Strangeland | By : SilverEros Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 4229 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0 |
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story. |
Title
Strangeland
Author
Silver Eros
Rating
R
Disclaimer
This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
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“Today, we will be brewing a potion that consists of dittany, hellebore, nettle, essence of belladona, jobberknoll feathers, porcupine quills, rat spleen, scarab beetles, eggs of an ashwinder, fireslugs, pogrebin hair and ginger. I expect you all to be able to tell me what these ingredients add up to... Potter -!”
Snape turned on his heel and pointed his wand at Harry with a nasty sneer on his face.
Harry’s mind raced as he ran through all the potions that he could remember off the top of his head.
“Wh- what were the ingredients again?” he asked.
“Tsk, tsk.” Snape’s sneer grew even more nastier. “And you expect to pass this class Potter?”
Immediately, after Snape’s eyes had left Harry, Hermione’s hand shot up into the air, but Snape ignored her and turned his back to them and strode across the room over the the Slytherins who were smirking delightedly in Harry’s direction.
“Mr. Malfoy. Kindly help out poor Mr. Potter.”
Malfoy’s eyes met Harry’s, and they were flickering with uncontrollable mirth. The blonde made a show of leaning casually back in his chair smugly, examining his nails.
“The Nostrum of Etre.” he replied in an utterly bored tone. His eyes flashed once more at Harry.
“Excellent.” Snape said almost gleefully. “Twenty points to Slytherin.” he then proceeded back up the aisle to the front of the classroom and flicked his wand at the long, black chalkboard and white letters jerked across the surface.
“The Nostrum of Etre.” Snape repeated evilly, narrowing his eyes at the class. When they finally landed back on Harry, Harry had to grit his teeth to keep himself from turning pink with anger. “I don’t suppose you can tell me what this potion is used for, can you, Potter?” he spat icily.
Hermione’s hand was straight as a stick in the air and her eyes were as wide as dinner plates.
Harry remained silent and pursed his lips.
“I didn’t think so.”
Harry glared at Snape, his fingers itching to yank that malignant smile off of Snape’s sallow face.
“The Nostrum of Etre, Potter. Is a very very advanced potion that has approximately an eighty-five percent chance of becoming a deadly poison if any mistakes are made in the brewing.”
The whole class winced at the information, looking fearfully at one another.
“That means,” Snape went on, clearly enjoying the building tension in the room. “That only two of you will manage to brew it correctly. The others will all be poison.”
Neville was positively quivering from head to toe and his face had gone as white as chalk.
Harry was sure that he would be one of those many that would turn out with a poison instead of a potion in the end. The two students that would obviously do it right would be Hermione and Malfoy. There was no question about that. He felt his heart sinking as thoughts of a big fat ZERO danced it’s way into his mind.
But Snape’s happiness faded quickly and was replaced by a menacing scowl only seconds later.
“But, as this potion is something another teacher requested that I have you brainless lot brew... it is a great disappointment to say that nobody will fall down dead today.
“Open your books to page five-hundred and sixty-eight!” he snarled.
There was a wild scrambling as all the students flipped through their books.
“Everyone will be at their own cauldron today. You know what to do, don’t waste time, as you will need every second of this class to brew this potion.” he hissed, his beetle black eyes looking into each face, and making them draw back in fear. “What are you waiting for? Get started!” he barked, and Neville toppled over from his seat.
There was a great rush to the student cupboards as everyone hurried to get the needed ingredients before they ran out of the freshest.
Ron was looking at Harry uneasily, as if he had great doubts that he would be able to make the right potion, and Harry couldn’t feel more agreeing. He would be lucky if he didn’t make about a hundred mistakes, because from the looks of it, this Nostrum of Etre was indeed very difficult. One stir in the wrong direction, one minute of idle bubbling, and it would be ruined.
He silently marveled at Hermione who’s eyes were narrowed in concentration as she read through each and every instruction carefully before dividing the ingredients into groups and proceeding to cut them up with painstaking neatness. Harry was already sweating from both nerves and the hot steam wafting unpleasantly from his cauldron, but he rolled up his sleeves and braced himself before taking up the knife.
Only minutes later, his arm was beginning to ache as he struggled to cut the dittany, which was a thick brown and completely solid stick-like plant.
Brushing his arm across his damp forehead, he exhaled heavily and glanced up to find that he wasn’t the only one struggling with the plant. Nearly the whole class had their tongues between their teeth, as they muscled their way with their knife.
Hermione, despite her efforts, could hardly make a dent through her dittany and she was beginning to look frantic as the minutes ticked by. Looking down at his half cut stick, he slid his pieces over onto her desk noiselessly and took her unblemished stick. Hermione looked at him with a startled expression and at first opened her mouth to refuse but Harry nodded toward Snape, who was leering over Parvati’s cauldron and had his back to them.
Thank you so much. She mouthed, her eyes glittering with grateful tears.
Harry smiled back and took up his knife again, but before he could start cutting, he caught a pair of grey eyes once more.
Malfoy was smirking at him with his eyebrows raised, and Harry was sure that he’d seen Harry and Hermione trade ingredients. Harry panicked only for a split second before shooting Malfoy the foulest glare he could muster, warning him to keep him mouth shut or else...
Malfoy just continued smirking though and nodded down at his own dittany stick that was finished and at the ready next to his frothing cauldron. Harry’s eyes widened and he followed Malfoy’s gaze over to Goyle who was mincing the solid stick as if it were made of wet clay.
Sulking slightly, Harry went back to his work.
Halfway through. He panted inwardly as he mixed in the rat spleen and stirred once clockwise, twice counterclockwise, and seven times clockwise. So far, he was pretty certain that he hadn’t made any mistakes. His dittany had been successfully cut and was in melting his cauldron along with the rat spleen.
He wanted to see how his friends were doing, but there wasn’t even a second to spare. Every minute was as precious as his own life. His eyes were constantly on the clock, counting the seconds as they ticked by until he could add the next ingredient.
The thick liquid inside his pewter cauldron was a deep, deep, crimson. Exactly the color of blood. The sight made Harry’s stomach churn.
He nearly dropped the whole bottle of fireslugs when a scream sliced through the silent air and he managed to catch it by the cork just before it landed in the potion.
Still keeping an eye on the clock, he snuck a quick glance toward the direction the voice had come from and was dismayed to see that Neville was writhing on the floor beneath his desk, the red mixture seeping through his robes and across the floor.
“EVERYONE CONTINUE WITH THEIR POTIONS!” Snape shouted, his teeth barred as he approached Neville. He waved his wand at the spilled potion and it instantly disappeared, leaving a path of charcoaled stone. Neville’s screams were filling the whole classroom as he flailed in agony; his skin looked as if it were actually melting.
Harry had the strong urge to rush over to Neville but Snape’s expression made him stay put and with trembling fingers, he stirred thrice counterclockwise, ten times clockwise, once counterclockwise, and once clockwise.
“No one leaves without finishing!” Snape snarled before conjuring a stretcher and levitating Neville onto it and then running out of the classroom.
When they left, Hermione let out a whimper, and she was chewing on her lip. Ron’s face was as white as Neville’s had been and he gulped as he concentrated even harder on his concoction.
Malfoy though, was laughing.
“I was wondering when the nimrod was gonna fuck up. Got me worried that he’d actually make a flawless potion for the first time in his pathetic life.”
It was all Harry could do to keep himself from flinging his cauldron at Malfoy’s head.
“Shut the bloody hell up, Malfoy!” Ron shouted furiously, his free fist clenching his wand.
“Do yourself a favor and do something stupid so you can end up in the Infirmary with Longbottom.” Malfoy drawled, blowing a strand of blonde hair from his face. “We’d all love to see what a deformed weasel looks like.”
“Ron! NO!” Hermione screeched, as Ron pushed up his sleeves. “You have to finish brewing that potion!”
Ron glared at her. “Sod this damn potion!”
“Ronald Weasley! Get back to your desk this instant!”
He halted and looked back and forth between his cauldron and Malfoy’s taunting face and after throwing him a crude hand sign, stomped back, shouting a series of words that would have landed him in a months’ worth of detention if a teacher had caught him.
Just one more stir.....
Harry prayed in his mind that his potion was flawless. All that hard work...
The potion was as scarlet as ever and producing bright orange wafts of smoke. With an unmeltable pewter ladle and wearing a pair of thick dragonhide gloves, he bottled some carefully and corked it firmly.
Finally. Done.
Slumping dead into his seat, he pulled off his gloves and loosened his tie that he’d just noticed was choking him. He took off his outer robe and sat fanning himself ineffectively with his dirt covered hands.
“DONE!” Ron cried proudly, tossing his bottle of Nostrum of Etre into the air and snatching is swiftly.
“Same here.” Hermione said quietly, a fatigued, yet relieved expression on her face. “Thank goodness. That was positively the most horrid potion we’ve ever had to brew, wasn’t it?”
Echoes of ‘done!’ and whoops of joy rang through the class as one by one, people began to finish up on theirs as well.
Snape still hadn’t returned but one look at the clock told him that he’d finished in perfect timing. Three minutes until the end of class.
Ron was dancing around his desk with Seamus and Dean, who had both finished too until a splattering sound and a sputtering sound made everyone stop and look.
Ron was dripping with what looked like black goo. His mouth was puckered as he spit out the rat spleen in mouthfuls.
The whole section of Slytherins were banging the tables with their hands and screeching with laughter.
“Scourgify!” Hermione said hurriedly and the black goo was gone.
“Malfoy, you - you -” Ron’s face was purpling rapidly and he lunged at Malfoy with the face of a rabid lion. Harry grabbed the back of Ron’s robe just as Snape strode in through the door.
“Sir!” Malfoy spoke up immediately. “Professor - Weasley here tried to attack me!”
Snape rounded on Ron. “Weasley! Fighting in my classroom, while I am absent? I won’t allow it!”
“But -” Ron shouted, his face contorted with rage.
“Professor! Malfoy threw-” Harry joined in at the top of his lungs.
“I saw it too!” Seamus exclaimed, jabbing his finger at Malfoy.
“It was Malfoy who started it!” Dean added loudly.
“SILENCE! FIFTY POINTS FROM GRYFFINDOR AND DETENTION FOR ALL FOUR OF YOU!!!” Snape bellowed, pointing at Ron, Seamus, Dean, and Harry.
“You slimy asshole!”
The whole class fell absolutely silent as Snape froze, his were fists clenched so tightly that Harry was sure those long nails were drawing blood.
“Detention for a month, Weasley. And two hundred points from Gryffindor.” it was barely a whisper. “Class dismissed.”
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