The Half-Blood Princes {Book 2}

Half-Blood

Harry

All the way down to the dungeons, Ron kept sighing and talking about how great Romilda would be. It was getting on my nerves, and that's why, when we made it to Slughorn's office, I breathed a sigh of relief. I knocked quickly and urgently.

"Harry?" Slughorn opened the door.

"Professor, can you help me?" I asked.

"That's not Romilda." Ron said behind me.

"Whatever's the matter?" Slughorn beckoned me in.

"Very powerful love potion. Can you fix him, please?" I asked. Slughorn took one look at Ron's starry eyes and nodded. Then he went to the cupboard while I sat Ron down on the couch.

"I would have thought that you would be able to fix this problem yourself, Harry." Slughorn said as he poured a little vile of the antidote.

"Uh," I looked away awkwardly. It's not that I don't know how to fix a love potion, but I also don't know why I took him to Slughorn. Maybe I just didn't want to risk my amateur skill on my best friend. I tell Slughorn this, and he laughs.

"Of course, Harry, I understand." He handed Ron the vile and I nodded, assuring Ron that the liquid is safe to drink. He downed it in one gulp. His eyes rolled to the back of his head and he collapsed backwards. I sat next to him, but felt something strange in my pocket. I shifted and took it out. It was Advanced Potion Making; my potions book. Lately I'd found an interest in the handwritten notes in the margins. It had really good advice on how to make the potions and was the secret to my success in class this year. Sometimes I had even found spells.

"What's that you've got there, Harry?" Slughorn asked as I was fingering through the pages. I was about to answer when I reached the front of the book. I don't know why I'd never opened to the cover page, but now that I had I don't think I could read the book the same way again.

Property of the Half-Blood Prince

My voice caught in the back of my throat, preventing me from answering. Memories I thought weren't important resurface with a completely different meaning.

——

"I'm a half-blood too!" Percy laughed.

——

"It's a blue hard covered book with THE LIGHTNING THEIF written on the front and that written on the back. How does that help us? Yeah, it might be about half-bloods like the prophecy says, but it's a muggle fiction. That means that it's not real, right?" Ron said.

——

"Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways."

—-

"Six half-bloods shall answer the call,
To thwart the darkness once and for all..."

—-

My hands shook as I read the same words over and over again. A clue for the prophecy. There's a half-blood prince.

Percy knows more than we think.

So many things were going around in my head, and it was like nothing could snap me out of the state I was in.

Ron started choking next to me.

That definitely brought me back to my senses.

Apparently, while I was reliving the past year in a flurry of memories, Slughorn had prepared us a drink of mead. Ron had woken up from his short coma and had some of the offered beverage.

"Ron!" I yelled and jumped up from the couch. He started clutching his throat and his eyes were rolling back into his head. His mouth started to froth. I could vaguely hear Slughorn panicking behind me. My best friend was dying right before my eyes.

I thought back to what I had learnt. What was killing him? Due to the way he was convulsing, I make the split-second diagnosis of poison. Then I remembered what I had read about antidotes in the book I was previously reading. It was one of the margin notes; just shove a bezoar down their throats.

I rushed to the cupboard. Bezoar, bezoar, BEZOAR. Where, where, where?! THERE. I grabbed the round, black, fruit-like antidote and bolted across the room to where Ron had gone still on the floor. My heart was in my throat as I shoved the bezoar down his. It felt like eternity as I waited for him to breathe. I prayed as I watched his still chest; please, not him too. Please, not Ron.

Ron gasped and I rested my head against his chest in relief, relishing in the rise and fall. He was okay. His eyes weren't open, but he was okay.

——

After a little bit of effort on my part, I managed to carry Ron to the medical wing. Madam Pomfrey seemed slightly upset to be bothered at nine at night, but once I explained everything, she took Ron from me in haste. I was sent away after I made sure Ron wasn't going to die, and I made my way to the Gryffindor common room. Professor Slughorn has told me - after Ron started breathing again - that the mead had been a gift for Dumbledore. The only problem was that he couldn't remember who had given him the poisoned bottle. I had brushed him off, telling him that it wasn't his fault and that we should be grateful that neither Dumbledore or Ron have died. I probably could have paid more attention to him, however, because I couldn't stop thinking about what happened. Someone was trying to kill Dumbledore? Or was I jumping to conclusions? I also need to talk to Percy about his whole half-blood thing.

He has a lot of explaining to do.

——

Percy

"Draco, stop."

"I told you not to get in my way."

"But-"

"No."

~~~

"Percy..." I turned to see Annabeth fall to her knees. Her wedding dress was tattered and stained with blood. I tried to run over to her, but my legs were stuck in a dark mud. Mist swirled around me as I tried to free myself. I kept sinking, lower and lower. Laughter echoed around me as I cried out for Annabeth. Jason appeared next to her, run through with a sword. His mouth was covered in blood and his eyes were empty. He was dressed in a suit, a blue tie hanging around his neck. The once white shirt was now red with blood. Slowly the fog cleared to reveal Camp Half-Blood. The grounds had been decorated in white and blue, however tables and chairs had been overturned. Streamers were scattered across the grass, blowing slightly in the wind. Bodies littered the camp but I refused to identify them. I kept screaming, eyes closed as tears streamed down my cheeks as I sunk lower into the ground.

——

I woke up in a cold sweat, my limbs heavy and stiff. My eyes adjusted to the dark room, shadows from the moon morphing into the bodies from my nightmare. I closed my eyes quickly, willing myself to believe that it was nothing more than a dream. Slowly, movement came to my arms and legs. I was able to reach over to the bedside table and grab the small bottle. Just one drop, they had said. Just one. I twisted the lid and squeezed the little pipet. The single drop landed on my tongue.

Just one drop.