A World Of Magic (Discontinued; Pending Rewrite)

Chapter VI

There was a scraping noise as everyone drew their cauldrons towards them , and some loud clunks as people began adding weights to their scales , but nobody spoke.

The concentration within the room was almost tangible. Harry saw malfoy rifling feverishly through his copy of advanced potion making. It could not have been clearer that Malfoy really wanted that lucky day.

Percy however hadn't even opened his copy and was already calmly releasing his sopophorous juice into his potion. Dear god , how did he get that much juice from those shriveled beans?.

Harry bent swiftly over the tattered book Slughorn had lent him.

To his annoyance , he saw that the previous owner had scribbled all over the pages , so that the margins were as black as the printed potions.

Bending low to decipher the ingredients ( even here , the previous owner had made annotations and crossed some things out ) Harry hurried off towards the store cupboard to find what he needed.

As he dashed back to his cauldron , he saw Malfoy cutting up Valerian roots as fast as he could. Percy however was already done and was now calmly stirring his potion.

Everyone kept glancing around at what the rest of the class was doing ; this was both an advantage and disadvantage of potions , that it was hard to keep your work private.

He looked into the book , it said to cut the sopophrous beans and release their juices.
But in the corner the old owner had written.

" Crush with flat side of a silver dagger , releases juice better than cutting."

He disregarded it and tried to cut it normally. But the sopophorous beans were proving very difficult to cut up. Harry turned to Hermione

' Can I borrow your silver knife?'

She nodded impatiently , not taking her eyes off the potion which was still deep purple , though according to the book , it ought to be turning a light shade of lilac by now.

Harry crushed his bean with the flat side of the silver dagger. To his astonishment , it immediately exuded so much juice he was amazed the shriveled beans could've held it all. Hastily scooping it up into the cauldron he saw , to his surprise , the potion immediately turned exactly the shade of lilac described by the textbook.

At the half hour mark , Percy finished his potion. The look on Malfoy's face was priceless , Slughorn looked like he might catch a fly in his mouth.

' How did you finish so fast ' asked Slughorn , awestruck. Percy merely shrugged.
' My boy you have a talent for this , I didn't even know this could be done in this little of a time.

Though we will have to wait until this period ends , if someone has done better than you' Slughorn himself sounded like he didn't believe a bit of it.

Harry however was focused on his work , his annoyance with the previous owner vanishing on the spot. According to the book , he had to stir counter clockwise until the potion turned clear as water.

According to the addition the previous owner had made ,however , he ought to add a clockwise stir after every seventh counter clockwise stir. Could the old owner be right twice?

Harry stirred counter-clockwise , held his breath and stirred once clockwise. The effect was immediate. The potion turned palest pink.

Percy smiled at him from his post.

' How are you doing that ' demanded Hermione , who was red faced and whose hair was growing bushier and bushier by the fumes from her cauldron.

' Add a clockwise stir -'