She whispered

by Lucas Chesterton

  ‘What did I smoke?’

  ‘I don’t know, what did it look like?’

  ‘Like herb, like…like bloody, herby, spliff. What the hell do you think it looked like?’

  ‘Shhh, keep your voice down,’ she says, her finger over his lips. She sighs. Looking at him and shaking her head in disbelief. ‘Come on, I’ll fix this.’

  She grabs hold of his hand and pulls him behind her as she starts off at a quick pace back towards the castle. They both manage to stay dry as they cross the courtyard and make their way into the corridors. She doesn’t let go of his hand as they push through crowds of first years just now getting out of class and Albus feels his heart race as McGonagall steps out of the doorway as well but she doesn’t seem to notice them and walks in the opposite direction.

  They weave through corridor after corridor before they reach the main staircases and he realizes she’s taking them down to the dungeons. At first, he assumes they must be going to the dorms but she swings a right after the first two flights of stairs and as they near the potions classroom he starts dragging his feet.

  ‘Are you insane!? You’re taking me to Slughorn?’ he asks, and despite her vigorous pace she trips at his abrupt stop and he catches her, squeezing her hand, to keep her from falling.

  ‘Would you keep your voice down,’ she hisses. ‘Honestly, how daft do you think I am?’

  ‘Then why are we near the potions lab.’

  ‘It’s study period,’ she reminds him, tugging his arm but he stands steadfast as he contemplates her words. ‘There will be no one in there,’ she says this time and he still seems confused. ‘I can’t counteract the herb without some of the potions in the classroom. Unless you’d prefer to wait another hour or two until it wears off?’

  ‘You’re just going to walk in there and start using potions, unsupervised?’ he asks and his heart is racing again and he’s silently wondering why anyone would want to feel this way and for what reason she made this particular blend.

  ‘Slughorn lets me practice during study period all the time.’

  ‘Since when? And since when do you have study period without me?’

  ‘Thursdays,’ she reminds him, pulling at his arm again and this time he moves. ‘When you are out at Care of Magical Creatures, I sit in the lab and work on potions. Slughorn checks in periodically but only to peek his head in to ask how things are going. Now come on, we have only thirty minutes before we have to be upstairs in Muggle Studies.’

  It doesn’t completely put him at ease but he trusts her despite the increase in paranoia currently surging through his veins. But as they turn into the classroom, it’s Thea who stops short this time, noticing two figures working together over a boiling cauldron with concentrated furrows in their brows.

  They both look up when Albus feels a small squeal of something crawl up his throat. Thea shoots him a glare.

  ‘Thea?’ Scorpius asks, looking up at her, not pausing from his stirring of the steaming concoction. At the sound of her name, James too looks up and casts them both curious glances. ‘What are you two doing here?’

  ‘It’s a free period, Scorpius. I have every right to advance my studies just as you do,’ she says easily and Albus envies her ability to lie under pressure. To everyone but him, he realizes.

  ‘And Albus is keen on an extra lesson as well?’ James asks, slicing something on the cutting board and he hisses as he catches the edge of his thumb.

  ‘Concentrate on your own potion, Potter. Albus was asking to review a few quick steps in a draught from last week’s lecture and I told him I’d show him a few tricks.’ Again, it’s too easy. James sucks at the cut on his finger but his suspicion is gone. Scorpius seems indifferent to their presence altogether as he focuses back towards his calculated stirring. ‘And no, Potter, I won’t teach you any of my tricks no matter how much you beg.’

  ‘I wasn’t���’ James starts to stay but doesn’t finish, realizing he’s risen to Thea’s bait.

  Thea points to a stool on the opposite end of the classroom and urges Albus to sit with a hard gaze. ‘Stay put,’ she whispers over her shoulder as she walks towards the storeroom and Albus tries desperately not to make a sound as he waits.

  His eyes are transfixed on figures he can make out in the curves and knots of the wooden table and it seems like hours before Thea returns with a cauldron full of several items and she immediately flicks her wand towards the heat and places the heavy bowl of metal over it.

  ‘Light yellow or brown?’ she whispers and he jerks his head up at the question.

  ‘What?’ he asks and his voice is loud enough that he gains a brief glance from his brother and Scorpius.

  ‘Merlin, Albus. You are impossible. The color, of the herb?’ she whispers. ‘What color was it? Light yellow or brown?’

  ‘Uh,’ he’s racking his brain but he doesn’t really remember anything except pulling a finely wrapped joint of something or other from her stash. It was a small stash, three or four joints of herbs Thea had experimented with growing in Majorca. None of which were technically contraband at Hogwarts, she reminded him. Yet. ‘I remember it tasted like flowers.’

  She doesn’t spend much time in thought as realization appears over her features and there seems to be a slight relief as well as she slides several ingredients off to the side. His stomach nearly turns at the bottle of toads eyes and he’s glad to see that whatever she’s making won’t include those.

  ‘You smoked something mild,’ she says under her breath, grabbing the knife and scraping it over her sharpening stone in four swift swipes. ‘It doesn’t help you focus but instead allows you to enter a…uh…meditative state,’ she says but Albus suspects it’s not entirely the case. ‘I experimented with the herb a few times and it had positive effects, but only on women. With men on the other hand,’ she says shrugging.

  ‘This?’ Albus mirrors her shrug. ‘What does this mean?’ he asks, shrugging again and James sets down his own knife with enough force that they all look up at his obvious annoyance.

  ‘Yes, Potter? Something to say?’ Thea asks, not looking up from where she’s cutting an odd shaped fruit that Albus can’t recall the name of but it releases an unpleasant smell.

  ‘What’s going on over there?’ James asks. ‘What are you two whispering about?’

  ‘If we wanted you to know, we wouldn’t be whispering,’ Albus says and he only realizes that he’s said it out loud when Thea snickers blissfully from his side and James gives him a look of disbelief at Albus’ increased sarcasm.

  ‘I know you’re desperate and all, Jamie, but I already told you, I’m not sharing,’ Thea adds in, unable to pass up the opportunity.

  ‘Theodora,’ Scorpius warns because she’s said that name again and James has that look as if he is going to do something he’s going to regret.

  Meanwhile Thea flashes her brother an innocent smile.

  ‘Well?’ she says. ‘If he would keep his nose in his own corner of the classroom I wouldn’t have to speak up.’

  ‘Let’s just get this done, James. We have one more step and it will be complete. Don’t get distracted.’

  ‘I’m not distracted,’ James mutters, trailing off so that neither Albus or Thea could hear the rest of what he had to say under his breath and Thea scrapes in a handful of green leaves that smell like Rhodiola. The unpleasant fruit smell is suddenly less overwhelming.

  ‘Now pay attention to what I’m doing here, Albus,’ she instructs and for a second he forgets it’s all for show as he attempts to watch her stirring motion and she uses her wand to lower the heat, but his mind drifts once again over to his brother.

  He wants to say something and he starts to open his mouth to speak but Thea covers it with one hand as the other stirs and she eyes him, eyes wide, and she shakes her head in protest.

  ‘See how it bubbles down when I add the Boom Berry, and the scent becomes more tolerable?’ she’s purposefully speaking loudly enough that both Scorpius and James glance up
for just a moment as her voice carries.

  Albus is fairly certain she hasn’t used any Boom Berry because, as he recalls, this isn’t a Wiggenweld Potion despite the fact that he feels as though he needs to be awoken from whatever haze is hanging over him.

  ‘Mhm,’ he agrees, trying not to laugh as he does both at the obvious lie and Thea’s scolding expression.

  It’s another ten minutes before the potion is ready and by then James and Scorpius are putting away their supplies in the storeroom when Thea finally has a moment to bottle the green liquid that is very obviously not the potion she has spent the last twenty minutes convincing everyone it is. She hands him the bottle, just as Professor Slughorn peeks his head through the door.

  ‘Ah, Theodora! Albus. Glad to see two of my best students logging in some practice hours,’ he says joyfully and Thea elbows him gently.

  ‘Yes, professor, just cleaning up here. Albus was just taking some of these vials back to the storeroom, weren’t you Albus? Especially that one there,’ she says, pointing to the one in his hand and he nods, gathering up as many items he can carry in the caddy and walking at a medium pace towards the closet on the other side of the classroom.

  He hears Thea discussing the techniques she is teaching him regarding extraction of Boom Berry and the properties for creating the proper antidote for Draught of the Living Dead, which is what Wiggenweld Potion is commonly known for. It’s not a cure-all and it certainly doesn’t work in every instance but it has been known to wake a sleeping princess a time or two.

  He downs the liquid as soon as he is alone and he hisses, forgetting to cool it before drinking it, but endures the heat as he passes down his tongue. He ignores the taste of licorice that makes him cringe.

  ‘You’re acting weird,’ he hears as he enters the store room and he nearly drops the vial in his right hand as he spins around to see his brother standing by the door, his wand directing the now-clean cauldron back up on one of the higher shelves. ‘Weirder than usual.’

  ‘Am I?’ It sounds dumb even as he says it but he tries to add a nonchalant shrug modeled after one of Thea’s to balance it out but it is obvious it just adds to how awkward he already feels.

  ‘Are you sick or something? You look sweaty.’

  ‘I think it’s just warm in here. Warm in there, I mean. Standing so close to the fire. Thea says it makes the potion brew with more accuracy. The rise in heat.’

  James contemplates this for several moments.

  ‘No it’s something else. I don’t know what it is. You just seem…not yourself.’

  ‘Just trying to get the hang of this potion. That’s all,’ Albus replies and he’s surprised at how easy the lie sounds as it passes his lips and his heartbeat seems less intense against his chest. His eyes feel less prone to wander as he speaks and they are soon joined by Scorpius who levitates several vials to various corners and drawers of the room with ease.

  James, distracted by the minor interruption as well as the sudden arrival of Thea who is clammering into the room with her eyes on him anxiously, seems content with his answer. Either that or content to let it go as he washes his hands under the sink in the corner.

  ‘Well Al,’ she says with a grin. ‘How do you feel? About the lesson. Do you think you have the hang of it?’

  He winks.

  ‘Yes,’ he answers. ‘I feel much better.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Yes, good,’ Scorpius says boredly, not looking up from where he’s filing one of his books. ‘You don’t want to spend the rest of Muggle Studies high on Thea’s homemade aphrodisiac.’

  He’s not sure if it’s him or Thea who speaks next because the sound is smothered by James dropping something made out of glass.

  ‘You gave my brother what?’

  Professor Slughorn peeks his head in just as Thea’s face flushes red, a bright grin on his face.

  ‘Everything alright in here?’

  She enjoys Muggle Studies despite the fact that she has yet to discover anything about the curriculum that she doesn’t already know. Her mother, being raised by muggles, likes to find a balance between the muggle and wizarding worlds in raising her children. Rose and her brother, Hugo, know more about the muggle world than even their father.

  But he does try his best, which seems to please their mother well enough.

  ‘I just don’t understand the purpose of this assignment, Professor,’ says Theodora. Rose rolls her eyes as it’s the fifth time she’s interrupted Professor Thomas since the beginning of class.

  Rose finds it irritating that the girl never raises her hand but for some reason, Professor Thomas finds it amusing and indulges her. Albus, too, is unable to hide his pleasure for Thea’s absurd questions as he sits next to his friend, arms crossed and holding back a smile. It is supposed to be a N.E.W.T. level course, not a Q and A session for Thea Malfoy, and so Rose can’t help the way she scowls every time the girl opens her mouth.

  ‘Theodora, if you’d let me finish���’ Professor Thomas begins and Thea leans back in her seat motioning for him to continue. ‘We spend a great deal of time discussing technology and customs of the muggle world. But this assignment is straight from a real muggle curriculum. It will allow you to reflect on the familial relationships of your classmates, as well as experience lifestyles unlike your own. This exposure is important to your growth as young-adults.’

  ‘But the Headmaster approved this?’ Theodora says, interrupting again and Rose can feel her fingers tightening around her quill. ‘I only ask because I think it’s fair to say that we’ve all heard the stories about the so-called ‘muggle marriage experiment’ you designed several years ago and, if I recall, at least three students ended up pregnant.’

  ‘Well���you see…’

  ‘I mean, I’m not even sure how that’s possible since contraception spells are a fourth-year concept.’

  There are several snickers around the room because while she can be intolerable during lecture, she does have a point. Five years prior, during her cousin Victoire’s final year at Hogwarts, Professor Thomas had instituted a marriage trial for all N.E.W.T. students. It was supposed to outline the struggles and advantages of domestic partnership but it caused quite a scandal when several of the couples took the experiment a little too seriously.

  ‘The Headmaster and I have discussed that extensively and while mistakes were obviously made, things worked out ok in the end. This experiment will, no doubt, prove much more conducive to the curriculum.’

  Rose raises her hand, glancing at Thea to hopefully send a hint. Thea only raises an eyebrow.

  ‘Rose?’

  ‘Yes, Professor. I was hoping for clarification on the timeline and what exactly would be expected of us during the process.’

  ‘The timeline is completely up to you. You will need to complete your observations with an essay, four feet should do the trick, by the end of the year.’

  There are several groans throughout the classroom and Rose barely has a time to process before Thea interjects, again.

  ‘Four feet?’ she balks. ‘I can hardly write four feet of parchment about myself let alone someone I know nothing about.’

  ‘Do you even have four feet worth of personality to write about, Malfoy? I’m pretty sure everyone in this room could write everything there is to know about you and your���.family���.in, what? About three inches?’

  Everyone turns to the back of the room where the comment comes from and while Rose expects a comment like that from James or Davy, she’s surprised it has come from Val. If it had been James, or Davy, or even Bas there would have been waves of laughter and Thea would have had a quick reply that would likely to have lead to someone, if not both parties, ending up in detention.

  Rose can’t help but glance back at Scorpius who is sitting directly behind her but his eyes don’t meet hers. His eyes are locked with his sister’s, both holding the other’s gaze for a long moment before Scorpius glances down at the quill he now fiddle
s with in his hand.

  The classroom is silent and eyes inch carefully up towards the professor who stares back at his daughter in disbelief.

  ‘Valerie,’ he says and his voice is heavy with disappointment. ‘I’d like you to stay after class.’

  ‘She’s spent the entire hour interrupting you and I have to stay after class.’

  ‘I haven’t spent the entire hour throwing insults,’ Thea replies and Rose can see Albus place his hand over her wrist in warning. She calms slightly at his touch and her shoulders fold back into their usual poised position. She turns her head but her grumbles are loud enough for them all to hear. ‘I usually reserve that honor for Potter during Potions.’

  This time there is laughter and James rolls his eyes from the back of the classroom as he lifts his hand to respond in the form of a certain hand gesture that causes Rose to sigh and Thea to wink.

  ‘Alright, enough now, the lot of you. Valerie, you’ll stay after class. Thea, keep the snark to a minimum so I can finish this lecture and pass you off to Professor Longbottom.’ The class settles and Valerie looks put out as she glares from the back of the room. ‘I have already taken the liberty of sending home notes to your families. All have agreed to participate in the project. I have carefully assigned you with another student from your year and no, before you ask Theodora, there will be no trading.’

  There are whispers as Professor Thomas raises is wand, summoning several pieces of parchment that are swiftly distributed through the aisles and onto the desks directly in front of the person they belong to. Rose glances down at her piece of parchment with a frown and then glances over to the corresponding student who wears a matching look of exasperation.

  ‘You can’t be serious?’ Thea mutters from across the aisle and she is not the only one to groan upon the realization of her partner.

  Most matches, in fact, elicit protests of disbelief of being paired with someone outside their circle of friends. Albus doesn’t seem to mind with whoever he’s been paired with but that’s likely because there is no one he dislikes enough to evoke anything but mild indifference.