Chapter 24
Pepper-up Potion Problems
It turned out that Herbology really wasn't as bad as Cassie had feared. The plants Professor Sprout had them working with today were a lot nicer than the others had been. Neville kept a close eye on her as well, and he seemed extremely competent.
"I'm sorry you had such a bad experience last time, Pia. I still don't understand why those plants were so riled up. They usually aren't that aggressive."
"Maybe they're like dogs. They can sense fear."
Neville had laughed heartily at that one but Ginny suggested maybe it was their growling and roaring fingernails that had aggravated the plants. Neville had seemed to accept that as a possibility, especially when Ginny had explained how Pia's nails were the loudest of the three of them and it made sense that the plants would have focused their unwanted attention on her. Her nails were exactly the same as everyone else's but Neville didn't know that. And, as Neville said, "I find that easier to believe than the possibility that the same girl who could tell Snape where to get off would be afraid of some friendly little plants." Cassie then tried to explain to Neville how her experiences in Potions on Friday were being grossly exaggerated as the tales circulated through the school, but he seemed to not believe her.
As they were working with their plants, up to the elbows in dragon dung fertilizer as George had predicted, Neville explained how terribly he had always done in Potions. "He just would make me so nervous that I could barely remember my own name much less anything else. The man hated me, I'm telling you. I was so relieved when I didn't have to take it last year."
"Why were you so nervous? I mean, what did you think he would do to you?" Cassie reached up to push some of her hair out of her eyes and Neville laughed as he looked at her to answer her question.
"You've got a streak of - oh, let me clean you up. You're only making more of a mess." Neville grabbed a cloth out of his pocket and carefully wiped at her forehead. Cassie flushed a little under his ministrations, thinking about what Ginny had said earlier about telling George she and Neville had started dating. Neville was nice enough although he seemed rather underappreciated by most people at the school. But she definitely did not want to date the boy.
"I don't know. I mean, when I first started I guess I thought he could have just hexed me or something. You know, Cruciatus or something like that. And then, the fear just multiplied even though I know he really wouldn't have done anything like that if he wanted to keep his job. He was really good at humiliating me though, and when you're young and don't have many friends that can be almost as painful as any curse he could give you. The fact the Slytherins were in the same class with us every time didn't help. Anything he would say to me would be multiplied 100 times by Malfoy and his cronies so that the whole school would know that I had, yet again, messed up my potion."
"That's really terrible, Neville. I'm sorry."
"Thanks. But I survived and now I'm taking classes I like. And I only have to see him at meals."
"That's probably often enough."
"Definitely." They both laughed although Cassie's was tinged with a little bit of nervousness because she knew after lunch she would be facing Snape and she wasn't looking forward to it. Not at all.
With that in mind, then, lunch was a quiet meal for Cassie. She kept expecting Professor Snape to suddenly appear at the head table and glare at her. She was already extremely tense in anticipation of this next "We're in Big Trouble" class, especially knowing everyone was expecting Snape to be extremely mean to her. She barely picked at her food and if someone had asked her immediately afterward what had been offered, she would not have been able to say. She could feel various students' eyes on her throughout the lunch and she could have sworn that the entire school was holding its breath waiting to find out how Potions went.
"I think I'm really sick now, Ginny. I'm not going to have to fake it, either."
"Yeah. I know what you mean. I'm feeling a little queasy myself. However," Ginny picked up Cassie's bookbag and threw it over her shoulder, "I think we're just going to have to fake it. If we don't show up, everyone is going to be talking about how you chickened out."
"Yeah. Is that a bad thing?" Ginny just laughed. Elspeth caught up with them on the steps as they descended down into the dungeon.
"Hey! Wait up! I'm sure you're anxious to get down there, but I'm coming, too!" Ginny and Cassie stopped and waited for a minute for the slightly out-of-breath girl to catch up with them.
"Hi, Elspeth. You may not want to be near me today in class. I have a feeling I'm going to be a lightning rod for all Snape's grouchiness."
"What's a lightning rod?"
"Um. I just mean he's going to be focusing all the bad stuff at me and anyone around me is going to get it, too."
"I'll take my chances. After all, Ginny and I have been dealing with it for six years. Trust me. We're used to it. You might be his target today, but by next time, it'll be someone else." Cassie seriously doubted this. She had a feeling that she was going to be the target as long as she was in the class. She could only hope this was her last time. The girls stopped outside the classroom as Cassie took her bookbag from Ginny.
"I better check and make sure I've got everything." She had a sudden terror that she had left the Snackboxes back up in her dorm room. If she didn't have them, she honestly did not know what she was going to do. Elspeth and Ginny waited patiently as she looked into one of the pockets to see the four Snackboxes safely where they were supposed to be.
"Okay. I'm all right. Let's go." She took a deep calming breath, forced herself to think of home, and walked through the door. The room fell immediately silent as the three girls entered. Professor Snape was already in the front of the class and he looked rather pointedly at the clock as they took their places. Cassie didn't even bother to sit next to Ginny. She knew where she belonged and since Niles was sitting next to an empty chair she walked resolutely to the front of the class and sat down.
"Hi."
"Hello. Are you ready for this today?" She shook her head and tried not to look at the front. She could feel the professor's eyes on her and she didn't dare look toward him in case their eyes accidentally met. She wasn't sure how long he would have to look at her to read her mind but she didn't want to take any chances. The bell rang and she reached into the bag and pulled out parchment and quill, arranging them carefully on the table before she looked around, hoping he had lost interest in staring at the top of her head.
"Good afternoon, class." His voice was pleasant but underneath Cassie could feel an element of anger she knew was aimed at her and she tried not to flinch. "As you know, I had fully intended to test some Veritaserum on some of you today so that you could get used to its administration. It is quite tricky and requires a careful touch. Unfortunately, that is not going to happen this class period." Cassie almost collapsed in happy relief, but she tried not to show it on her face as she concentrated very hard on a spot on the wall immediately to the left of Professor Snape's ear. It seemed to be moving and she thought it might be a spider.
"I have been asked by Madam Pomfrey to brew her an extremely large batch of Pepper-up Potion as she expects the cold season to be extremely harsh in the next few weeks. I would have my other classes brew it, but they are incompetent and this is a potion which insists on delicate handling. The 7th years could do it, but they are not available right now. So, despite all my efforts to dissuade her or to assign the task to another class, it is up to you. However, be prepared for next class period. You can be assured that we will be learning to administer Veritaserum. There is no question of it at all."
Cassie looked down at her parchment and then back up at him. She knew that if she appeared frightened or worried, he would jump on her. She needed to be confident or at least project confidence even if inside she had no idea of what he was even talking about. "Miss Spencer." Oh, dang. It hadn't worked. "Perhaps you can tell us the ingredients necessary for a batch of Pepper-up Potion."
"No. I'm sorry, sir. I can't."
"Not even one?"
"No."
"Hmm. And why is that?"
"I didn't study the potion before class today."
"But certainly you've used it or seen it in the past?" Cassie thought fast. If it was to help with colds, it was probably pretty commonly used.
"I have used it, certainly, but I didn't ask for its ingredients when my mother gave it to me." There was a small smattering of laughter around the room which was silenced immediately as Snape threw a glare at the offending students.
"Ten points from Gryffindor, then." Cassie grimaced but sat quietly. Another student was able to list all the ingredients necessary and Cassie listened with some detached interest.
"Miss Spencer." Oh, great. What now?
"Yes, sir?"
"Don't you think you should be writing these ingredients down?" Cassie looked up at him, meeting his eyes for a brief second. She glanced at Niles' parchment which was still blank as well as the table next to theirs. Neither of those students even had parchment even in view.
"No one else is, sir. I assumed you would put them on the board again as you did last time."
"But all the other students in this class know the ingredients, Miss Spencer. Why should they be forced to write what they already have in their heads?" His voice was low and silky, each word carefully articulated so that it carried over the entire classroom and despite herself Cassie felt her face getting warm. This was terrible. No wonder poor Neville had practically had a nervous breakdown in class every time.
"You're right, sir. I wasn't thinking."
"Obviously not." He stared at her for another long minute and Cassie wondered if she had somehow missed a part of the conversation. He seemed to be waiting for her to do something but she had no clue what it was. "Well?"
"What, sir?"
"Write down the ingredients. They have been listed for you." She looked frantically up at the board but it was still blank. Oh, he meant by the student.
"I don't remember them, sir. I'm sorry."
"You are only proving to me, Miss Spencer, that my concerns about having you in this class were not unfounded, despite your assurances to the contrary. Ten more points from Gryffindor." He waved his wand at the board and the ingredients appeared as well as all the instructions for making the Pepper-up Potion. Cassie read them through carefully. It did seem fairly tricky although not compared to the Veritaserum.
Niles smiled at her sympathetically as he stood up. "It was inevitable after last week."
"I know. I was expecting it."
"I'll get the water this time. You can go get the ingredients." Snape was sitting behind his desk now, watching as the students approached his desk for some of the necessary ingredients. She was about to protest. The water would be a lot easier even though it did require a spell. At least the snake head fountain wasn't about to bite her. She wasn't sure about the man at the front of the classroom, though. Ginny was walking toward the front desk and looking frantically toward Cassie. Cassie went up, trying to pretend that their simultaneous arrival at the ingredients was just a coincidence. She parroted Ginny exactly, taking what she took in the same amounts. Ginny didn't say a word to her, just carefully measured and scooped, counted and sorted. She was almost to the end of the row of ingredients when tragedy struck. Ginny accidentally knocked against a beaker of some liquid which then spilled all over the floor. This not only meant more lost points for Gryffindor but it also meant that Ginny was then occupied trying to get it cleaned up rather than finishing retrieving her ingredients. Cassie stood there, looking hopelessly at the next four items, unsure of what to do. Snape was looking at her carefully and Cassie seriously wondered if he could see right through her clothes to her Muggle soul. Ginny was looking quite frantic.
"Do you need some help, Gin?" Ginny glanced up with some relief, apparently thinking that this was a good idea. If Cassie were to help her, they would get done at the same time which would then make getting the rest of the ingredients easier.
"She does not need help, Miss Spencer. She managed to spill it herself. Finish getting the ingredients, please. Mr. Caden is waiting."
"Yes. He is. I think I'll take these back over to the table and then come for the rest in a minute." Snape looked extremely put out at that suggestion but since other students were doing the same thing, probably trying to keep their feet clean from the sticky liquid that was now blocking their way to the rest of the desk, he couldn't really forbid her to do so. She carefully carried her ingredients over to Niles who had started the fire and was chatting nonchalantly with the boy who had been his lab partner until last class period. He looked up as she came over and the two of them laid out the ingredients carefully in the order they would be needed for the potion.
"We're missing a few ingredients, here."
"Yeah. I'll go get them when Ginny finishes cleaning up. It's a real mess over there." Elspeth, in order to avoid further delay on their potion, had made her way to the front of the room and Cassie practically ran up to meet her. Elspeth gathered up the last four ingredients but she wasn't being careful to measure or count where Cassie could watch so Cassie had to kind of guess on some of the amounts. Yes, it was true that the board listed the amounts of each ingredient, but the beakers, bowls, and boxes at the front of the classroom were not labeled and despite herself, she had no idea which of the powders was bitterroot and which was pepper dust. She supposed that if she had been working with these ingredients for years, it would be obvious that the light brown was one and the light gray was the other, but . . . it wasn't. She just hoped that she had been able to follow Elspeth's lead well enough. She carried her ingredients over to Niles and they finished getting things set up.
This potion didn't require as many disgusting things to be chopped up or shredded as their previous effort, so within a fairly short amount of time, the potion, a noxious green color at the moment, was boiling. "That needs to simmer for about 10 minutes and then we'll add the pepper dust. That's what gives it it's kick, you know?" He smiled broadly at her and she smiled back, very nervous. Pepper dust was one of the ingredients she had been unsure of and now that she knew it was the light brown powder, she couldn't remember if that had been what she got 60 cc of or not.
"Does that look like the right amount?"
"Yeah. It looks good. Did you measure carefully?"
"Well . . . yeah, but-"
"I wanted to apologize again for Friday."
"What about it?" Cassie was trying desperately to reconstruct what she had done at the front to remember if she had actually gotten the right amounts of the different ingredients, but she just couldn't remember. Well, it was going to have to do.
"I could tell that you thought I sicced Draco on you, but that actually isn't what happened."
Oh, yeah. Friday. "He said that you mentioned me."
"I did. But he had already noticed you. Everyone was talking about you at the table when he came in. He took one look at you and started talking badly about you."
"That doesn't surprise me."
"He said you were hot looking but were probably a mudblood or half-breed.. I told him you were actually a cousin of the Weasleys and he looked . . . well, more interested. Then he asked me how I knew this and someone else volunteered that we had been lab partners. I tried to dissuade him from going over, telling him that you seemed nice and that you were really smart. He seems to like to date with girls who aren't quite so bright."
"Ah." That didn't actually surprise her very much.
"Anyway he said a couple of other crude things about you and then he headed over there. I considered trying to stop him but his goons were egging him on and I knew . . . well. I knew it wouldn't do any good." And, thought Cassie, since you are not one who is willing to do something difficult just because it is the right thing, you didn't even try to stop him, did you? But she didn't say anything.
"He's really disgusting, you know?"
"He comes from a really good family."
"That, Niles, is a matter of personal opinion. And I don't agree with yours."
"They're old wizarding blood -"
"I'm well aware of his family connections, thank you. But that doesn't change my opinion. If anything, it just makes me angrier. They have everything, but . . . . "
"We'd better add the pepper dust." She had known, known on some subconscious level, that she had assumed pepper dust would be black. It made sense. And she had gotten the two measurements mixed up. And you couldn't tell to look because the difference between 60 cc and 75 cc would be almost undetectable to the naked eye. But the potion knew. And five minutes later, Snape declared it a total disaster, waved his wand, emptied their cauldron, and insisted that they tell him what they had done wrong.
"It was my fault, Professor Snape. I mis-measured the pepper dust. Niles had nothing to do with it."
"Then you will be serving detention tonight, alone. That's fair, isn't it, Miss Spencer?"
"Yes, sir. I believe so." Detention. Ron had said that it usually involved scrubbing floors and things and even though that didn't seem very fun it didn't sound as terrifying as being whipped or something, which she had seriously thought was a possibility before yesterday.
"Seven o'clock, then?"
"Yes, sir. I'll be here."
"See that you are." And he turned to stalk over to another student who was having trouble with their potion, but not before Cassie saw a very smug little grin on his face. He was pleased as punch that he had managed to trip her up. As long as someone was happy.
"I'm sorry, Niles. It was my fault. I thought I'd messed that up."
"It's okay. That happens every once in a while. Grades hinge more on the tests than the everyday work so it won't matter for me. Now for you, I don't know since the year is almost half over."
"I'm not too worried. My parents won't care. They just . . . want me to be safe. That's the important thing."
"That must be nice. No pressure. Although I'd think that if they want you to get a decent job, they might at least care a little." Cassie was about to answer when there was yet another ruckus raised over at Ginny and Elspeth's table. "What is with Weasley today? She's usually not clumsy. She's got her share of problems, it's true but that's not one of them."
Cassie grimaced again. She knew what was happening. Ginny was trying to earn herself a detention, thinking that they could serve it together tonight. She tried to send Ginny subconscious messages that it wasn't worth it, but they weren't getting through. It was finally Snape who made Elspeth a lot happier by putting an end to Ginny's attempts to screw her potion up badly. "Miss Weasley, it is obvious what you are doing. But I can assure you that you will not be in detention with your cousin tonight. If you continue, you will be here the rest of the week, but not tonight."
"I don't understand what you are talking about." Ginny tried to bluff, but the rest of the class passed without further incident although she did send apologetic looks toward Cassie periodically. Niles and Cassie didn't even talk much because they had to do essays on what they had done wrong and the correct way to make Pepper-up Potion and thought they might as well get a head start on it during the rest of class.
"Your handwriting is terrible, Pia. No offense or anything."
"None taken. It is really bad." She briefly thought of offering some stupid explanation like she had broken her hand or something but decided not to. Bad liars give too much information, remember, she told herself.
"I don't even know if Snape will accept that for a grade. I suggest you rewrite it."
"Oh, I will. This is just a rough draft. I'll have to make it to the library before next class and get some information anyway. But I guess not tonight." It seemed like an eternity before the class finally ended and she was able to gather up her things and walk back to meet Ginny at the door.
"Bad luck, Pia. I've got to run." Elspeth took off immediately, leaving Ginny and Cassie standing out in the hall looking at each other.
"Come on. We've got a really long hike ahead of us. Divination is all the way in the furthest corner of the castle up about a million staircases. Why they put these classes back to back is a big mystery to me." The two girls walked along in silence for a few minutes as the other students in the class passed them by or called out sympathetic greetings to them. It was not until they were completely alone that Ginny finally had a chance to apologize for the entire fiasco.
"I know you didn't mean to, Ginny. Don't worry about it."
"Well, it was just a huge disaster. And I know I caused the whole problem."
"I should have asked Elspeth, I guess, but I thought it might be suspicious."
"It probably would have been. You did the right thing, despite how it turned out. I just . . . detention seems a bit harsh of a punishment. You didn't blow anything up."
"He was looking for any excuse to give me detention, Ginny. If I'd have sneezed funny and he could have gotten away with it, he would have done the same thing."
"Yeah. You're probably right. I'm just nervous that he is so insistent on having you alone tonight. What do you think that's about?"
"Do you want me to tell you the truth?"
"Of course."
"He's going to try that mind reading thing on me."
"What?!!! He wouldn't dare!"
"Why not? He's desperate to figure me out. He knows something isn't what it seems."
"You can't go tonight, then. We'll tell Dumbledore and he'll run interference."
"I want to go tonight. Truthfully . . . even though I know it's going to be dangerous, I almost am looking forward to seeing what he can do. He doesn't scare me, even though he tries hard. I just won't let him do it. I'll ask Harry for some pointers or something."
"Ask Harry, but I'm pretty sure he'll agree with me. You really can't go tonight. Maybe we could. . . No. That wouldn't work. I'll talk to Hermione, but I think our best bet is to go directly to Dumbledore." Cassie didn't say anything else. It was dangerous to all of them and if they all agreed that someone had to prevent her from serving detention, than she would go along with their wishes. She was anxious to find out more about what made the man tick, but if it was too risky, than it was too risky.
Ginny smiled as they started up a seemingly endless flight of stairs a few minutes later. "Hey. Maybe we can consult tea leaves or something in this next class to figure out what you should do tonight!"
"Wha'dya mean, Gin?"
"We're going to Divination. That means predicting the future, you know? Tea leaves, crystal balls, palm reading, the usual. Trelawney calls it 'Consulting the Inner Eye.' Maybe we can predict whether it's safe for you to go."
"I hope you're kidding."
"I'm not kidding about the class, but I am kidding about trusting anything we can 'predict.' Trelawney's a big fraud and the entire class is ridiculous. I wouldn't be taking it at all if it weren't for the other one."
"The other what?" But then they were there, climbing a narrow silver stepladder up to a round trapdoor in the ceiling and there was no more time to talk.
