บท 7: Cheating in Potion's class
With a clean bill of health, since nothing was outwardly wrong with her, Oleandra was released later that Friday morning, arriving just in time for two classes in a row of Potions with the Gryffindors. The potions classroom was down in the school dungeons, near the Slytherin common room.
As Professor Snape was taking roll call, he suddenly paused.
"Ah, yes," he said softly, "Harry Potter. Our new … celebrity."
"You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potioneering," he continued after Draco and his cronies had finished sniggering at his first jab at Potter.
Snape further explained what they were going to learn in his class, with great embellishments. Bottling fame, brewing glory, stoppering death … had little to do with the actual first-year curriculum, which called for the knowledge on how to brew potions that removed boils (just use acne cream), potions that made you forget things (the equivalent of downing a bottle of gin), an herbicide potion (environmentally friendly!) and the Wideye potion (why go to these lengths when a cup of coffee will do?).
"Potter!" said Snape suddenly. "What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"
Hermione Granger's hand shot in the air.
"I don't know, sir," responded Potter.
"Tut, tut—fame clearly isn't everything."
Oleandra actually knew this one. It was the family business to know plants, after all. She also raised her hand.
"Yes, Greengrass?"
"The Draught of Living Death, sir." Oleandra said.
"Yes, very good. Ten points to Slytherin. The Draught of Living Death is an extremely potent sleeping potion."
"Let's try again, Potter. Where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?"
Granger's hand somehow stretched further up. She clearly knew the answer.
Not to be outdone by her twin sister, Daphne also quickly raised her hand… Except since this question wasn't plant-related, she had no idea.
"Yes, Greengrass?"
Daphne looked desperately at her sister, hoping for an answer, to which she received a shrug. Then after a moment of thought, Oleandra whispered something in her ear.
"In, in the potion ingredients cupboard?" Daphne said tentatively.
Snape looked surprised for a moment, then applauded slowly and said, "Excellent answer, though not exactly what I had in mind. The bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat, and is a general-use panacea, which means it will act as an antidote against most poisons. Knowing where the bezoars are kept might one day save your life in this classroom, so for this answer I will award 20 points to Slytherin."
Daphne beamed at her sister, while Granger shot her a death stare. This was hardly fair to her, after all.
"What is the difference, Potter, between monkshood and wolfsbane?"
Granger stood up from her seat, arm straight up as if she were trying to tickle the ceiling.
At this point, Oleandra felt bad for Granger and didn't raise her hand, but Daphne had no such qualms.
"I don't know," said Potter quietly. "I think Hermione does, though, why don't you try her?"
"You, Granger, sit down. Greengrass, answer the question."
"It's the same plant, sir. It's also known as aconite, it's very poisonous!" said Daphne airily.
"Precisely," Snape said. "Ten points to Slytherin. And a point off from Gryffindor for your cheek, Potter."
Then, he added with a smirk, "Even someone who has just recently come out of a coma has better brains than you, Potter."
Finally, the actual lesson started. The Greengrass twins were paired up, and everyone set to work on their boil-curing potion. Everything was going fine, until the penultimate step, when Oleandra accidentally stirred anti-clockwise instead of clockwise after removing the cauldron from the fire. The green potion started turning a certain shade of burgundy!
"No need to panic," thought Oleandra. "I know just the rune for this occasion."
Oleandra closed her eyes. In her mind's eye, the starry sky appeared. She quickly found the grapheme she was looking for and called out its name gently.
"Yera…"
… Nothing happened. All twenty-four runes were properly engraved in her soul, which meant she could use them. So, what was the problem? The key word was engraved, she realized. Runes were a form of writing. Calling out their name was fine if she wanted the runes to work inside her soul where they lived, but to be used to their full potential outside, they had to be written down!
To serve as an analogy, runes are a bit like solenoids. Just as a solenoid produces a magnetic field when electricity runs through a wire shaped into a coil, so do runes produce different effects when magical energy runs through different patterns. (In case you haven't learned about electromagnetism in muggle studies, all you need to know is that magnets are basically magic!)
Oleandra swiftly pulled out a piece of parchment and wrote the rune for good harvests on it, and dipped it into the potion, which immediately calmed it down.
"How did you do that?" hissed Granger. "I know you messed up, so how did you fix it?"
Oleandra simply shrugged and said, "Trade secret. You shouldn't trust everything you read in books, you know?"
And then she fished out the wet piece of parchment with her ladle and stuffed it into an empty vial, for future disposal.
By the end of class nearly an hour later, the Gryffindors had lost fifteen points for an accident they caused and Slytherin had gained another ten, five each for Malfoy's team and the Greengrass twins for their well-brewed potions.
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