Ron looked up as his only sister plopped down next to him at the breakfast table. "Guess what?" Ginny asked happily, peering nervously at Harry out of the corner of her eye. Bloody girls and their bloody crushes on his best friend. Even his sister now...

"Wot?" He asked, still chewing his eggs. She grimaced at him, but kept talking.

"I made a friend! Did you hear about the whole thing with the first years and Professor Lockhart yesterday?" Ron practically choked. The "Lockhart scandal" had already become famous among students, and no doubt some children would be writing to their parents about it soon, which would in turn mean that soon all of magical England would know about it. Ron almost felt sorry for Lockhart, even if he was apparently a liar, a thief, and a terrible teacher. During his, Hemione and Harry's first class with the man, he had set Cornish pixies on them and fled the room. "Well, she's the one who started it. I think she knows some werewolves, or something, because she got really upset about some of the things written about them in the textbook. Anyhow, she started it and I helped, and now she's my friend!"

Ron swallowed another spoonful of eggs and opened his mouth. "What's her name?" He asked.

"Elizabetha. She never said her last. Oh, she's also the one who did the funny spell at lunch yesterday, and was at the bookstore, too!"

Bloody hell. She's spreading.

Elizabetha was having a fairly good time. She had two best friends, Draco and Blaise, plus several half friends, like Luna, some red-headed Gryffindor girl, and another Slytherin first year, Peter, the one who had glared at her in charms yesterday. To be fair, the more time she spent with him the more she realized that he simply glared at everything. Kneazles, she was sure Peter would glare at even kneazles. She wasn't quite sure what to think of Harry Potter and his two friends, though. She was pretty sure Granger was after either her life or knowledge that she didn't have, but Potter himself seemed okay, and Weasley she hoped wasn't too bad.

"Lizzy." Blais' voice interupted her musings and she looked at him blankly. "You're just chewing on the spoon now. I don't think they're edible." He rumbled, and she looked down to notice he was right.

"Oopsie daisy. Ah well, I've eaten worse." That gained Draco's attention, and he gave her a slightly concerned look. She laughed. "Hey, nothing too bad! To be fair, dementors were bound to be terrible cooks from the start. I don't even want to know what they fed me as a baby." She told him, and they left it at that, eating in silence for a bit.

"So," he began a while later. "today you start potions." She nodded happily. It was one of the classed she was looking forward to. Granted, she was looking forward to them all, but who cared. "I'll be praying for you."

Uh...what? Why?!

Five minutes later she finished breakfast and rushed to said class early, mentally reviewing what she knew of potions, which was probably quite a lot thanks to her odd but informative upbringing, until the rest of the students filtered in and the professor arrived. Gloriously.

Elizabetha stared as a man with longish black hair and a slightly crooked nose swept past in a truly marvelous fashion, coarse-looking black cloaks billowing behind him not unlike a dementors. So this is the infamous Snivellus... She immediately liked the man, despite what Sirius said. He obviously had good taste; his classroom was down in the colder area of the dungeons, and filled with vials and bundles of things that reminded her of her own rooms. She could almost swear she saw a bundle of silver fur that looked just like Mora's.

"Welcome..." The man hissed loudly, and Elizabetha felt a comforting chill run down her spine. "I have no doubt," He continued slowly. "That some of you idiots think this class will be easy. Don't be fooled. Potions is as hard as any other subject, and requires just as much work, if not more to ensure you don't lose your life due to some stupidly made mistake. In this class I will teach you all you need to know, assuming you're not idiots. And if you wish to learn, I can teach you how to bottle up life itself." Ending with that dramatic note and a good solid glare that sent a few more chills down Elizabetha's spine, he turned to the black board and scribbled something down. "Open your textbooks to page twelve and get to your stations."

The rustle of pages and the stomping of feet followed as students rushed to obey the bat-like, or in Elizabetha's case, dementor like professor.

"What you will find at your stations are the ingredients for a simple cough potion. Assuming you are at the right page, commence. If not, get out of my class."

To Elizabetha's great amusement, two people actually scurried out. ...Really?

Severus Snape stared doubtfully down at the cauldron before him. In it was a pale pink liquid, bubbling merrily away. The color was right. The smell of the steam rolling off of it was right. It wasn't exploding, or exuding toxic fumes, that he knew of. But the area felt unusually chill, even for the dungeon, and suddenly he noticed that cooling charms had been placed on the fire. He shot a doubtful look at the girl who had brewed it. She was one of his newest Slytherins, blondish, skinny, and freakishly pale in the strange light of his classroom. He didn't miss the shimmer of insanity in her dark-circled sleep-prevented eyes as she smiled expectantly at him.

"It is done well." Was all Severus said before going on to the next failed brew. Honestly, she was only the second to get it right so far, so he probably should have been far more rewarding, but that really just wasn't him, so he just continued to insult those who failed and leave the third who had succeeded with an approving nod. Not getting hexed should be enough of a reward, he decided.

"Fifteen points to Slytherin." He ended up saying. Unsurprisingly, they had done the best, the three who completed the cough potion all being from his house. Of course.

Some muttering rebelliously, the students filed out of his classroom. Soon only he and the blond girl remained.

"Professor, may I ask you a question?" She asked, and he blinked at her voice. It was like rusty nails scratching on dry wood. He nodded, and she continued. "I was wondering if I could put cooling charms on my station next time as well, or if it was an issue."

"Are you Elizabeth?" He distantly remembered getting a note from Poppy about one of his students having issues with heat. Or something like that. "The one who has trouble with heat?"

"Elizabetha, actually. With an A at the end. Of course, I do understand that you don't want to spoil me, after all, discomfort is part of life, however I thought to ask." That surprised him, on some small level. She seemed rather accepting of how miserable life was, for a first year, and was actually somewhat polite. Entirely unlike that Potter brat, who complained at every opportunity.

Oh well, that hate was mutual. Somewhat. Not really. Not with those green eyes.

"Do whatever you want, as long as it doesn't mess up your potions." Oddly enough, she smiled gratefully up at him. No one smiles at me. What is she up to...?

"Thank you, professor. Oh, and sir? I love your cloak. Your entrance was amazing." With that she walked off, leaving Severus slightly speechless. And mostly flattered.

He'd worked on that entrance for days, it was nice to know someone appreciated it.

Um... Can I just say that I've always loved Snape's cloak? It's marvelous. Also, I'm going to call him Snivellus occasionally, so don't be, like, offended, or something. The reasoning for that was that is probably what she thought his name was, being friends with Sirius and all. I'll be trying to thrown stuff like that in every now and then.

Also, I wanted to ask this as early as possible, but who should the new DADA teacher be? Should I have Snape start teaching it, or just make someone up? Should I put Remus in early? Should I throw Lucius Malfoy in and watch the chaos unfold? That actually sounds really fun. I may do that, or at least have him show up for some reason. Anyhow, I have only a few more chapters written until I'll need to know what to do with that, so please tell me in the reviews! Or feel free to suggest someone else, too. I need to know before I write much more. Anyhow, that's it, so byeeeeee!