[Long chapter warning: ⚠️ 3982 Word Count]
"The moat is still there," Sam confirmed, as she came into our dorm room to find me going through my laundry basket.
Earlier in the week a green placid moat had cursed itself onto the fifth floor near the east wing, compliments from Fred and George following a rather impromptu escape from school on their confiscated brooms. The whole ordeal had been absolutely hilarious to those who witnessed it and became the talk of the school since then. Not many could believe Fred and George Weasley actually up and left school in the middle of fifth period, upsetting the corridor and Umbridge (who came shortly after the chaos started) with dung bombs galore and more fireworks that had been showcased at the beginning of her reign.
They never gave sure instructions on how to rid the moat from the fifth floor, no teachers under Umbridge's flock could deactivate it (thought I'm sure Professor McGonagall could easily fix the mess if she wanted to). So it remained as a constant jab in our Headmistresses side and a nice reminder to the rest of us to keep fighting.
"Brilliant," I said with lackluster as I tossed one of my skirts clear across the floor before divebombing again for one of my cloaks.
"What are you doing?" Sam asked the imaginable. It took me a moment to respond over the rummaging, but finally I came up for air.
"I've been missing one of my three cloaks for the last few weeks now and it's been driving me nuts, swapping back and forth between the two without a clue about the other- "
"And so you reasonably think that after weeks of it being lost you'd find it in your week-old laundry?" Sam asked with a very sister-like tone that I was familiar with hearing aimed at Tati or Alice. Occasionally me, but only when I was being a real ditz.
I rose from the mass of clothing with an obvious pout while Sam regarded me from the doorway with a motherly stare.
"Why can't you just wear one of the two remaining cloaks you have? I manage to do fine with two cloaks, I don't see why you can't."
"Because," I huffed as I grabbed for the clothes on the floor and began to stuff them back into the laundry bin. "One smells and the other I spilled jam on from breakfast so I can't just-" one of my button-up shirt's caught on my shoe, making me trip. I tried to shake it off but it stayed stubbornly on until I thrashed my foot in the air enough times for it to finally go flying. I released a frustrated sigh before grabbing the rest of the clothes on the ground and stuffing them unceremoniously back where they belonged.
Sam had seen enough. My bin was looking desperately overstuffed and I was on the edge of crying for no apparent reason.
Well, there was a reason. But it was a rather stupid one.
"Here." Sam was holding that damned shirt from across the room nicely folded in front of me. "Now, is this about the potions OWL? Because I'm just about ready to shake you mad until you learn to realize you've studied more than long enough to know what you're doing for today-"
I snagged the shirt from her with a grateful glance before tossing it on top of the mess now in the corner.
"I know, I know," I agreed as I sat down, defeated on one side of my bed. Sam eyed me suspiciously but went on to open the top draw of her dresser and snag out a chocolate frog with its wrapper.
"So then, what is it?" Sam asked, with her back turned.
I didn't want to open that can of worms. But knowing how Sam was, it was bound to come out eventually unless I gave her a story to keep her mind off it.
In reality, what bugged me had slowly been growing now for the last few weeks.
Following my revenge with Pansy and the start of weekly detentions with Umbridge, Draco and his band of squad members became more prolific with their work. It didn't seem like much but I watched as Draco went from avoiding being anywhere near me to suddenly taking back the spots by the fireplace with his clan with no real worry over whether I was in the same room or not.
In fact, it became impeccably clear within a matter of days that Draco Malfoy no longer seemed to find reason to worry about what I was up to, whether I was looking at him or even talking about him.
He never turned to look at me anymore, or at least I never felt that grey stare of his.
Odd as it was, I quickly realized how much I liked being stared at by him. Whether it was for attentive reasons or far worse.
I had suddenly become ordinary to him. Like I was just another Slytherin in the common room, and that was all.
What became of an it-girl without the attention she needs to be it?
"My mind just kept going through random potions ingredients all night," I said at last. "It wasn't exactly restful sleep." Sam gave me an understanding look before beheading the chocolate frog in one bite.
"I hate study-nightmares," Sam emphasized with a sigh. She popped the rest of the frog in her mouth and chewed furiously before adding, "but just think, after this, you'll only have two more exams and then summer!"
"And no Umbridge," I concluded with a sigh that did little to release the growing knot between my shoulders. Sam's eyes glittered at the reminder.
"That's right. You know, I heard Umbridge has been having a real headache thanks to the Hogwarts board recently. All thanks to your mum I suppose."
This was old news but still a subject far better than Draco at the moment.
"Ah yes," I commented, laying back on my bed. "Maybe if we're lucky my mother will dethrone the bitch before graduation. I know Theo want's nothing to do with her leading his graduation."
"I could give a rat's arse what your brother thinks," Sam mentioned darkly before bolting up with another curse.
"It's 8:50! Merlin, Ava let's go."
"Transfiguration isn't until 10," relax," I said, unmoving. My thoughts were still on Sam's last comment. In reality, my brother was also not too happy with life and Umbridge was just a part of it. I figured it had something to do with the Weasley twins up and leaving him for their own freedom.
If I knew my brother any better, I'd think he wished he left with them.
"That's when class usually starts," Sam explained, "but we're in finals season now and the exam is at 9. So MOVE."
I shot out of bed like my life depended on it and rushed to grab my bag off my dresser.
"Your cloak, grab your cloak," Sam ordered, already at the door watching me frail around the room. I turned unfortunately to my laundry bin where the peak of my jam-stained cloak lay crushed at the bottom half of the bin.
Sam released a string of curses before drawing her wand and stating in a less than pleasant voice "Accio Ava's misplaced cloak."
I was mortified at how simple of a fix that was. Especially when said cloak came flying out from under my bed with a snag of dust bunnies following with it.
"Brush them off when we're there. Who care's how your ruddy cloak looks?"
We were dashing down the stairs when I passed the empty fireplaces and common room. A sure sign that we were in fact very late on the uptake of events for the day.
"Sorry if I take a decent concern for my physical welfare!" I snapped back at Sam's heals as she slammed the portal door open, to the great surprise of some first year Slytherins waiting just outside the door.
"Awesome!" one of the kids echoed as we took the stairs two at a time. We were out of breath by the time we had reached the transfiguration room and Professor McGonagall gave us very degrading stares as she waited with the exams in her hand as the two of us took our seats.
Her mouth was a thin line as she watched me fumble for a quill while Sam riffled through her bag. I ran my hands through my pockets coming up short with no quill but to my odd surprise, found the fake galleon from the D.A.
I had thought I lost it. But what little pleasure I felt at finding it did nothing for my desperation for a quill. I felt someone tap at my back and turned to find of all people, Jasper holding out a second quill to me.
I took it before muttering an inaudible thank you in his direction and turned back to the front.
"Now then," McGonagall began with little patience in her voice. "I hope we all are ready for the exam as it is now 9, the time specifically written out in your schedules for this exam."
The clear angle of that jab did little to subdue my mortification but the actual exam thankfully went by with less pain.
When I found myself walking out of that exam I felt my confidence come back, though it was short lived. The Potions written portion of the OWL started in an hour.
"How'd you do?" I turned around to find Jasper walking out of the classroom with his bag over his shoulder. Those gold curls of his were delicately ringed around his head like a crown. His eyes as warm as caramel. If he felt stressed going into that exam, he sure didn't look it.
"Not bad," I admitted, though hesitantly since it was Jasper asking. Apart from some off glances in each other's direction while being in the D.A together and now consequently in weekly intentions, Jasper and I hadn't much room to talk since the Yule Ball. Or no, maybe he had talked to me when he and Dom had snagged Sam, my Beauxbatons friends and I from the chaos that ensued following the third task.
Either way, hearing him talk in my direction made me have more than enough reason to pause and think about what he was up to.
"I expect you want your quill back," I stated, thinking that the only real reason for his brazen attempt to talk to me. "I've got it here, hold on," I said as I turned toward my pocket where I was sure to have placed it.
"No need, keep it," he said with barely a wave in my direction. "You would have done the same if I needed help." I looked at him and I was sure he saw my thoughts clearly on my face.
I would, in fact, have not done the same had the roles been reversed.
"Well I," he began, "I saw the galleon and it made me think, we are all in this together, right?"
I was stunned by his honesty, let alone how quickly he had resorted back to his bashfulness from before.
"Yeah," I agreed simply. "I didn't even realize I still had it on me."
"Really? I keep with me all the time," he pulled his galleon out of his pocket for shows before pocketing it again. "Guess I'm still a bit in denial at this point, huh?"
He managed to get me to smile then. Sam was next out the door with her raven hair in a curly mess along with the look in her eyes as she approached us.
"I managed to get porcelain and porcupine properties mixed up, can you bloody well believe it?"
"How'd you manage that?" Jasper asked, turning on her with his own growing smile that made me pause. "They're completely different."
"Because I'm thick in the head, that's why."
"You know I could hear you from the classroom," Dominic's voice commented as he stepped out with his own bag on his shoulder. He barely gave me a look before rounding on Sam's smarting face. "Not that I can complain. It's not often I get to hear you admit to being thick."
"Bite it, Dom. I'm not in the mood."
"I better go," I said after a beat. With the growing students exiting the classroom, my own nerves were coming back to bite. "Potion's in less than an hour."
"Is it?" Dom questioned, rashly turning for his schedule.
"She's taking the OWL, you daft," Sam explained before walking to my side and placing a hand on my arm. "You've got this," she said my way with a squeeze of the arm. "I'll come wait with Ella following your demonstration portion of the exam. We can go eat sweets in the kitchen after, alright?"
I squeezed her hand back gratefully, stating that would be perfect.
The OWLs ended up taking place in the Great Hall amidst a vast line of desks and chairs while wizards and witches in grey-cut uniforms walked back and forth between the lines watching us write.
I knew they were there to watch for cheating but did they have to walk so near? It was terribly difficult to focus every time one walked past.
I was nearly 2/3's of the way through the written portion and while the exam was far longer and more in-depth to what I was used to on the basic level, I was still on top of it all.
But that didn't stop the feeling uneasiness that lingered in my gut. Draco had been talking loudly to Crabbe and Goyle when I had arrived, out of breath from running up from the dungeons.
It hurt that he didn't even pause in his story as I passed him by toward my seat.
Hermione on the other hand was kind enough to have smiled warmly my way on my entrance. We gave each other a thumbs up before it began. No doubt, I'm sure she was as ready for this exam as anyone could be.
I released a breath as the clock at the front of the room chimed, reminding us we had 45 minutes left for the exam.
I stifled down a wave of anxiety with a deep breath before looking back to the next question at hand:
List the seven properties of moonstone.
It was like the universe was trying to punish me or something.
I sat with Hermione, Ron and Harry during our break before the demonstration portion began. While the boys were sitting there zooned out, Hermione and I were reverbing our knowledge back and forth.
"And the antidote for a Swelling Solution is?"
"A Deflating Draught," Hermione answered hastily. "Which is colored..."
"Green thanks to the essence of sneezewort," I confirmed to Hermione's nods of encouragement.
"Did you remember what you put for the cutting style used in preparing Chinese chomping cabbage?"
"It was Chiffonade, " I explained after a beat. "Unless you are making skele-gro in which case you tear it manually."
Hermione released a sigh and sat back against the wall before explaining, "I thought so but I almost flipped them again."
On the other side of the wall, Ron was giving Harry a familiar look that reminded me of Theo when he was begging for a diversion from our mother's constant commentary in his direction.
Obviously Ron wasn't exactly at ease with Hermione and my chatter.
"Don't worry Ron, we're almost done," I said his way, catching Harry up from his daydreams.
"I'll stop worrying when we can be bloody done with classes," he said to no one in particular while Harry watched on, noiselessly.
"We'll still have half the afternoon left once this is over," Hermione mentioned with a hint of cheer but it didn't register on the boy's faces. They remained glum up until the demonstrations began.
The demonstrations were done in heats in alphabetical order, making Hermione and I go in together alongside Daphne Greengrass and a few other nobodies.
The Great Hall was transformed again, now with long tables along different lengths of the room with potions brewing.
One look around and I was reminded of Snape's test from the beginning of the year. He had obviously gotten his inspiration from an OWL method.
If that was the case, I had this in the bag.
And that was exactly how it went.
I started with a number order of which table to go at what time and followed along accordingly. Different wizards in grey waited at different cauldrons with questions for me on the potion in front of me.
The first table had murky potion that shone silver vapor. I didn't even hesitate a moment when the wizard asked me to write out the name of the potion for him.
"Draught of Peace"
A few tables later had a line of various fungi for me to categorize for draughts and antidotes. I nearly missed one sprig of scurvy grass for Billywig which would have been detrimental.
But my real show of my prowess came when I stepped forward to an older wizard with a rather large mole on his chin standing in front of an empty cauldron with ingredients as far as the eye could see.
"For this portion of the exam, I ask that you make whichever potion you deem you can complete within the allotted time frame left."
I gawked at him.
"Any potion? Not just from our textbooks?"
He regarded my question a moment before nodding back.
"Yes, my dear. The trick of the question is, you can choose to produce a rather easy potion however, how I mark you will be lesser than say if you were to make something more robust."
"Which means I am playing the clock." He gave me another nod, this time with a sensible smile at seeing my understanding.
"Is this my last demonstration of the exam?"
"Yes, my dear. It is."
I gave a satisfactory nod and walked over to the ingredients with new eyes. The importance of this task was what would skyrocket my score from a mere E for excellence to that of an O.
Because the problem here was time. One look around me and I could see that in my bracket I was the only one to have made it to this bench from my heat first. Hermione was still processing sprigs. With the two hours ahead of me, I could potentially fast pass a 1 and a half hour long potion. But, if I try for too much, I will be docked points and be lucky if I even get an A for acceptable, let alone an E.
But if I go easy, I won't ever get that O.
There was movement from my side vision, making me glance to the side, spotting Professor Snape watching me through a lidded gaze.
Aha.
I rolled back my sleeves and turned my attention back to the ingredients in front of me.
The list of ingredients were made to make people like me go for fancy potions. Stuff that would tempt me do something ridiculous in a 2 hour span. Question was, would I take the bait?
I grabbed for the bottle of eel eyes, jobberknoll feathers, mandrake, sage, alihotsy and peppermint before taking the flint and starting the heat.
I was 100% taking the bait because obviously, I had an audience. So naturally, I was going to show off.
The time moved quickly, all the while I kept to my task as meticulous as I had been trained. The wizard did not say a word but there was no doubt he knew exactly what I was doing and watched with mere breaths as I chopped, stewed, powdered down and stirred the ingredients into the bubbling cauldron below.
The most tolling moment of that exam was waiting with baited breath for that potion to change colors within the last 15 minutes of the allotted exam time.
Daphne was serving her potion up to her wizard in grey when I finally began adding the last round of my ingredients to moonlight blue potion. I had to suppress a smirk as the last of the peppermint floated down onto the potion and turned into a beautiful gold color, the likes of which put my own golden curls to shame.
But that smirk was short lived as the wizard in grey cleared his throat making me glance at the clock.
My stomach dropped.
I had 45 seconds and counting before the exam was over and I had yet to vial the potion.
Those seconds moved so quickly, I didn't have time to think, let alone feel anything but determination as I ladled up the potion and vialed it up before stoppering it shut and placing it on the display rack in front of the supervisor.
The toll bell rang loudly and I heard a student nearby slam his ladle done hard on the counter.
But I didn't look to who that was. Instead I looked to my wizard in grey as he took the vial up from the counter and brandished it into the light from the ceiling.
He let out a sigh before the biggest grin appeared on his face and turned back to me.
"Of all my years monitoring potions OWLs, I have not once seen a young witch or wizard brazen enough to complete a true memory potion in less than a 2 hours span. Why, such a potion takes at least 2 and 15 to complete!"
Some of the others were staring now, as he spoke, and one of the neighboring supervisors in grey stepped over to take a better look at the vial he held.
"You are very talented young witch, that be so," the other said after pause to look at the golden vial. "And ah yes, you are Slytherin house. That would make sense. It seems Slytherin has been getting all the brilliant potion users of late. Congratulations, Miss Fountaine. You are free to go."
As I turned from my bench, I caught sight of Snape, standing the wall, watching me. A hint of a satisfactory smirk shadowed his face. I knew I would never hear a compliment angled my way from him, but after today, there was no doubt that I had made up somewhat for the trouble I had caused this year for Slytherin house.
Today, I was a brilliant potion's master in the making.
I had more than just Ella and Sam to welcome me once I left the great hall. Tati was there too, jumping for joy when she caught me walking out. It was the first time I didn't take notice of whether Draco was nearby, or if his gang was leering in my direction.
For once I could celebrate without worry, and so that's how it was.
The girls and I were walking outside, following a nice hoarding of food from the kitchens when a sudden sensation came about me that made me stop in my tracks and made the others turn toward me.
"Ava?" Ella asked with a frown of concern. "What's the matter?"
My left pocket of my robes had gotten warm like a hot coal had dropped into the lining. I fished it out, knowing well what was causing the heat.
The D.A galleon gleamed at me as the numerical lining across the coined shivered and changed.
The message was clear. Hermione was sending out an SOS to the D.A. And she needed us now.
Hello there,
Glad to say I am feeling better and my plans for these next chapters are already underway. I plan to post on Sunday, so I will see you all then!
-WG-