The Winterscapes

The Winterscapes - Chapter Five

Draco,

Your mother and I received your letter and are pleased to know that your classes are going well. The Notts and the Goyles came for supper last night. They enjoyed your mother's night blooming rose garden, and your mother was most pleased that the Black Queen of Midnights were in full bloom. They are, of course, temperamental, but can be quite lovely.

Mrs. Nott announced that she is expecting. I am sure you will be pleased to know before your classmates, as everyone has been waiting for the news since Nathaniel was, how shall we say, injured in that unfortunate raid. Every family's heir should be strong in mind and body, and bring pride to the family name, as you well know. I expect you will do well this year. I would say good luck at your upcoming Quidditch match, but Malfoys do not need luck. Speaking of Malfoys, your mother is going to France tomorrow to stay with my second cousin. He is very ill, I am told, but I am to discuss your initiation with our Master sometime in the next week. I have been led to believe that he wishes to initiate you as soon as you leave Hogwarts, which is entirely appropriate of course. Your mother has always been fond of my cousin and his wife, and is eager to go in my place. We must always be there for our family.

You requested more allowance for your next Hogsmeade visit, and I will send it as soon as news reaches me about your Quidditch match, providing you win, naturally.

Yours sincerely,

Father

As soon as Draco finished reading the letter, it crumbled and turned to ash, then disappeared in a whirl of black smoke, lost to the air. Just as it would have done if anyone other than Draco had tried to read it. He sighed. Yet another cheerful letter from home. Other kids got homemade sweaters and howlers, some got notes saying "I miss you," and some had parents who forgot to write at all. Draco got subtle lectures about family pride. Well, homemade sweaters were lumpy and ugly, and at least I'll have something interesting to say at dinner. He didn't think anyone knew the Notts were expecting an heir, for if they did the girls would surely be gushing over babies and rot.

"Draco, pass the butter," Crabbe grunted, interrupting Draco's thoughts.

Draco passed the butter and went back to his bacon and eggs. He glanced at his watch. "Almost time for Potions," and grabbed an apple to stick in his bag to eat between classes.

He and the rest of the older Slytherins sat at the end of the table farthest from the high table. There were fewer seats than there were sixth and seventh year Slytherins, but meals lasted longer than it took anyone to eat, so students wandered in and out of the Great Hall. In the morning, that usually meant that the early risers woke up and went cheerfully to breakfast, and then back to the common room to do homework, play chess, or whatever they felt like doing before classes. Draco and Blaise both liked to sleep in and not rush to anything, least of all meals, so they were usually at the tail end of the breakfast crowd. Of course, they always left the Great Hall in enough time to ensure that they did not have to rush to class. Draco, Blaise, Madelyn, Crabbe, and some of the others picked up their bags and left for the dungeons.

Draco covertly watched Madelyn as they walked. She was generally thought to be one of the prettiest girls in school. She had shiny gold-blonde hair that was curly and cut to her shoulders so it moved and bounced when she walked, and she had very pale blue eyes. She was curvy and had something else that bounced when she walked. Too bad she was stupid. Really, annoyingly stupid, all she ever did was gossip and spread vicious rumors. Draco averted his eyes. Blaise didn't mind unintelligent girls; he actually preferred them that way and had been snogging Madelyn in one of the common room's dark corners since the term began. Draco and Madelyn had snogged a few times in fifth year, but that was ancient history. He wondered briefly about some of the younger Slytherin girls, maybe the fifth years. The Halloween festival was coming up, and he would need an acceptable date.

As they walked through the door of the Potions classroom, Snape directed them to the supply cabinets opposite the door.

"Today we are brewing a Strengthening Solution; it will require rare and expensive that ingredients you were not instructed to buy yourselves. Take three grams powdered granite, two and one third grams powdered Romanian longhorn dragon horn, and two drops phoenix tears. Then go to your seats. Quickly, we have a lot to cover today. And for Merlin's sake, put the phoenix tears in a glass dish, not in your mortar; mortars are for grinding ingredients, not transporting them."

They shuffled over to the supply cabinet. Blaise whispered to Draco, "Hey, did you do the reading for this?"

"Yes, last night," Draco said.

"Remember that part about the phoenix tears not coming into contact with the granite before the knotgrass base?"

Draco grinned. "Yeah"

When it was their turn, they both measured and took their ingredients. After they each put two drops of phoenix tears in a glass dish, they sprinkled some of the powdered granite into the rest of the vial of tears and went to their respective seats to wait for class to begin. When Hermione, Ron, and Harry entered the class and heard Snape's instructions, Draco waved Hermione over.

"Already have ours," he said.

When the whole class was present and seated, Snape began. "I assume most of you did not read chapter four in the text as you were assigned, so I will issue a warning. Listen only once; I will not repeat it. The potion must be prepared in a particular order so the more delicate ingredients are not contaminated by the strongest ingredients. The ingredients are as follows: four grams knotgrass, two drops phoenix tears, four porcupine quills, two and one third grams powdered Romanian longhorn dragon horn, and three grams powdered granite, in that order. Begin by making an infusion of knotgrass, to which you will add the phoenix tears and let brew for twelve minutes while I lecture. Begin."

"I'll crush the knotgrass and you start the water boiling," Hermione said, and began to grind the knotgrass with her mortar and pestle. They finished the infusion quickly, added the phoenix tears, and waited for Snape's lecture on the theory behind the potion. As Snape went on about the delicate interaction of phoenix tears and knotgrass and granite, and the human muscular system, Draco scribbled a note and passed it to Hermione.

I already know this, do you?

She wrote back:

Of course.

He thought for a minute and wrote something else.

Are you and your bodyguards going to the Quidditch game tomorrow?

She answered, though she was obviously trying to pay attention to the lecture.

Ron and Harry are going. I have better things to do.

He scribbled:

I'm playing, you know.

"Now, you may finish the potion. We will test it at the end of class, and I will issue detentions to be served with Filch to everyone whose potion does not work," Snape finished.

"I said I'm playing, you know," Draco whispered as he ground the porcupine quills.

Hermione waited with the powdered dragon horn to add immediately after the porcupine quills. "Yes Draco, I know you're on the Quidditch team," she said. "Are you sure you measured this correctly?"

"Yes," he said.

Hermione stirred the potion counterclockwise as Draco sprinkled in the powdered granite.

"I don't want to test this," said Draco.

"You're really spoiled Malfoy, you know that?"

"Not at all, Granger, I just know you'll make a good lab rat."

"You do realize it's a Strengthening Solution, Malfoy? I could punch you in the face after I've taken it and you'd be in the Hospital Wing for a week."

"You wouldn't"

"Yes I would."

"No you wouldn't."

"Yes I would."

This went on for some time until the entire class was finished with the assignment.

"Fill your smallest vial with the potion, and one person from each pair drink it and come to the front to lift this iron block. It weighs fifteen stone. Each student who can easily lift it, and his partner, should clean up their desk and leave. Everyone else stay to receive your detention."

Hermione went and stood in the line of students who had drunk the Strengthening Solution. When it was her turn she leaned over and lifted the huge block like it was a feather pillow. There were five students total who lifted the block, and five who could not. Snape was irate. Draco was pleased, and he assumed Blaise was as well. It had to have been the phoenix tears they tampered with that ruined so many of the potions.

As Draco and Hermione finished packing away their ingredients, she looked him straight in the eye and said, "You know, I think I will go to the Quidditch game after all."

"Really?" Draco smirked. This day was turning out to be altogether satisfactory.

"Yes," she said. "Ron and Harry have been trying to get me to go all week." And she went off with the other Gryffindors.

Draco rolled his eyes.