Love Potion No. 9 (Grey)

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina always thought Grey was a little off; okay, maybe more than just a little off. But lately, her fellow Gryffindor had been stranger than usual. For one, he never stopped talking about Ondina Weasley of all people. Sure, she supposed if she thought about it Ondina was a pretty girl, Daryl Thomas certainly agreed with his dorm mate. But before this year, this past month really, she couldn’t remember them even having any sort of interaction whatsoever. He’d also been very aloof and loopy too, almost as if he was on something. Then his sister Addilyn had approached her with the Auror trainee Finn Jordan regarding Grey’s recent behavior. When they asked about antidotes, it all slowly began to fall into place for the Krum girl.


Love potion.


Was it the only way to explain Grey’s abrupt behavior change? No, but to Irina it was the most logical. She was incredibly happy then to realize that she had offered to tutor Grey in Potions after their chance meeting in the Kitchens, way before the Champions were selected. She had never had the opportunity to offer the tutoring sessions; she had gotten busy with her own schoolwork and Dan, but since Dan had needed some space to figure out what was going on with his head, Irina realized this was the perfect distraction for her. So she asked Grey to meet her down in the dungeons so they could go over Antidotes, which could go disastrous if brewed incorrectly. As a test, she had told him that Ondina would be coming later on for Potions tutelage as well, which was anything but the truth but as Potions Club captain it could be believable. When Grey jumped at the opportunity, Irinas’ suspicions were all but confirmed. So she waited for Grey in the dungeons, ingredients for the basic antidote by his cauldron, and the love potion antidote by hers; luckily they looked so similar that Irina highly doubted he would notice a difference.

grey xavier slater

[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

Good things happened to good people, at least that’s what Grey had always been told. He didn’t think he was anywhere on the spectrum of good behavior while at school though; he’d already been reprimanded numerous times by the Gryffindor prefects, aurors, Finn, the works. So when he was offered to have extra potions lessons by Irina, something he vaguely remembered them talking about earlier in the year, it was hard not to pass up the offer. Truth be told, there was an extra caveat about being tutored that he hadn’t had the heart to tell Irina about. He was only going because Ondina was too. Destiny. It had to be that. He had found it rather odd that someone as perfect as Ondina needed extra potions lessons, but maybe it was because she was so perfect that life got in the way. He knew his life did that all the time. Sleeping and thinking about her took up most of his waking moments. Pure, utter bliss. That’s what it was.

Off he went to the potions classroom to meet Irina, and eventually Ondina. As she had explained it, Ondina wouldn’t be there until later, which was good because he could mentally prepare himself. Not that he needed it, but there really hadn’t been too many times where he had interacted with her around other people. It’d be good practice before shocking the daylights out of everyone at the Yule Ball. He had already almost given Addi a heart attack when he told her a week ago.

Pushing the door to the classroom open, he saw that Irina had everything set up already. That was good. He was going to be practically useless once Ondina showed up, so the faster they got to making antidotes the better off he was going to be when it came to learning everything. “Thanks again for this.” He said as he made his way over to what he presumed was his station. “I’m sure you’ve seen me struggling a bit in class.” That was an understatement. Grey tried to laugh it off as he stared into the empty cauldron. He hated these things.

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina had to stifle a laugh when Grey came in; Merlin how long had he been under the effects of the love potion? “Well I am happy to help, and antidotes are probably one of the most important things you’ll ever have to brew properly. For example, if you know how to brew an antidote and Ondina has one of her asthma attacks, you can help her,” she explained with a little smirk. She tapped her wand first under her own cauldron, then under Grey’s and the fires began to burn.


“To start, we need to add the base liquid in, fill up the cauldron about half way,” she told him. She watched as he poured the liquid base into the designated line before filling her own. “Next, we must add the Wiggentree twigs; your antidote should turn green - if it’s not green enough then go ahead and add one or two more.” She added the Wiggentree twigs and watched as her antidote turned bright green. So far, so good; Grey wasn’t the least bit suspicious. “Then, stir your potion clockwise until it turns a brilliant orange,” she instructed, turning the spoon until her antidote flashed and turned bright orange. “Then add three drops of castor oil; the potion should turn blue.” She added the castor oil and watched her potion turn blue. “Am I going too fast for you? If you get this right the first time around you know Ondina will be able to get here quicker,” she asked, raising a brow at him.

grey xavier slater

linky to potion steps

[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

His face lit up a little when Irina mentioned knowing about antidotes could help Ondina in case of one of her asthma attacks. He had never thought of that before, probably because that thing was pretty new to him still. Irina was really thoughtful though. It was too bad he had ruined a possible friendship over the past few years, because she definitely would have been able to help him with potions before they got to this point.

Watching her light the fire under his cauldron, Grey listened to the instructions intently. This was important, since he was going to be in a field where common knowledge of potions and antidotes could mean life or death for him or another auror. The last thing he wanted was to have his shortcomings mean someone else’s demise. And like Irina had already mentioned, he could help Ondina out if she needed it. That was number one in his books. Pouring the liquid into the cauldron, he half expected something to blow up. He knew it wasn’t really possible, but there had been times where he managed to cause some sort of destruction upon his hands and face. Usually he just put the wrong ingredients in and they happened to go boom.

Irina was going quickly, obviously she had mastered this antidote before. He assumed they had covered this in class at some point, so didn’t think it was pertinent to inquire what the antidote was actually for. As long as he knew how to make it, he could always ask at the end. Dropping in the Wiggentree twigs, the potion turned a nice bright green. Grey grinned. He wasn’t too shabby at this! A little patience and clearer instructions was all he needed to do everything correct. Stirring it as Irina directed, the liquid turned the assigned color. “No this is a good pace. Can’t dawdle all day.” Grey added three drops of the castor oil to the cauldron, turning the liquid blue. Enticing him with Ondina seemed like cheating, but he was definitely going to do his best to get it done in time. Surely that had to be impressive.

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina peered into Grey’s cauldron to see his progress and offered him a curt nod and a small smile. “Good,” she said, turning back to her own cauldron. “The next steps get repetitive mind you, but are essential in creating the perfect antidote,” she warned, purposely leaving out the fact that this was a love potion antidote. Combine the potions effects plus Grey’s obvious inability to pay attention much in Potions, and Irina was sure he had no idea what was going on. “Stir your potion until it turns purple, then once it turns purple we’re going to add the first extract of Gurdyroot until it turns red,” she told him, stirring her potion and watched as it changed from blue to purple. She picked up her bottle of the extract and emptied three drops into the cauldron; it glowed bright red.

They continued until they got to the last step. "Right, so this can be a bit tricky, so be mindful and pay attention," Irina instructed, looking over at Grey seriously. Irina was only minorly nervous that she would get this wrong, but she had done a test run the previous day just to make sure and it had looked exactly like the book said it would. "Add seven, EXACTLY seven Wiggenweld twigs, then let it simmer until it turns pale pink," she said. She carefully counted out the Wiggenweld twigs, and then prodded the fire so it went down a bit to let the potion simmer. As hers began to turn pink, she walked over to Grey and peered into the cauldron. "How is it looking do you think," she asked him.

grey xavier slater

[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

Everything was working smoothly. That had never happened with him and potions before. Never. Not even with the basics. Grey hadn’t cheated his way into the NEWT level class, but it was quite apparent that he was one of the worst in it. He recalled Anna saying she was struggling just as much as he was, so it wasn’t like he was a lost cause yet.

Grey nodded his head as Irina briefly mentioned that the next steps were repetitive. Great. He was probably going to be expected to count how many times he half-stirred the liquid in the cauldron, or would need to alternate between ingredients. He let out a sigh of relief as she explained the actual instructions. That wasn’t nearly as bad as he anticipated. Most of his problems with potions had to do with not wanting to be patient with it, tossing things in before they were ready to go in, or putting the wrong stuff in completely. Taking it slow like this definitely help fix that though.

Grey continued to stir the potion until the purple hue appeared and then dropped Gurdyroot extract just as Irina told him too. A few drops in and it started to look like it the red was coming through. And then it stopped. He paused, preventing any more drops from going in. The color stayed a strange mix of purplish-red. Squinting at the cauldron, he let another drop into it, and almost immediately it burst into a red color. Scary how effective some things were.

Looking up at Irina, they were onto the next step. Apparently it got trickier. Getting the Wiggenweld twigs ready, Grey started letting them fall in one by one, finally stopping when he reached the correct amount. “Eight of them. Got it.” He smirked. “Just kidding, I put seven in…I think.” Grey shrugged, returning his gaze to the cauldron. Now all he had to do was let it simmer until it turned a pink color. That was easy. Within no time it started to turn and Irina made her way over to observe his work. “It looks good to me.” He could barely see the top of her potion, and the colors were almost identical. “Only way is to test it. Antidotes are the ones safe to drink, right?”

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina narrowed her eyes at him. “You know when you make those jokes, you think you're funny. But then when you're making that one little mistake and the antidote blows up in your face, everyone will be laughing at you,” she told him with a smirk, then laughed to ensure him she was joking. Well, mostly joking. Aside from history, Potions was Irina's most passionate subject, and was very aware of the consequences of making one tiny mistake in a potion or its' antidote. She looked at her antidote and it was the perfect shade of pink. Perfect. “Why don't we bottle this up for Professor Constantine; he had mentioned last Potions club meeting that he was planning on introducing these antidotes in the next few classes,” she told him. She didn't want him testing out his own antidote, not when it had taken that long to go from purple to red. She needed to ensure that the antidote Grey was about to take would actually work and relieve him of his current state.

“You did well though, and doing well does deserve a break,” Irina relented, somewhat begrudgingly. He had done much better than he had in the past, and she wondered if it was in part because she dangled Ondina in front of him. Truth be told she had not interacted much with the girl; they didn't hate each other per se. If anything, Irina didn't mind her because they both hated her cousin Rose. But still, love potioning someone was wrong and needed to be remedied. Irina looked over to make sure Grey wasn't paying attention to her as she pulled out two bottles of pumpkin juice. Quickly she slipped a bit of the love potion antidote into Grey's bottle before turning around. “Here,” she said, offering the juice to him. She toasted his bottle with a clink and a small smile. “To Ondina,” she said, taking a sip of her own pumpkin juice.

grey xavier slater

[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

Grey shut-up after his joke about placing the wrong amount of ingredients in. He knew Irina was joking with her comment about it blowing up in his face, but it had happened to him before. That one had hit a little close to home, and he realized that making light of it could actually be a serious matter under the right circumstances. Grey nodded silently in agreeance as Irina mentioned bottling up her potion for the professor. That would be nice for him. People these days were crazy. Whatever this antidote was actually for, maybe it would come in handy for the professor or one of his lessons. Then Irina said that there was a possibility this one would be taught in one of the upcoming lessons. Having prior knowledge like this was kind of nice for once. Typically he’d get upset that he went out of his way to do something before it was actually assigned. This time though, knowing about it beforehand meant he could do better in class, maybe even impress everyone. Irina’s acknowledgement of doing well added to that sense of accomplishment too. He’d have to remember to tell Ondina about it when she got here.

He was about to ask about Ondina, but Irina was busy bottling up the antidote, amongst other things. About to offer his help, she had already turned around and was carrying two bottles of something. From the looks of it, pumpkin juice. So now they were celebrating him completing an antidote without blowing up? That worked for him. It was a rather large accomplishment on his part after all. “Thanks.” Grey took the bottle from her, toasting it to hers before taking a sip. He was about to say it was to Ondina as well, but for some reason that didn’t seem right. Why wasn’t that right anymore? He looked down at the bottle and back up at Irina, a confused look coming across his face. “This wasn’t just pumpkin juice was it?” That was the only explanation he could come up with. One second his mind was racing about Ondina, and then it wasn’t. Not only was he not thinking about her anymore, he didn’t feel anything for her. At all. It was all gone. Missing. Grey peered into the bottle without looking back up at Irina. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”

(Grey's reaction next post)

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina hadn’t realized she had been holding in her breath while Grey took the sip of pumpkin juice spiked with the love potion antidote. She let it out as he tipped back the bottle and drank, happy that he hadn’t questioned anything. She shook her head slowly as Grey’s facial expression started to change. “Oh, it’s pumpkin juice alright. But with a little something extra,” she told him. She waited as the antidote worked its’ magic, watching as he went from aloofly happy to confused in the matter of a few moments. Irinas’ face twisted as she allowed a wry smile to grace it.


“You, Grey Slater, have just been cured of a love potion spell,” she told him, standing up and walking over to him. “Ondina’s been slipping you the potion for some time now. Your sister noticed, told Finn and instead of turning you both over to professors, he came to me.” She paused, taking another sip of her pumpkin juice and nodding at his. “Continue drinking; I don’t know how strong the potion was so you’ll want to keep a flask of the antidote on you in case of any relapses.” She pressed a bottle of the antidote into Grey’s hand, then nodded at his bag. “You should empty out your bag, it’s probably been administered somehow using something you use daily,” she instructed.

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[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

Seconds. That was all it took for Grey’s face to go from a look of confusion to one of realization about what was going on. A love potion. Great. That meant everything he had done, said, even his thoughts. He had probably looked like an idiot the last few weeks too. No, he knew he acted like an idiot; a love struck fool that lived to catch a glimpse of a girl that didn’t reciprocate his fabricated feelings. It was all sorts of messed up. Irina’s explanation helped relieve a lot of the questions that were building up in his head. The first would have been who was doing it, but that made sense now that he wasn’t in love with Ondina anymore. At least he didn’t think he was. There was still the sense that it felt right to him, but it wasn’t the same kind of overwhelming urge that it had been only moments before. The whole thing was freaky. Having emotions, whether they were real in the first place or not, manipulated so easily like this was not fun. Grey knew he’d have to start watching himself and applying antidotes on the regular once he became an auror. That was part of the job. Starting that now made him feel like he was becoming too paranoid, but apparently that was the smartest move at the end of the day.

Grey nodded his head throughout Irina’s explanation, taking each bit of information in one at a time and processing it. Addi had figured it out. It had to have been during their talk in the Great Hall at breakfast that one day. Or argument rather, since he remembered having been rather quarrelsome with her about Ondina. He’d have to apologize about that later, even though he wasn’t in the right frame of mind. Finn too, he deserved a thank you as well. Irina wouldn’t have been able to help him without either of them.

At the mention of the potion still possibly having an effect on him, Grey immediately chugged the rest of the pumpkin juice. He wasn’t leaving anything to chance at this point. He’d even drink another three glasses full of antidote if needed. “Thanks Irina.” Was all he could really get out at this point, still trying to process everything that had happened and how it wasn’t real at all.

He moved over to his bag and dumped everything out of it as instructed. Hopefully it wasn’t on a notebook or pen. “How easy do you think it would be for someone to drop it into my morning coffee? Ondina never came over there, so that means it had to be someone else right?” At least he didn’t think it was her. By this point, the love potion could have been on anything he touched or owned, just to insure that he was dosed up every day. That seemed like quite a bit of effort to put towards someone like him. “Wonder if this was because of that…” He said, voicing his thoughts, somewhat forgetting Irina was there while he continued emptying his bag out. That being him breaking the deal with Theodosia about not contacting Addi. If it was, it definitely seemed overboard. Then again, nothing made sense with girls these days, especially ones out with a vengeance. The only thing scary than them were love potions. Hell, love was scary. He could do without it for a while.


(Grey's reaction next post)

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina didn't answer him immediately when he asked if it would be easy for someone to slip him a Love Potion. The truth was there were a lot of variables in the answer; it depended on the person it was being used against, and the person delivering it.  Grey was not exactly the sharpest tack in the bunch, but he wasn't an idiot either.  Ondina could be very calculating though; it was also incredibly possible that she'd recruited people to do the work for her.  People who wouldn't suspect she was up to no good being around Grey.  There were a lot of questions with the whole situation, more questions than answers at this point.  "It's possible.  If you were reading the Daily Prophet during breakfast, or working on an article while drinking some water, it's entirely possible that's when it was slipped to you," she finally said.  

She bottled up more of her antidote and handed it to him.  "You should keep this with you at all times.  Just in case.  And don't accept drinks from strangers, though that is something you shouldn't be doing anyway," she said, with a small hint of a smile.  Her eyebrows furrowed as Grey trailed off on his thought; it was very mysterious and made Irina curious.  "Maybe it's about what?" she asked, deciding to go ahead with the question.  She had just cured him of a love potion after all, she had the right to at least ask what he was talking about.


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[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

Any point in which he was eating it could have been slipped to him. That was literally three times a day. Always being in the Great Hall at the busiest times didn’t help either. That meant anyone could have done it if it wasn’t Ondina herself. Disgusting that she was able to manipulate so many people like that. Having that sick feeling towards her eased his mind though, because he knew now that everything before had been false. Still, it felt so real. Scary. Grey reached out and took the extra antidote from Irina. So this was going to be his lifeline until he broke the news to Ondina. Perfect. Probably a little afterwards too. Knowing what she was capable of now, anything was possible. He had a feeling this could be the end of it all, but there really was no telling. Anything more was immature and childish in his opinion. “At least I’ll know what’s wrong if I fall head over heels for her again.”

He hadn’t anticipated Irina to question his thought about why Ondina would do this. It seemed plausible to him though. “My sister and one of her friends had issues with one of Ondina’s younger Slytherin friends. I kind of jumped into the middle of it and cut a deal with the girl, where I wouldn’t talk to Addi and she would leave them alone.” Repeating all of that again hit home how awful that deal was in the first place. It was done with though. Or at least he thought it had been. Apparently not if this love potion was in retaliation. “I ended up breaking the terms and then this started up some time at the end of November. Makes me wonder if this is their revenge for cutting the deal short.”

[Irina Rose Krum]

Irina listened as Grey told her of the deal he’d made with one of the Slytherin girls; she knew there was a clique of Slytherins who called themselves the Hexens, and that Ondina was one of them. Most likely if Grey had broken a deal with one, any of the others would gladly retaliate on her behalf. “I think that is the most possible scenario at this point,” she agreed, then her face softened slightly. “I am sorry this happened to you Grey, truly I am. Regardless of how much you used to annoy me, I wouldn’t wish being Love Potioned on anyone.” She meant it too; she’d experienced real, emotionally raw love with Daniel and though loving an empath was difficult sometimes, she wouldn’t trade it or him for the world.

Irina hesitated before speaking again. “If it is alright with you, I’d like to tell Roxy about this. Ondina likely got the potions from Weasley Wizarding Wheezes because let’s be honest, she’s not a dab hand at Potions. Since she’s the owners’ niece, it’d be easy enough for her to order or get her hands on some. Roxy has her fathers’ ear though; she could get the assurance that they won’t be sold to Hogwarts students from the owner himself,” she told him. Roxy Weasley was his best bet of this not repeating itself; she would be livid to hear that her cousin was using her fathers’ products for something like this.

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ooc: feel free to end on next post <3

[grey xavier slater]

Irina Rose Krum

He nodded his head back and forth as Irina agreed that he had probably been love potioned for breaking the deal. Honestly, it was the only thing that made sense. Grey had tried to swat a bee, and instead got stung by the whole hive. Needless to say, he was going to be smart before approaching them again. Ondina, from what his non-lovelorn self could deduce, got bored with things easily. She was probably already tired of her little game anyways, but would keep it going just to spite him. Theodosia was simply her nasty little gang member and she was the mob boss. Playing with potions and hearts on a whim. He couldn’t be too mad, he was already starting to find the whole thing hilarious, outside of acting like a fool in front of his sister and probably the entire house. “I wouldn’t either.” He responded. “There’s something messed up about falsifying feelings like that. I imagine the real thing is something less…obsessive. Don’t really care to find out anymore.”

Irina then brought up telling Roxy about it. He bit down on his lip in thought, unsure if telling more people was a good idea or not. Roxy and Ondina were cousins after all. Who was to say that wouldn’t slip out at some point before he could get back at her? Grey could still get into the Yule Ball on his press badge, but it simply wouldn’t be the same as getting an authentic reaction out of Ondina. “Yeah…I think that’s fine. Roxy has a pretty good sense of right and wrong, so I’m sure telling her won’t hurt.” The damage had been done already anyways.

Looking at the vial of antidote again, Grey twirled it around before stuffing it into his pocket. That was his lifeline from now on. He had to come up with a plan to break the news to Ondina. He was sure she would probably laugh in his face for not being completely stupid and then leave, but even that would be satisfying. "Thanks again Irina. I don’t have too many ways I could help out, but I owe you one.” Giving her one last smile, Grey grabbed his bag off the table and left the potions room. This was going to be a long month until the Yule Ball.

[THE END]