Ouch. Risu had apparently gone too far. Not that he felt particularly bad about it, but it was good to know - in the case of a Potions master, maybe important to know - how far someone's sense of humour went. The cat had caught his owner's mood too. Mephisto uncurled himself and, with a reproachful look at Risu through his huge feline eyes, dropped onto the floor.

Risu bit back his first reply ("That's certainly a two-percent improvement.") and merely inclined his head apologetically. Watching the Professor with his back to him, handling the teapot and cup, with a blank expression on his face, Risu decided not to rise to her horrid description of this Galman Fever either. The Universe had any number of gruesome and inventive ways to kill someone, some spectacular enough to earn them their own descriptive word, but he did not feel like going into a wand size-measuring contest over whose subject offered more horror.

"It, er... sounds like an ugly way to go, yes," Risu ventured when Professor Lafay had returned to her seat. "It's certainly reassuring to know that a cure has been found."