Chapter 14 – Anecdotes
Lizzie regained the points she lost from Snape rather quickly, having finally, after many years, given into Flitwick's insistence that she join choir. Though she only agreed to sing for fall concert, since he no longer had a solo lead.
"I haven't in years, Professor," she reminded.
"Not a problem," he smiled.
"I haven't even tried... I might be awful," she added.
"I doubt that, dear, will reward Gryffindor House handsomely in points..." he smiled like he won a prize chicken.
"Right, definitely my goal," she said sarcastically, but he took her seriously and smiled wider. He insisted her mother was wonderful, but the only point of reference to her abilities from a charms lesson years back where you needed to sing the incantation. Lizzie started to think she signed off on a new prescription for humiliation, but maybe he was right, she thought. After all, she was good in primary school, the threat of a caning was always incentive to hit the high notes.
The thought of Potions didn't put any of them in a bad mood for a change. Before class started, Lizzie approached Slughorn politely, "Professor, could I borrow a book? Do you have extras? I'm still waiting on the Flourish and Blotts order..." she explained. He smiled, nodded, and pointed to the cupboard.
When she turned around, she nearly collided with Draco and froze in place to glare reproachfully. He still looked ill and barely kept eye contact with her. Lizzie pulled a ratty book from the cupboard with a damaged spine that was covered in margin notes and brought it back to the table. Slughorn meanwhile, waited until everyone was settled in to introduce himself and the lesson. "Welcome NEWT students! I love this particular year, things really do get interesting when you've got the brightest bunch," he beamed.
"I have four brews in front of you, could someone volunteer to tell my what the first is?" Hermione stepped forward and announced it was a draft of living death and rattled off some properties.
"Very good, Miss Granger, ten points to Gryffindor," he commended.
Dean stepped forward for the second, "That's a Mopses Potion, it allows the drinker to move things telekinetically," he explained.
"Excellent, yes, ten points, Mr… Thomas, correct?" Slughorn praised, Dean nodded.
"Miss Potter, would you like a go?" He asked encouragingly when nobody stepped forward.
"Erm, sure," she said, having been distracted by the notes in the book she grabbed.
She stood above the potion and knew immediately,"Amortentia, it's a powerful love potion, it emits the scent of what attracts the drinker most," she explained.
"Yes, exactly. For a full ten points would you give us examples?" He asked with a smile. Lizzie hovered over to place the scents for a moment.
"Sure, I smell... fresh coffee... fire whiskey... dragon scales... the crisp wind you only get in the air at a high altitude... the grass on the quidditch pitch...and...bubble bath," she said, suddenly mortified she said the last bit out loud. Her head starting to fog over euphorically until she stepped back.
"Very good. Next to that, if you open the cauldron... could you tell me what that is?" He asked.
Lizzie lifted the lid and winced, her stomach suddenly doing somersaults, "that's the anecdote...has the opposite aromas," she said, covering her nose and mouth.
"I know it's unpleasant, humor us with what is most repelling to you if you can stomach it," he said encouragingly.
"Um... brandy... rat poison... snakes... stale over-recycled air... summer sweat... vomit... and tall vanilla candlesticks," she said slowly as the smells changed, dropping the lid over the top when she couldn't take more.
"Vanilla candlesticks?" He asked with a chuckle.
"The kind burned at mass," she clarified.
"Ah. Brandy though? Not a fan?" He asked. Lizzie thought about Vernon always smelling like brandy and shook her head reproachfully.
"Well, acquired taste. Very good, fifteen points," he said happily. She gagged at the thought of Vernon being an acquired taste.
"Now, we will be brewing all three of the Potions over the next two weeks and first will be The Draft of Living Death, mind you it is extremely finicky and I've only had one student brew a perfect batch on the first try. Should any of you succeed, you will be rewarded with this," he explained, pulling a small vile of clear liquid from his robe pocket.
"Felix Felicis, liquid luck. The drinker will find all their endeavors successful, though it is banned for use in competitive environments," he explained. Draco seemed to perk up and noticeably more so than the others. Lizzie promptly decided he wouldn't be successful if she could help it.
Most everyone struggled with the potion, not excluding Hermione to Lizzie's surprise. Seamus blew his up, unsurprisingly, most people muttered profanities, some had the content come to near life, and Slughorn seemed the most amused at this demonstration, knowing it was the most complex potion of the year.
"All downhill from here, my friends," he laughed lightly.
Lizzie took to following the margin notes which were proving extremely helpful. Crushing the beans, alternating stirs, slowly adding the ingredients... by the time the lesson was over, hers was by all standards perfect.
Slughorn went around the room to drop a leaf in each cauldron to test, and jeered at Lizzie when hers melted.
"I now have two students in all my years of teaching who have perfected this potion on the first try, congratulations, Miss Potter," he said, handing her the crystal vile, but nobody looked happy for her.
"Professor, do you mind if I use the lab? I'm trying to finish a potion I've been trying to perfect for..." she started to explain as the class filed out.
"Yes; of course. I'm headed off for a meeting, but be my guest," he assured excitedly.
Lizzie finished her animagus potion in about an hour, relieved to get rid of the leaf, and broke a rule, for the first of many times to come, about heading onto the grounds alone.
Map and cloak in hand, she found a spot in the forest to plant the potion and left it for the next storm. This better work, she thought to herself. Kill me if I become a permanent Koala mutant... she laughed to herself at the thought.
Lizzie never thought she'd feel more dread about Defense Against the Dark Arts than she did with Umbridge, but Snape set her teeth on edge like nobody else.
The first half of the class he lectured, displayed slides of people turned inside out by dark magic along with various other horrors. Even she had to admit he seemed at home in this area if magic, but it was no compliment to him.
Partway through the lesson, her mind got lost in what she thought was a daydream that quickly spiraled into something else.
'What do you mean I cannot use this?'
'The cores, matching cores cannot fatally harm, especially Pheonix cores, they're uncommonly loyal to their owners and yours can't tell you apart from one another,' There was a loud scream of pain and Lizzie closed her eyes tightly in response. It sounded like Voldemort interrogating Olivander.
For a moment she swore her stomach moved, and stared down waiting for a repeat motion.
"Can anyone tell me the difference between an inferius and ghost?" Snape asked.
"Potter," he snapped, noticing her mind seemed preoccupied. She looked at him with a telling expression that she hadn't heard what he said.
"Difference between and inferious and a ghost," he said slowly in a menacing tone.
All of the sudden she felt almost too ill to speak. "Inferious are animated corpses and ghosts.. are... transparent spirits," she muttered and grimaced around a wave of pain as though bitten from the inside.
"Transparent... how observant," he sneered.
"Well, if you're... you know... trying to tell them apart in person... that's the most obvious," she stammered. Lizzie clasped both hands over the right side of her abdomen.
"Lizzie... what's the matter?" Hermione whispered nervously.
"He's really upset about something," she whispered with a considerable amount of effort. Hermione looked horror stricken, and Snape caught the exchange.
"Azalea is a perfect living example of a byproduct of dark magic. Unique case study, really, please do donate your body to research should you ever die, Potter..." he announced. "Death curse afflictions, oldest obscurial in Europe and first of anyone to ever get rid of it and survive... not to mention nine days under possession and the cruciatus without permanent damage, and an ophidian host. Who knows what else because the rules just don't apply..." he lectured sarcastically in as condescending a tone as possible. Then he looked at her instead of the class, "You might be considered the chosen one, but judging by your current predicament you'll be eaten alive before you ever get the chance," he hissed, noticing her apparent discomfort. Lizzie glared back at him.
"I'm only a byproduct of someone who is idiotic enough to keep using this kind of magic on someone it's obviously going to interact differently with. The same someone who is too bloody stupid to learn from his own goddamn mistakes," she growled.
"Your gall never ceases to surprise. Are you really insinuating that at seventeen you are more intelligent than the darkest wizard of our times?" Snape asked scathingly.
"My intelligence has nothing to do with it, doesn't change his oversights. I didn't decide his course of action. Do forgive me for being his biggest critic though, fourteen years of being a black magic experiment hasn't been kind, and I don't appreciate his track record for murdering my loved ones," she retorted. Snape glared back reprovingly. The pain was dissipating to something slightly bearable. By the end of the period she sat with her head buried waiting for people to file out.
"What are you still doing here, Potter?"
"It's back..." she whimpered into her arm, horrified by how involuntarily pathetic the words came out in the present company. He stared down at the top of her head.
"What do you expect me to do about that?" He hissed.
"Do you have anything I can take? I don't want to be cut open every time. He's upset. Really upset. They're eventually going to eat through if..." she said desperately.
"If YOU don't learn to control it," he sneered impatiently. "I don't have anything. You will need to check with Slughorn," he added harshly. He was colder to her than usual, if that was possible. She nodded but her stare was still scathing.
"I'll just consult my book on how to control ophidian curses then. The last book I read on the topic was about how they were outlawed because that's bloody impossible... but perhaps it would be possible if you hadn't given him the goddamn room..." she snapped. Snape's eyes flashed extra mean and he grabbed the sleeve of her cardigan in a balled up fist.
"I have told you before and I will tell you again, none of that was my idea," he growled.
"It doesn't change the bloody outcome though does it? 'Yes, my Lord, I'll go secretly tell the Order what you're doing to fulfill my double agent obligations. Will be gone just long enough for that not to matter though, and I'll leave you to it in the meantime, enjoy,'" she impersonated mockingly, and flinched before he even raised his hand, but he didn't hit her, she was hit with a mental load of immense guilt from him instead that was startling in itself.
"Just get out," he whispered and released his hold. Lizzie collected her bag aggressively and left.
Before she could head up to Pomphrey, Slughorn stopped Lizzie in the corridor and gestured for her to follow him to his office.
"Lizzie - you mind if I call you, Lizzie? I won't in classes I assure you -" he asked politely. Lizzie nodded.
"Term off to a good start, my dear?" He asked.
"Um, yes. Yes it is, thanks... are you liking being back, professor?" She asked politely.
"I am... when you have taught for as long as I had it sort of comes back as second nature. I used to only teach the advanced studies... NEWT students, back in the olden days. I forgot how little the younger ones know," he chuckled. Lizzie smiled back at him sweetly. He was an awkward bloke but sweet tempered and spirited from what she could tell. Something about her was bringing out both a fonder side to him and a nervousness and fearfulness she couldn't place. They entered his office and he offered her a seat.
"I have a potion ready I think for you, I just wanted to see how you took to it," he explained.
"Oh, that's actually perfect timing, professor... thank you..." she said graciously.
"It's foreign magic, I had to do a great deal of research on the topic but there's a base solution and a metal in this that's toxic to reptiles. It shouldn't harm you... but if you start to have any strange side effects, you should let me know immediately. I suggest taking a small amount weekly," he explained.
She stared down at the vile he handed her.
"In the research did you come across anything that may help me control them? I mean anything interesting at all? A friend of someone in the Order explained the basics to me in Giza this summer... he said that because I'm a parseltounge it would cause confusion?" She asked.
"I don't pretend to be an expert in this, dear... this kind of magic was outlawed because it is absolutely heinous. The descriptions of what happened to the women subjected to it was enough to keep anyone awake at night. I am deeply sorry you are afflicted," he said sadly.
"I've blacked most of it out, I didn't think it was possible to survive that much pain but my mind just doesn't want to remember it. Single touch from him is like being branded with hot iron, so... once he decided to do this... might as well have been drawn and quartered while set on fire... Just need to learn to survive with it I suppose," she rattled off with a bit of absentness in her eyes that Slughorn noticed. She drank the vile and winced around an uncomfortable amount of pain in the center of her abdomen.
"Lizzie, are you alright?" He asked, suddenly worried. She nodded with her face scrunched in pain and waited for it to subside. It was like a brick fell into the base of her stomach and then slowly lifted moments later.
"I'm alright, thanks..." she said quietly.
"You need to let me know if you're not, my door is always open for you, dear. Please know that," he insisted. Lizzie nodded with gratitude in her eyes. Slughorn clasped her hand in his and patted the top of her hand reassuringly. She grabbed her belongings and left. Dinner... she thought but wasn't the least bit hungry, feeling certain the potion had numbed her insides completely.