Author's Note: hmmmmm, I like this chapter. I hope you do too. Thanks, of course, to those who reviewed.



chapter 27: DEVIATION - the letter of the law



It was several minutes before Harry could stop staring at the door to the Potions classroom in shocked bafflement. When he finally pulled himself together, he turned around only to find Hermione busily working at the chalk board, chalk already smudged across her hands, elbows, and, interestingly enough, her forehead.

"Hermione! What are you doing?" he hissed, the paranoid part of his brain convinced that this was just some strange joke Snape was playing on them and that he was going to come back any minute and punish them for messing about in his classroom.

"We have to have something to work with," Hermione hissed back distractedly before hastily wiping the hair out of her face and thereby solving the mystery of the forehead chalk. "I found these notes on the desk," she waved the papers clutched in her left hand at Harry, before returning to her furious writing, "so this is probably the potion Snape was planning on assigning for today. But I have a plan, and this potion is just perfect for the task."

"Plan?! Hermione? What plan? Somehow we have to get Slytherins to behave until Snape comes back." Harry felt a slight hysteria coming on and did his best to combat it.

"Yes, exactly." Hermione climbed down from the chair she'd been standing on to write up the last ingredients on the chalk board, then strode over to Harry and slapped the notes into his hands. "When the other students come in, just follow my lead." She then continued on to their regular seat and plopped herself down in the chair while muttering something that sounded rather like, "Now, if we can just get rid of their wands, unless..."

Feeling rather dazed, Harry stared at the notes in his hands. Noticing something odd, he frowned and wandered over to sit next to Hermione just as Seamus, Dean and Neville trooped into the classroom. "Hermione," he whispered fiercely in her ear, "you've forgotten the last ingredient."

Hermione just raised an eyebrow and removed the notes gently from his hands. "Harry, does that really sound like something I would do?" Harry couldn't help but feel suspicious at the tone of her voice and, as the rest of the class began filtering in, he began to suspect that the plan she had developed to take care of Snape's Potions class was going to be much more interesting than any such plan ought to be.

As more and more of the class settled into their seats, the noise level in the room began to rise higher and higher. Harry could see that without Professor Snape to keep them in check the class would quickly get out of control. He glanced nervously at Hermione to see what she was going to do, but she just remained sitting quietly in her seat, a small smile of anticipated satisfaction playing about her lips. Finally, at some seemingly random moment, she rose from her seat and strode confidently to the head of the classroom. The noise level changed not a jot and Harry felt a sinking sensation begin in the pit of his stomach.

"Vox Vocis Silentium Facere." The silence following the pronouncement of this spell was deafening. At the same time, Harry could tell without turning around that the expression on each and every one of the Slytherin's faces was that of murderous rage, and he suddenly wished that he was more religious so that he could start praying to every god out there that everyone would make it out of this alive. Even some of the Gryffindors seemed a little hostile.

"All right, class." Hermione's voice rang out over the still dungeon room. "As you can see, Professor Snape is not yet here today. He has given me control over the class until he returns and, until such time, we are going to operate under some very simple guidelines." There was an angry rustling from the Slytherin side of the room and Harry tensed, hoping fervently that Hermione knew what she was getting herself into.

Ten minutes later the class was working diligently and Hermione was smiling happily to herself as she stirred in the third ingredient to Harry's and her own potion. Harry himself had come to the conclusion that he should never, ever piss off Hermione when there were no teachers around to keep things in check, and he realized that the incident with Neville in first year was just the tip of the iceberg when it came to just how brilliantly scary she could be.

"Harry, hand me the frog's eyes."

Harry passed them over then pulled out a sheet of paper and his quill and began scribbling a note to her. She'd restored everyone's voices several minutes ago but Harry figured it was best that the discovery of that fact by the rest of the class be delayed as long as possible.

-Hermione, are the fumes of this potion really toxic without the last ingredient?-

Harry figured that this was the first question he should get out of the way. Definitely the most important. Hermione read the note then raised her eyebrow at him before picking up the quill and scribbling.

-Of course, Harry. You know bluffing is a bad idea with Slytherins.-

Harry swallowed as he read this, then continued his questions as Hermione began chopping up dung beetles.

-1. Will you really keep the last ingredient a secret if anyone misbehaves?

2. What will happen to a person without that ingredient?

3. What did you curse Pansy Parkinson with? She's starting to scare me. -

He handed over the parchment and began grinding the beetles up into a paste with rosewater as Hermione answered him. Shortly, she passed him back the parchment.

-1. No one gets to know the last ingredient until they are ready to add it to their potion or until

Snape comes back.

2. Without it you'll start to go blind in a couple of hours.

3. Don't worry about Pansy. It'll wear off before tomorrow. Though I thought I'd have to use

it on Malfoy too. Good thing he's not here today.-

Malfoy, or no Malfoy, Harry did not feel comforted. His next resolution was to never again ask Hermione what she was doing. He decided it was better just not to know.

It was just as Harry was scraping the beetle paste into their cauldron that Professor Snape swirled back into the room, followed by a scowling Ron. Harry breathed a sigh of relief before remembering that all hell was going to break loose as soon as the Slytherins told him what had happened. It took him a minute to realize that the room remained eerily quiet, but then he looked up to see Snape standing at the head of the class, a look of patent disbelief on his face. Turning around in his seat, Harry saw that the Slytherins had all stopped what they were doing and were just looking silently at Snape. After a moment, Snape's face settled back into its familiar disdainful sneer. "Well, get back to work. And that includes you, Mr. Weasley," he snapped, then, "Ten points to Gryffindor." With that Snape began doing what Snape does best, moving around the room and making all of the Gryffindors too nervous to mix their potions correctly. As he passed their work station Harry glanced up at the chalkboard and saw that one more thing had been added to the list of ingredients and conspicuously labeeled, "last ingredient": 1/2 cup diced tomatoes

Harry was about to turn around and energetically question Hermione's sanity (was she actually serious!?) when Ron came over and began listlessly starting his potion at the workstation next to theirs. Deciding that Hermione was probably perfectly serious anyway, Harry covertly tore off another piece of parchment, scribbled a hasty note, and shoved it at Ron under the desk. Ron read the note with a blank expression on his face. He then picked up a knife and began chopping dung beetles. "Not now, Harry," was all he said.

Harry ground his teeth in frustration. Despite seeing Blaise Zabini being attacked by his own school books and Pansy Parkinson sprouting a pair of horns and starting silently mooing, the anxiety alone was quickly turning this into the Potions class from Hell. Remembering the Parkinson episode, Harry threw a hasty glance her way to check that the horns had disappeared before Snape came back. They hadn't. With this, on top of everything else, Harry just couldn't find it within himself to care. Snape probably wouldn't even notice anyway.