Chapter 21: The Wrong Side of the Bed
George woke up in a pool of his saliva whilst being smothered by his pillow. Every bone in his body was grinding together and, although faint, the headache was still thumping away. He groggily pushed himself away from his bed and opened his eyes to look around the room. After his eyes adjusted to the light, George realised he was back in his dormitory and no one else was present.
George raised his arm and checked his watch, the time was currently ten minutes to nine o'clock. His eyes went wide after realising how long he had slept. Not only had he missed breakfast, but his first lesson was about to start in ten minutes. He practically leapt out of bed, slipped on a pair of shoes, and ran out of the dorm room. He didn't even bother putting on a new set of robes since he was still wearing his uniform from yesterday.
His tie and collar were a mess, but George couldn't afford to stop. He rushed through the common room and bounded up the empty staircases, he didn't wait for them to stop moving. He took the risk and jumped the gaps between the staircase and the next-floor corridors which saved him a few precious seconds.
George surprised himself by arriving outside of the greenhouse with five minutes to spare, he'd flown through the castle way faster than he'd anticipated. He could still see students entering the greenhouse with crumbs around their faces. George's stomach growled fiercely after he imagined what he had missed out on during breakfast, saliva started pooling in his mouth which threatened to drip from his lips.
All the Ravenclaw and Slytherin students were entering a small room connected to the greenhouse. George followed in after them and found himself in a conservatory with stone walls lined with coat hooks. Every hook had an old dull white robe hanging on it and the students were exchanging them for their robes.
George walked over to a corner of hooks void of students and swapped out his slightly scorched robe for one of the white robes that were large enough for him. Just as he was about to enter the main greenhouse, he saw something that instantly made his blood boil. There was a little twig of a boy called Theodore putting on a white robe whilst happily talking to a couple of Slytherin students, and they were loitering right in the middle of George's path.
He walked over and forced himself directly between Theodore and the two boys. George somewhat casually leaned against the wall whilst supporting his weight from the hook Theodore had hung his robes on. The cheerful conversation stopped instantly after the abrupt interruption. George did not care about the boys behind him as he stared down at Theodore with a face void of happiness. Theodore recognised George and immediately turned into a scared deer in headlights.
George lost his patience and decided to lead Theodore on, "don't you think you might have forgotten something this morning?"
Theodore looked terrified as he stuttered like Quirrell, "I..I…I don't know what you mean?"
George stared deeply into Theodore's eyes, "really, well isn't that odd? Perhaps I'm just crazy, but I think it would be normal for a roommate, such as yourself, to wake up their fellow roommate, such as myself, so they don't miss breakfast and more importantly the first lesson of the day. What do you think, am I crazy or am I right?"
Theodore seemed to realise at that moment what George was referring to, the realisation clearly came with a strong sense of dread. Theodore's stress levels appeared to shoot through the glass ceiling, his entire body started vibrating like George was electrocuting him through his stare.
A boy's voice came from behind George, "excuse me, can't you see we were in the middle of a conversation."
Another slightly deeper voice came right after, "yeah, who do you think you are?"
George didn't react to the comments from behind and instead continued to stare down at Theodore.
Theodore ended up spitting out, "I didn't... I mean we didn't want to bother you. After yesterday…"
Theodore stopped talking mid-sentence after he saw George crush the wooden coat hanger with his bare hands. Theodore's robe along with a bunch of splinters fell to the ground next to his feet. Then George grabbed Theodore by his collar and pulled him up close so that their faces were only a few inches apart.
George spoke in a hushed voice so the other students would not overhear, "don't bullshit me. Trust me when I say you don't want to lie to me. I don't care what you think I am or where I'm from, and that goes for all the little turds you call friends as well. You fall in line and do as I say. Because if you don't…"
Then he whispered into Theodore's ear, "not even your death-eater daddy could save you from me."
George suddenly let go of Theodore and the petrified boy fell backwards into the wall of coat hooks. Half a dozen robes fell to the ground which got a few of the Slytherin student's attention. Theodore was so scared that his trembling knees gave out, causing him to collapse to the ground. George felt like he couldn't look at such a pathetic sight any longer, so he quickly turned around to enter the greenhouse. None of Theodore's so-called friends tried to stop him. Instead, they averted their eyes as he walked past.
The moment George walked into the greenhouse, he felt all of his furious emotions being suppressed which brought him some much-needed clarity. It took him only a second to realise how emotionally compromised he had become upon seeing Theodore. It became immediately obvious that his erratic emotions must have meant that the Calming Draught had worn off way earlier than anticipated.
He didn't hesitate to pull out another Calming Draught vial from his pouch and down it in one. George felt the cool minty sensation travel down his throat and was immediately relieved of the weight of his repressed emotions. The anger towards Theodore vanished like it never existed. He remembered what he needed to do today and pushed all irrelevant thoughts aside.
After a few minutes of pushing and shoving, all of the students found a place to stand around a large metal table filled with ceramic pots. Half of the pots had a range of colourful plants inside, the other half was just filled with dirt. The plants looked just like any other found in the muggle world except for the fact they were several times larger than George remembered they ort to be.
Five minutes late for her own lesson, a large woman in a dirty green witches' robe with a pointed hat entered the room from the opposite side of the students. Sprout picked up a trowel off the table and banged it against a pot to get everyone's attention.
She spoke in a loud booming voice, "good morning everyone!"
The room fell silent as the students looked towards her whilst waiting to be told what to do. Sprout put her hands on her hips as she pretended to be disappointed in the class.
She shook her head, "that won't do at all. I want you all to repeat after me, good morning Professor Sprout."
The students played along with her request and repeated her words monotonously in unison.
"Good morning, Professor Sprout."
Sprout looked very impressed as she clapped her gloved hands together which sent bits of dried dirt into the air.
Then she placed both of her hands on the table and leant forward, "welcome to Greenhouse One first years. This will be where you'll be spending most of your time in Herbology. We will be heading over to Greenhouse Two after the break so you can see where you will be spending the other half of your time.
As the more astute of you have probably guessed, I'm Professor Sprout and I'll be teaching you Herbology for the foreseeable future. Now gather around the table everyone, nothing is going to bite, at least in this greenhouse. I'm going to quickly summarise your semester and then we can get our hands dirty."
Sprout talked for a while and then performed a rather uninteresting demonstration of what was in essence muggle gardening whilst the students looked on with underwhelmed expressions. Unlike the rest of his fellow students, George wasn't complaining about the lacklustre education. His time wasn't wasted in this class since two of the ingredients he could smell and taste in the Calming Draught could be easily sourced from inside Greenhouses One and Two.
George had managed to sneakily take some samples of lavender in the first greenhouse. The students were told how to transfer the plants from one pot to another in the latter half of the first lesson. Therefore, George strategically placed himself in front of a lavender plant. During the lavender's re-potting, he took that opportunity to break off a stem of lavender by 'accident' and hide it inside of his enchanted sack.
The next ingredient was found in the second greenhouse, George needed some peppermint leaves. The second greenhouse differed from the first as it grew vegetables and herbs instead of flowers. In the second lesson, Sprout had the class learn how to take samples from the plants without damaging them. The students were given a pair of scissors and had to cut off some leaves from the plant in front of them and place the leaves into a bag next to their plant pot.
George had placed himself in front of the peppermint plant and simply let a pile of leaves form at the bottom of the pot as he cut a bit too enthusiastically. Once the lesson ended, he discreetly scooped up the leaves and placed them in his leather sack on the way out of the greenhouse. Sprout was none the wiser as she waved the students out and congratulated them on their efforts.
Once the Herbology lesson ended and everyone made their way to the Great Hall for lunch, George began making plans on acquiring more information about the Calming Draught. But before he started bashing books, there was something far worse he had to do. George was genuinely starving and he desperately needed to grab a bite to eat in the cursed hall. The past two times George had been in the Great Hall had been a disaster. But as the saying goes, the third time's the charm.
A few minutes later and George stood outside of the Great Hall entrance whilst leaning against one of the doors. He was currently holding a large metal tankard he had previously stored inside his enchanted sack. Dozens of students were passing him by as they went to eat their lunch, every one of them stared at him in confusion as they walked into the Great Hall.
George took no notice of them as he was too busy concentrating. The food had already been served ten minutes ago and the majority of the students were already seated and eating their meals. Most of the professors, except Snape and Dumbledore, were present. The food of the day appeared to be a traditional English stew, it was one of George's favourite meals back at the Linwood house.
He could see tens of large black cauldrons with a couple of ladles hanging over the sides, they were evenly spaced down the centre of the house's tables. The students were picking up the ladles and using them to spoon out a brown gravy with pieces of potato and beef floating inside onto their plates. George had been hoping for a meal that he could easily pick up and run with, but the stew required a unique approach.
George scanned the eyes of the students and teachers as he waited for a moment when they were all simultaneously distracted with their conversations. He hunched over and primed himself for his opportunity, he could feel the time was nigh. As soon as everyone looked distracted, George bolted into the room and headed to the end of the Hufflepuff table.
The final-year Hufflepuff students were minding their own business as George leaned over the table and plunged his metal tankard into their cauldron. He was waiting for the tankard to fill up with roughly six pints of stew, seconds felt like hours for him as it was being filled to the brim. Once the tankard was finally full of stew, George abruptly lifted it out of the cauldron and accidentally spilt a few droplets of gravy over the table.
The conversations at the end of the Hufflepuff table came to a halt as the older students bared witness to George's unusual behaviour. The half-a-dozen teenagers just looked at him very confused. He took full advantage of their stunned state as he held the tankard close to his chest and darted out of the Great Hall. He didn't stop running until he had left the Hogwarts castle and was standing outside in the cold.
George waited with bated breath to see if he had finally managed to get an opportunity to eat his meal in peace. Luckily, he was greeted with nothing but blissful silence. George looked at the tankard full of piping-hot stew as he swallowed the saliva pooling in his mouth. Then he lifted the tankard with both hands and poured it down his neck. He did not bother to chew as everything flowed down his gullet with immense speed.
Fortunately, there was no one to bear witness to the weird sight of George's neck bulging as large chunks of beef and potato forced their way down his oesophagus. This hurried process made his eyes water, but he kept on pouring the entire content of the tankard down until there was nothing left. George wiped his mouth and burped to release all of the air he had swallowed during his rapid gulping.
George checked his watch and saw that he had forty-eight minutes before he had to go to his History class with the ghost Carrow. He dropped the tankard down his pants and headed back into the castle, then he climbed up the moving staircases until he reached the first floor. George kept on walking down the corridor until he saw a sign next to a large door that read 'Hogwarts Library' on the wall.
He entered the Library and was greeted by a humongous space that rivalled the size of the Great Hall. There were hundreds of wooden shelves housing thousands of leather-backed books standing several storeys high, they were all illuminated with glistening golden chandeliers. There were many students seated at long tables located between the bookshelves which provided an area for them to read and make notes.
Unfortunately, this vast collection was going to be more of a hindrance than a blessing. Without any hesitation, George entered the Library. Sadly, the hunt was going to be far more difficult than he'd initially anticipated. Most of the forty-five minutes in the Library were spent getting lost in a labyrinth of books. Only with three minutes to spare did he eventually find the department dedicated to advanced potion craft.
This particular section of the Library consisted of over a thousand books, and none of them was titled with anything referencing a Calming Draught. This meant George would have to return to the Library and undergo the tedious task of trawling through all one thousand of these books. For now, George attended his History class right after leaving the Library and was thankful that Carrow, the ghost that teaches History of Magic, was exactly as Gemma had described.
Carrow was the only ghost that taught at Hogwarts, the rest were just freeloaders siphoning the ambient magic energy left by the students. The dead professor looked like a blue partially-transparent old man with big bushy eyebrows and a pair of reading glasses hanging off the tip of his nose. His voice was slow and melodic, every sentence ended with large pauses like he had fallen asleep in the middle of his monotonous speech.
Carrow's entire class consisted of droning on about the semester whilst expecting no input from the students. Never was there an opportunity for the students to interact with the lesson, Carrow didn't even expect any of the students to write down any notes as he talked endlessly. He even had a habit of wandering around the room whilst repeating himself without realising it like a dementia patient.
Fortunately due to Carrow's terrible teaching methods, George was able to return to his catatonic state without being disturbed for a couple of hours. This free time allowed him to plan out the optimum strategy for scouring the Library. Sadly, there wasn't a good way to skim through over one thousand books in a short period. One thing was for certain, George wasn't going to get much sleep tonight.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone