2
The next day the student body was assembled a full hour before the start of lessons. Dumbledore smiled benignly at the youths.
"Everything works splendidly. They are hooked," he pointed out to Snape from the corner of his mouth.
"It certainly seems so," agreed the potions master. "Don't you think you should let them have their calendar windows now?"
"Indeed, indeed." Dumbledore rose to his feet and bid the crowd of youngsters a good morning. "I'm delighted to find you all here in time for us to open our advent calendar and enjoy what we get at leisure. Now, kindly fetch your gifts."
Once again there was a rush to the walls and soon everybody sat with a little parcel waiting for the signal to unwrap what they had got. Snape had got a clumsily wrapped long narrow package. He looked at it with dread. Had somebody given away their wand? Hopefully not! So what could it be?
Like the day before, the potions master had to wait to find out because Dumbledore insisted the teacher watch the students opening their gifts first.
First everything went well. Children unwrapped bits of various sweets. Fudge, chocolate, Bertie Bott's every flavour beans, some of the sweets were even of the muggle variety.
There was a number of more interesting gifts but those who had received sweets didn't mind. Nothing was wrong with a nice chocolate bar. Snape tried to spot who had gotten his gift.
It turned out that Miss Cho Chang from Ravenclaw was the lucky student to get cute bunny ears after downing a vial of potion. First the girl looked unhappy but that changed when she became the center of attention within seconds and all her housemates wanted to touch her soft new ears.
"How cute," McGonagall remarked. "Did you give more than one? I had no idea that was possible."
"What are you talking about?" Snape asked.
The witch pointed at the Gryffindor table where Ronald Weasley was just downing a potion, too.
"No!" Snape replied with a feeling of doom. He was the only potions master present. He just hoped Weasley's gift had been made by one of his more competent brewers. He hurriedly searched his pockets and was relieved when he discovered a bezoar.
"Don't worry," Dumbledore whispered. "It was I who gave a potion today. I found yours hilarious yesterday and decided to join in the fun today."
"Well, at least we don't have to worry that Weasley was poisoned," sighed Snape. The discoverer of the twelve uses of dragon blood certainly was competent enough to cook up some fun brew. At that very moment, the Slytherin table erupted with laughter. Snape looked over and discovered Daphne Greengrass covered head to toe in green scales.
"That was mine," Dumbledore murmured. He looked puzzled as he observed Weasley.
"Then what did Mr Weasley drink?" asked McGonagall.
The three teachers watched the young Gryffindor with a mixture of curiosity and worry. Nothing changed. At last they gave up and turned their attention to other students.
Gregory Goyle had got a knitted hat with stripes in all four houses' colours. He was wearing it proudly and as far as Snape could tell from the Head Table he was trying to find somebody who would make him a matching scarf. Of course no pureblood witch with self-respect knew how to knit.
At the Ravenclaw table somebody had unwrapped a twig of mistletoe. The thing now hovered over the table and people kissed the person beside them when the mistletoe was above them. Some exchanged neutral pecks, others blushed crimson and some of the older ones put on a show that made Snape blush. When Algie Peters was still snogging Gwendolyn Abercrombie although the twig was at the other side of the table the potions master had had enough.
"Mr Peters, that is enough!" he thundered and the young couple let go of each other as if burnt.
"Severus," interfered Flitwick, "the whole house has been waiting for them to admit their feelings since Easter. Don't scare them off each other."
Mr Peters and Ms Abercrombie both blushed crimson and it got only worse when their housemates started to congratulate them.
Hannah Abbott of Hufflepuff was now the proud owner of a stack of chocolate frog cards and had immediately upon discovering what her gift was started a chocolate frog card exchange. It came as a surprise how many children carried their collection to breakfast.
At last all the students had opened their gifts and the teacher were free to look at theirs.
Snape unwrapped his box and – indeed – found a wand inside. He shuddered. Who was silly enough to give away their wand?
The potions master got to his feet and called for attention. "Who of you put their wand into the advent calendar?" he asked sternly and held up the wand in question for everybody to see.
Students started to pat down their robes. Snape pinched the bridge of his nose with his free hand. They carried chocolate frog cards with them wherever they went and were not sure where their wands were. No wonder teaching them was a herculean task!
"Well?" Snape shook the wand and gave the students at large a stern look. He almost dropped the wand when it exploded and turned into a rubber chicken.
The Great Hall roared with laughter.
Snape sat back down, blushing. "This is not funny," he muttered.
"But it is!" crowed Dumbledore and McGonagall agreed.
Snape's first lesson of the day was with his least favourite group, Slytherin and Gryffindor seventh years. The class which held the walking disaster – Neville Longbottom – the boy who lived to annoy Snape – Harry Potter – the Slytherin prince – Draco Malfoy – the girl who knew everything – Hermione Granger – and the boy who was in the middle of it all because he had chosen the right train department – Ron Weasley. And those were only the worst of the bunch. There were more. In fact, there was not a single student in that class whom Snape would call normal.
The lesson started out as normal as a lesson with that group could. Snape gave them the recipe for a simple fever draught. Malfoy dropped something into Potter's cauldron in passing. Parkinson cut her finger and whined about how slicing ingredients was servant's work. Longbottom exploded his cauldron although at that stage only water should be boiling in there. Finnigan set a whole jar of dried basket willow leaves on fire, the stench was excruciating.
Then it happened.
Weasley walked over to the Slytherin side of the room and knelt in front of Millicent Bulstrode before he started to sing. Surprisingly, Weasley was not a bad singer but the song he had chosen was absolutely unacceptable. It started harmless with praise for the girl's hair and eyes but got naughtier and naughtier as he proceeded to describe her more bodily attributes.
It was Draco Malfoy himself who took it upon him to defend his dumbfounded housemate.
"Weasley," he barked as he stood beside Millicent, "one more disrespectful line and I will teach you how to treat a respectable pureblood witch! Maybe mudbloods like Granger like that kind of treatment but you will not take liberties with Millie!"
"Who do you call a mudblood?" screeched Potter and within seconds curses and fists were flying while Weasley continued his song.
Then it dawned on Snape. It must be the potion the boy had found in his advent calendar! Snape had to impede five students to fight his way to the redhead. With one swift movement he threw the bezoar he was carrying in his pocket into the boy's mouth.
"Thank you, Professor," panted Weasley when the bezoar did its work and enabled him to stop singing. "I am very sorry, Millicent. I got a potion from the advent calendar and thought it was going to change my hair colour or something. I had no idea it would make me offend you."
Millicent Bulstrode accepted the apology gracefully as was becoming for a witch of breeding.
Snape restored order in the classroom by sending some well-placed stinging hexes at the fighting boys.
The rest of the lesson went as usual.
"Tom got a tattoo making set," Dumbledore informed the teachers at dinner. "Lucius got muggle chocolates and he's eating them in order to destroy them." The teachers giggled.
"And Madame Lestrange?" asked Flitwick. "What did she get?"
"One of the Weasley's daydreams. They don't know whether it is good because she's still caught in it. Tom says she doesn't look unhappy, so they won't disturb her."
Snape shuddered at the thought of a daydream which made Bellatrix Lestrange happy but said nothing. He had to come up with a new present for the next day and that took some thinking.