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The foursome walked down the corridors, holding their books under their arms. Draco slunk past them without even muttering anything under his breath, the first time in four years that he’d ever done so. Harry, Hermione and Ron all turned to look at the new girl with awe.

“You’ve really put the fear of God into Malfoy,” Ron gushed. “How’d you manage that?”

Buffy winked at him. “Trade secret.”

Harry suddenly laughed, something from the previous evening finally occurring to him.

“What?” Hermione and Ron asked simultaneously.

“You fought Malfoy,” Harry said, grinning from ear to ear.

“No I didn’t,” Buffy said, trying to pull off looking both innocent and indignant at the same time.

“Yes you did,” Harry insisted. “In the Forest, you told that vampire that you’d fought an evil little git with better fighting skills. You were talking about Malfoy.”

Buffy grinned. This boy didn’t miss a trick. “So, maybe I accidentally knocked him onto his ass in the hallway, but…I didn’t throw a single punch.”

Ron grinned and put an arm around Buffy. “I think you’re my new hero.”

Hermione felt her heart sink, and Harry felt a similar feeling. The two friends exchanged glances and looked away, slightly embarrassed.

“Ron huh?” Harry asked.

Hermione just nodded. “Buffy?”

Harry grinned and had an evil thought. “No.”

Hermione’s eyes went wide and Harry burst into laughter. “Kidding ‘Mione. Just kidding.”

“God Harry. It’s too early in the morning for that sort of humour.”

Harry just grinned and placed his arm around Hermione, giving her shoulder a squeeze.

“What’s to become of the two little love-sick puppies?” Harry mused.

“Besides an intense amount of jealousy…I’m really not sure.”

The first lesson for the day was Potions, which, besides having Snape as a teacher, Buffy was actually looking forward to. Both Ron and Harry were dreading the lesson and were just keeping their fingers crossed that they wouldn’t lose too many points in the first lesson.

“Just be careful of this guy,” Ron whispered to Buffy. “He’s a complete git, and he deducts house points like nobody’s business. Not to mention, he’s almost actually nice to Malfoy.”

Buffy nodded, knowing full-well that Snape was completely evil. Well, she was actually fairly certain that he wasn’t evil at all, considering he was employed by Dumbledore, but she’d known him for six weeks now and he hadn’t warmed towards her at all. Even Snyder had been nicer to her.

Snape burst into the room, the room going completely silent when he entered. He swarmed towards the front and turned quickly, his cape fanning out behind him.

“Let’s begin,” he said. “Page twenty-four.”

The books were opened quickly and without any fuss, every student with parchment and quill at the ready.

“Read the potion over for yourselves, and we’ll be testing them in exactly twenty-five minutes,” Snape said, his voice booming around the room. “Work in pairs, one creating the venom, the other creating the antidote. And Longbottom…I expect yours to be perfect.”

Buffy actually heard the nervous boy who she assumed to be Longbottom gulp. The chairs scraped the floor as everyone rushed to get the ingredients from the cabinets to begin making their potions.

“Hermione?” Buffy said before they could begin. “Would you mind if I worked with someone else?”

Hermione shook her head and turned to Parvati. Buffy grinned and moved her ingredients to Neville’s table.

“Be my partner?” she asked.

Neville turned to look at the person who had offered. He very nearly fainted when he saw the cocky, confident and gorgeous blonde that had single-handedly brought down Draco Malfoy.

“Uh…uh…”

“You can say no,” Buffy said.

“No,” he said quickly. “I mean…I mean yes. Yes.”

Buffy nodded and began setting up.

Neville shakily brought out the ingredients, reading the book to make sure he did this right. He really didn’t want to make a fool out of himself.

“You okay?” Buffy asked.

Neville just nodded, not trusting his voice.

“Relax,” she whispered, seeing Snape shoot a glare in their direction which only got Neville more worked up. “Ignore him and pretend that this has nothing to do with the Professor.”

“If it had nothing to do with the Professor, I wouldn’t be doing it in the first place,” Neville replied with a nervous laugh.

Buffy couldn’t help but grin.

“Alright then, just ignore him,” Buffy said. “Just breathe in deeply and read the potion through carefully before you start mixing anything. You’re working on the antidote, so you’re looking at page twenty-five, not twenty-four.”

Neville did as requested, reading through the ingredients and controlling his breathing.

“Alright. Check what you’ve got on your desk against what it says in the book,” Buffy said.

Neville nodded and quickly checked the list, confident that he’d got it right.

“You doin’ okay?” Buffy asked.

Neville nodded, his breathing starting to speed up again as Snape walked past them.

“Relax,” Buffy said firmly. “Start at the top. Go through it, step by step, one thing at a time. Don’t rush it. Forget about Snape, forget about the Slytherins. Just you and me here, no one else.”

“Like that helps,” Neville muttered beneath his breath. He winced as he remembered that the girl had incredible hearing. Buffy just pretend she hadn’t heard so as not to embarrass him.

He took a shaky breath and read the first step, doing what it said. With each passing step, his confidence slowly increased. His hands were still shaking, and he was still petrified, but he was a little more confident with what he was doing.

He reached the final step and felt as though he’d actually done the potion correctly.

Buffy had been watching him out of the corner of her eye and was pleased to see that he’d brewed the potion correctly. His confidence needed work, but he was getting there.

“Time’s up,” Snape said, his voice breaking through the quiet atmosphere, making several members of the class jump. “Fifty points to anyone who has both potions completely perfect. We’ll begin with Potter and Weasley.”

Buffy turned her attention to her two friends who were looking a little nervous, Harry looking far more confident than Ron.

“Potter,” Snape said. “Put your hand out.”

Harry breathed in quickly and held out his left hand. Snape spooned out a small amount of Harry’s potion and dropped several drops onto his flattened palm. The skin began sizzling, the class gasping in alarm. Harry winced but held his hand steady. Snape quickly dropped a few drops of Ron’s potion onto the burning patch and the sizzling stopped.

“Any residual pain Potter?” Snape demanded.

“A little,” Harry admitted, his face beginning to show that it was definitely tangible pain. There was still a raw red mark in the centre of his hand. Snape smirked and brought out an eye dropped from his pocket. He dropped a single drop onto Harry’s palm and Harry sighed with relief, the red mark disappearing.

“Your antidote needs work Weasley,” Snapes said.

He moved onto the next pair, going through the same thing with each of the different students.

Buffy couldn’t help but notice that Snape moved more quickly when he was dealing with Slytherin students. He would pour the antidote on almost straight away for the Slytherins rather than allowing them to feel pain. Every single antidote though had needed Snape’s one on top of it as well.

“Notice how he didn’t ask Malfoy to be a volunteer,” Neville whispered into Buffy’s ear. She nodded, having noticed it.

Snape came to stand in front of them. Buffy looked up at him, not allowing herself to be intimidated by him. She won the staring competition when he wrenched his eyes away from her.

“Summers. Hand out.”

Buffy did as requested, holding her right hand out.

“You’ll soon see why you don’t volunteer to be Longbottom’s partner,” Snape said.

He spooned out a small amount of Buffy’s potion and looked at her outstretched hand.

“You may want to use your left hand, Miss Summers,” Snape said.

Behind him, there were hushed whispers. Nobody else had volunteered their writing hands.

“I trust him,” Buffy replied easily.

Snape just shrugged. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

He dropped a small amount of the potion onto Buffy’s palm and Buffy breathed in sharply but didn’t flinch. Neville bounced on his feet, his fingers crossed tightly, silently hoping that he hadn’t just hurt the girl who had been incredibly kind to him.

Snape spooned out some of Neville’s antidote and dropped it onto her palm. The burning went away and the red mark completely disappeared. Snape’s eyes widened in shock and he grabbed hold of Buffy’s hand, looking at it intently.

Buffy shot a look at Neville who’s eyes were wide with complete disbelief. Snape was completely astounded. He didn’t believe for a moment that the antidote had actually worked.

Silently, he spooned some of Buffy’s potion onto his own palm, quickly feeling that Buffy’s potion had been perfect in what it did. He scooped some of Neville’s potion onto his own hand and felt the effects completely disappear.

He scowled and moved away from the twosome, completely flabbergasted. He’d been watching those two intently and had seen that Buffy hadn’t given Neville an ounce of help with the actual application of the ingredients. She had pushed him gently to work more carefully, but hadn’t told him anything more.

“Continuing on,” Snape said.

Buffy grinned and took her seat beside Neville who looked as though he was about to pass out. This was the first lesson that hadn’t ended with him having points taken away from him. In fact, between he and Buffy, they’d just earned fifty points for Gryffindor. He finally smiled and sat down, wondering how on earth that had just happened.

The lesson continued, Neville forcing himself to concentrate so that he didn’t unintentionally lose the fifty points that they had gained, even though Snape hadn’t mentioned them again. The forty-minute lesson finally drew to a close and the students raced out.

“Miss Summers.”

Except for Buffy. She stopped and turned to look at the Professor, a calm look on her face while her heart sped nervously.

“Professor Snape,” she replied.

Snape waited until every student was out of the classroom before continuing.

“Congratulations,” he said coolly. She couldn’t tell whether he was being genuine or not.

“Thank you sir.” Best to just be polite and not question it.

“You somehow managed to achieve in one lesson what Miss Granger has been trying to achieve for four years. I’d just about given up on Mr Longbottom,” Snape said.

“He just needed to believe he could do it without help,” Buffy said.

“Be that as it may, it was still a foolish thing to trust him so blindly,” Snape said. “In my opinion, trust needs to be earned.”

He looked at her intently and she could see the obvious sub-text. He didn’t trust her. She didn’t blame him. She was certain that there were rumours going around the staff of Hogwarts as to who she really was and why she had been placed at Hogwarts.

“I had no reason not to trust him,” she countered.

Snape almost flinched, but he just nodded.

“Perhaps we’ll see an incline in Mr Longbottom’s work in future,” Snape mused.

“Well, with the promise of more house points like today, he might just have the incentive,” Buffy said, purposefully reminding the teacher of his earlier words.

Snape nodded, knowing that he’d been beaten. He almost had to respect the small American girl for that.

“Have a good afternoon Professor,” Buffy said pleasantly, walking out the door. She tried her hardest not to begin giggling until she’d reached the top of the stairs where Harry, Ron and Hermione were all waiting for her.

“You’re alive!” Ron stated.

His mock-surprise just made the girl giggle even harder. She put her hand over her mouth to try and contain herself.

“That man is worse than Malfoy,” Buffy said, finally garnering control over herself.

“Told you. Did he mention the house points?” Ron asked.

Buffy grinned and nodded. “Fifty points to Gryffindor.”

“Amazing,” Harry said.

“He was watching you like hawks the entire time,” Hermione said. She’d never been able to help Neville without getting caught. “I don’t understand how he didn’t see you helping him.”

Buffy just shrugged and began walking towards the Great Hall for lunch.

“That’s cos I didn’t help him.”

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