real…pomegranate seed, for strong attraction…a bit of unsweetened chocolate for aftertaste—helps with a feeling of longing…poppy seed for a dreamlike state like you're in when you first fall in love with a person…"
Ron coughed discreetly, hiding a blush creeping into his cheeks. Hermione looked up and eyed him skeptically before returning to her notes.
"You know, you can find most of this either in the kitchens or in the student supplies…" she continued, tapping her quill on an open book. "Let's see…don't forget the bit of the person you want Snape to fall in love with…diluted juice of nightshade to add mental blindness towards the potion, you don't want Snape finding out you're the ones behind this…um." She stopped, licking her lips. "There's something I'm forgetting, I know…"
"Could it be…honey?" Seamus suggested in a small voice, afraid he might be wrong. "You know, because everyone loves honey. Note the key word, love."
"Good point, thanks." Hermione jotted it down, and then handed the list to Ron. "Here you have—Lamb's ear, cinnamon, pomegranate seed, unsweetened chocolate, poppy seed, diluted juice of nightshade, part of Trelawney, honey…and instructions…combine them all in a beaker of grapefruit juice and boil it for four hours. Viola, potion for love."
"Thanks," Harry said, grinning.
"Yeah, thanks," Dean added, as the four boys trotted out the door.
"My god, I can't believe how blasted easy that was!" Ron exclaimed.
"Yeah, and you love Hermione," Seamus goaded.
"Now we'll have Trelawney off our backs!" Ron went on, undaunted.
"Yeah, and you love Hermione," Harry added, snickering.
"Oh, shut it, you," Ron said good-naturedly, hitting him lightly upside the head. "To the kitchens!"
"And the student stores!" Dean added, an arm raised triumphantly to the ceiling, traipsing down the hallway. The boys burst into maniacal cackling and stumbled their way to the kitchens.
It was Sunday night when the four of them finished the potion. "Right, then—we've solved that puzzle…" Harry muttered. "Now for how to give it to Snape." The ingredients had been easy to procure, two of which were from the student stores, and most of which were readily given by the eager, handy kitchen elves. The part of Trelawney had been taken as Ron asked for help on a zodiac puzzle in class. When she had bent over to look at his parchment, he had taken a silver hair discreetly and dropped it into a small glass phial. Now that the potion was done, they all knew they couldn't very well just pour the potion into Snape's evening pumpkin juice.
On Monday morning in potions, wielding the beaker, Harry found the solution as Snape went to assist Draco on his Secrecy potion. Harry was at a desk to the front of the room, and noticed that the professor had left a glass of grapefruit juice on his table unattended…Harry slipped in the love potion, and sat back into his seat just as Snape passed by, glancing carelessly to see how the Secrecy potion was coming. He took hold of his glass; Harry held his breath. Snape gulped down the rest of the juice, wiped his lips, and then glared at Harry.
"What are you staring at, Potter?"
"Nothing, sir, just…uh…grinding my lo—er, milkweed."
"Fine, then, get back to work," he snapped, and made his way back up the aisle as Pansy Parkinson raised her hand for help. Harry gave Ron the thumbs-up sign behind Snape's back, and Ron grinned, passing it on to Seamus and Dean. All Harry could think of was, we did it…
The next day, on his way through a hallway to the stairs to the North Tower for Divination, Harry came across Snape and a very rushed Trelawney. He hid quietly in an alcove, watching his Divination teacher come running down the stairs with a pile of McGonagall's transfiguration books that had been dumped in her classroom by Peeves, the resident Hogwarts poltergeist. Trelawney was muttering under her breath in a most irritable fashion, not looking where she was going.
"Blast that stupid poltergeist, the DADA teacher should've gotten rid of that vermin by now…" she brushed a silvery lock from her glasses, and Snape, who stood yards before her in a euphoric, trance-like state, smiled dazedly and didn't move. Harry watched gleefully. Two feet, one foot…BAM. Sibyll Trelawney smashed right into Severus Snape and bowled him over onto the floor. The books went flying in every which direction, and passing students ducked wildly as they hurtled through the air. Harry could hardly contain his laughter.
Snape was hardly making an attempt to remove himself from underneath the divination teacher, and was grinning oddly at a most disheveled Trelawney. She struggled to push herself up. "Oh, really, I'm so sorry, Severus! Really, I don't know what just happened. My thoughts were clearly somewhere else…" she braced herself in a slightly upright position pushing her hands down upon the stone floor, and Harry caught a glimpse of her bright pink face. He was glad she couldn't see him. But once she was close to kneeling, Snape reached up with a grin and clamped his hands around her torso, bringing her back down. "Sevvie—I mean, Severus, I mean—Professor Snape—I—I—OOMPH!" Her mouth was smothered by Snape's lips. Harry's jaw dropped.
"Blimey, it did work then!" He restrained himself from clapping his hands in celebration. "Now we won't have to listen to that old bat anymore…" Ron came up behind him, his eyes wide as saucers.
"We did it!"
"Shhh…" Harry whispered, looking backward for a fleeting second and then letting his gaze get glued back to Snape and Trelawney, who were still kissing passionately. "They're kissing…"
"I know, you dimwit…"
The two professors pulled apart breathlessly, staring at each other with new love shining in their eyes. "Oh, Sevvie…" Trelawney murmured.
"Oh, Sibbie…"
Flushed, Trelawney pushed herself back to a standing position, giving Snape a hand up as well. "Well—well—I, I mean, I—I'd better get to my class…" Trelawney gathered up the scattered books, apparently not remembering to return them to McGonagall. She gulped nervously, then straightened her shoulders bravely. "Farewell, O dashing man of my dreams," she said with new courage. Ron and Harry could hardly contain themselves and covered their mouths tightly with their hands. Snape gazed at Trelawney in watery adoration.
"Sibyll, believe me when I say you are my one and only true love, and I shall keep you close to my heart always. It is now that we are sadly parted for we must disperse to our respective classes—I to potions, you to divination. I will save you a seat beside me at lunch, beauteous one…" he sighed, brushed an oily black lock of hair out of his black eyes and bowed dramatically, sweeping away down the corridor and around the corner behind which Ron and Harry were hiding. Snape stopped abruptly, and turned on his heel, whipping around to face the two highly amused boys. His dreamy state vanished, replaced with his usual sneer and strict air. "And just what do you two think you were doing?" his voice was dangerously quiet and his eyes were narrowed to ferocious slits.
Harry and Ron coughed harshly, not able to bring themselves to face him, and then burst into much pent-up laughter. "Nothing!" Ron wheezed. "Nothing. We were…just…on our way to…divination class! Yeah!" Ron dissolved back into childish giggles, covered his face with his hands and sliding to the floor. Snape wrinkled his nose skeptically.
"Well, go on then! Go! Now! Get out of my sight!"
Ron and Harry scrambled to get to their feet, gathering their backpacks, and scampered to the North Tower stairs.
"And…and say hello to Sibyll for me!" He called after them, his voice softening unnaturally. The boys doubled over in laughter once again, stumbling up the stairs.
"Oh, trust us, we will!" Harry replied through choked mirth. "We certainly will!"
"Oh, shut up, you nutter," Ron poked him in the side. "Hurry along, we'll be late for divination…"
For the next week, students aside from Seamus, Ron, Dean, and Harry were giggling about the outrageous affair that was carrying on in the school between Professors Sibyll Trelawney and Severus Snape. In hallways when they passed each other, they would often bow theatrically and speak in romantic verse to one another, blatantly displaying their affection. Occasionally Snape would even, much to the dismay of pupils and teachers alike, grab the divination teacher and kiss her passionately in front of everyone. Some students—most in Slytherin—even dared to applause when in the dining room one day at lunch, Snape and Trelawney bewitched the sky so that the clouds floating across played a tango and the two enamored teachers danced down the aisles, dipping and swaying like professionals. At the Gryffindor table, Hermione winked secretively at the four boys who had made Trelawney's secret fantasies come true.
"You guys must've done an excellent job on that potion," she whispered carefully one day later than the end of the week in which the potion was to be in effect. She glanced at the teacher's table as Sibyll planted a smooch on Snape's sallow-skinned cheek. As he glowed in euphoric happiness, his smile—most rare—actually made him look handsome. "It's a day after the week when he's supposed to be in love with her. The potion should've worn off by now, but look—he's plainly still in love with her. You can see it—his eyes just light up when she sweeps in the room."
Seamus snorted. "I know, it's just hilarious. We must've made too much potion"—
Dean cut him off. "No, I'm very sure we made the perfect amount. I measured each ingredient out perfectly, I should know. I seriously don't know what's going on now…and to tell you the truth," he muttered mischievously, "I kind of think they're, well…cute together, don't you?"
Hermione giggled discreetly behind her hand. "I guess so…" She glanced at Dumbledore, who was smiling kindly at the two lovebirds. "But really," she said, her serious air back in place, "Don't you think the two professors would be back to ignoring each other by now?"
"Yeah, it's kind of odd…" Ron said, though still grinning evilly at the teachers' table.
Harry coughed, and then turned an embarrassed red. "I'd speak my mind now, but you'd laugh…"
"No, come on, hack it up," Ron demanded, taking a gulp of pumpkin juice.
"All right…" Harry replied reluctantly. "Well…I think their romance goes deeper than just the potion, if you ask me. I know it sounds crazy, but I have this feeling…like, I know for sure that the effects of the potion have worn off Snape…it's just, I think he realized through the clouds of it all that he really truly loves Trelawney."
Seamus, Hermione, Ron, and Dean eyed him skeptically, and then they all stared off into space in contemplation. Hermione was first to come back to earth. "You know, Harry, I think you're right. This isn't the potion in action…I think it's real love for Snape and Trelawney! Wow! You guys are genius matchmakers, I must say."
Professor Snape was absent for the first time from his potions class the next day. Draco complained loudly when he heard that Dumbledore would be taking over for the period. The headmaster swept into the room, eyed the students over the rim of his half-mooned spectacles, and cleared his throat.
"As you may have noticed, Gryffindors and Slytherins, your usual professor, Severus Snape, is absent today. He reported sick to Madam Pomfrey. However, though some of you may wish to visit him and comfort him, I'm afraid it is not possible. He has locked himself in his quarters, refusing treatment, and will not take visitors. I shall take his place in his classes today, but since I am not so great at potions, I figured we could all do something fun."
Harry could make out Draco at the back corner shaking his head in his hands and Pansy looking surprisingly tearful and put out. He wondered silently what she was so sad about…surely she couldn't be that concerned for Snape…then, a most horrible and unwanted thought crossed his mind, which he hurriedly shoved away. He nearly gagged at the prospect, and then turned his attention back to Dumbledore.
"I have managed to bribe the Bloody Baron to ensnare the resident poltergeist Peeves and bring him to me. Today we will practice how to freeze a poltergeist in midair for twenty four hours!" Dumbledore's blue eyes twinkled with silent, amused laughter, and most everyone's face in the room brightened with excitement.
"For real?" Lavender squealed. "Oh, that'll be brilliant! Now he can't get into my…uh, my…never mind!" Her face went a dark scarlet and she buried her head in her arms, which were crossed in front of her on the desk.
"And I won't pry any further, I assure you, as I hope no others will," Dumbledore reassured her. "Now, if you would all be so kind as to take your wands from your bags…"
With that, Dumbledore took a shaking box from behind him, from which loud and angry curses could be plainly heard. The headmaster opened the box with a steely wrench, and Peeves bounced out, ranting and raving. Harry grinned, and his previous thought was erased from his mind for the time being…
TO BE CONTINUED…
AUTHOR'S NOTE: How are you liking it so far? If you're wondering…yes, I am kind of weird, to think up a couple like Trelawney and Snape…but I thought it was funny, which is a legitimate excuse when this is supposed to be a rather comical story. So if you think that the couple it extremely disgusting, don't flame me…please…no one likes those, they're no fun, really. Anyhow, review, kindly…