The Half-Blood Prince

by J. K. Rowling

  ‘I have not asked you to take out your books,’ said Snape, closing the door and moving to face the class from behind his desk; Hermione hastily dropped her copy of Confronting the Faceless back into her bag and stowed it under her chair. ‘I wish to speak to you and I want your fullest attention.’

  His black eyes roved over their upturned faces, lingering for a fraction of a second longer on Harry’s than anyone else’s.

  ‘You have had five teachers in this subject so far, I believe.’

  You believe … like you haven’t watched them all come and go, Snape, hoping you’d be next, thought Harry scathingly.

  ‘Naturally, these teachers will all have had their own methods and priorities. Given this confusion I am surprised so many of you scraped an O.W.L. in this subject. I shall be even more surprised if all of you manage to keep up with the N.E.W.T. work, which will be much more advanced.’

  Snape set off around the edge of the room, speaking now in a lower voice; the class craned their necks to keep him in view.

  ‘The Dark Arts,’ said Snape, ‘are many, varied, ever-changing and eternal. Fighting them is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before. You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible.’

  Harry stared at Snape. It was surely one thing to respect the Dark Arts as a dangerous enemy, another to speak of them, as Snape was doing, with a loving caress in his voice?

  ‘Your defences,’ said Snape, a little louder, ‘must therefore be as flexible and inventive as the Arts you seek to undo. These pictures,’ he indicated a few of them as he swept past, ‘give a fair representation of what happens to those who suffer, for instance, the Cruciatus Curse’ (he waved a hand towards a witch who was clearly shrieking in agony) ‘feel the Dementor’s Kiss’ (a wizard lying huddled and blank-eyed slumped against a wall) ‘or provoke the aggression of the Inferius’ (a bloody mass upon the ground).

  ‘Has an Inferius been seen, then?’ said Parvati Patil in a high-pitched voice. ‘Is it definite, is he using them?’

  ‘The Dark Lord has used Inferi in the past,’ said Snape, ‘which means you would be well-advised to assume he might use them again. Now …’

  He set off again around the other side of the classroom towards his desk, and again, the class watched him as he walked, his dark robes billowing behind him.

  ‘… you are, I believe, complete novices in the use of non-verbal spells. What is the advantage of a non-verbal spell?’

  Hermione’s hand shot into the air. Snape took his time looking around at everybody else, making sure he had no choice, before saying curtly, ‘Very well – Miss Granger?’

  ‘Your adversary has no warning about what kind of magic you’re about to perform,’ said Hermione, ‘which gives you a split-second advantage.’

  ‘An answer copied almost word for word from The Standard Book of Spells, Grade 6,’ said Snape dismissively (over in the corner, Malfoy sniggered), ‘but correct in essentials. Yes, those who progress to using magic without shouting incantations gain an element of surprise in their spell-casting. Not all wizards can do this, of course; it is a question of concentration and mind power which some,’ his gaze lingered maliciously upon Harry once more, ‘lack.’

  Harry knew Snape was thinking of their disastrous Occlumency lessons of the previous year. He refused to drop his gaze, but glowered at Snape until Snape looked away.

  ‘You will now divide,’ Snape went on, ‘into pairs. One partner will attempt to jinx the other without speaking. The other will attempt to repel the jinx in equal silence. Carry on.’

  Although Snape did not know it, Harry had taught at least half the class (everyone who had been a member of the DA) how to perform a Shield Charm the previous year. None of them had ever cast the Charm without speaking, however. A reasonable amount of cheating ensued; many people were merely whispering the incantation instead of saying it aloud. Typically, ten minutes into the lesson Hermione managed to repel Neville’s muttered Jelly-Legs Jinx without uttering a single word, a feat that would surely have earned her twenty points for Gryffindor from any reasonable teacher, thought Harry bitterly, but which Snape ignored. He swept between them as they practised, looking just as much like an overgrown bat as ever, lingering to watch Harry and Ron struggling with the task.

  Ron, who was supposed to be jinxing Harry, was purple in the face, his lips tightly compressed to save himself from the temptation of muttering the incantation. Harry had his wand raised, waiting on tenterhooks to repel a jinx that seemed unlikely ever to come.

  ‘Pathetic, Weasley,’ said Snape, after a while. ‘Here – let me show you –’

  He turned his wand on Harry so fast that Harry reacted instinctively; all thought of non-verbal spells forgotten he yelled, ‘Protego! ’

  His Shield Charm was so strong Snape was knocked off-balance and hit a desk. The whole class had looked round and now watched as Snape righted himself, scowling.

  ‘Do you remember me telling you we are practising non-verbal spells, Potter?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Harry stiffly.

  ‘Yes sir.’

  ‘There’s no need to call me “sir”, Professor.’

  The words had escaped him before he knew what he was saying. Several people gasped, including Hermione. Behind Snape, however, Ron, Dean and Seamus grinned appreciatively.

  ‘Detention, Saturday night, my office,’ said Snape. ‘I do not take cheek from anyone, Potter … not even the Chosen One.’

  ‘That was brilliant, Harry!’ chortled Ron, once they were safely on their way to break a short while later.

  ‘You really shouldn’t have said it,’ said Hermione, frowning at Ron. ‘What made you?’

  ‘He tried to jinx me, in case you didn’t notice!’ fumed Harry. ‘I had enough of that during those Occlumency lessons! Why doesn’t he use another guinea pig for a change? What’s Dumbledore playing at, anyway, letting him teach Defence? Did you hear him talking about the Dark Arts? He loves them! All that unfixed, indestructible stuff –’

  ‘Well,’ said Hermione, ‘I thought he sounded a bit like you.’

  ‘Like me?’

  ‘Yes, when you were telling us what it’s like to face Voldemort. You said it wasn’t just memorising a bunch of spells, you said it was just you and your brains and your guts – well, wasn’t that what Snape was saying? That it really comes down to being brave and quick-thinking?’

  Harry was so disarmed that she had thought his words as well worth memorising as The Standard Book of Spells that he did not argue.

  ‘Harry! Hey, Harry!’

  Harry looked round; Jack Sloper, one of the Beaters on the previous year’s Gryffindor Quidditch team, was hurrying towards him holding a roll of parchment.

  ‘For you,’ panted Sloper. ‘Listen, I heard you’re the new Captain. When’re you holding trials?’

  ‘I’m not sure yet,’ said Harry, thinking privately that Sloper would be very lucky to get back on the team. ‘I’ll let you know.’

  ‘Oh, right. I was hoping it’d be this weekend –’ But Harry was not listening; he had just recognised the thin, slanting writing on the parchment. Leaving Sloper in mid-sentence, he hurried away with Ron and Hermione, unrolling the parchment as he went.

  Dear Harry,

  I would like to start our private lessons this Saturday. Kindly come along to my office at eight p.m. I hope you are enjoying your first day back at school.

  Yours sincerely

  Albus Dumbledore

  P.S. I enjoy Acid Pops.

  ‘He enjoys Acid Pops?’ said Ron, who had read the message over Harry’s shoulder and was looking perplexed.

  ‘It’s the password to get past the gargoyle outside his study,’ said Harry in a low voice. ‘Ha! Snape’s not going to be pleased … I won’t be able to do his detention!’

  He, Ron and Hermione spent the whole of break speculating on what Dumbledore would teach Harry. Ron thou
ght it most likely to be spectacular jinxes and hexes of the type the Death Eaters would not know. Hermione said such things were illegal, and thought it much more likely that Dumbledore wanted to teach Harry advanced defensive magic. After break, she went off to Arithmancy while Harry and Ron returned to the common room, where they grudgingly started Snape’s homework. This turned out to be so complex that they still had not finished when Hermione joined them for their after-lunch free period (though she considerably speeded up the process). They had only just finished when the bell rang for the afternoon’s double Potions and they beat the familiar path down to the dungeon classroom that had, for so long, been Snape’s.

  When they arrived in the corridor they saw that there were only a dozen people progressing to N.E.W.T. level. Crabbe and Goyle had evidently failed to achieve the required O.W.L. grade, but four Slytherins had made it through, including Malfoy. Four Ravenclaws were there, and one Hufflepuff, Ernie Macmillan, whom Harry liked despite his rather pompous manner.

  ‘Harry,’ Ernie said portentously, holding out his hand as Harry approached, ‘didn’t get a chance to speak in Defence Against the Dark Arts this morning. Good lesson, I thought, but Shield Charms are old hat, of course, for us old DA lags … and how are you, Ron – Hermione?’

  Before they could say more than ‘fine’, the dungeon door opened and Slughorn’s belly preceded him out of the door. As they filed into the room, his great walrus moustache curved above his beaming mouth and he greeted Harry and Zabini with particular enthusiasm.

  The dungeon was, most unusually, already full of vapours and odd smells. Harry, Ron and Hermione sniffed interestedly as they passed large, bubbling cauldrons. The four Slytherins took a table together, as did the four Ravenclaws. This left Harry, Ron and Hermione to share a table with Ernie. They chose the one nearest a gold-coloured cauldron that was emitting one of the most seductive scents Harry had ever inhaled: somehow it reminded him simultaneously of treacle tart, the woody smell of a broomstick handle and something flowery he thought he might have smelled at The Burrow. He found that he was breathing very slowly and deeply and that the potion’s fumes seemed to be filling him up like drink. A great contentment stole over him; he grinned across at Ron, who grinned lazily back.

  ‘Now then, now then, now then,’ said Slughorn, whose massive outline was quivering through the many shimmering vapours. ‘Scales out, everyone, and potion kits, and don’t forget your copies of Advanced Potion-Making …’

  ‘Sir?’ said Harry, raising his hand.

  ‘Harry, m’boy?’

  ‘I haven’t got a book or scales or anything – nor’s Ron – we didn’t realise we’d be able to do the N.E.W.T., you see –’

  ‘Ah yes, Professor McGonagall did mention … not to worry, my dear boy, not to worry at all. You can use ingredients from the store cupboard today, and I’m sure we can lend you some scales, and we’ve got a small stock of old books here, they’ll do until you can write to Flourish and Blotts …’

  Slughorn strode over to a corner cupboard and after a moment’s foraging emerged with two very battered-looking copies of Advanced Potion-Making by Libatius Borage, which he gave to Harry and Ron along with two sets of tarnished scales.

  ‘Now then,’ said Slughorn, returning to the front of the class and inflating his already bulging chest, so that the buttons on his waistcoat threatened to burst off, ‘I’ve prepared a few potions for you to have a look at, just out of interest, you know. These are the kind of thing you ought to be able to make after completing your N.E.W.T.s. You ought to have heard of ’em, even if you haven’t made ’em yet. Anyone tell me what this one is?’

  He indicated the cauldron nearest the Slytherin table. Harry raised himself slightly in his seat and saw what looked like plain water boiling away inside it.

  Hermione’s well-practised hand hit the air before anybody else’s; Slughorn pointed at her.

  ‘It’s Veritaserum, a colourless, odourless potion that forces the drinker to tell the truth,’ said Hermione.

  ‘Very good, very good!’ said Slughorn happily. ‘Now,’ he continued, pointing at the cauldron nearest the Ravenclaw table, ‘this one here is pretty well-known … featured in a few Ministry leaflets lately, too … who can –?’

  Hermione’s hand was fastest once more.

  ‘It’s Polyjuice Potion, sir,’ she said.

  Harry, too, had recognised the slow-bubbling, mudlike substance in the second cauldron, but did not resent Hermione getting the credit for answering the question; she, after all, was the one who had succeeded in making it, back in their second year.

  ‘Excellent, excellent! Now, this one here … yes, my dear?’ said Slughorn, now looking slightly bemused as Hermione’s hand punched the air again.

  ‘It’s Amortentia!’

  ‘It is indeed. It seems almost foolish to ask,’ said Slughorn, who was looking mightily impressed, ‘but I assume you know what it does?’

  ‘It’s the most powerful love potion in the world!’ said Hermione.

  ‘Quite right! You recognised it, I suppose, by its distinctive mother-of-pearl sheen?’

  ‘And the steam rising in characteristic spirals,’ said Hermione enthusiastically, ‘and it’s supposed to smell differently to each of us, according to what attracts us, and I can smell freshly mown grass and new parchment and –’

  But she turned slightly pink and did not complete the sentence.

  ‘May I ask your name, my dear?’ said Slughorn, ignoring Hermione’s embarrassment.

  ‘Hermione Granger, sir.’

  ‘Granger? Granger? Can you possibly be related to Hector Dagworth-Granger, who founded the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so, sir. I’m Muggle-born, you see.’

  Harry saw Malfoy lean close to Nott and whisper something; both of them sniggered, but Slughorn showed no dismay; on the contrary, he beamed and looked from Hermione to Harry, who was sitting next to her.

  ‘Oho! “One of my best friends is Muggle-born and she’s the best in our year!” I’m assuming this is the very friend of whom you spoke, Harry?’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ said Harry.

  ‘Well, well, take twenty well-earned points for Gryffindor, Miss Granger,’ said Slughorn genially.

  Malfoy looked rather as he had done the time Hermione had punched him in the face. Hermione turned to Harry with a radiant expression and whispered, ‘Did you really tell him I’m the best in the year? Oh, Harry!’

  ‘Well, what’s so impressive about that?’ whispered Ron, who for some reason looked annoyed. ‘You are the best in the year – I’d’ve told him so if he’d asked me!’

  Hermione smiled but made a ‘shush’ing gesture, so that they could hear what Slughorn was saying. Ron looked slightly disgruntled.

  ‘Amortentia doesn’t really create love, of course. It is impossible to manufacture or imitate love. No, this will simply cause a powerful infatuation or obsession. It is probably the most dangerous and powerful potion in this room – oh yes,’ he said, nodding gravely at Malfoy and Nott, both of whom were smirking sceptically. ‘When you have seen as much of life as I have, you will not underestimate the power of obsessive love …

  ‘And now,’ said Slughorn, ‘it is time for us to start work.’

  ‘Sir, you haven’t told us what’s in this one,’ said Ernie Macmillan, pointing at a small black cauldron standing on Slughorn’s desk. The potion within was splashing about merrily; it was the colour of molten gold, and large drops were leaping like goldfish above the surface, though not a particle had spilled.

  ‘Oho,’ said Slughorn again. Harry was sure that Slughorn had not forgotten the potion at all, but had waited to be asked for dramatic effect. ‘Yes. That. Well, that one, ladies and gentlemen, is a most curious little potion called Felix Felicis. I take it,’ he turned, smiling, to look at Hermione, who had let out an audible gasp, ‘that you know what Felix Felicis does, Miss Granger?’

  ‘It’s liquid luck,’ sa
id Hermione excitedly. ‘It makes you lucky!’

  The whole class seemed to sit up a little straighter. Now all Harry could see of Malfoy was the back of his sleek blond head, because he was at last giving Slughorn his full and undivided attention.

  ‘Quite right, take another ten points for Gryffindor. Yes, it’s a funny little potion, Felix Felicis,’ said Slughorn. ‘Desperately tricky to make, and disastrous to get wrong. However, if brewed correctly, as this has been, you will find that all your endeavours tend to succeed … at least until the effects wear off.’

  ‘Why don’t people drink it all the time, sir?’ said Terry Boot eagerly.

  ‘Because if taken in excess, it causes giddiness, recklessness and dangerous overconfidence,’ said Slughorn. ‘Too much of a good thing, you know … highly toxic in large quantities. But taken sparingly, and very occasionally …’

  ‘Have you ever taken it, sir?’ asked Michael Corner with great interest.

  ‘Twice in my life,’ said Slughorn. ‘Once when I was twenty-four, once when I was fifty-seven. Two tablespoonfuls taken with breakfast. Two perfect days.’

  He gazed dreamily into the distance. Whether he was play-acting or not, thought Harry, the effect was good.

  ‘And that,’ said Slughorn, apparently coming back to earth, ‘is what I shall be offering as a prize in this lesson.’

  There was a silence in which every bubble and gurgle of the surrounding potions seemed magnified tenfold.

  ‘One tiny bottle of Felix Felicis,’ said Slughorn, taking a minuscule glass bottle with a cork in it out of his pocket and showing it to them all. ‘Enough for twelve hours’ luck. From dawn till dusk, you will be lucky in everything you attempt.

  ‘Now, I must give you warning that Felix Felicis is a banned substance in organised competitions … sporting events, for instance, examinations or elections. So the winner is to use it on an ordinary day only … and watch how that ordinary day becomes extraordinary!

  ‘So,’ said Slughorn, suddenly brisk, ‘how are you to win my fabulous prize? Well, by turning to page ten of Advanced Potion-Making. We have a little over an hour left to us, which should be time for you to make a decent attempt at the Draught of Living Death. I know it is more complex than anything you have attempted before, and I do not expect a perfect potion from anybody. The person who does best, however, will win little Felix here. Off you go!’