Hermione Has Met Her Match
Fanfiction by Kitsunedajfox based on J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter
Authors Note: More Snape-goodness. He isn't really acting like himself. I promise there is a reason for it. Just keep reading. I'll get the next part up soon.
Part 3
"Can anyone tell me what an inconta-visibilis potion is and does?" Snape said, charging into the noisy dungeon classroom, door slamming behind him. Hermione sat in the back row next to a dark messy haired boy Harry Potter and a slouching Ron Weasley. Her hand shop up desperately trying to gain the professor's attention. The room had falling quiet as Snape passed down the desks and turned his back to the class. He knew without looking that Granger had probably her hand in the air, but ignored it nonetheless. His heels spun and he glared into the eyes of the unlucky students seated at the front of the class. Various sized caldrons and flasks had been placed on each table and ingredients had been set. It was double potions today, both Gryffindors and Slytherins stared blankly up at the professor. Hermione continued to furiously wave her hand about, hitting Ron and knocking Harry's glass off. Snape rolled his eyes and bluntly stated, "Anyone else besides the Gryffindor know-it-all?" Draco Malfoy sitting next to his comrades Crabbe and Golye sheepishly began to raise his hand. "Yes, Malfoy?" Snape asked rather shocked Malfoy would attempt and answer.
"Sir, it is a potion that makes the drinker temporarily invisible?" he answered nervous. Snape's mouth pulled at a slight grin and sat,
"Very good Malfoy, 5 points to Slytherin. Now…" he started but stopped upon looking down on the desktop at which Malfoy was sitting. A piece of parchment stuck out from under a potions book which read in clear red ink good job answering Draco and then disappeared. Malfoy stared questioningly,
"Sir? Is there a problem?" Snape simply blinked at him and continued past.
"Now, open your books to page 437. You find the list of ingredients you will need up on the selves on the south wall of the class, you have one hour to complete your potion. Begin," he said quickly. Hermione's hand shot into the air again and Snape sharply shot at her,
"Miss Granger what part of page 437 do you not understand?"
"But sir! An inconta-visibilis potion takes months to saturate correctly! How are we supposed to…?"
"Yes Miss Archcrest?" Snape spoke plainly to another student who had raised her hand just as Hermione had started to speak.
"Clearly, you are missing the point. Professor Snape only needs to see that you can make the potion correctly and test it by seeing that it turns you invisible for a second or two. Since every intelligent potions master understands that the longer the potion sits, the longer one can not be seen. So very elementary Granger," she said running her fingers through her silky golden-brown hair smirking.
"Another 5 points for Slytherin, now get started," he said ending the conversation. Students abruptly stood from their seats and scrambled to get this and that for their potions. Hermione slumped back in her seat and pouted to her red head friend,
"That wicked girl. So very elementary my as…"
"Oh get over it Hermione," Ron said back getting up and walking past her obviously not wanted to get himself into trouble by just sitting around. She gave an exhausted humph and turned to Harry for reassurance. He only shrugged at her,
"Come on, we had better get started." She rolled her eyes and followed him across the room to where other students had congregated for ingredients. Alana Archcrest sat quietly in the center of the room watching the other students; her eyes not wandering far from where Hermione and Harry stood waiting. She looked down at a piece of parchment she had pulled out of her potions manual it read thanks Alana! You're not so bad aft... the words had just faded away as professor Snape came up behind her and began to speak,
"50 minutes left Miss Archcrest, I hope you are working?" he said his lips curling. She eloquently stood with her chin turned up in such a way that allowed her to glare right into Snape's eyes.
"Of course professor," she said her eyes then rolling as she stepped away to join her classmates. Snape, as she walked away, slipped the parchment out from her book and headed back to his desk unnoticed.
Several minutes later all of the students had found their seats and had begun their potions, carefully adding ingredients and odd colored liquids. A hum could be heard echoing off the walls as students whispered to each other. Pansy Parkingson and another Slytherin girl snickered something about Hermione and the Daily Prophet and pointed back at the trio. As comical as Hermione had found Rita Skeeter's little article to be, the torment from various girls was already getting annoying. Harry seemingly reading her mind spoke softly to her as he poured a dark black substance into his caldron,
"It's only the second day of that article, give it some more time. The commotion will die down."
"Thanks Harry, oh wait! Don't put that in your potion yet!" she said abruptly grabbing a narrow flask full of a chunky brown substance out of his hand, "you need to bring your potion to boil first. My goodness Harry you are going to fail your O.W.L.s next year if you keep this up." He rolled his eyes at her and flipped a page in his book randomly.
"So enough about Harry, what about Krum? Do you think you could ask him for me for his…" Ron started peeking over at Hermione's notes. She roughly shoved her notes into her book and then slammed it closed. Frustrated she said,
"Go ask him yourself!"
"Please Miss Granger, this is not Relationships 101, we don't care about your affair with Potter and that Quidditch boy," Snape said mockingly from his desk. Hermione turned a pale red and her face burned. The girls in the front of the class had turned around to identify where the sudden slamming of a book had come from and were now blowing raspberries at her. However Harry noticed that Malfoy kept checking under his book at a blank piece of parchment in increasingly frequent intervals. He looked nervously around the class every now and then and haphazardly added elements to his caldron.
"30 minutes left," Snape suddenly said getting up from his desk to scowl at students. Ron had to poke Hermione twice to get her attention as he begged for her help, his potion emitting a foul scent and starting shrivel like sour milk.
"Oh Ron, you should be ready to let yours sit by now, what have you done to it?" she asked. He turned red and replied,
"Maybe I boiled it too long?"
"Oh dear, Mr. Wesley what have we hear? I seriously hope you'd rather fail, than test that on yourself?" Snape said bending over to glance inside Ron's caldron.
As the end of the hour arrived students had begun to file at the face of Snape's desk all looking rather worried. It would be one of the first times they would test a potion that the professor hadn't guided them through. Results would indeed be interesting. Hermione had successfully turned herself invisible for a brief period and Harry had done so as well, even if it had been only for a split second. Crabbe and Golye were both sent back to their seats Snape not trusting their potions to not do something seriously harmful. Malfoy had his hair turn green, along with Neville who dared his potion and formed blue spots all over his round face. Snape sent him off to the infirmary followed by three other students who had unusual coloration changes in their body upon drinking. Ron had also failed and was forbidden to bring his potion any where near the professor's desk and fellow students. Finally Archcrest was the last to test her potion. Snape didn't even bother looking at her potion before giving her the okay to try it.
"Please clean up your areas and take out your notes for lecture," Snape demanded as Archcrest reappeared on the other side of the room seconds later already putting her books away.
"Unbelievable. Did you see that Hermione?" Ron asked before silence fell on the class again. After what seemed like an eternity Snape dismissed the class. Malfoy and Longbottom had returned fully cured although Harry could have swore Neville had bags under his eyes and looked as though he was going to puke. The four Gryffindors wasted no time rushing out of the class followed by the rest of the anxious students. The only one left in the class was Archcrest. She was taking her good time carefully putting her things away. She carefully looked all around her. Snape came up behind her,
"Missing something?"
"No professor, I was just waiting to ask you something," she said quickly. He gave her an unbelieving stare.
"You did very well today, better than Miss Granger. It is about time someone in the Slytherin house understands potions," he said casually heading for his desk once more. His long pale hands rummaged through a stake of essays. He pulled out the parchment he had taken earlier. Archcrest had finished gathering her things and was almost through the door when Snape stopped her, "I wonder why you were trying to help Malfoy along. He has never needed help before?"
"Sir?" she asked her throat in her stomach.
"It takes a good deal of magic to bewitch an everyday piece of parchment," he said, now moving between her and the door.
"I'm sorry sir, I don't know what you are talking abo…" she hastily spoke.
"This!" he said shoving the parchment at her, "don't let me find it again!" Archcrest took the parchment and stared at it hard.
"It's just a piece of parchment. That you stole? Professor, I don't know what I ever could have done to provoke this?" The two stood silently looking into each other's eyes. Finally the sound of foot steps broke the tension and a distant voice was heard,
"Alana? Is that you?" It was Fulke Archcrest, Alana's older Gryffindor brother.
"She was just leaving, sorry to keep you, good job today Archcrest. I wouldn't expect any less of my Slytherins," Snape said with a hint of frustration and did not look back at Alana. As Snape moved aside the two Archcrest hastily walked away in hushed conversation.
Snape rubbed his chin in thought, alone in the darkened room. He hadn't seen much interaction between Draco and Alana before. Alana had never helped anyone before either. He tapped his fingers on a close desk and with a whip of his wand all the candles went out. The door slammed behind him as he exited and the room was quiet once more.