Paragraph 7 - 35 : A Fair Potion

Ann quickly swallowed the food she ate at the end of year feast. It was probably a shame, and disrespectful of the house-elves' work, but she was just unable to focus on something different from the Mark Amader narration's implications. After having filled her stomach - it would have been excessive to describe what Ann had done as 'eating' - she started looking alternatively at her three friends spread across the Hall, ready to jump at the first of them who would stand up. This was no short business. Obviously, Eleanor, Judith and Sigismond were enjoying the meal - Ann thought

especially Judith, she loves food and has won the Cup

which brought Ann on edge : they were having fun with blissful forgetfulness, not knowing that something much more important was to be done. They wouldn't have that much time to solve the remaining mysteries : who had drunk the potion, and why ? Finally, when Ann's case was from a medical point of view almost desperate, Sigismond stood up, headed towards the immense doors, and Ann ran to him, which made some students giggle :

Time to declare yourself, Aves !

When she caught up with him, that is, within five seconds, she told him, at the same time panting and trying to keep her voice low enough for the exchange to remain private, she told him :

Someone drank the potion, we must discuss this now

Sigismond stopped in his tracks, and replied :

Err. Yes, of course. But now I need to go to the bathrooms

Noticing her accentuated use of the word 'now' in conjunction with her look that spelled distress, he added :

I will be back in five

and walked faster than usual for him towards the nearest boys' bathrooms. In the meanwhile, Eleanor had posited that Ann's move was somehow related to the four of them, so she stood up and went to Ann, who had turned around to face the inside of the Great Hall in order to see if Eleanor or Judith was also finished with the feast. Ann saw thus Eleanor walking calmly to her. She wasn't panting anymore, and she was able to whisper to Eleanor the same as what she had told Sigismond. Both girls decided to wait for Judith, who had not noticed anything yet, to be ready to join them. This didn't last long, though, for several Hufflepuffs had seen the puzzling gathering, and they told Judith that maybe she was missing something since her friends were talking secretively to each other. Judith hurriedly finished masticating and ingesting her last mouthful, and went briskly to Ann and Eleanor. Eleanor updated Judith on what was happening. They chose to move slightly to the left of the doors, so as not to be watched permanently by some other students, who clumsily behaved as if the three girls were giving a show. They were now out of sight of the people sitting in the Great Hall, and waited for Sigismond to come back. On the one hand, Ann was impatient to tell Judith and Eleanor the details, on the other hand, she felt it would be ridiculous to speak now, then to have to go over the same story for Sigismond. The three girls thus waited silently for Sigismond's return. When he joined the group, Eleanor proposed that they go near the lake, not at their hidden spot far away, but at a location as close as possible to the castle. Upon agreeing to this plan, they headed towards the lake, Ann leading the pack at a fast pace. On arriving near the lake, at a place where they obviously would not be heard, Ann stopped, and remained standing, while the three others sat on the grass. Ann, understanding that the situation would keep looking weird as long as she would not have sat, did so. Now that they were still, they could feel the fresh air : there was a bit of wind, and it was moving the clouds slowly, at times in front of the sun, next out of the way of its rays. Ann started recounting everything she could remember from Mark Amader's tale at high speed. She concluded :

There are too many coincidences. Somebody must have drunk the potion

Sigismond reacted in his casual voice :

Did you ask Mark Amader if he had drunk it ?

For the second time in a few hours, Ann was stunned. She had mulled over what she would explain during possibly one hour, but hadn't looked for a single candidate drinker. Deducing from the silence and Ann's silent but open mouth that she hadn't, Eleanor kindly told Ann :

He is a Slytherin. So, I think your next job is to fetch him

Ann paused briefly, then said :

Of course

And she left the three others, striding towards the castle. What was she going to tell Mark ? Well, anything would do. He would most likely be very pleased to have an opportunity to stick around Ann. On reaching the doors of the Great Hall, she caught a glimpse of the Slytherin table as discreetly as possible, and not seeing Mark in the two seconds that lasted her glance, she went to the dungeons. Anyway, if she had just failed to detect Mark at the Slytherin table because she had not looked at it properly, this was not much of a problem : it would have been awkward to address him in front of the people who were still in the Hall. But at least, she knew it was most likely she would have wasted her time waiting near the entrance to the Hall. She reached the Slytherin Common Room, and started her search for Mark Amader. She knew by and large where was the passageway to the second-years' boys' dormitories. She therefore made her way according to these sketchy memories in the maze that made up the Slytherins' quarters. She was now in front of a corridor, and on each side of the corridor, a long line of wooden doors was spreading. She had no idea of the one behind which Mark was spending his nights. Therefore, she just waited for somebody to enter the corridor or to exit through one of the doors. Ann was preoccupied : currently, she didn't know if she was at the right place. She was positive she was not in a girls' dormitory of years encompassing the first, second and third one, since she had slept in those in the past years and she thus knew very well where to find them. But if she was at the wrong spot, Mark could already be walking out of Slytherin's Common Room. Now that she was thinking of that, he might have already left the castle before she even entered the Slytherin's lodgings. She tried though to reassure herself : nobody could pack that many things in the short time they had spent going down near the lake, and her going back up to the castle. What if Mark had been so fast that he had finished the feast before Ann ? Anyway, Ann's waiting strategy paid off within three minutes. She didn't want to invade the privacy of a boy, especially a boy who seemed attracted to her, this would lead to very unwanted misunderstanding. Therefore, when she saw a young wizard leaving one of the rooms lined up on either side of the corridor, she told him she and her friends wanted Mark to join them near the lake, because he was knowledgeable about something that was important to them. And she asked the boy while trying to remain as polite and collected as possible :

Can you go to Mark's room to deliver this message to him ?

The boy answered

Sure

and he walked up the corridor, before pushing one of the doors. In less than one minute, Mark was in front of her, with a wide smile on his face. Ann asked Mark, with all the kindness she could pack in her voice :

Did you drink a potion that was not part of the classes ?

Mark answered :

Yes. How did you know ?

Ann went on :

I will explain to you in a few minutes. When did you drink it ?

Mark complied with the request :

About a month ago. Why ?

Ann replied :

Because it matters a lot for me and my friends. We may know important things you too should know

Ann was happy about the confirmation, but she didn't want to give him any chance to imagine things, so instead of smiling, she tried to picture what Professor McGonagall would tell in this situation, and instructed to Mark :

Please follow me

They then went up to the ground floor, out in the open, and down to the lake. They both kept silent. Ann was worried that Mark, who was so important in the short time available, would escape, so she kept turning around to make sure he was still behind her, and sure he was, grinning from the beginning of the trip to the end. When they were both next to Judith, Eleanor and Sigismond, Ann made the introductions, then told Mark :

Err. Well. Please, sit

They were soon all seated in a circle on the grass. Ann updated the group :

Mark has drunk the potion one month ago

Judith said :

Maybe we should make sure we are talking about the same potion. What was the title of the potion ?

Mark answered :

It was labelled 'For The Curious Wizard'

Judith went on :

It wasn't rather entitled 'Intuition Potion : For The Curious Wizard' ?

Mark replied :

No, just 'For the Curious Wizard', nothing else

Then, what did you assume the potion was supposed to do ?

was Judith's next question.

I thought it would show me interesting things

was Mark's answer. Judith felt it necessary to make Mark current with what the potion was actually doing :

If you need to discover some information about a precise mystery, the potion will give you the intuition for one or several things to do in order for you to get this information

Eleanor, who had listened carefully to Ann's exposé about what Mark had told her, had noticed that Ann had insisted on the fact that Mark was talking a lot about House Cup points. She added :

What I guess is that you wanted to find out who was getting or losing House Cup points. You wouldn't have tried this potion if you hadn't been indeed very curious about all these important events that influenced the House Cup rankings. And the potion will always generate extraordinary coincidences : for you to get the information you want, you need to be at the right place at the right time

Mark tried to make sense of everything he had been through since he had drunk the potion with this additional crucial piece of knowledge :

So, I drank the potion, this other guy drank it too, and we both got to know things we wouldn't have been aware of otherwise. I saw two things that mattered for the House Cup, namely the Quidditch game at which my wand connected with the other guy's one, and the attempt by another Slytherin to frame the Gryffindors for cheating

This time, all four friends were befuddled. Judith had seen the action at the Quidditch game, but seeing the events unfold from a distance, she hadn't kept any reliable recollection of what the two boys whose wands had interacted looked like. Eleanor was thrown off guard, so much so that she didn't even care to correct Mark, who had actually seen at least three actions that impacted the House Cup scores, the third one being the invention of the temporary amnesia potion by Ravenclaws. Now, they had to fetch a second boy, and they had no idea about the kind of knowledge the latter was seeking when he had drunk the potion. Sigismond, who had the most serene temper of all four friends, was the first to come to his senses :

Mark, who is the other boy who drank the potion. And why do you know he did it, too ?

Mark coolly answered :

Lewis Lapst. And I don't remember the name of the Gryffindor bloke who was bugging me, explaining lengthily as if he had the scoop of the century, you know, I had heard that two people had drunk a most peculiar potion, I wanted to know if it was the same, so I cast a spell on many students, and the spell would make the wands of people who had used the same potion produce sparks blah blah blah

Ann felt it rich from Mark to disparage another student for talking a lot while he had done the same with her, but Mark was now some kind of resource for the group, therefore she kept her slight annoyance private. Eleanor addressed Sigismond :

Now, it's your turn. You know Lewis Lapst ? Do you think you will be able to find him before it is too late ?

Sigismond replied

I hope so

And he calmly set off in the direction of the castle. The three girls, along with Mark, waited quite some time for Sigismond's return. Ann didn't want to say it loud, but she feared that Sigismond's lack of determination might make him miss chances to get to Lewis Lapst in time. This break in the action near the lake brought yet an unexpected benefit. Judith recalled a part of this Flitwick class, when the tiny Professor had dwelled on the fact that spells and potions were deeply connected. That was probably why the 'Gryffindor bloke' had been able to use a spell which allowed to identify who had drunk a potion. If they had been intelligent to the extent they would be almost clairvoyants, they could have inferred from the wands' connection at the Quidditch pitch that there was a link with the potion. And once they knew that the secret of the Intuition Potion had been leaked by Peeves, they could have hypothesised that the wands' interaction was not just about a random potion, but to the Intuition Potion. In other words, in a perfect world, they would have been able earlier to theorise that two boys had swallowed the Intuition Potion. Then, they would have investigated who these boys were, and they would have solved this about two weeks ago. This brought to Judith's mind the memory of the sight of Eleanor and Sigismond drinking with disgust the potion. Mark and Lewis Lapst had probably been also very surprised at the potion's taste. Finally, they saw Sigismond bringing a lean, tall, dark-haired with blue eyes fourth-year Gryffindor boy. From the point of view of the four students waiting near the lake, this was a pair of tall Hogwarts boys about the same age, in the same Gryffindor uniform. On reaching the group, Lewis Lapst introduced himself, and after an invitation by Eleanor to do so, they both sat in the circle. Lewis didn't seem upbeat. He began :

Sigismond told me you were some kinds of specialists for the potion for curious wizards

It soon emerged that the Peeves copies Mark and Lewis had used to brew the potion were shortened versions of what the four friends had at their disposal. There was no mention of the word 'Intuition', nor of the actual working of the potion on the two boys' parchments. Just the recipe, with the vague title 'For Curious Wizards'. Lewis said he didn't have a clue about what he was after when he drank the potion, about one month ago. He expected it to improve the magical abilities of curious wizards, or something of that sort. To get out of this impasse, the four friends asked both boys to recount with more details what had exactly happened when the wands' streams had joined. In the first instance, both boys had just moved on, and the wands had stopped emitting sparks, probably because they weren't anymore close enough to connect. In the second instance, there was much more to learn. Judith remembered the Ravenclaw girl stopping by the Hufflepuff girl, and shortly after, both boys' wands getting out of control. It turned out Lewis knew quite a bit about this. Hufflepuff's Emma Austeere had been clapping feverishly while marveling at her House's Quidditch team members who had flown towards the stands to celebrate with their supporters. Lewis was behind the Ravenclaw witch, Adelaide Morr, and when she had been level with Emma Austeere, Morr had quipped :

We know who has to make a move to catch what she wants

Then, all joy gone, Austeere had turned around to face Morr, taken out her wand and raised it, but abstained from using it, probably because she didn't want to make her House lose the precious points its Quidditch team had just collected. At that point, Ann filled in Lewis' story blanks thanks to what they had gathered from Mark :

Emma had been petitioning almost all year to have Andre Gaspy apply for the position of Seeker in Hufflepuff's Quidditch team. The Seeker catches the Golden Snitch. So, when Adelaide said that Emma needed to catch something, she was perfidiously alluding to the fact that Emma needed to act decisively in order to make her romantic attraction for Andre known. Emma was in short mocked for not catching the Golden Snitch catcher

Lewis seemed upset. He barely waited for Ann to stop speaking, and criticised :

It was not perfidious. She was just frustrated because Emma was not being honest and needed to get a grip on herself

Mark, who was clearly a very outspoken young wizard, added some oxygen to the fire :

What Adelaide did was mean and despicable. She tackled publicly the private life of somebody else, and she hadn't her best interest at heart. It was a gratuitous mocking pun. Probably premeditated, since she could have exited elsewhere

The four friends were now growing more and more worried by the second they were going to witness a heated argument. Lewis responded :

Mean ? Despicable ? You are the one being mean, not Adelaide !

Both boys took out their wands. Eleanor did so, too, and cast 'Expelliarmus' on both boys :

We get it boys. The potion's signature is the coincidences it leaves behind. People who are strangely at the right place, at the right time. There was no reason for both of you to be at this part of the stands at the same time. Mark is in Slytherin. But he drank the potion, and the potion wanted him to be where House Cup points were being won or lost. So the potion had Mark almost stalk Emma, who had sourced the only Quidditch player who could make Hufflepuff win a lot of points. Therefore Mark ended in the same stands as Emma at this game in which Hufflepuff would win the points it needed to seize the Cup. As for Lewis, who is so vehement when one criticises Adelaide, he drank the potion because he wanted to know more about her, for obvious reasons. Thus, he was merely following Adelaide at the Quidditch pitch. Since Adelaide had decided to make her opinion known to Emma, she went straight to the stands packed with Hufflepuffs, especially Emma who had brought the game-changing person to this House's team. Adelaide, who was near Lewis, got close to Emma, who was near Mark and that is why the wands connected

Mark's mood had completely changed. He told Eleanor, smiling :

Can you give us our wands back please ? I swear I won't do anything detrimental to Lewis' health. And I would like to object to what you said. Because you have just tackled publicly the private life of somebody else. I could deem this mean and despicable you know

Mark winked. As for Lewis, he was blushing intensely. He sat back down, as if mortified. Judith tried to appease Lewis' distress :

Err. This is not good to keep this inside. I think we can all understand what you feel, even Mark

Ann thought

Sure. Because if I were telling him I was about to date Hagrid, he wouldn't be as cheerful

Judith went on :

I think love stories are just beautiful stories

which made Ann imagine herself telling Judith :

Wait till some Mark Amader gets fond of you

However, the kind, fair and heartfelt words of Judith seemed to be the right ones, because, after a few minutes of silence, Lewis said :

This is quite a long one