Potion Co-morbidity - Fall term (Open to 5)

The first few weeks back at Hogwarts had only seen one major event take place for Azalea Harrington, her meting with the Headmaster. True to her word, the witch had worked hard the last month of summer break to get a proposal ready despite Josh's insistence that the Murray team could take care of it. And if the witch was honest with herself, they had done most o the work, leaving her to approve almost perfect manuscripts of ehr proposal each evening before putting it in final print. Having settled on the idea of combination potions from lack of any other inspiration, Azalea found herself actually growing more interested in he subject largely thanks to the fact that the much sought after plants she had traveled all the way to Versailles to observe were now in her personal greenhouse back in Wales.

Well, Josh's personal greenhouse. It was still hard to think of his things as hers.

Feeling no small amount of guilt at having all the legwork done for her, Azalea had compensated by memorizing and researching the material as thoroughly as possible, ensuring she was ready for any questions the Runes' Professor might have. Of which he'd had only two, disappointingly enough. Andrei Kessler had hmm'd and aah'd his way through her presentation, asking her what the practical approaches to realizing her research wer and how she intended to get there. To which Azalea had replied with some practiced answers. In the end, the meeting had concluded with the man being satisfied that she was not falling short of her academic pursuits and her contrast had been blessedly renewed for another year.

After the anticlimactic meting, things almost seemed boring. On the very second day of term, Annika had found Azalea only to profess in front of the older witch that she was going to give it her all to her kids this year. That last year, while the children were annoying and noisy, she had still garnered great inspiration from their primitive ways and she intended to capitalize on it more now. Azalea had had to bite her tongue a lot lest she jump to the student's defense at every sentence the potion mistress spoke.

Professor Blackwood's devotion lasted three whole weeks. Three weeks in which Azalea didn't have to take any classes or even grade anything. In fact, the witch found herself skulking around the castle helping other staffers out of sheer boredom. Then it happened.

Seven o clock on a Wednesday morning, Azalea woke from her artificially induced sleep to see an owl staring patiently at her. Knowing Annika's personal owl well by now, the witch mumbled something about treats and the bird obediently flew off to the pantry where it dipped its beak in a large jar of owl treats kept mostly for this particular mailbird. It took two before dropping the envelope it clutched on the counter and flew out once more.

Inside was a simple note, in Annika's untidy scrawl. "Can't children today, soz luv.~A"

Which was why at a quarter past eight, Azalea was to be found at the Potions' lab, expecting her class without a clue as to what they were working on. There was a lesson plan but Annika had chosen to line her bins with it rather than teach cording to it, meaning Azalea now had to improve.

The witch managed just in time, putting the final touches five minutes before the start of class. Today, when the students entered the lab, they would not see the usual combination of workstations and cauldrons. Even the teacher's worktop would be missing. Instead, a low table lined the far right wall, boasting baskets of tiny vials containing different colored potions. Today would not be the usual class everyone was used to.

Instead, today would be a lesson on the many, versatile uses of potions.

Dominique was doing her best not to be late. As potions was her favorite classes. So once she walked in she was glad to see that she wasn't late. Dia was ready to tackle the new school year. This year she was going to focus harder. As she knew that her grades had slipped last year. Head girl was still her goal in her 7th year. That is if the choose her.

Dominique smiled as she seen professor Harrington. At least today was going to be good. Later she knew that she needed to write her mom. But also write to her uncle Jackson and Victoria. For now she was just going to worry about potions. And not think about quidditch. Dia was trying to keep out of trouble. Even though she wanted to be a rebel. There was a time and place for it. And it isn't in the potions class.

Fifth year was a big year at Hogwarts, apparently. Mariah didn't know much about OWLs, but it was all anybody in her dorm would talk about, so she gathered they were important. Someone had explained it to her as basically a placement exam slash aptitude test to determine what kind of future her abilities in certain subjects suited her for. She could see why people would be nervous - if you scored low on something you needed for your dream job, you might never get it - but personally...well, she'd barely even thought about her future. She was only fifteen; she'd always thought she'd have tons of time to decide what she wanted to do. In America, that wasn't something she'd have to think about until college, and even then, most people changed their majors halfway through.

So she couldn't decide whether that should make her more stressed or less stressed about the exams at the end of the year. On the one hand, she couldn't be disappointed if she didn't have a goal. On the other hand, what if she decided in the future that she actually did want to do something she'd already doomed herself for by failing an OWL? Did that mean she had to excel in absolutely everything just to give herself more time to think about what she wanted? Or should she just pick a career based on what she was already good at so she wouldn't have to worry? What if she found out she didn't like that career? What if she was unhappy for the rest of her life because her OWL results stuck her on a path she didn't want?

What if she just decided she didn't want to work in the wizarding world, and then she could do the normal thing and have the entire muggle job market open to her no matter how well she did on her OWLs?

Wait, but then wouldn't she need a high school diploma?

It suddenly dawned on her that, while studying magic seemed fun at the present moment, she'd never actually considered a future in it. When she thought of the future, she always pictured something like what her moms did - go to college, get a degree, find a job. And she guessed wizarding school was kind of like that, but what if she didn't want a degree in magic? What if she wanted to study psychology? Would she need to go back to high school? Or get a GED? Take the SAT and ACT and whatever else colleges asked for without ever having learned the muggle curriculum?

What was the process in England, anyway?

As all these thoughts swam through her head, she wandered into the potions classroom, mostly oblivious to her surroundings. She waved absentmindedly to the professor, barely even registering that it was Professor Harrington today, and then paused when she realized there were no workstations. She blinked and snapped herself out of her thoughts - she needed to pay attention. She might as well do the best she could on her OWLs, even if she wasn't sure if she would use them. She took a spot near the wall and stood somewhat awkwardly, glancing around at her classmates.

"That's exactly right, Nikolai, take those points," Azalea agreed with a smile, encouraging the rest of the students to come forwards with their own answers. Unsurprisingly, hr daughter's hand was up next.

"They have a funny name too, what does "Estimulo" even mean?"

"Good question Mimosa, points to you too. "Estimulo" means to "stimulate" or "stimulating". If you know the language, it isn't hard to figure out what the potion does. It enhances your spell work as Nikolai suggested."

"Who?" Mimosa called out just as another student raised their hand.

"Yes Jia En?"

"There are three types of Eatimulos. Normal, strong and potent, I think those are all in the baskets..."

"Well done, and yes they are, points to you too. Now can anyone tell me what are common ingredients in an Estimulo recipes? You don't have to know all of them, just name one or two and we'll take it from there." The witch paused, taking in all ehr students to see who would provide the next answer. Overall they were doing better than expected. Though the witch couldn't say if that was their own hard work or from being exposed to Annika who - whatever her faults - was a renowned mind in the field of Potions.

Mariah tentatively raised her hand, not really expecting to be called upon. She knew the ingredients for Exstimulo Potions, or at least some of them, but she was sure just about everyone else in the class knew them too considering how eager they were to participate. Still, she figured there was no harm in at least raising her hand to demonstrate that she knew the answer. This was the one part of potions class she could actually somewhat excel in, so if she was going to earn any points at all, it would have to be here.

She'd always found Exstimulo Potions somewhat confusing. She'd memorized the textbook definition and the ingredients, but she had trouble when it came to practical application. If you drank two and then cast two spells, would that double the effects on the first spell, or would that grant the normal effects to both spells? If the latter, could you just drink a whole vat of it and then have all of your spells be super powerful for a short period of time? Could you overdose? Was it like a drug? And what metric could be used to measure how much of a boost you got? Was there a limit to how much the potion could help? If you could already cast a spell perfectly, but you used an Exstimulo Potion anyway, what would happen? Could you even predict the effects of a spell cast with the help of the potion, or did you just have to rely on vague words like "stronger" and "better"?

The professor saw her hand, despite the fact that she barely raised it to shoulder height. Mariah quickly racked her brain for the answer she had previously prepared - she'd forgotten it once she'd started thinking about other things.

"Uh, bitter root and snowdrop are both key ingredients," she managed, momentarily blanking on the rest. She put her hand down to signify that she was done.