PURIFY : Fred Weasley

03: Spoiled

Over the following month, I get letters from my family. They keep piling up inside the top drawer of my dresser, but I don't bother reading them. I know what they are going to say. My mother, bless her sweet soul, will be asking what I'm doing and desperately trying to make sure I'm okay. My brother will want to know why I haven't mailed Marcus, and my father will have spelled out the same question in the single letter he sent me. My brother, on the other hand, won't stop harassing me. It's at least a letter a week.

Thinking about the number of questions that awake me, I accidentally crush the nuts under my fingers, instead of only cracking them open. Professor Snape looks up from his desk and eyes me carefully but ultimately looks back down.

"Sorry, Professor," I mumble, cleaning up the mess and going to the cupboard to retrieve more.

He looks at me once more, before he stands. He glides over towards my cauldron, positioning himself opposite my stool.

When I return, he looks up at me through narrowing eyes. "The Wolfsbane potion must be brewed very quickly."

"I understand," I say, already cracking open the nuts and dropping them inside. I move to put the rest of the already prepped ingredients inside and add one more piece of kindling to the fire below so that it continues to heat.

His body tightens. "Last year, Miss Larkin, you mentioned the desire to become a dueller. Is that still the case?"

I don't answer him, focusing on the steps before me. While I would love to be a dueller, I could never. It's incredibly hard to become one, after all, and while I received an O in Defence Against the Dark Arts, I still struggled to cast a corporeal Patronus Charm in my fifth year.

"If not, you might have a promising career as a potioneer," he points out. "Perhaps even inventing new potions of your own."

I don't argue with him. This is only the third potion he has had me made, each getting stronger. I had to throw out my Draught of Living Death potion twice before getting it right, and this is my fifth attempt at Wolfsbane.

Professor Snape insists that I look at the directions on my own, and come here without the book. It has complicated things substantially.

After a few more minutes, the potion seems right. It is the right colour, a ghostly white, and consistency, at least. Mostly fog with little liquid in the bottom. Professor Snape wafts over the steam with one hand and smells it.

His eyes crinkle, and he turns up his nose.

"That is above the curriculum for the seventh year N.E.W.T. examination," he points out. "You have quite the talent."

This is, quite honestly, news to me. I knew I was good at potions, but I didn't know that I was beyond the curriculum. Rather than speak, I blink back the information, as if my eyes deceive me.

Professor Snape struts back across the room, pulling out a sheet of paper. "I am going to write a letter to the ministry on your behalf, asking permission to brew a controlled potion. It will take a month to brew, which means you will be here, every day until the end of the year when you have successfully brewed the potion. That is, if you are serious about becoming a potioneer."

The way he speaks makes me feel like the word no isn't an option. I doubt it is even in his vocabulary. So instead, I nod. A question bites my lips that I do not ask. "What potion?"

"Veritaserum," he tells me. "It is perhaps the most complicated thing that I am able to teach you. It should take up the majority of the year, and I only have one test passed it, which we will save for your final year."