Chapter Forty-Seven
Transfiguration Classroom, Hogwarts, Scotland, January 15, 1991
It had been almost a week since Henry and Adrian had been released from the hospital, and many things at the school had changed.
Henry and his godfather- whom he jokingly deemed Uncle Remy- were becoming extremely close, and could often be found on the Quidditch pitch or practicing various spells.
Also, it seemed that the Weasley twins had not forgotten about their prank war, as the Firebrands had, over the winter holidays. Rather, they had struck with far more vigor than they'd demonstrated before.
However, once Henry and Adrian were released, the war had roared back into the minds of the entire school, becoming more and more creative by the day.
As a matter of fact, Henry was discussing a new idea with Neville that involved a squeaky dog toy, a venture to the kitchen, and borrowing Loki for a bit when Professor Lupin sat on the edge of the desk.
"May I ask what is so interesting, Mister Potter?" he asked pleasantly.
Henry gulped and turned to face his teacher. When he looked at Lupin's face, however, he struggled to bite back a laugh.
It seemed that the professor had been the unfortunate victim of one of the Firebrands' latest and admittedly foulest jokes; his skin was scaly and ranged in color from green to purple to orange –a combination of one of their new PermaDye Balloons and a modified potion that Draco and Hermione had half-invented, half- accidentally-found.
"I-I was just talking about the Firebrands, sir," Henry answered.
"Ah," Lupin said, smiling slightly. "Yes, they are interesting, I suppose, mysterious and extremely creative. Though, I must admit, I do not see the relevance as it applies to this lesson, Mister Potter."
"Sorry, sir," Henry mumbled.
"Two points from Hufflepuff, and I forgive you," he said. "Now, as for turning a shoe into a soup bowl…"
Neville sighed, running a hand through his hair. He noticed that it was growing rather long and smiled softly. Many of his friends were growing their hair longer than the other students were; Adrian's was already long enough to tie back, and his own was constantly falling into his eyes, which he didn't mind overmuch.
His dad had longer hair, if the pictures he'd uncovered in the attic at home were any indicator. He looked more like his mum, though, as his dad had blue eyes and rather sharper features than Neville himself had. He was told by Sirius, the new assistant teacher, that he had inherited his father's unfortunate clumsiness and lack of skill with potions and had gotten his mum's smile and love of Herbology.
Sirius was apparently a good friend to both his parents. Neville was glad to hear of their faults as well as the stories he'd grown up with; the way his grandmother had always carried on, it seemed as though his parents were the epitome of perfection, and Neville, with his unsteady hand and slight stutter, could never hope to compare. Hearing that he was far more like them than he'd thought was a relief he didn't know he'd been waiting for.
A sharp elbow to the ribcage brought Neville swiftly- and painfully- back to reality, where Professor Lupin was assigning a foot-long essay on the day's topic, which he hadn't paid the least bit of attention to.
'Well,' he thought glumly as he shoved his unused ink bottle and parchment into his bag, 'maybe Blaise will help me.'
Slytherin Common Room
There was something decidedly odd about the four first-year boys who were currently sneaking out of the green and silver dungeon. And with their absent friend Greengrass as well, now that he thought about it.
Theodore Nott came to this conclusion quite suddenly one evening as he sat reading in the common room.
He'd noticed them, of course. Hell, everyone noticed them; they were friends with Muggleborns, half-bloods, and even a Gryffindor.
What was most interesting to Theodore Nott, however, was the way they didn't give a damn.
It was something he admired, really. He himself came from a long and twisted line of purebloods, and he personally didn't think that he'd turned out too badly.
He got good marks in nearly all of his classes (History of Magic was simply hopeless for him), he was a decent Beater when he played pick-up Quidditch games, and he never, ever disobeyed when someone gave him instructions or orders.
Though, perhaps this was part of the problem, really, as he was beginning to truly hate the elder Slytherins who reigned over the others like monarchs. Being a first-year, he was expected to adhere to their every whim and wait on them hand and foot.
This was expected of all the first-years, but those five others couldn't care less about the "powerful connections" they had the opportunity to make while still at Hogwarts.
Instead, they had done something that was most odd for a group of characteristically ambitious young Slytherins and decided that their time would be better spent having a bit of fun.
He wished he could follow suit and tell Marcus Flint exactly where he could shove his connections, but alas, he was far less brave than they were.
Admittedly, it was far easier to be brave when there was someone to back you up, which Theodore didn't have at Hogwarts.
He had a friend, of course, a best friend, in fact.
Her name was Emmy, and she was a funny and blond and freckly Muggle girl who lived in a village not far from his home.
His parents and brother didn't know, of course, because they thought that Muggles were filthy animals with little to no intelligence, and wouldn't want their young son to be corrupted, not when he had such promise.
He sighed, returning to his book. It was one of a fascinating set of Muggle books Emmy had given him for Christmas about little people called Hobbits, and there were Dwarves (which everyone knew to be mere legend), and wizards (which amused him, since Emmy didn't know of that aspect of his personality) and even dragons (which he was secretly obsessed with. He wouldn't mind being a dragon trainer or even a dragon catcher, but to do so would shame his family, which he didn't particularly want to do).
He was, unfortunately, stupid enough to hope that if he kept his head down and his nose in a book he would be ignored, but alas, it was not to be so.
Millicent Bulstrode and Pansy Parkinson plopped into the seats on either side of him and sneered.
"Look at this pathetic little bookworm, Millicent!" Pansy said in her gratingly nasal voice. "All he ever does is read! Maybe he should have been a Ravenclaw!"
Theodore scowled darkly at her, though he privately agreed, wishing that he'd listened to the Hat when it'd practically begged to put him in Ravenclaw. Unfortunately, he had been adamant about his wishes to follow in his family's footsteps and become a Slytherin.
But, that was months past, and it was much too late to undo his mistake now.
Sighing again, he shoved his book roughly into his robe pocket and stomped out of the common room to avoid any more of the idiocy within. He opened the portrait and ran smack bang into someone just as it closed behind him.
This wouldn't seem so odd to Theodore on a normal day, as his feet were rather large and easy to stumble upon, however, it did not seem normal now, as there was no one else in the corridor.
"Hullo?" he called, feeling rather stupid. "Is anyone there?"
He listened intently, and heard the soft swish of a cloak at the end of the hall.
Feeling more curious than apologetic now, he dashed to where he'd heard the sound and stopped; there was the faint scrape of a sneaker on a stair.
He ran toward the stairs as fast as he could, ignoring all of the stares he got as he ran full bore through the entrance hall and up the huge marble staircase. When he reached the seventh floor, he looked about madly and saw…
he shook his head and stared, bewildered, at a bend in the hall where he'd just seen a pair of worn sneakers run by without any legs attached to them!
He chased after the floating sneakers and could easily hear panting and loud footsteps ahead of him now, and then he saw something very, very strange.
There was a large wooden door materializing out of the solid stone wall, and before his eyes, the door opened and closed by itself before it began to rapidly turn back into stone.
Theodore ran toward the vanishing door and reached for the handle, but it had already turned into a slightly protruding bit of rock and the rest of the door disappeared completely.
"Damn!" he said, slapping his hand against the rough surface of the wall.
Panting and clutching the stitch in his side, Nott sank to the floor as his body suddenly became aware of the fact that he'd just run up eight flights of stairs.
Disappointed, he walked to the library, which had been his original destination, and too the book out of his pocket to read where no one would bother him.
Still, he was more than a bit curious about the sudden disappearance of the door in the seventh floor corridor, and about the sneakers he thought he'd seen.
He decided to investigate.
Later.
Room of Requirement
"That was way too close," Ron panted, bending to catch his breath.
"What was?" Hermione asked from her seat on a nearby blue and bronze couch.
"Nott almost caught us!" Blaise said. "He was right behind us all the way up the stairs! I had no idea he was so fast!"
"I have no idea how he even knew where we were!" Adrian said, pulling the cloak off of himself and Loki, who looked to have quite enjoyed the run. "We were under the cloak he entire time!"
"He probably heard us," Daphne said. "We don't all have charmed boots, Ade."
"I have to agree with Daph on this one," Draco panted. "It certainly didn't help when we started running and bumping into people."
"Or when Loki started panting."
Hermione's eyes narrowed. "You'll just have to be more careful then. We don't need anyone confiscating the cloaks or finding out about the Room, because they'd start snooping around."
"Yeah, the last thing we need is someone finding out that we know about the Stone," Henry added, glancing up from his potions essay.
The five Slytherins nodded and joined their friends around the warm fire.
"Alright, we'll be more careful. Did we get any further with our, ah, research?" Ron asked, flopping down next to Hermione.
She slammed the book in frustration. "No! There are thousands of possibilities for the enchantments that the professors could have used!"
Adrian shook his head. "Well, maybe we should just keep researching what we do know is guarding the Stone," he suggested.
"You mean Fluffy?" Neville asked fearfully.
"Yeah, Nev, I mean Fluffy," Adrian smiled apologetically. "There has to be some way to get past it. I'm sure of it! I mean, why would they design a way to keep something so valuable safe if you yourself could never get to it? I mean, doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of having it in the first place?"
"Well, the only thing I've come across was that a Cerberus can't be felled by any spell, as it is born with protections against that sort of thing," Hermione sighed, rubbing her temples tiredly.
"What about a potion?" Draco asked suddenly.
Hermione looked up, beaming at him. "That's it! Would Professor Snape have any of the Draught of Living Death left from when he brewed it with the sixth years?"
Draco nodded, grinning broadly. "Yeah, he keeps them under a stasis spell so that they don't spoil."
"We could drug the dog with a potion and then sneak past it?" Neville asked hopefully.
"Absolutely, Neville, if we can find a way to get into the potion storeroom without Snape noticing," Hermione said. "But he's always prowling around the room. He'd notice straight off if some of us snuck off for ten minutes."
Neville didn't seem at all phased by this, and smirked at her. "I can guarantee you fifteen minutes as long as Draco pairs with me in Potions for the rest of the year. I'll need it after this."
"After what, Nev?" Adrian asked, intrigued.
"I think I'll pair up with Seamus tomorrow," he said simply, and the rest of his friends quickly caught on and laughed.
Potions Classroom, Hogwarts, Scotland, 16 January, 1991
Neville gulped as Professor Snape stalked past his and Seamus' cauldron again. Glancing up, he saw Adrian and Draco slowly pull their cloak out of Draco's bag, Daphne sneeze into her and Theodore Nott's (whom they'd decided to keep a closer eye on) cauldron, and Ron "accidentally" tap his silver knife against his and Blaise's cauldron twice, the ringing noise echoing quietly through the silent dungeon.
That was the signal.
Quick as a flash, Neville dumped Stinksap, dragon dung, ashwinder eggs, and doxy venom into his nearly completed Sleeping Potion, ducked under the desk and covered his face and ears with his robes.
The potion- and the cauldron with it- exploded magnificently, drenching Seamus, Dean, and every other nearby student but Neville in a noxious orange foam. When Seamus tried to wipe the mess off with his wand, the botched potion caught fire and sent off angry sparks which, in turn ignited several other potion- covered students, as well as much of the classroom.
Screams of outrage, pain and terror rang through the dungeon, but they were nothing compared to the gagging and spluttering that the putrid stench of the burning, smelly, sparking potion induced.
When Neville peered over the top of his desk, Draco and Adrian had vanished, Daphne was covering her mouth with her robes, Ron and Blaise were retching, and Professor Snape was storming toward his table, a truly petrifying expression on his face.
"Would either of you care to explain?" he asked in a deadly whisper.
Seamus began spluttering an explanation when Lavender Brown threw up on the front of Snape's black robes.
If Neville didn't see it for himself, he wouldn't have believed it possible for Snape to look even more livid than he already had.
"Out," he whispered harshly. "All of you, get out of this classroom right now. One hundred points from Gryffindor."
The students hesitated a moment too long, and Snape exploded with fury. "OUT! NOW! GET OUT!"
There was a mad rush for the door, and as he was swallowed up by the mob of eleven-year olds, Neville breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Adrian and Draco slinking to the back of the crowd, hiding their smug expressions with twin looks of revulsion.
He hid a smile as he scrambled out the door and up the dungeon stairs.
It'd worked.
And he was dead meat.
"What the hell Neville?!" Seamus yelled once they'd exited the dungeons. "We were nearly finished, you spastic git, and now we've lost 100 points! We were in the lead for the House Cup, and now we'll be lucky to tie with Hufflepuff!"
"I-I… it was an a-accident!" Neville cried as his housemates rounded on him.
"Oi, leave him alone!" Ron shouted, shouldering his way through the crowd, Blaise, Daphne, Draco and Adrian close behind him. "It's not his fault that all you stupid lions are rubbish at potions!"
"Ron, not helping," Neville whispered as the Gryffindor's faces turned even angrier.
"Right, right, sorry mate, just wanted to get that off my chest," Ron whispered back. "You're the idiot who set the ruddy potion on fire, Finnigan! And Brown's the one who puked all over Snape!" he shouted at them, pointing his finger accusingly at the offending Gryffindors.
"Clear off!" Daphne ordered sternly, grabbing Ron's arm and pulling him and Neville out of their corner.
The five Slytherins and Neville shoved their way through the scarlet and gold- clad students and into the deserted Great Hall, hoping to get an early lunch.
Once they were alone, they burst into hysterical laughter.
"Oh, Merlin, did you see Uncle's face?" Adrian howled, leaning on Neville for support. "I wish I'd had Father's camera!"
"And that potion! That was the worst thing I have ever or will ever smell," Blaise smiled, gagging as he sniffed his robes by accident.
"Neville," Draco chuckled, clapping a hand on Neville's shoulder, "I now understand why you're a Gryffindor; that was the bravest, dumbest thing I've ever seen anyone do."
"That wasn't brave," Neville panted. "That was a botched suicide attempt!"
Loki barked, evidently in agreement.
They laughed again.
