A/N: Here's the chapter we've all been waiting for... Will Nat find out about the love potion? Sorry, sorry, sorry for the terrible quality of writing and late updates the past few weeks! Finals have been hectic!

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:

Revealed

"Good Merlin," she laughed, her wand pointing playfully at him, "Why do you insist on sneaking up on me when you know you'll never succeed?"
"It's not my fault you've got awesome reflexes," he protested, holding his arms up in defeat. "But one day, I swear I'll be able to do it," he added, looking determined.
"Is that a challenge?" her eyes sparkled mischievously.
"But of course," he smirked. She slowly lowered her wand.
"Then I believe you're off to a horrible start," she grinned, pocketing her wand, "Come on, I'm hungry, let's just go get James and Lily and find someplace for dinner." She turned around and began to walk away.
He grinned; he seized his chance and jumped. To his amazement, she didn't even turn around and soon, both of them were on the ground.
"Oi, why didn't you fight back?" he frowned, staring down at the back of her head. "It's not fair if you just let me win." He slowly stood and helped her up.
She shrugged, grinning. "Just so I could do this," she said, before leaning over and kissing him softly on the lips. He looked at her, stunned, and she laughed and took his hand.
"Your reflexes are very poor, Mr. Black," she said. "Far poorer than a constipating dragon trapped in cotton floss."

Sirius opened his eyes and shook his head. These dreams had been getting more frequent as the days rolled by, and he had no idea why. He was convinced that the girl in his dreams was Leona, but in his dreams, she was much more charming, cheerful, and quick-witted. He groaned and fell back against his pillow, regretting that he ate that bruised apple Leona had given him that night. She hadn't known it was bruised, but the hopeful look she had on her face when she had given it to him was unbearable.
Bruised apple...
How could Sirius be so blind? He was obviously thinking the girl in his dreams was more charming, because he hadn't appreciated Leona enough. She does so much for him, and all he could do was regret? He loved her with all his heart and soul, and he felt that Leona wasn't getting enough of that. No, he would do something for her that would proclaim his love for her, so that she'd never forget it. He lay back on his pillow, dreaming instead, of what he would do for her.

"Oi, Padfoot?" came a quiet voice from the bed beside him. Aggravated that someone had disturbed his thoughts of Leona, Sirius sat up and gave the person a harsh look.

"What?" he snarled. "Can't you see I'm trying to sleep?"

James frowned.

"I heard you groaning and sitting up, so I assumed you were awake," said James. "Anyway, can we talk? I'm - I'm kind of worried about something."

Sirius looked annoyed, but motioned James to continue.

"Sirius," James said. "I'm worried about this whole in-love-with-Leona business. It's not healthy; you don't really eat your meals unless Leona feeds them to you..."

"It was her request," Sirius defended. "And quite frankly, she's right. Food does taste ten times better when she spoons them into my mouth!"

James decided not to comment on the absolute pathetic-ness of that issue. "Well, yeah..." he said, "but I don't want to lose my best mate over some girl, yeah? It's been kind of lonely these past two months without you. Especially since lately..." he hesitated, glancing at the empty bed beside Peter's.

"If you can't accept Leona, then I don't see the point of us being mates," Sirius snapped. "I love Leona, and if you can't handle that, then goodnight! I have nothing more to say to you." He lay back on the bed, motionless.

Normally, at this cold snub, James would have been pissed off. But something wasn't right; Sirius wasn't acting like himself. Was it family problems again, and Sirius was hiding it by making excuses of loving Leona? Could that be it?

James sighed to himself. "G'night, Padfoot," he muttered quietly, before pulling over the curtains of his four-poster bed.

"Line 102: I... will not... imper... sonate... a student and... trick... the... author...ities," Natalia said aloud as she wrote, "Line 103: I will... not... imper... sonate a... stu...dent... and..."

"For God's sake, Lynx, shut your mouth!" snapped Professor McGonagall, completely losing her cool as a vein throbbed in her temple. "You've been doing that for the past half hour!"

"I thought we could write lines together, and - oh, would you look at that, I messed up my sentence, exclaimed Natalia, frowning. "Looks like I'll have to start over. Line 103: I will not..."

"Just - just finish writing the sentence and get out of here!" said Professor McGonagall heatedly, throwing her arms up in defeat. Natalia grinned and quickly scribbled down the sentence in three seconds, before picking up her bookbag and winking at the deputy headmistress.

"Good night, Professor McGonagall," she said, laughing. "Cheers!" And she bounded out of the office, ten minutes earlier than she was supposed to.

Minerva McGonagall took a deep breath and relished the silence. That was the last time she was ever going to give Natalia Lynx a writing lines detention again.

I'm running out of detention types to give her, she thought with good humor, in spite of herself, Good thing it's her sixth year.

"Oi, Lily!" Natalia bounded into the girls' dorm, grinning, "What are you doing?"

Lily raised her eyebrow skeptically. "Homework, Natalia, what else would I be doing?"

Natalia shrugged and bounced on her bed, cocking her head to one side. After a while, she let out a loud sigh. "Lily, I'm bored," she whined, "Let's do something fun."

"Like what?"

"I dunno..." said Natalia, grinning mischievously, "Why don't we... have a pillow fight?" She tossed Lily a pillow while she grabbed her own.

"What? No, I've got homework..." Lily said halfheartedly, staring at her parchment of Arithmancy homework that she didn't really want to do.

"What, scared you'll be pummeled by Nat Lynx?" Natalia mocked, bouncing up and down on her bed, "Too scared to lose?"

"No... I'm scared that you'll cry once I beat you!" Lily laughed as she got up from her chair and ran around the girls' dorm, chasing after Natalia. "Where do you think you're going? Hiding from unavoidable defeat?" she said as she caught up to Natalia and began beating her with the pillow. "Give it up, Lynx!"

"Never!" Natalia laughed hysterically, trying to defend herself. It was chaotic, both girls were running after each other, jumping from bed to bed, ruining the other girls' nicely made beds. It was until Natalia tripped and landed on a bedside table that they calmed down. Perfume bottles shattered as they hit the floor, causing a nice, white mess in the dormitory.

"Oh, brilliant," Lily sighed as she dropped her pillow. "Look at what we've down. Leona is going to kill us when she realizes we've broken all her perfume bottles."

"Not our fault they're made of glass," Natalia retorted. "She ought to take better care of them. Lily..." she suddenly said, looking around, "Do you smell something?"

"Yes," Lily sniffed the air, "It smells like... newly mown grass, and... lemons."

"What? I don't smell that," protested Natalia, "It smells like... pumpkin pie and strawberries...Food?" she said aloud, looking around the room. However, only Lily and Natalia were in the room.

"These smells must be coming from the perfume bottles," said Lily, bending over to sniff the liquid mess, "Yes... the smell gets stronger and -" Lily sprung back, looking shocked.

"What is it, Lily? You look like you've just seen a ghost," said Natalia, looking concerned.

"I - I just thought something... it's really odd... about Leona..." Lily stammered, "Oh God, I hope I never think that way again..."

"Think about what, Lily?" asked Natalia impatiently.

"Wait a second," Lily frowned. "Both of us have smelled different things, and it's obviously coming from the perfume... my thoughts..." she went towards the perfume bottles again, but this time slower, and more careful.

"What's going on?" said Natalia, looking exasperated. "What do you know that you're not telling me?" She folded her arms impatiently as she waited for Lily to answer.

Lily was silent for a moment, before letting out a gasp. "L'eau d'Amour... that's... Nat! This is Amortentia!" she shouted, holding a large fragment of broken glass.

"It's what?" Natalia said, looking dumbfounded.

"Amortentia! Leona has been charming Sirius under Love Potion! How could we have missed it?" Lily said, turning back to examine the glass. "I mean, it's so obvious! I'm so stupid, Leona is brilliant at Potions, she'd have no problem with - Nat?" she whirled around when she heard the door slam.

She looked around the room, and found that she was alone. Natalia had already gone to find Leona and Sirius. And in the meantime, Lily grimaced as she began rummaging through Leona's drawers, I'm going to McGonagall with this. Lily shuddered when she found more bottles of the same substance. She didn't need to take a lot, one bottle were more than enough to get Montmorency expelled. She noticed that some bottles had a stronger scent than others, as if Leona had slowly built the strength of the Amortentia in order to make it seem more realistic.
She won't get away with this.

Damn it! Where the hell are they? Natalia thought angrily as she ran around the school, searching for that elusive and fraud couple. Finally, out of breath and unsuccessful, she found herself back on the seventh floor, staring at the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy. She frowned and began pacing about, trying to think of where they may be.

They're not in the Great Hall, they're not in the kitchens, the library, or anywhere! I even checked the potions classroom, for Merlin's sake! Where could they be? I need to know where they are so I can tell Sirius that Leona is a lying, manipulative bi... Where did that door come from?

She stopped pacing about when she noticed a door in the wall that she had never seen before. She walked towards it, looking tentatively. Maybe it was dangerous, it could kill her once she entered, maybe she'd go into some sort of dark dimension and never be seen again... it was better if she just left it alone, and –

Natalia snorted to herself and turned the knob. She found herself in a room of luxury, with animal fur carpets lain all over the floor. It sickened her when she saw a dead bear staring up at her with lifeless eyes. Dark red curtains draped the windows, and a roaring fireplace was located in a corner of the huge room. Right in the center of the room, was a long, red couch, and there, snogging right in the middle, were her targets.

"I love you so much, Leona," breathed Sirius between kisses, as she lay below him, her hair a mess and her shirt halfway undone. It took a while for Natalia to be able to speak. She had to remind herself that this wasn't the real Sirius. Well, he was, but he wasn't really Sirius in the way that he was... oh, never mind.

"Well, isn't this a sight to behold," said Natalia dryly, abruptly ending the romantic mood. "Two lovers snogging on a couch, I can hardly wait until Park's belly starts to bulge, or haven't you already gone that far?"

"Lynx!" Leona screamed. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Oh, I'm here on business," said Natalia cheerfully. "I'm conducting a research paper. Quite an interesting topic, really, I'm sure you'd be interested, Leona. The Effects of Love Potion, I'm planning to call it. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you?" She walked towards the couple, her smile looking dangerously thin. Her bright grey eyes sparkled with a hazardous emotion, and her entire body radiated with fury and rage.

"What - what are you talking about?" demanded Leona. "I wouldn't do anything like that! Sirius loves me for me, don't you?"

"Of course I do," said Sirius, wrapping his arms protectively around Leona. "I love her."

"Oh, that's lovely," said Natalia, within a foot's range from them. "I'm so happy for you. Especially you, Leona, why, I've got a bit of a present for you." She smiled sweetly, before delivering her gift of a punch to Leona's face.

"HOW DARE YOU HARM LEO-mmph!"

"And that's an antidote, Black," Natalia spat, continuing to shove the bottle of clear liquid into his mouth. "You can thank me later. Found it in Slughorn's office while looking for you. Neatly labeled too, didn't think he'd supply the classroom with 'Amortentia Antidote'. Honestly!" And without another glance at either of them, she left the room.

Sirius' mind was spinning as he fell to the floor, furrowing his brow and trying to make sense of the situation. When he finally looked up, he found Leona looking at him with a horrified expression on her face.

He gave her a hard glare.

"So this is your game, is it?" he snarled, shaking his head slightly to clear his thoughts. "A love potion? What kind of sick, twisted, little -"

"I love you!" she screamed. "I tried to make you see it, but when you didn't, I had no choice!"