Obsidian (Harry Potter Fan Fiction, Sequel to the Lazuli Trilogy)

Eight - Cecelia

The news of the Triwizard Tournament sent the entire school into a flurry. Everywhere you looked, teachers were ordering students to create new display boards for the classrooms, fifth years were being recruited to help with the cleaning of the school (since Hogwarts was far too big for the responsibility to be left entirely to old Mr Filch). Our Heads of Houses preached to us about the importance of presentation, and so some extra house-elves were brought in to help the older students with the repairs of uniform. In the short period leading up to the arrival of our guests, everybody was given a job, and everyone was expected to help out in some way or another.

I was given the job of helping Hagrid with the building of safer pens for the vast array of animals he kept (and by safer, I mean pens that actually locked; a rogue Hippogriff would not be what we needed, especially since my dad had a strange fear of the beasts, although I'm not sure why). After my lessons finished at lunchtime on Friday, myself and the rest of the fourth year Gryffindors and Slytherins headed down to Hagrid's hut, where he was waiting with tools and wood to build the pens, and various dead creatures to distract the bigger beasts with.

I sat perched on a pile of wooden stumps waiting to be hammered into the ground with Dominique and Roxanne whilst Jonah and Jacob built the pen the five of us had been given control of, laughing and smiling sweetly as Jonah cast us hateful glares. Jacob grinned at me as I teasingly leaned backwards and enjoyed the warm autumn sun on my face, shutting my eyes and listening to the rustling of the leaves above me. Roxanne was already laid back on top of the wood, her hands behind her head and her robe folded up into a pillow. At my feet, Dominique was also enjoying the sun, but answering some potions questions as she did. My cousin frowned, before looking up at me.

"Cece, what do you get if you combined powdered moonstone, syrup of hellebore, powdered unicorn horn and powdered porcupine quills?"

"Draught of Peace," I answered without opening my eyes. Potions had always been my finest subject; it came from the Percival line, Mum said, since both she and Grandmother Cecelia - for whom I was named - were exceptionally skilled potioneers. My grandmother had spent a vast amount of time when I was young teaching me the simple mathematics and skills required for making the best potions, and so as a child I had seldom felt safer than when I was with her or my mother in the large potions room beneath either our house or in the basement of our second house on my Malfoy grandparent's estate. Being surrounded by the sound of potions bubbling, feeling the thick smoke that some of them produced and smelling the aroma of a successful potion had been a constant fixture in my childhood, and books on the art of potioneering had been the literature I had learned to read on. Unlike my older brothers, I had a natural aptitude and love of the subject, and so there was no surprise that this combined with my childhood training has resulted in a lifelong adoration of anything to do with the most ancient art of potion-making.

"Merlin, you're so smart, Cece," Dominique said loudly, her eyes flicking up to Jacob as she said it and then back to me with a smirk. "I wish I was as clever as you!"

"Yeah, yeah, she's a real brainiac," Roxanne retorted sarcastically. "Now can you stop jabbering? I'm trying to relax here!" Dominique glowered at our cousin before returning to her work, and I returned to watching Jacob.

He'd shed his robe, jumper and tie because of the sun and the taxing labour, and he'd rolled the sleeves of his white shirt up to his elbows and unbuttoned the top couple of buttons. His blonde hair was slightly dishevelled, and there was the slightest hint of perspiration on his forehead. As usual, he was looking painfully handsome.

I stood up slowly, dusting my skirt off and taking my water bottle out of my school bag. Leaving my two sunbathing cousins behind, I walked over to the boys, holding out my bottle to Jonah and smiling at him. "Go on, you've earned a break, I'll take over."