As Silan walked over to join Hermione, a Slytherin boy leaned across his desk and whispered in a mocking tone, “Look, here comes the Chimera Duo.” “What’s a Chimera Duo?” a nearby student asked, playing right into the joke.
“A mythical beast made of a goat, a lion, and a snake.
Don’t you think it fits certain people perfectly?” The boy glanced cautiously over at Silan.
Seeing that Silan didn’t seem to notice, he puffed out his chest and spoke a little louder to the people around him.
The group burst into a wave of quiet giggles.
The “Chimera Duo” was the nickname they had privately come up with to describe Silan and Hermione’s constant pairing across houses.
Although they kept their voices down, Silan had noticed them immediately.
Eleven-year-old wizards hadn’t yet learned how to mask their intentions.
Even without hearing the exact words, the shifting expressions on their faces and the dirty looks directed his way told Silan everything he needed to know.
Instead of confronting them directly, he flicked a folded piece of parchment across the room.
The note wasn’t aimed at the two boys gossiping, however.
It landed squarely in front of Chris Nott.
Ever since losing his hair, Chris had taken to wearing his pointed wizard’s hat everywhere indoors, making him stand out like a sore thumb.
He had been happily enjoying the unfolding drama until the note landed on his desk.
His smile vanished instantly.
With trembling fingers, he unfolded the scrap of paper.
It contained two simple sentences: Mr.
Nott, I was just wondering, has your hair started growing back yet?
Also, if those two little mice sitting next to you keep gossiping about me, I’ll be forced to ask you for another dueling match.
Asking about his hair and threatening another duel in the same breath was an explicit, undeniable threat.
Chris’s face flushed with a mixture of grief and pure fury.
*I was just minding my own business, watching the show!
I didn’t say a bloody thing!* Despite his internal outrage, Chris completely folded under Silan’s calm, steady gaze.
He reached over, slapped the shoulders of the two gossiping boys, and hissed through his teeth, “Shut your mouths, both of you!” The two younger students stared back at him in utter confusion.
What was wrong with this guy all of a sudden?
They weren’t even talking about him!
Why was he getting so worked up?
They opened their mouths to snap back, but before they could utter a word, a sudden, heavy silence fell over the classroom, and the temperature seemed to drop instantly.
Instinctively, they snapped their heads toward the entrance.
Right at the doorway, a giant, greasy-haired bat of a man burst into the dungeon, sweeping into the room with absolute fury.
The two gossiping boys silenced themselves instantly, sitting up straight and shutting their mouths tight.
Snape kept his face tightly set, refusing to speak right away.
Instead, he used the heavy silence to grate on the students’ nerves.
Only when the classroom atmosphere was entirely suffocating did he pull out the roster and begin roll call.
When he reached Harry’s name, he paused exactly as expected, drawling it out in a peculiar, biting tone.
“Ha-rry.
Pot-ter.” “Ah, yes,” Snape said softly, his eyes flicking up to glare at Harry.
“Our new…
celebrity.” He looked back down and quickly finished the rest of the roll call.
“Potions is a science and an art that requires absolute precision and rigor,” Snape said, his voice barely above a whisper, yet every word cut clearly through the silent room.
“This course does not require you to foolishly wave your wands around, nor do I expect you to truly grasp the beauty of a cauldron gently simmering over a low flame, white smoke rising from it and waves of fragrance drifting through the air.” Snape caught both sides of his long black cloak with his hands, drawing it tight around himself like a bat closing its wings.
“I can teach you…
how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even…
stop death.” Snape dragged out those last few words to nearly twice their length.
None of the Slytherin students minded, though.
Every single one of them sat with their chin held high, as if this would finally get his attention.
Snape’s lip curled slightly as his contemptuous gaze swept across the Gryffindors.
“That is, of course, providing you aren’t the usual pack of dunderheads I so frequently have to teach.” Before the students could even process the insult, Snape suddenly locked his eyes onto Harry, his voice snapping out fast: “Potter!
What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?” “I don’t know, sir,” Harry replied.
“Tut, tut,” Snape sneered, curling his lip in disdain.
“Clearly, fame isn’t everything.” “Let’s try again, Potter.
If I told you to find me a bezoar, where would you look?” “I don’t know, sir.” “Then tell me, what is the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?” By now, Snape had walked right up to Harry’s desk, staring directly into those vivid green eyes.
Though he appeared to be looking at Harry, his mind was actually drifting to someone else entirely.
For a fleeting split second, though his face remained tightly set, a faint, subtle tremor rippled through his cold eyes.
Sitting nearby, Silan watched the scene unfold with great amusement.
This was an absolute classic piece of theater.
“I don’t know, sir,” Harry said quietly.
“Hermione clearly knows the answer, though.
Why don’t you ask her?” Snape slowly shifted his gaze, turning to glare at Hermione, who had been holding her hand up for so long she was practically standing.
“Put your hand down!” Snape took one last, lingering look at Harry’s eyes before turning his attention toward Silan.
“Mr.
Silan Prewett.
Ah…
how could I possibly forget you?
Our very own Slytherin celebrity.” “Why don’t you enlighten our legendary, famous Savior on the answers?” *Wait, this involves me now?* Suddenly called upon while minding his own business, Silan sat up a bit straighter and spoke in a calm, steady voice.
“Powdered root of asphodel and wormwood combined create a powerful sleeping potion, commonly known as the Draught of Living Death.
A bezoar is a stone taken from the stomach of a goat, and it acts as an antidote to most poisons.” “As for monkshood and wolfsbane, they are the exact same plant, which also goes by the general name of aconite.” “It seems that among those with a reputation, not everyone is entirely hollow,” Snape murmured, taking another subtle jab at Harry before letting a mocking smile slip across his face.
“A satisfactory answer.
However, if anyone had bothered to read the textbook ahead of time, they would know just how elementary these questions are.
Only a fool would fail to answer them.” “Five points to Slytherin.” Clearly not satisfied with just talk, Snape seized the opportunity to sting Harry one more time before turning a piercing gaze onto both Hermione and Silan.
“However, Prewett, perhaps you care to explain why you are sitting with a Gryffindor student?” Several nearby students, who had long disliked seeing Silan and Hermione together, looked over with smug satisfaction.
Finally, a professor was going to address this!
Silan looked up, meeting Snape’s eyes directly.
“Professor Snape, Hermione is my friend.
Is it a violation of school rules for us to sit together and study in class?” “Surely you must have had a good friend in Gryffindor once, Professor?” The direct counter-question made the corner of Snape’s mouth twitch.
*A good friend in Gryffindor?* Though he had suffered endlessly at the hands of Gryffindor students during his school days, his absolute best friend had indeed belonged to that house.
It was just that…
he had lost her.
Snape fell completely silent, freezing in place for so long that the students began to wonder if he had been hit by a Full Body-Bind Curse.
Finally, he spoke, forcing the words out through his teeth.
“To your cauldrons!” Snape instructed them to work in pairs and began handing out ingredients.
He even went out of his way to keep Silan and Hermione paired together.
To ensure everyone had enough to work with, Snape usually provided three sets of ingredients per station.
However, when he reached Silan’s desk, he only set down two.
“I hear that Slytherin has been blessed with a charms prodigy–one who spends his very first day dueling his classmates,” Snape said smoothly.
“Well, Mr.
Prewett, perhaps you are a potions prodigy as well?
Why don’t you allow me to see it?” “Surely being short a single set of ingredients won’t trouble you?” A few students began to snicker quietly.
“For the famous Mr.
Prewett, this must be a piece of cake, right?” “One less set of ingredients means one less chance to fix a mistake,” Ron muttered, looking a bit pleased.
“That Slytherin is going to make a fool of himself.” Hermione frowned, looking quite worried.
“Are two sets enough?
What if we fail on an attempt…” “Don’t worry, two is plenty,” Silan said with a reassuring smile as he gathered the components.
“With the two of us working together, how could we possibly fail?” Snape was actually right about one thing–Silan truly did possess a Potions Genius trait.
“True,” Hermione agreed, her confidence returning.
Ever since they were children, the two of them had never failed a joint project.
Not even once.
The students began brewing their potions, while Snape glided around the dark room like a giant bat, his black cloak trailing behind him.
He spared no criticism whenever he caught a student making a mistake.
“Oh, Merlin…
I truly wish you would squeeze your barren brains.
If you could extract even a single drop of intellect, you wouldn’t be reducing a simple potion to this state!” “What is this disaster?
Syrup?
Start over!” “The color is completely wrong.
Empty it and start again!” Snape patrolled every corner of the dungeon, leaving a trail of quiet groans and whines in his wake.
He did, however, pause to praise Malfoy for the way he was stewing his horned slugs.
But before anyone could look over, a thick cloud of green smoke suddenly erupted from Neville’s cauldron, followed by a violent, hissing sound.
In a matter of seconds, Neville’s cauldron melted into a twisted, deformed lump of metal.
The boiling potion inside broke free, splashing fiercely across the stone floor directly toward Silan’s station.