Chapter 15
Quite quickly we reached the statue of the architect of Hogwarts, where we used magic to get the right box without any problems, and then went to the bathroom, so as not to be seen.
- Come on Draco, open the drawer! We can't wait to find out what's inside! - The brothers began to lose patience as soon as we were in the bathroom.
I had no intention of wasting time in my plans either, so immediately the lid of the box was pulled aside, giving the twins a view of what was in the box.
- Wow, that's a lot of stuff George!
- Yes, we've hit the big time, Fred! - The brothers were instantly ecstatic, but remembering our agreement not to put their hands in the box. After all, the right of first refusal belonged to me. And I shouldn't have told my brothers that I had already taken some things out of the box.
- Come on Draco, pick something for yourself already. Don't keep us waiting! - My brothers were starting to lose patience with me, seeing how long I was looking at the contents of the box.
- Frankly speaking, because of the name of the box I expected something interesting and useful. But here, it's just useless stuff that I'm not the least bit interested in. So the choice is quite difficult, especially since the nature of some things I do not understand.
- Let us tell and show you everything then, and then you can finally choose something!
- Here, for example, this "burping powder", one sniff of it and even the most modest girl will burp like a 200-pound man.
- Or this Biting Mug, which will bite anyone who tries to drink from it.
Fred and George talked for a couple minutes about the effects of various things, and of the whole list only two things caught my attention, namely a bag filled with "fainting nuts", which as the name implies make the person who eats them briefly lose consciousness, and a couple of vials with unknown liquids, which are most likely potions. So I chose the peanuts first, and then the potions. After that I left the rest of the stuff to the twins and went back to the Slytherin dungeon, which of course the brothers were incredibly happy about.
***
Sitting down on the remote and partially hidden couch of the common living room, I pulled out my belongings and began to look at them. And they consisted of nothing more than a few pieces of old parchment.
Each of the parchments looked like nothing special at first glance, but my gut told me they weren't, so with my wand and magic I began to try to unravel the mysteries behind the simplicity.
- Manifest! - The basic spell for detecting magic and hidden objects bore fruit immediately. Words appeared on the parchment that described some of the secret passages of Hogwarts. All subsequent pieces of paper were similar. And only the last parchment, which was larger than the rest, clearly distinguished itself. For for a spell of manifestation, an outline of Hogwarts and a bunch of words appeared on the paper for a moment, which immediately disappeared.
A few more attempts ended similarly, so I started going over the words that revealed the essence of things and so it went on until I whispered "reveal your secrets to me".
In an instant the parchment seemed to come to life, it colored and the image of the castle did not disappear, and in the next moment a series of words appeared on the parchment that I did not know whether to cry or laugh and they read as follows:
Mr. Lunatic welcomes the upstart from Slytherin and respectfully requests that you keep your long snake tongue out of the way.
Mr. Shaggy joins Mr. Lunatic and would only like to add that all Malfoys are arrogant assholes.
Mr. Tramp signs his amazement that such pure-blood adherents are still not extinct.
Mr. Tails scoffs at the Malfoy descendant and advises him to use less hair gel.
For a moment I even wanted to throw this piece of paper into the nearby fireplace, but I quickly pulled myself together and realized that there was something wrong with it, and it wasn't likely that this piece of parchment had been created to insult others. So either a special code word or a specific spell was needed. And that will probably be my secondary research goal, while the original goal was and still is to find the phenomenon of the glow and unlock the secrets of the locked stone door...
***
At the beginning of November the weather turned bad. The mountains around the castle changed from green to gray, the lake looked like frozen steel, and the ground turned white with frost every morning. Sometimes from the castle windows you could see the school forester, Hagrid, who met us at the pyron, defrosting broomsticks on the flight training ground. Hagrid was wearing a long mole coat, huge boots insulated with beaver fur, and rabbit fur mittens. And because of this he looked very sloppy and wild, like a mixture of animal and human.
On top of that, the Quidditch competition had started at school. I didn't want to sit in the stands in such terrible weather, so I decided to devote all my free time to studying the science of potions in the company of Professor Snape, which of course he was very happy about, though he didn't show it.
Several times I was eager to pull out and show the vials of potions I had lugged from Filch's office to Professor Snape, so that I could finally learn their nature. But every rationality prevailed, because Professor Snape would obviously be interested in their origin, and there, given his intellect, it wouldn't be hard for him to put two plus two together.
- Mr. Malfoy, you're clearly distracted from my instruction today. Is something bothering you? - Snape said. It's understandable, because of my thoughts I almost made a couple of mistakes that would have ruined the whole potion.
- I'm sorry, Professor Snape. I was just thinking about my Defense Against the Dark Arts class. We have a new class tomorrow, and I hope you remember my suspicions about our rather incompetent professor.
- Don't worry, Mr. Malfoy, I've got it covered. So, put your thoughts aside and concentrate on the potion brewing in your cauldron. It's about to get critical, so all your attention and skill are needed. Otherwise, all your hard work and expensive ingredients will turn into nothing but garbage.
- Yes, Professor. Your words have reassured me. Rest assured, the potion will definitely be of good quality....
***
- And how, Professor, did I do? - I stared at Snape, who was testing my brew for quality.
- Well, congratulations Mr. Malfoy, you have brewed an excellent cough potion, which is indispensable at this time of year. And although it's a difficult potion to learn in sixth year, you should remember that Hogwarts doesn't teach very difficult things. So don't be too proud of yourself, or it will affect your future prospects.
- Don't worry, Professor. I understand, this potion is still considered a basic level potion. Unlike those that require specific and rare expensive ingredients that require careful and long processing, and then no less complex brewing, which can take several months.
- I'm glad you understand that. We're done for the day. So I suggest you hurry to the Great Hall so you won't be late for dinner.