Marriage Law Madness

“Come in, Miss Withers.” The schoolgirl stood shyly in the doorway, not looking at him as she entered his office. She had already been told that she would have to remake the potion she had been attempting yesterday. That was fine. It was the other part of the detention she was worried about. He seemed to be in a good mood. Hopefully that would work in her favor.

Having decided that afternoon the best way to show her the reason for his anger was to show her what the results of her careless mistake could have been, he had taken a leaf out of the younger Crouch’s book and collected a jar of spiders. He led her through his office door into the potions classroom. Crossing the room to a lab table, he said, “Start making the potion, double the amount. There will be extra punishment for careless mistakes, so mind the recipe and READ THE LABELS!” He yelled the last bit for emphasis. “Stop when you reach the point where you went wrong yesterday,” he said in a more pleasant voice.

With a tremulous, “yes, sir” she took her cauldron from its assigned space on the shelf, and then proceeded to the ingredient shelf. “aloe stalk, arnica powder, ginger root, Emu oil, Eucalyptus leaf, Calendula powder.” She muttered the ingredients to herself as she collected bottles. He was amused to see her triple-checking labels: once to select it, again before she took it off the shelf, and once more before adding it to the potion. She sliced the ginger root into tiny pieces, placed the oil in the cauldron, then let the mixture heat as she crushed the Eucalyptus leaf with a mortar and pestle. Tipping it into the cauldron, she carefully measured the Caluendula and created a paste. In no time at all she had a soft butter yellow concoction emitting soft steam. “Sir, I’m to the point where I screwed up yesterday.”

‘That was fast, and it looks perfect so far. This one may end up to be worth teaching,” he thought to himself as he scooped half of her potion into his oldest student cauldron. “Continue with the correct ingredients.” She added the aloe, and her potion turned a soft green and became the consistency of a cream. She folded in the Arnica powder, saying, “done, sir.”

“Good girl.” She blushed at his unexpected praise.

“Come with me. Bring the ingredient you added yesterday instead of the Aloe.” He picked up the cauldron containing the unfinished potion and the jar of spiders. Leading her into his private lab, he placed the cauldron into a large glass box with sealed glove holes. “This will allow us to replicate what would have happened had I been a split second later correcting your mistake. It does no good to punish you if you don’t understand why I was so angry at what must have seemed to you to be a simple mistake.”

He took a cactus bud from the jar, laid it next to the cauldron, then dumped the spiders into the glass box. “This box has a shatterproof charm, and once it is sealed, it will be airtight, allowing for safety controlled replication of a very nasty potion. Do you know a sealing spell yet?”

She shook her head, and he demonstrated for her. “Colloportus. Now you try it.”

“Colloportus.” The box glowed blue.

“Good. Your spell was nice and strong, it sealed it the rest of the way. You have to keep saying the charm until it glows for it to be sealed properly. Now put the cactus bud into the potion.”

She slid her hands into the glove spots, dropping the bud into the potion. Almost immediately, the cauldron exploded into bits and thick purple smoke billowed into the box, the spiders all dying instantly from the highly poisonous gas. “Now, imagine if you will, had I not managed the spell in time, and the bud fell into the potion, not an empty cauldron, that those spiders would have been your classmates and me. You would have died in the explosion. I would have had to seal the room, killing us all to save the rest of the school.”

A look of horror crossed her face. “I c-could have killed them all.” Seconds later, she was on the floor in a dead faint.

“Miss Withers! Loralei! Wake up, please!” She swatted at the bottle of smelling salts as she came around, and after a few minutes she was able to sit up with his assistance.

“You understand, now?” She nodded, tears filling her eyes. He lifted her from the floor, carrying her into his office. Sitting down in the big leather chair, he held her as he had Molly earlier, just letting her cry.

“What are you going to spank me with, sir?” she asked shyly.

“I'm not. I think you've punished yourself enough over this. But if I ever have to give you a detention because of a mistake like this again...." He left the threat hanging, sounding much more like the snarky professor she knew. "It’s after curfew, I’ll walk you back to the common room. Am I ever going to have to do this again?”

She shook her head. “Not for not reading labels, I promise. You may have to swat me occasionally for being slow, as I’m going to check every single new ingredient in 1001 Magical Herbs and Fungi first. I really like potions, plus I don’t fancy getting expelled.”

He dropped her off in the Slytherin common room, then headed towards the kitchen. There were two people sitting at the huge table tucking into bowls of ice cream. As he drew closer to the table, he realized they were Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. “Grab a bowl, Severus. Your stepson should be here from the Ministry any minute. Said he had something to discuss with Harry.”

“I’ll wait and take some ice cream back to Molly, thanks. But I’ll stay until Percy gets here. You’ve piqued my interest, plus, we need to fix a time to go wedding robe shopping tomorrow. Minerva will have my head if you aren’t ready. Said something about if I didn’t, I’d be paying big fines to the ministry as she would ensure I was in to much pain to fulfill my husbandly duties. Promise me you’ll never deliberately irritate her, or let her have alcohol after she loses a Quidditch game again.”

“While we’re on the subject of weddings, tell Molly she has carte blanche to plan Minerva’s hens night, and to buy her lots of nightgowns so I can start hiding those hideous tartan ones.”

“Will do.” Just then the pear in the door painting giggled, letting them know Percy was on the other side. When he appeared he was dragging something heavy, which he dumped in front of Harry.

“Your marriage proposals, Mr. Potter. All of them invalid, of course, as the law states the men must do the asking. We were running out of space and considered just binning them, but I thought you might find some of them amusing. There is, however, one that caught my eye while sending out invalid proposal form letters.” He took an envelope out of his pocket and handed it over.”

“Dear Harry,” he read out.
‘This isn’t a marriage proposal per se, as I am too old for you anyway. I read in the article in Witch Weekly what a good listener you were and about how you seemed to be able to solve problems for your friends. I am past any reasonable hope, so I was hoping you maybe had a friend who could help me. I am currently residing at the Hogsmeade Home For Distressed Witches, seeking shelter here for the last two and a half years. My husband threw our now three-year-old daughter Sophia and I out into the street when he discovered that her birth had left me barren and I could never bear him a son. He died in the last battle before he could officially divorce me, so I am legally a widow. No one wants a barren woman, and I have reached the limit of time I am allowed to stay here, and will soon be out on the street again. If you know of someone who might be willing to take in my daughter, I would appreciate any help you could provide.

Respectfully,
Felicity S. LeBaron.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Harry looked at Snape, Percy and Dumbledore.

“Lupin.” They all chorused together.