Ella listened carefully as Professor Lafay explained why they were using blood instead of feathers. She nodded her head, looking down at the cup of blood with a small frown. Well at least there was a good reason they were using it, right? ...Meh.

She felt a bit bad that Professor Lafay glared at Kurumi, understanding completely why the older Gryffindor had commented on the situation. Kurumi cared about the creatures just as much as Ella did so the third year could sympathize, even if Professor Lafay couldn't.

Picking up her wand, the badger pointed it at her cauldron, wanting to clean it before starting. "Scourgify!" She peeked inside and satisfied with her work, began filling it with water. "Agumenti!" She then lit a small fire under the cauldron and scanned the ingredients for the wormwood essence. Spotting it, the third year picked it up and began adding the drops. "1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8."

Belle looked at what the professor was doing in the front of the classroom. Belle already knew the step like the back of her hand. Belle got out her cauldron and cleaned it out first. "Scourgify!"

Then she filled it up with water saying, "Aquamenti!" and the cauldron filled up with water. This was going all to plan. Then she found her wormwood essence in her supplies. Once she unstuck the bottle, she did one drop at a time. One...Two...Three...Four...Five...Six..Seven...Eig ht. Once the last drop was added she looked at the professor for the next set of directions.

If they weren't learning Veritaserum, why was Professor Lafay teasing them with it? Not very nice of his Head of House...But then again, perhaps he could speak to the woman later. In private. The Slytherin felt that he might have been able to convince her to loan him just a little bit.

Lingualaxus...Yes, Dylan had heard about this. Not that he'd ever aspired to make it. As she'd said herself, it was considerably weaker than actual Veritaserum. Weaker didn't interest the Slytherin. Weaker wasn't good enough...In fact, the only good thing about it was that the drinker wouldn't...remember...

Hmph. Would they be keeping vials of this potion...after class? Would their homework be based around it? Oh, how much fun he'd have with that assignment if they did...


Ingredients time.

Winking at Bee, Dylan stood, slowly making his way over to collect what he needed. There were just a few things he was missing, considering his lack of brewing this term...It was a shame, really. When had he gotten too busy to enjoy the little things?...Like brewing potions on a Saturday morning in the Lab? Meh, there was zero free time these days.

Once everything was collected (the Belladonna, Poppy seeds, and wormwood essence), the Captain headed back, placing the selected bottles carefully in his workstation. They'd be getting started soon...

...And they were off. Giving Bee a significant look (Dylan intended to help her since she was NOT good at this class), he pulled his cauldron and began going about curing and cleaning. The Potions Mistress was strict about those first steps...and with her not looking as...healthy as she usually did...Well, Dylan just assumed she'd be that much more strict. No one was ever in a good mood that looked like that. Like...ever. In the history of the world.

Giving Beezus another significant look, Dylan pointed his wand tip at the top of his cauldron, muttering "Aguamenti." Water quickly gushed from his wand, filling the bottom at a fast rate. It only took mere minutes to fill completely. Saying "Finite.", he went about turning on his burner.

Hmph. Wormwood essence...

Grabbing up the bottle, Dylan twisted off the cap and leveled it over the top of his cauldron. With practiced precision, he watched with almost baited breath as the drops fell from the bottle into the water below.

One...Two...Three...Four...Five...Six...Seven...Ei ght!

Setting the tiny bottle back in it's place, he pulled his notebook, recording his progress.

Now they were getting started on the potion. Nigel cleaned out his cauldron and filled it up with water. That was the easy part. The Ravenclaw looked around at his ingredients and spotted the wormwood essence. He opened the bottle.

Okay, One drop at time. Nigel could do this. "1..2..3..4..5.6..7..8". After the last drop enter the cauldron. Nigel waited patiently for was to come next.

BUUUUUUUUUUUT, filling the cauldron with water was hard! Theo actually found the littler spells more difficult than the main target of some of the lessons. Aguamenti was a typical example. EVERYONE seemed to automatically know how to do it, but he must've missed the memo when everyone learned it.

Eh...

"Aguwamenti." Noooooope... It's not THAT hard, just think! "Aguamenti!" Viola, it was done. Yes, he'd practiced this spell tons in the past year, but it still got tricky here and there. With a flick of a switch, the burner underneath the cauldron was on and he was ready to rock and roll.

Grabbing the wormwood essence bottle, Theodore crouched down slightly so that his head with just level with the cauldron top. He needed to get a good view of the drops!

One.... two.... three.... Slight pause cos he lost where he was. Three, right.... four... five... six... seven.... EIGHT!

Bam.

Yes. Boom. Good question.

Followed immediately by the sickening sense that she was pandering to a woman she didn't even like. Vivi grimaced as she set up her cauldron, remembering to give it a thorough scouring this time before she filled it with water.

Gideon was looking mutinous beside her, and Vivi nudged him gently with one elbow in the same motion she used to light the fire beneath her cauldron. They could both be silently unhappy, with Kurumi obviously feeling the same way on the other side of the room, but all three of them needed to just keep their mouths shut.

The water began to heat, and Vivi retrieved the wormwood essence. Wormwood. Bitterness. What relationship did that have with the truth? Maybe... you felt bitter when someone told you the truth and you didn't want to hear it? Maybe not telling the truth made you bitter. Maybe truth tasted bitter on your tongue, but you still needed to speak it. All very philosophical.

She was so busy musing over the wormwood that Vivi very nearly put too many drops into the cauldron. She jerked her hand at the last moment, letting the ninth drop hit the workbench. Whoops!

Professor Lafay certainly was a testy woman. You would be too if you were sick! she thought. But still, she was unusually strict. Threatening to fail someone for being concerned about the jobberknolls didn't seem rational. Does she have something to hide? she wondered. I suppose I wouldn't want students questioning my authority in my own classroom either, but... No, there just was something off about this whole thing. She frowned as she copied the steps into her notebook.



Putting the jobberknolls out of her mind for a moment, she began her work. "Scourgify," she cast the cleaning spell on the cauldron. She was feeling rather matter of fact about how she made her potion today, now that there weren't too many poisonous ingredients in it. Then she added some water, still not sure how much exactly, but she said, "Aguamenti" and watched the water come close to the stop. "Finite." She ignited her burner and unstoppered the Wormwood vial. Carefully, she held the dropper over the cauldron and counted out each little drip. One... two... three... four... She shook the bottle to encourage the rest to come out a little faster. Five...six, seven, eight - Woah! She quickly placed the bottle back on the table before the last uninvited droplet could fall into her potion. Well that was close! She wiped her bottle clean and waited for the next instruction.

Lex raised her wand to attempt that water spell she had seen a few kids doing during their first Astronomy class but then her eyes caught sight of a few people using that cleaning spell on theirs. Oh yeah...they were suppose to clean this thing first weren't they? Knowing this didn't make her very happy. She hadn't ever actually tried this spell before and after the history she had with spell casting she didn't want to BUT if she didn't then how would she get this thing over with?

It had to get done. She WANTED that potion. Just thinking of the possibilities of having the potion was enough to make her willing to try. Right. She cleared her throat. Umm...what was the command again? Score...scourg...crugify...apple pie?--just behind her another person cast the spell. That was it. Yup and she knew that too. Ahem. "Scourgify." She said boldly, expecting something to happen. When nothing did she sighed. "Okay, let's try this again." She looked down at the cauldron.

"Scourgify." She even used that 'grown up, I mean business tone'. It seemed to work for everyone else!--It even worked for her!!! The cauldron actually got cleaner! Gee, this playing copycat thing sure was useful! What else could she copy?

The water spell. She aimed her wand at the cauldron again. "Aguamenti." Eeep! Another victory for the 11 year! She stood there proudly by her cauldron, watching the water filling up...wait, that was too much! "Okay, you can stop now!" The water just kept pouring until it was spreading along the ground. "Seriously, that's enough water, I don't need anymore!!!!" The bloody thing wasn't listening to her! "Umm...help...?" She said, watching the water spread further and further.

Hmm. Seri wasn't the most animal-y person here, but she didn't like the ideas this kid was suggesting about killing off an animal that sounded fluffy, just for a silly potion. Seri listened to the teacher, who did not deny it, only threatened the Prefect with failure.

Great.

Well Seri wasn't using the blood. She slid the cup of blood to the other side of the desk, she just wouldn't put it in. Yeah, that was PERFECTLY reasonable. Afterall, the Professor would HARDLY notice. Seri wondered if it really was. She thought of all the puppies' pictures she'd cut out of magazines over the years. Ohhhh. She thought of whatevers blood it was. Ick. Noooo. She wasn't using that...

Anyway, Seri actually knew what she was doing now. She cast 'Scourgify' the n 'Aguamenti' and 'Finite'. Before lighting a fire and adding 'wormwood essence'. Seri wasn't an 'exact' sort of person. She was all for 'ish'. She added a load of drops, somewhere from 8-16. Whoops. Whatever, Seri wasn't gonna pretend she was any good at this.

After the last drop had fallen into her cauldron, Kurumi leaned back a little in her seat and continued to silently fume over the jobberknoll blood...until she felt her shoe getting wet?

O_____________________O

PLEASE DON'T TELL HER THAT SOMEONE HAD SPILLED THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF THE POOR ENDANGERED CREATURES!!!

Oh, no, wait...it was just water. WATER? Had she missed the ghost flooding the bathrooms again?! Kurumi's head snapped around and she saw that it wasn't the fault of any ghost, but of a certain first year. Sigh. Just what Gryffindor did NOT need right now with the Dragon Lady looking like she was going to spit fire at any moment - at least in Kurumi's eyes she looked that way.

Wand out, Kurumi pointed it at Alexa and cast Finite to stop the the Aguamenti Charm and then turned her attention towards the floor wet floor. "Tergeo," she murmured, hoping not to draw too much attention to the current situation.

"Don't forget Finite to end spells," she winked at the first year before turning her attention back towards the front. Crisis averted? Yes? No fire breathing please!

Lex began to panic when she saw the water creeping even further away in the classroom. It had to stop before it got to Professor Lafay!!! The woman clearly wasn't well and in her current state she might have been more inclined to HEX or something. Gulp.

Her eyes went wide and she sucked in a breath when she saw Kurumi looking over at her. Oh noooo. She was gonna give her that look--the one that said she was an idiot then make her feel even worse about spilling the water. Stop water! Stop. Stop. STOP! Still nothing. She jumped back when the prefect raised her wand at her. Flooding the classroom was bad but it didn't mean she had to wanna beat Lafay to the hexing!!! Don't kill me!

All her muscles relax when not only was she not hurt but the water had stopped. Kurumi even dried the floor!!!! Woooooow. Lex beamed up at her quite appreciatively. "Thanks! I'll have to remember that next time." Nod. Note to self: When copying others be sure to copy everything.

Now she could move on--but not before removing some of the excess water. Alexa turned on her burner then grabbed a handful of wormwood essence then began dropping them in. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. There! Now she was back on track with everyone else!

Righty right! Time to start it then.

Sophie listened as the jobberknoll talk went on - sort of - and shrugged. There was no use in going against professor Lafay's instructions, so she just accepted the fact they would use all that blood. Besides, not using the blood wouldn't bring the creatures back to life now, would it...? Shrug.

WAND! Sophie loved performing any kind of spells, so she always beamed when they had to do that. Heeheehee! "Scourgify." Clean cauldron! "Aguamenti." as water poured out of the tip of her wand, Sophie watched closely and lifted the spell as soon as the water got to the neck of the cauldron.

"Incendio." She put down her wand as soon as she started the burner and looked around to find the first ingredient she'd use. Wormwood essence. Okay!

One....... two...... three..... four.... fivesixseven

EEP!! O____O

How many drops... how would she supposed to know nooww??? Sophie froze, staring at her 'potion' with wide eyes. Merlin! Should she just go on with it and hope that she had added 8 drops of wormwood essence? Should she start over? What if professor Lafay said she was waasting her ingredients???

MERLIN, WHAT TO DO????

Sophie glanced around, not looking for anyone in particular. She watched as her classmates seemed to be doing alright - expect for that water incident. Gulp. She had never done that befoore!! Gaahhh!! What should she do nooowww???

Hecate wanted to bang her head on her desk... thankfully the prefect stepped in before she could kill the young girl.



"Good," she said to the others. "Now begin stirring your potion in a counter-clock motion. As the motion is in motion, slowly add your Jobberknoll blood. It should be a low and slow stream into the moving potion. You will see the red making circles in the water."

Jobberknoll blood. Blood made Kat a bit sick. But she endured it. Taking the... whatever this is, a spoon?... Kat stirred her potion. Counter-clockwise, Lafay said. The blonde did the same. While her potion was still in action, she poured in the Jobberknoll blood slowly.

Eekk....

The smell of blood was NOT good. Really. She could've barfed. It smelled so stingy and so... disgusting and... ew. After she finished pouring the blood in, she saw that it made a circle in the water. Hehe. Looked so cute. But not the blood. Blood was not cute.

Once Professor Lafay told the class the next step, Angelina started right away with stirring the potion counter-clock motion. When she felt it was fine and could go on its own she started to add the Jobberknoll blood. As she added it she watched as it started to make circles of red in the water. After all the blood was in the water she waited for the next step.

While waiting on the next set of instructions she stole a glance up at the Professor, wondering if she saw the little mishap earlier. Her eyes quickly shot back to her cauldron when she saw the look on the woman's face. Yup. She saw.

She kept her gaze steady on her cauldron until the Professor spoke again. Now she could get a move on with the potion! Finally! She couldn't wait for the thing to be made and in her possession. Not wanting to waste any more time she began stirring in that counter-clock motion that the Professor had instructed them to.

This. Was. Harder. Than. It. Look.

It always looked so much easier in the movies but getting all this water into a spinning motion after so much repititive movement was making her arms hurt. She wasn't cut out for this kind of manual labour!!! Stir. Ow. Stir. Ow. SCOWL. The things she did for a good potion. Once the water was swirling in a way that pleased her she took up the cup of Jobberknoll blood and began steadily pouring it.

Some people were pretty hung up about the use of Jobberknoll blood but really they were all dead. If they didn't use the blood then it would just dry up and no one would benefit from the little guys kicking the bucket. There was just no point in that. No. They might as well had used it so that some good could come out of a bad situation--really she just wanted the potion. Quite the opportunist she was. Lex found herself being fascinated by the swirling motion of the red in the water...it was actually kinda...cool...

Oh, stirring! Vivi liked this part, if only because it almost always brought on interesting changes to the potion. She began to stir, keeping her eyes fixed on the potion and not straying off to look at that blood. There was just something... unsettling about all of this.

When it was time to grab the blood and add it, she actually felt her throat close up. She gagged. She actually gagged, she of the iron Healer-esque stomach. That was even more upsetting than the blood, and Vivi poured the blood into her cauldron completely distracted with thoughts about her gag reflex.

Fortunately, her instincts were fairly good, and she didn't end up making an enormous mess that Lafay would throw out. A glance into the cauldron showed the red making concentric circles. She gagged again... it looked like a target.

Olivia had to stop and think for a minute, physically practicing stirring in a clockwise motion so she could reverse it a figure out whitch direction counter clockwise was.

The motion was in motion, and now she had to actually stir her potion. She did so, and added the jobberknoll blood. Yup, everything seemed to be going fine so far. So many of the other kids had washed out their cauldrons before starting their potion. Olivia, didn't really think hers needed a wash; but she still wondered if any dust would affect her outcome.

Jory first wrote down this instruction and the last one in his book before taking the spoon and began stirring counter clockwise. Stir...stir...stir... He reached for the Jobberknoll blood. He tried not to inhale- he hated the smell of blood. Slowly and carefully, the Puff added it into his cauldron. Sure enough, there emerged the red circles in the water.

Oh. Ahh? So Wormwood was really an ingredient? Heh. Lucky guess then. Although, if effects of the said plant are considered, it could then be justified that the Potion would really bring the drinker into a near-sleep state. So then, this Lingualaxus potion had some kind of hypnotic potency?

She heard the woman mention the discovery of mixing Belladonna and Poppies by muggles? The Ravenclaw's ears perked up. Muggles discovered it? How exactly? She was about to ask the Professor when the woman told them to get their ingredients. Okay, she can just ask her about that later then.

With the cue, Beezus went and grabbed the necessary ingredients from the closet before carefully making her way back to her workplace and ever painstakingly settling them down. Good. Nothing broken yet. That was a good sign.

Narrowing her eyes at Dylan (Seriously? She knew she was clumsy with cauldrons, but to constantly give her THE LOOK? ..Pfft..), the brunette then pointed her wand at the cauldron. Deep breaths first before doing anything though. Cauldrons were her hazard zone. Cautiously, she took note of the 5C's then filled the vessel with water, "Aguamenti." After so, muttering a quick 'Finite' to stop the spate of water before lighting the burner underneath as they were told to do so.

Hmm. Her ingredient came first, they need to drop the essence into the cauldron. Gulping somewhat, she uncovered the bottle of Wormwood essence and brought it above the cauldron. Then with a slightly shaky hand, she watched and counted as drops fell into the water.

Eight, seven, six, five......four, three.....two.......one.

PHEW.

Successful with the first step, Beezus exhaled laboriously and looked at the Slytherin Captain in hope of getting a stamp of approval or encouragement from him.

Next was to stir the potion and add the Jobberknoll blood.

Following the instructions, the Ravenclaw began to stir the mixture in a counterclockwise motion. However, the next part didn't came off easy. She went a little pale and even gagged as she added in the Jobberknoll blood. It was making her stomach retch into knots. Shaking her head slightly, she indeed saw the blood creating circles in the water and she covered her mouth again.

At least that step was done.

So far, nothing much had happened besides half the classroom being flooded, courtesy of Alexa. That didn't bother Kendall much, seeing as that had just been water. If it had been after things had already been added, she would have been more concerned, but just water didn't hurt anyone. Kurumi had stopped it before things had even gotten too bad, and Professor Lafay hadn't even commented. Maybe that meant this lesson would go okay. Well, except for the fact they were using blood and poisons, but the belladonna hadn't done too much damage in the last potion and she could always pretend there was no way the jobberknoll blood was from the school jobberknolls. Odds were it wasn't, but if the people who had questioned it were going along with the potion, she would. Anything to keep the professor's attention off of herself, and she looked up from her notes as the next instruction was given.

The jobberknoll blood. Of course it was the blood. That was the next ingredient on the list, after all, and she reached for the container carefully after noting the new steps into her journal. Stir first, and then add it, she remin ded herself, setting the cup down to reach for her stirrer. Which she then made sure to Scourgify to be safe, then she slipped it into her cauldron and started stirring counter-clockwise. Before she realized that somehow she was supposed to pour the blood while keeping the potion moving, which meant using both hands. And she wasn't about to try to stir with her left, so she'd have to pour. Carefully lifting the cup again, she brought it over to the cauldron, still stirring with her right hand. Slow, she thought, tipping the cup gently until it started dripping over the edge, then growing to a steady but small stream of redness. This really wasn't what she wanted to be doing, but she glanced into her cauldron to make sure it was all doing what it was supposed to. Definitely red circles, and she made sure to keep stirring. They hadn't been told to stop, after all.

SPOILER!!: Potions journal

Lingualaxus Truth serum

Ingredients:
Water
8 drops essence of wormwood
1 cup jobberknoll blood
4 billywig wings
3 belladonna leaves
2 tablespoons of poppy seeds
7 sprigs of valerian
5 leeches

Steps:
1. Make sure cauldron is clean
2. Fill cauldron with water, up to the neck, then light a flame underneath
3. Add the eight drops of essence of wormwood, one at a time
4. Stir potion counter-clockwise
5. While potion is still moving/while still stirring, slowly add jobberknoll blood (blood will make circles in the liquid)

Wait what? All the Jobberknolls at Hogwarts died???

Vickers turned his head sharply at Kurumi, clearly alarmed. It was like the mysterious happening of the previous terms, with creatures getting the first brunt of whatever it was that was soon to wreck havoc on the school population. He stared at the cup of blood sitting on his desk-- was that where it came from? The poor Jobberknolls annihilated and instead of a proper burial their parts were used for Potions class. It was like the Plimpies all over again. Woe is he!

As the Potions Mistress started to demo the steps and Vickers' gaze kept drifting towards the blood-filled cup, mindlessly going through the motions of filling up the cauldron with water and setting the burner alight. What in Gaia's good earth happen to the Jobberknolls to be obliterated like that in one go? Taking the wormwood essence bottle he uncorked the top off and slipped the dropper in, taking it out and hovering it over the cauldron... is it justifiable that they use the Jobberknoll blood in this class given that they were found dead instead of being killed for parts like what they did to the poor Plimpies? Well that still didnt sit well with this Ravenclaw....

.... oh worm wood essence in his hand. With all his preoccupation with the Jobberknolls he's forgotten to drip-drop the ingredient in. He started counting silently and then set the dropper aside on the 8th drop.

Now it was time to stir. Scourgifying the stirrer for good measure he slipped it in and started turning it counter clockwise all around the pot. He paused when the Professor instructed to use the Jobberknoll blood next...

It was like a moment of crisis. Seriously he doesnt want to use it, but the he knew that the Jobberknoll part of the potion was essential to the Truth Serum. So begrudgingly he reached out for the cup and, obviously frowning and totally not-OK with the possible source of this item he slowly tipped the cup's contents into the pot, stirring it in, looking away with the redness started to swirl in the water.

The least he can do is make sure this turns out well so he can use to interrogate find out the truth about who or what killed the Jobberknolls...

But Ariana liked things Shaken.. not stirred..... Ohh well. she began to stir her potion counter-clock wise and waited for the whole potion seemed to be moving as one.. that's what she meant by "the motion is in motion" righhttt? heh okay joke over. now to add ZE BLOODDD ...... she looked around the room.. no one could read her thoughts right? cause if so this would be awakwarddd.. anyway slowly poor in Ze Blood... She began pouring the blood in slowly while deciding to hold her breath as they did so.. Blood stunk.. didnt anyone else know that...OOOooohhh pretty red circles in le cauldron.. they'd be cuter green.. but whatever.. okay NEXT

Minerva listened to the next step and her face fell. The blood part...already.. yuck... Trying to push it out of her head she picked up her stirrer and made sure it was clean. Then placed it in her cauldron. Stirring her mixture in a counter clockwise motion she watched it start to swirl. That's when she heard and noticed Ethan lean towards her to tell her nothing was wrong she gave a small smile and looked at him for a quick second. "I'm glad" is all she said not wanting to get in any trouble.

Turning back to her potion she looked at the Jobberknoll blood. Without touching it she didn't want to be near it. Taking a deep breath and picking it up she measured out a cup and slowly let it stream into the cauldron. She felt her stomach turning at the sight of blood. She felt as if she could smell it as well. Her face had to be turning a bit green from this one. Was it because it was blood, or was it because of the rumors she had heard about the recent Jobberknolls at school that were making her feel this way. She had never had problems in potions before.

Once the blood was all in and the red circles were being seen in her cauldron (which was a horror movie scene if she could think of one) Minerva cleaned the measure cup and placed it away from her. Taking some deep breaths she tried to steady her stomach. She did not want to throw up in class, especially this class...

She eyed the lion prefect. Merlin she was annoying! Did she always question everything? The answer very clearly was a yes. Still she wondered how she had not been hexed yet. She might want to watch her tongue because her head of house was just the one to do it. Putting her attention back on the task at hand she cleaned her cauldron with a quick "Scourgify."

She added some water. "Aguamenti." When she had reached the desired amount of water she ended the spell. "Finite." She started her burner and stared for a minute. It was time for the wormwood essence. She added the eight drops one at a time. Drop, drop, drop...until she had eight in there.



She got right to stirring her potion in a counter-clockwise motion. Once she was good and moving she slowly added the Jobberknoll blood which was very icky btw! She hated that she had to go at it slowly. If she had a choice she would have dumped the whole thing in as fast as she could and stirred it until it didn't resemble blood anymore. Her stomach rolled as she watched the red blood making circles in the water. She was ready for the next step all right!