Percy Jackson and the Department of Mysteries

142) I Get On My Knees For Umbridge

Whatever Harry saw in the Pensieve was clearly eating him up. At first I thought it was guilt from being an invasive little shit, but as time wore on, it seemed more like shame.

I didn't ask.

Hermione was concerned about the Occulemency lessons and why they'd ended, so I covered Harry by saying that Snape had entrusted me to teach him. Ron cackled with delight at that, and I cackled, too. It would've been a decent idea if I actually knew how to get into someone's head, but Harry kicked me when I told him I was going to research it. I made him promise that he would try and control his dreams, at the least.

I think the Occulemency stuff got pushed aside in Hermione's mind because of how close we were to exams. Six weeks. Time really flies (ignore the fact that it took 141 chapters to get to this point). She carefully constructed study schedules for the three of us, which I pretended I wouldn't give as a gift to Nugget (there was shiny stuff stuck to the corner of my page).

I wasn't big on plain ol' memorizing things, so I came up with a song for nearly every lesson. Sometimes I would get an Apollo kid to make a particularly catchy tune for any lessons I didn't understand. The songs did wonders for my grades, and I never had to study. It was pretty great, except for when I'd forget I needed to be quiet and started belting out, "The Goblin Wars! The Goblin Horrors! All because the Wizards shut their doors! The Goblin toils! The Goblin royals! They came back with much force!" in class.

I worked a lot on my potion during the Easter holidays. I tried a little bit of everything, but had settled on a few key ingredients. Dragon's blood, Essence of Daisyroot, Demiguise hair, Gravy (which was shocking to me, for the obvious reason of it being gravy, but also because when used in potions, it was for fake protection potions sold illegally), Herbaria, Lavender, Rue, Lethe river water (I didn't like using it, and needed to find something to replace it, because it made my head feel fuzzy when I added the diluted stuff to the potion, but something about the Tartarus river made monsters walk straight past Seamus when I tested it on him. Until they turned around and jumped him, but that's not the point), Nux Myristica, Betony, and avocado. All in all, it was an absolutely disgusting concoction. Adding cinnamon only made it taste like garbage with cinnamon. And it didn't smell great, either.

But, for the most part, it worked. The smaller monsters of the Forbidden Forest wouldn't notice me, or any of the others I've tested the potion on, at all. The medium sized ones would backtrack after a moment, and would ultimately notice you, but it took them a minute.

It was a step in the right direction, something we'd never had before. A glimmer of hope. I'd have to find out a way to make it last longer, or at least make it into a spray of sorts, but that would be easy once I figured out how to make it food the big monsters.

Of course, that was about the time Umbridge found out I'd been working on it, and put a stop to my project.

We had a bit of a fight in the Great Hall. Not anything too terrible was said.

"You absolute bitch!" I shouted at her, staring at the empty cauldron she'd presented me. My cauldron. Thank the gods I'd made sure to write everything I'd done down, otherwise all my work would've been lost.

"Students are not allowed to experiment with spells and potions," Umbridge said proudly.

"Oh, sorry, I forgot that under Educational Decree number one we weren't allowed to use our heads unless in a happy, ministry approved way," I rolled my eyes. "Next time I'll make sure to sit behind my desk like a good little boy, my head full of thoughts that you came up with for me. Here, I'll try it right now. I'm never going to be creative or innovative unless it's convenient for any and all authoritative figures in my life. Wait. Sorry. I forgot, it's your life now, not mine. How could I forget that you controlled my every move?"