Swelling Potion

Luo Bin had never made a Swelling Potion before, and he couldn't swear it would work. But he had been put on the spot. For the sake of his marks, he had to test it then and there.

He drew two milliliters of potion into a fine syringe, pried open a white mouse's mouth, and slowly pushed the potion down its throat.

Perhaps because the potion was sweet rather than bitter, the mouse didn't resist. Once he had finished, Luo Bin held its pointed muzzle shut. Fifteen seconds... thirty... sixty... ninety... a hundred and thirty... a hundred and eighty...

Five minutes passed without the slightest reaction. Luo Bin sighed. He was about to ask whether the practical Potions exam allowed retakes when the mouse's bones began to click.

Its body twisted grotesquely. Its forelegs flipped back against its spine, its hind legs bent upward at right angles to its rump, and its neck rotated a full 360 degrees before turning all the way back. Its tail twisted like the topmost flight of the Spiral Staircase.

Strangely, the mouse showed no sign of pain. Even its squeaks sounded much the same as before.

A minute later, its neck, forelegs, belly, hind legs, and tail returned to normal. Then the mouse began to swell visibly, stopping only when it had expanded in every dimension to the size of a basketball!

Squeak! Squeak!

Snape tapped his wand. Pop! The little—no, the large white mouse was shut inside an iron cage.

Snape lifted the cage and inspected the mouse closely. At last, he said coolly, "Barely a pass."

After the practical Potions exam, the three members of the Main Character Group asked Luo Bin what had caused the exploding Red Mist. He took out a slim bottle of Swelling Potion and told them what had happened.

"If—and I'm only saying if—Uncle Vernon drank the Swelling Potion, he'd blow up like a huge balloon. He might even float into the sky!"

Harry couldn't help laughing as he pictured Uncle Vernon's panicked face and Aunt Petunia and Dudley shouting for help.

"Harry, that's a dangerous idea. Listen: unless it's an emergency, wizards can't show magic in front of Muggles, let alone feed them potions. Besides, it expands things proportionally. Even if he swelled to the size of a house, he wouldn't float!"

Hermione had clearly taken Harry's joke seriously. She weighed the risks and tried to talk her friend out of it.

Ron shrugged at Harry and Luo Bin and pulled a face, making his feelings about a certain person's lecture perfectly clear.

"Here, there are exactly four bottles—one each. Swelling Potion only lasts thirty minutes. I added Bubotuber and Fanged Geranium, so that might cut the duration in half. But the swelling itself is basically painless."

"Brilliant! I can give some to Scabbers. Fred and George will get the fright of their lives!"

"A huge rat with no fur and a missing toe would be frightening, all right! Come on, the sun's setting. Let's get back to the Great Hall. Don't forget we have History of Magic tomorrow!"

"Hermione, I'd only just managed to make myself forget about that, and you..."

"Harry, would not mentioning it make it go away?"

With a slim bottle of Swelling Potion in each of their pockets, they strode toward the Great Hall.

The History of Magic exam was much easier than Luo Bin had expected. He worked through it with his quill and finished every question with forty minutes to spare.

Professor Binns's ghost floated over to him, his hair curled like a roll of dough, and quickly scanned the parchment.

"Oh, not bad. Every answer is concise and gets right to the point!"

"Thank you, Professor, for—"

"No, don't thank me yet, Luo Bin Sear. There's a serious problem with your paper!"

Luo Bin's stomach dropped. Which question did I get wrong? But that couldn't be it. He had checked every answer several times.

Professor Binns's ghost seemed to read his confusion. "It isn't the content. It's your handwriting, Luo Bin. Buy a few copybooks over the holiday and practice."

With that, he drifted away at an unhurried pace.

Luo Bin stared at the words on his parchment. The a's looked like a's, the b's like b's, and the c's like c's. So some curves were a little straight and some straight lines a little curved. How was his handwriting worse than anyone else's?

He didn't think handwriting he had practiced for months still deserved to be called ugly. Even so, he silently considered whose copybooks he should buy.

When the clock rang, Professor Binns's ghost went from desk to desk collecting the parchments. The students filed out of the exam room, gazed through the windows into the distance, and celebrated surviving the grueling exam week at last.

"Damn it! Neither the Werewolf Code of 1673 nor the account of the House-elf Rebellion came up. I wasted more than ten minutes memorizing them."

"Ten minutes? It took me four whole hours to memorize the Werewolf Code and the history of the House-elf Rebellion. I'm never trusting your list of important topics again."

"Hmph! Who says my list was wrong? Eight of the ten points I marked about the International Statute of Secrecy, signed and enacted in 1689, were on the exam!"

Ron swayed and pulled faces, looking thoroughly unconvinced. He made Hermione so angry that she grabbed Luo Bin and Harry, stormed down the slope, and sat heavily beside the Black Lake. She picked up a clod of earth and hurled it into the water.

"Hey, Miss Granger! You're scaring my pet. Stop throwing things!"

Across the lake, George Weasley waved his arms and shouted.

Luo Bin looked over. In the shallows, the Giant Squid was basking leisurely in the sun while Fred, George, and their mutual friend Lee Jordan played with its tentacles.

"Whoa, that's a huge squid. Catch it and a family could eat for days!" said Ron, catching up with them.

"If you tried to catch that squid, there's no telling whether you or it would end up on the chopping board!"

Luo Bin had been in the magical world for almost a year, and he was sick of rich Western food. As he watched the tentacles wave, an image of a black griddle kept flashing through his mind. Maybe after the students leave by train in two weeks, I could sneak back and make grilled squid.

A small pale hand suddenly waved in front of his face, breaking his train of thought. "Luo Bin, what are you thinking about? Harry's been talking to you, and you haven't heard a word."

Grilled squid covered in cumin and chili. "Oh, I was thinking about spells. What did you say, Harry?"

"For the past week, I've had the same dream every night. I dream about a beautiful woman with red hair. She reaches out and shouts, 'Harry, you're in danger! Run!' And then..."

"And then he wakes up terrified!"

As Harry's roommate, Ron had seen his friend bolt upright in the middle of the night several times, his forehead drenched in sweat.

"No, it isn't fear that wakes me. It's the pain in the scar on my forehead. Luo Bin, I've got a bad feeling. I think Voldemort is getting closer and closer to the Philosopher's Stone!"

"Harry, what happened to the Unicorn put the school on alert. Two professors patrol the Forbidden Forest every night. It's been weeks, and the forest has been quiet. There haven't been any more attacks," Luo Bin said, trying to reassure him.

"That sounds rather like... the calm before the storm. But as long as Dumbledore's here, the Philosopher's Stone won't be stolen. Harry, you're too tense. Try to relax. The headmaster's here to handle things," Hermione urged.

Harry was too caught up in his worries to listen. Luo Bin searched the sky in every direction but saw no owls. Well, there goes another chance to give Harry Potter a hint.