Tevin was contentedly reading through a simple book he picked up from Madam Pince in the library.  It was a book for the First Year students.  One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore.  His father wanted him to learn the basic properties of twenty entries each week. 

The fireplace roared to life in a burst of green.  Then, two blondes that Tevin knew very well came through.  Tevin closed his book and jumped up.  "Draco!" 

"Hi, Tevin!" said the blonde boy. 

Tevin noticed the other person that came through with Draco.  "Hi, Mrs. Malfoy." 

Narcissa smiled down at Tevin.  "Hello, Tevin.  Is your father teaching right now?"  Tevin nodded.  "I had a question or two for him.  Would you mind telling him to call on Lucius and me later?"

"Okay," Tevin said, shifting his weight as though eager for her to leave. 

"Is...Ophelia here?"

"She went to get something at home.  She should be back soon." 

Narcissa looked a little unsettled by this information.  "And they left you here by yourself?" 

"It's normal.  She raises plants for Diagon Alley and my dad teaches all day.  They work.  I don't mind."

Narcissa did not respond for a moment.  She wondered if Tevin was subtly insulting her and Lucius.  She brushed it off in her mind.  There was no way the boy was that clever, even if Severus Snape was his father. 

"Mother," Draco said from at her side.  "We'll be fine.  We won't do anything bad."

Narcissa looked down at her son with a slightly doubtful expression.  "Draco, if you get into any sort of trouble-"

"I know, mother!  Father will take my broom away again...and my snitch."

"And what else, Draco?" 

"My training wand," he said reluctantly. 

Narcissa sighed before she reached out with an elegantly gloved hand and cupped her son's cheek.  Draco began to whine and squirm, but she tightened her hold.  She leaned down and pressed her lips to her son's forehead.  Draco made a noise of disgust, and frantically wiped where she'd kissed him.  Tevin contorted his face in an attempt not to giggle.  Narcissa turned to look at Tevin as she released Draco, and Tevin quickly schooled his expression into polite neutrality.  "Keep him out of trouble, Tevin."

"Okay."

Narcissa then left through the floo again, leaving the two boys in the parlor. 

Draco stormed off towards the bathroom, urgently feeling the need of a mirror.  Tevin followed him.  Draco managed to get up on the small step-stool at the sink so that he could see himself in the mirror.  He began to meticulously smooth his hair back into the style it was before he had destroyed it due to his wiping away of Narcissa's kiss.  He turned on the sink and wet his hand before running his fingers over his hair, hoping that when the water dried, his blonde locks would be plastered to his head in the way he wanted.  Tevin couldn't help but laugh at his friend. 

Draco whipped his head at Tevin and glared fiercely at him.  "Appearances are important, Snape!  You would think you would try to make yourself a little more..." his bright eyes looked Tevin over from head to toe, taking in the messy black hair and very casual clothing, before continuing.  "...presentable, but I suppose being around two parents who make potions all day and play in the dirt, you have to be prepared for messes." 

Draco went back to styling his hair.  Tevin watched him without responding to the slight insult about Severus and Ophelia.  Draco tilted his head side to side, trying to look at himself from every angle he could before he thought himself satisfactory in appearance.  He turned off the sink and hopped off the step-stool.  "So!" he exclaimed cheerfully.  "I brought something for us to do so we don't get bored out of our minds in this place."

At that moment, a fluffy white kneazle came into the bathroom and rubbed her body along Tevin's legs.  Tevin picked her up and left the bathroom, knowing that Draco would follow him.  Tevin took the animal into his room and put her on his bed. 

"You still have the red hangings?" complained Draco from behind him.  "Any color is better than red."

"I like red," Tevin said.  He was preoccupied petting the kneazle.  Then, he remembered.  "You said you brought something to do?"

Draco smirked at him.  "Yeah.  Wait until you see it!"  Draco walked up to Tevin as though he were about to share a very important secret.  Draco reached into his pocket and pulled out a carefully folded up piece of paper.  With a mischievous gleam in his eyes, Draco unfolded the paper.  It was clear that it had been torn from a book by the ragged edge on one side. 

Draught of Peace

"You're not serious, Draco." 

"No?"  Draco looked offended at Tevin, but the gleam never left his eyes.  "You think I took this out of a book in Diagon Alley just to show you I'm a thief?"  He laughed.  "No, Snape.  We're going to make this."

Tevin knew the name of that potion.  It was difficult and commonly misbrewed by... "Draco!  My dad teaches that potion to Fifth Years!  We're nowhere near ready to make that!  It's never going to turn out right." 

Draco smirked again at Tevin.  "If it turns out right, your father will be so impressed."  With that, Draco darted out of Tevin's room and barged straight through Severus's room and through the door that led to his private brewing lab. 

"Draco!" called Tevin as he ran after him.  "If it's wrong, he'll be really mad!"  When he got to the lab he saw Draco had already found a cauldron and had put it on the table somehow.  "Your dad will take your broom away!"

"And my wand, I know."  Draco scanned the recipe for the potion as he wandered around the room.  "Really, some things are worth getting in trouble for."

Draco quietly opened the door that led to Severus's store of potions ingredients.  He tip-toed into it, his blue eyes searching the labels on each bottle for what they needed.  He began to climb the ladder to get to the higher ingredients. 

"Draco," whispered Tevin, hoping that his father would not hear them in his private stores.  "Potion ingredients are dangerous.  Some are poisonous!  We shouldn't be playing with them."

He was forced to stop talking as a bottle was tossed down to him carelessly.  Tevin caught it, and examined the label.  It was powdered moonstone.  "And you shouldn't throw the bottles either!"

"Shut it, Snape!  It's fine.  See?  You caught it, no harm done." 

Tevin mumbled, "This time." 

Draco hurriedly scurried down several rungs of the ladder, his one arm cradling several other bottles.  When he was a few rungs from the ground he leaped off the ladder and landed loudly.  Tevin flinched.  Draco smirked wickedly at his friend.  "Come on, then.  Let's go brew a potion."

With that, the two boys went back into the private brewing lab of Severus Snape. 

After Tevin insisted that they cross-reference the recipe for the potion in his father's potion-making books in their parlor they finally began to brew.  They both decided to use one of Severus's old potion books, Advanced Potion-Making.  They found that it might be a good idea to use all of his helpful hints that were doodled in the margins rather than assume what the directions on Draco's loose page meant. 

They were both kneeling on top of the lab table, bent over the fuming cauldron.  Tevin held the stirrer gingerly and looked into the cauldron with a fierce look of concentration.  Draco held the textbook in his hands on his lap, and kept glancing at the instructions every so often.  It seemed that every time he would look back into the cauldron his grimace grew more and more pronounced.  

"Honestly, Tevin, you think you'd be better at this considering who your parents are," he said in a voice very similar to Lucius's tone when he was displeased with something Draco did.  "I mean really, your mother raises magical plants and your father brews potions for a living!  How could you not be good at this?"

Tevin glared at Draco.  "This is harder than it looks.  Dad makes it look easy."

"Probably because he knows what he's doing."

Tevin stopped stirring.  "Are you actually admitting that you don't know what you're doing?"

Draco snorted.  "No," he said, haughtily.  "I'm saying you don't know what you're doing, even though I've been dictating to you perfectly."  Draco looked quickly at the book.  "By the way, you should keep stirring."

Tevin did not resume his motions.  "If you think you could do better then go on." 

"I'm not doing it.  You're the potion maker's son.  You do it."  Draco clutched the book to himself.  "I'm more suited for reading."

Tevin huffed and slowly began to stir.  "What do we do now?" 

Draco consulted the book again, "You pour in the syrup of hellbore."

Tevin noticed Draco's use of ‘you' instead of ‘we' but chose to ignore it.  "What amount, what height from the cauldron, how fast, how-"

"It says ‘a thin, constant stream for two seconds, at about point two two eight six meters, while constantly stirring.'"  Draco and Tevin exchanged horrified gazes. 

"How high is that?"  Draco mimicked his arm up and down until it reached to a height he assumed was correct.  Tevin groaned.  "We should have brought in a ruler." 

Draco shrugged.  "We could always guess."

Tevin glared at Draco.  "If there's one thing my dad always said about potion-making it's that you never guess about anything!  He said it's an exact art and a subtle science."

Draco picked up the bottle labeled Syrup of Hellbore, and opened it, before standing up on the table.  He mocked Tevin quietly, mumbling, "Exact art...subtle science."  While Tevin continued to stir, Draco tipped the bottle and a thin stream of syrup poured from the bottle into the cauldron. 

While Draco watched the consistency of the syrup, Tevin watched the potion in the cauldron.  "Draco," he said, "I think we should-"

He never finished.  The potion in the cauldron exploded and both boys were thrown backwards and off the table.  Draco was thrown back into the wall before he fell to the ground, trying to stop his fall with his hands.  When he landed he heard a sickening snap.  He looked and saw that his left wrist was at an odd angle.  At the sight of it, Draco began to hyperventilate and panic.  Tevin was also thrown backwards, but he landed directly onto the stone floor, his back taking most of the impact, but his head bounced disturbingly against the floor.  He lay there blearily for a moment, feeling sick and dizzy.  He realized that he still held the stirrer.  Tevin let go of the stirrer when he comprehended that it was now melting in his hand and burning his palm and fingers.  He looked up at the table to see that the cauldron was lopsided and melting and the ruined potion was oozing over the sides of the table onto the floor.  He vaguely hoped that his father's book had survived the explosion.  He breathed in relief when he noticed the now ripped cover leaning dangerously against a cupboard on the other end of the room near Draco. 

Draco looked up and saw the state of the room.  He groaned.  He frantically thought about what he had to do first.  He knew he hurt his wrist.  First thing was first.  "Infirmary," he said to himself.  Draco pulled himself to his feet and cradled his arm as he looked around.  He knew he still had his wand on him.  He knew he didn't need to bother looking for Tevin's, because he knew it was still in his friend's room.  "Tevin?" he called.  He got a groan in response.  Draco stumbled his way over to his best friend and shook him.  Tevin moaned louder at him.  "Come on, Snape.  We have to get to the infirmary." 

"Book," moaned Tevin.

"What?"

"Dad's book.  His favorite."

Draco looked around for the potion book they were using.  He found it close to where he'd landed.  "Alright we'll stash it in your room before we go, okay?"  Tevin groaned again in what Draco interpreted to be an agreement. 

"Now."

"You want me to do it now, Snape?"

Tevin nodded, and then grimaced as he regretted the action.  "Yeah."

Draco stared at Tevin in disbelief.  "You must be joking," he mumbled to himself as he stalked over to the book.  He picked it up and was surprised that the potion hadn't gotten on it.  He thought about it and realized that he'd probably pushed it off the table with him when the explosion threw him backwards.  At least, that is what the blonde thought.  Draco half stumbled and half jogged through the doorway and into Severus's room, and through the next door that connected that room to Tevin's.  Without stepping over the threshold, Draco tossed the book into the room and watched it slide under Tevin's bed.  He nodded satisfactorily and then made his way back into the lab as quickly as he could. 

"Tevin?"  He heard a soft moan answer him again.  He saw that Tevin was still on the ground.  Draco made his way over.  "Come on, Snape.  Get up."  He leaned down and saw that Tevin's eyes were unfocused and that his head was lolling side to side.  "Oh bloody-"  Draco used his uninjured hand to grab onto Tevin and haul the boy's arm over his shoulders.  Draco almost fell over as he tried to stand up straight to get Tevin standing.  "Come on, Tevin, you can't expect me to drag you all the way there!" 

Tevin's head continued lolling about and he barely managed to get his feet to work.  Draco struggled to stay upright as he supported nearly all of Tevin's weight.  "Ridiculous," he fumed.  He managed to get them both to the hidden doorway that led to the corridor.  Draco opened it just enough to check that no one was in the halls.  He peeked out the door and then he began his journey to the hospital wing of Hogwarts, hoping that no one would find them struggling down the hall. 

"Oh!  I'm so sorry!" practically shouted the fourteen-year-old girl, who began picking up the books and parchment that had flown in every direction. 

The boy on the ground was shaking his head.  "No, it's fine." 

"You okay?"  Before the Gryffindor boy could respond, she continued speaking as she crawled around hurriedly on the floor picking things up, not noticing if they belonged to her or the boy at that point.  "I'm just so clumsy sometimes that I walk before I look where I'm going.  And then things like this happen and that's how everything gets ruined." 

"I'm fine, really."  The boy started to help her pick the books and parchment up.  "Um," he said, trying not to sound awkward.  "You mixed up our stuff."

"Oh, Merlin!" she shouted.  She put it all back on the floor and began to sort it into two piles. 

The red-haired boy began to help her.  "I'm Charlie Weasley, by the way," he said. 

"Tonks," she replied, focused on her separating task. 

"Just ‘Tonks,' then?" he teased with a smile as he put one of the books on How to Put Out the Fires of a Tempermental Dragon in his pile. 

She sighed dramatically.  "Nymphadora."  She picked up a now broken quill and pointed the nib at the boy, as her hair turned bright red and her eyes a matching scarlet.  "Don't call me that or I'll hex you so fast you won't even know it!"

Charlie held up his hands.  "Whoa!" he said, smiling.  "You're a Metamorphmagus!"

"Don't tell anyone, or I'll hex you so-"

"Fast I won't even know it," he finished for her.  "Alright." 

"And don't call me Nymphadora!" she whispered, her hair turning back to a mousy brown color and her eyes going back to a dull grey. 

 "Alright, won't call you by your name."  After a pause he studied her.  "What should I call you then?"

Without looking at him she replied.  "Tonks." 

Charlie nodded.  "Okay, Tonks you are." 

She offered him a shy smile.  "Sorry about your quill."  She held it out to him feebly.  He took it without a word, but with a small grimace.  He knew he would have to pluck up the courage to write to his parents and ask them to send him another quill.  Maybe he would try to ask his brother, Bill, for one first. 

"What year are you in?"

"Um, fourth.  What're you?" she fired back, a little defensively. 

"Third!" he squeaked.  They finally got everything in a pile respective of its owner and they picked up their stack.  Charlie began to walk away from the library and then stopped when he saw that Tonks looked like she couldn't decide where to go.  Charlie walked back to her.  "Hey, where are you going?"

"I was going to go do some studying, but I don't really want to anymore."

Charlie bit his lip anxiously.  "Well, I was going to head outside after I put my books back in the Tower...maybe visit Hagrid for a bit and see if he has a new pet to see..."  He shuffled his feet awkwardly.  "You want to come along?"

Tonks looked up with an expression as though she couldn't understand the verbal gesture.  Then, she smiled.  "Yeah!"  She hurried over to Charlie and then they began to walk towards Gryffindor Tower.  "Mind if I put my stuff in your common room?" 

Charlie shook his head.  "Nope."

She gave her pile to Charlie and he dropped them off in his dormitory.  When he came back out of the portrait hole, they began to walk towards the main doors.  

"Just to warn you," Charlie said, "Hagrid sometimes has some fierce animals so if you are feeling really clumsy maybe you should stand back.  They might set you on fire or bite you or sting you or something." 

Instead of being frightened like Charlie expected any girl would be, Nymphadora's eyes lit up brightly.  "Really?  Cool!" 

"Come on, Snape, this is impossible with you like a corpse!" whined Draco as he was now practically dragging Tevin down the corridor. 

"Stop," moaned Tevin. 

"What?"  Tevin moaned the word again, fainter this time.  "You want to stop?"  Tevin tried to nod, but failed.  "We're only halfway there!" the blonde whined again. 

Then Tevin lurched forward, almost taking Draco with him.  Tevin surged forward again and then fell to his knees out of Draco's grasp.  "Tevin!" he shouted, getting down next to him.  "Come on, get back up!" 

Tevin's head flew backwards and when it came forwards again, he was heaving.  Before Draco could get completely clear of his friend's vomit, he found that his shoes and the hem of his trousers were splattered.  Draco let out a dismayed sound that was a mixture of pity and disgust.  He watched as Tevin continued to heave on the floor.  Draco looked up and down the corridor helplessly.  He didn't think he had the strength to drag Tevin the rest of the way to the infirmary, but he knew he couldn't leave him by himself there as he vomited.  "Help!" he began to shout.  He went down the corridor at least twenty paces and shouted again.  "Help!"

"So, what do you want to do when you get out of Hogwarts?"

"I don't know," Charlie replied.  "Maybe go off somewhere and work with something wild, like...like dragons!  That would be amazing!"

Tonks smiled at him.  "I think I'd like to be an Auror." 

"Why?" 

She shrugged.  "Don't know, really." 

"You're going to have to work on watching where you're going," he teased. 

Tonks, to her humiliation, felt a faint blush heat her cheeks.  "Shut up," she half-giggled. 

In the moment of silence in their conversation they both heard something.  "Help!" 

Tonks turned to Charlie with wide eyes.  "Did you hear that?"  Charlie nodded just as they heard the cry for help again.  "Where's it coming from?"  Then they heard it again.  Charlie pointed. 

They both began jogging down the corridor towards the cry.  When they found the problem, they saw two children in the hall.  "Oh no," she moaned.  "That looks like Professor Snape's son down there on the floor."

"Is that...vomit?" 

"Looks like it," she said, starting forward determinedly.  She looked back and shouted to Charlie.  "You'll have to learn to deal with it if you want to work with animals."  Then, she found herself on the ground, barely registering the surprised and half-horrified shout that accompanied her descent. 

She looked up and saw a blonde-haired, blue-eyed boy looking at her with a pained expression.  "Oh!  I'm so sorry!  Are you okay?"  She had a moment of déjà vu when she realized it was the second time in a half hour that she'd run into someone and landed on the floor. 

"No!" he bit back.  "We have to get to the infirmary!"

"That must is obvious," said Charlie as he reached them.  "What happened?"

Draco looked uncomfortable.  "Um...an accident."

Tonks made her way over to the kneeling form of Tevin who was crying from the effort it took his body to expel what was in his stomache.  "You poor thing," she said, drawing her wand.  "Evanesco," she said firmly as she pointed her wand at the vomit on the ground.  It vanished.  She began rubbing his back. 

Meanwhile, Charlie looked patiently at Draco.  He knew from experience about little kids.  "What kind of accident?"

Draco glared at Charlie.  "I'm not going to tell you!  Only my father and Tevin and the nurse needs to know." 

"And Tevin's father, don't you think?" he replied, calmly. 

Draco didn't say anything to that.  Charlie looked at Draco like he was some sort of animal specimen that he was trying to determine how to deal with.  "What's your name?"

"Draco Malfoy." 

No one noticed Tonks stiffen next to Tevin. 

"Well, Draco Malfoy.  You need to get to the infirmary, and I can get you there.  That sound alright to you?"  Draco nodded.  "Okay, then.  You can walk, right?"  Draco nodded again.  "Okay, I'll carry him," Charlie said, nodding his head towards Tevin, who miserably knelt on the ground with Tonks rubbing his back. 

Charlie helped Draco to his feet and then went over to Tevin and Tonks.  "You still coming?" 

Tonks looked up at Charlie with a look he knew well - the look of an animal desperate for escape.  "Ton-"

"Someone should go and tell Professor Snape," she cut him off from saying her name.  "I'll meet you outside the doors in a bit, okay?"  She scrambled to her feet and took off down the corridor before anyone could say anything else. 

Charlie watched her run away with a bit of confusion before a tiny moan caught his ears.  He looked down at Tevin and as he was trying to figure out how to pick him up, Draco spoke.  "His head's all wobbly.  I think he hit it."  Charlie nodded and then he slowly managed to get Tevin in his arms.  Then, he stood up and he began to lead Draco down the corridor - while he carried Tevin - to the Infirmary.  "Don't worry, you two," he reassured them.  "Madam Pomfrey'll fix you up in no time." 

On the other end of the hallway, Tonks continued to run.  She stopped for a moment to check if the Potions Classroom was occupied.  She listened at the door and heard Professor Snape's voice through it.  She didn't want to burst through the door, so she thought to wait in his office.  She had begun running again before she looked where she was going when her shoulder hit something that was sticking out of the wall.  She was jarred to the side and then she stared at the protrusion. 

It was a door!  Curiously, Nymphadora peered inside.  What she saw was a disaster zone.  There was a melted cauldron on a table, with a ruined potion dripping off of it.  The smell of the room was overwhelmingly bad.  Despite that, she wandered inside.  She looked around and saw that there was another door in the room.  Again, overpowered with curiosity, she approached.

When she went through she was in a bedroom.  She walked over to the desk and then saw handwriting that she'd seen on her potions homework for the last four years.  "Oh no," she gasped, as she realized that she was standing in her Potions Professor's bedroom! 

Without thinking of turning around and going back, she ran for the first door she saw which was right in front of her.  She went through it and found herself in another bedroom which obviously belonged to a child.  She had a fleeting thought that it was odd that the bed hangings were Gryffindor red before she ran to the next door.  She flung it open and ran into what she instantly realized was a parlor.  The first thing she saw was straight ahead of her - the fireplace was blaring green! 

Then, a man stepped out of the green flames.  A man with light brown hair, pallid skin, and a thin physique.  Nymphdora tried to hold back her gasp by clamping her hand over her mouth, but she knew it was heard when the man's bright blue eyes darted up and stared directly at her. 

They both stood frozen, staring at each other, surprised at the other's presence.  Finally, the man spoke in a soft and tired, but alarmed voice.   "Who are you, and why are you here?"