All's Fair

Chapter Eleven- Smitten

Draco did not get up in time for breakfast the next morning, rather tired from the night before. Blaise and Pansy reported back to him that very few of the seventh year Gryffindors had turned up either.

Pansy also proudly informed Draco that she had slipped Hermione her potion with her usual tact last night during Prefect duties, and that the girl had, rather surprisingly, suspected nothing.

And much as Draco had congratulated his beaming friends, and told them that he too was anticipating the events that were to come during the day... something lurking in the back of his mind was crying out in protest.

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Blaise had insisted that they turn up early for Potions class that day so that they would get good seats. After all, it would be awful if they 'missed all the action'.

As a result, the three Slytherins were walking down the corridor towards the dungeons in silence, each wrapped up in their own thoughts.

When they neared the door to the classroom, however, sounds from inside caught their attention.

"Severus," purred a voice from inside the laboratory. "Fancy seeing you here."

"This is my classroom, of course I am here," stated the teacher abruptly. "Emphasis on the my. I should be here. You shouldn't. Get out."

There was a pause. "Are you sure about that?" asked the voice huskily.

"Wh-" began Snape's voice, when it was cut off. There was a sound from the room that seemed rather like desks being shifted. Like something -or someone- was being pushed against them.

After a moment, the unknown voice said, "Oh Professor. I am impressed."

Silence for a moment. Snape spoke again: "No. Stop it!"

"What? This?" A suspicious sounding rustle.

"Yes, that!"

"You're sure?"

"Y- ohhhhh. No! I mean yes. Just get out!"

"B-" began the voice, sounding the slightest bit whiny.

"Now!"

The three Slytherins jumped away from the door that their ears had been pressed against a split second before it burst open, and out of it stumbled a very red and dishevelled looking...

Neville Longbottom?

The bumbling Gryffindor did not seem to notice the gaping Slytherins as he quickly sprinted away down the corridor.

When he was out of sight, and the door of the classroom had slammed shut, Pansy turned to Draco.

"Draco," she began sweetly, "there were only two servings of water left in the jug when you added the potion, weren't there?"

"Yes," replied Draco fearfully.

"And you do remember who they were meant for, don't you?" she asked, with a hint of something much more frightening than this sickly sweetness on her voice.

"Yes. Ron and Harry."

"Tell me, Draco, what the potion that you put in the jug was."

Draco sighed. "It was a love potion that wears off quickly enough to cause embarrassment but not lasting damage."

"And whose hair did we put in it?"

"Snape's."

"Now tell me, Draco," continued Pansy in her sugar sweet voice. "Did you notice anything funny about Longbottom's behaviour just now?"

"Yes." Draco whimpered quietly.

"And what was it?"

"He was smitten with Snape."

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Harry, Ron and Hermione blearily stumbled down the corridor towards their Potions class. Before they could reach the door, however, Harry found himself being grabbed by the arm and dragged into a nearby classroom.

"Harry, how do you feel about Snape?" asked Draco urgently.

"He's a cranky asshat," replied Harry, feeling rather bemused.

"No... feelings?"

"Lord no!" cried Harry, looking horrified.

Draco smacked himself on the head. Brilliant. I know that I didn't want Harry to take the potion, but... What do I tell him? How do I tell him?

"Draco, what's wrong?" asked Harry, looking slightly concerned.

"IputalovepotioninyourdormsjugandnowWeasleyandLongbottomaresmittenwithSnape," muttered Draco, staring at his feet.

"What did you just say?"

Draco sighed. "I put a love potion in your dorm's jug, and now Weasley and Longbottom are smitten with Snape."

"What??!"

"It won't last long, just until the end of the day, but, uh, yeah..." Draco trailed off.

"Draco!" cried Harry. "Why Neville?"

"It was meant to be you, but I guess the thirst spell went wrong."

Harry glared at Draco, his forehead wrinkling with the intensity of it. "You used me! Last night was- You used me!"

"No, no, I-"

"You just wanted to prank us, and just got last night as an extra! I can't believe you! I though that you... I don't know what I thought..."

"Harry, no, it wasn't like that," protested Draco.

"And now Hermione and I will need to look after Ron and Neville all day too. You're so... ugh!" cried Harry, throwing his hands in the air.

Draco looked away and muttered something.

Harry just glared at him, and waited for him to repeat whatever it was that he had said.

"Hermione was given the potion last night by Pansy," whispered Draco.

Harry turned red with fury.

"Hey, we're playing a game!" cried the blond.

"And you broke the rules," replied Harry quietly.

"There are no rules, Harry."

"You're not playing fair. You took advantage of me."

"All's fair in love and war."

Harry merely gave Draco as disdainful look, then stormed out of the classroom. Draco followed him back to the line of pupils outside, his heart sinking right down to his feet.

Draco watched as Harry made his way over to where Ron and Hermione were standing casting furtive glances at the door of the classroom. He saw Harry looking carefully at each of them.

Stupid boy, he thought. As if they will be wearing signs that say 'I wuv Snape and want to give him hugsies.'

Actually, Granger might make badges.

Before anything else could happen, though, the door to the classroom creaked open. Snape popped his head out and looked up and down the line of students. His eyes briefly alighted on Neville, who was beet red.

Draco fancied that he saw the older man flush slightly, but he may have been imagining it. Nobody had ever seen Snape blush before.

The class quickly filed into the room. Surprisingly (or not, depending on who you were), three Gryffindors immediately abandoned their usual seats towards the back of the class in favour of the front benches.

Harry turned around briefly to glare at Draco, then took a seat next to Ron, Hermione and Neville right at the front of the class.

Snape stood silently at the front of the class, waiting for everyone to be quiet so that he could begin the lesson. He said a few quick words about the potion they were to be making, scrawled some instructions on the blackboard, then span around with a glare.

"Why are you not making your potions?" he snapped.

The class stood staring at him in shock. They had, of course, not even had time to read the instructions on the board.

"You're still not doing anything! Start working!" yelled Snape, shaking with anger.

As Harry noted that the teacher seemed even more irritable than normal, he heard Ron whisper to Hermione:

"He looks so sexy when he's angry."

The darker boy turned to see Hermione's reaction to this. After all, she was Ron's girlfriend. She ought to be angry.

Hermione however was not angry; she was actually nodding in agreement.

"He's so exciting... so unpredictable," she replied eagerly.

Oh yes, very unpredictable. Will he assign detention, deduct house points, scream threats at us, or a mixture of all three?

As Harry watched Hermione wander off to collect the ingredients to the potion, he could have sworn that he saw her attempt to smile seductively at Snape.

Snape swooped around the room in his usual manner as they began to complete their potions. He eventually arrived at the Gryffindor's bench.

Snape's lip curled as he looked at the line of rather bizarre potions that had been created.

Neville, who was not good at potions at the best of times, had been so utterly distracted by the presence of his new love that his handiwork, far from being a pale yellow, was a thick green sludge. Snape snorted derisively, and carried on without saying a word.

Harry, who had not actually been looking at what he had been throwing into his potion, had needed to step away from his cauldron; the smell being emitted from it was too unpleasant to bear. But it was not his fault that he had been a bit distracted by his friends theories about what their teacher wore under his robes, whether he had black silk sheets, what his opinions concerning student-teacher relationships were...

Ron and Hermione's potions had not fared any better. Ron, blushing as red as his potion, was muttering disjointed excuses.

"Sorry professor... you're too distracting... no not you, I mean... sorry professor..."

Hermione, however, had a much more direct approach.

"Professor," she said slyly, "I'm very sorry about messing up the potion. I would love to improve, though." She paused. "Do you think that you would be able to give me a private... study session?"

Snape froze. He glanced nervously at Hermione, who fluttered her eyelashes in response. He looked to Ron, who gave him a shy smile. He averted his eyes towards Neville, who flushed at the attention. As a last resort, Snape glared at Harry, who was looking despairingly at his friends.

"Potter!" he barked. "I don't know what you've done, but this is all your fault! Detention! Class is dismissed, now get out!"

As the stunned students packed up as quickly as humanly possible and scurried out of the classroom, Ron and Hermione rounded on Harry.

"How the hell did you manage that?" asked Ron angrily.

"You know we like Snape, and yet you still go and get detention with him! We thought you were our friend!" added Hermione.

"Hey, what's with this?" asked Harry. "I thought you two only had eyes for each other?"

"Nah," said Ron cheerfully. "We had a chat this morning, and decided it wasn't meant to be."

"Please tell me," plead Harry, "that you have not ruined your wonderful, perfect relationship for Snape."

Ron and Hermione looked shifty.

"Honestly, you two!" cried Harry. "You know that you can't get teachers! He's out of reach. And I didn't even know you liked boys, Ron!"

"I don't," said Ron, looking dreamy. "Just him."

"B-"

"What are you three still doing here?" snarled Snape, who had come up behind them. "Shouldn't you be out somewhere spreading love and puppies?"

There was a brief silence, and then the man growled and stalked quickly away.

"I'm in love," whispered Hermione, staring after him.

"No!" yelled Harry. "No, you're not! You're under a love spell! You hate Snape!"

"Don't be stupid," replied Hermione briskly, her demeanour changing speedily. "What a mad idea. Anyway, I need to go study... or something. Coming, Ron?"

"Are we going to be 'studying' or 'something'?" asked Ron.

Hermione smiled. "Something," she replied.

"Oh goody."

With that, Harry's best friends wandered away to spy on a certain Professor. He sighed, deciding that for the first time that 'something' did not mean 'snogging in an empty classroom', it was not as great as he had imagined.

Still, he thought to himself, they don't appear to be doing anything harmful. And I tried to warn them. Sort of. And Draco did say that it would wear off sometime today...

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Fortunately for Harry, aside from a little giggling and some rather pathetic attempts to catch the attention of their beloved teacher, Ron, Hermione and Neville did not cause any trouble.

Granted, there had been a little incident in which Hermione had attempted to show Snape some leg and ended up nearly tripping over. And then the one where Neville had fallen up the stairs watching the man walking down a corridor. Not forgetting Ron's 'coming across' a bunch of flowers and 'just happening to' thrust them at Snape.

Still, it could have been worse, Harry decided as he settled down to go to sleep. And in the morning, everything would be back to normal. Well, as normal as it could be.

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Harry woke very early the next morning for no apparent reason. He got dressed quietly, and made his way down into the common room to start doing his leftover homework. He was half way through his herbology essay, when a shadow fell over his work.

Harry looked up to see Ron and Hermione looming angrily over him.

"Harry," growled Ron. "I think you have some explaining to do..."