Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

She raised her quill and dotted an ‘i’ so ferociously that she punctured a hole in her parchment. Harry said nothing. He thought his voice might soon vanish from the lack of use. He bent a little lower over Advanced Potion-Making and continued to make notes on Everlasting Elixirs, occasionally pausing to decipher the prince’s useful additions to Libatius Borage’s text.

“And incidentally,” said Hermione, after a few moments, “you need to be careful.”

“For the last time,” said Harry, speaking in a slightly hoarse tone after three-quarters of an hour of silence, “I am not giving back this book. I’ve learned more from the Half-blood prince than Snape or Slughorn have taught me in—”

“I’m not talking about your stupid so-called prince,” said Hermione, giving his book a nasty look as though it had been rude to her. “I’m talking about earlier. I went into the girl’s bathroom just before I came in here and there were about a dozen girls in there, including that Romilda Vane, trying to decide how to slip you a love potion. They’re all hoping they’re going to get you to take them to Slughorn’s party, and thay all seem to have bought Fred and George’s love potions, which I’m afraid to say probably work—”

“Why didn’t you confiscate them then?” demanded Harry, it seemed extraordinary that Hermione’s mania for upholding the rules could have abandoned her at this crucial juncture.

“They didn’t have the potions with them in the bathroom,” said Hermione scornfully, “They were just discussing tactics. As I doubt the Half-

Blood Prince,” she gave the book another scornful look, “could dream up an antidote for a dozen different love potions at once, I’d just invite someone to go with you, that’ll stop all the others thinking they’ve still got a chance. It’s tomorrow night, they’re getting desperate.”

“There isn’t anyone I want to invite,” mumbled Harry, who was still not trying to think about Ginny any more than he could help, despite the fact that she kept cropping up in his dreams in ways that made him devoutly thankful that Ron could not perform Legilimency.

“Well, just be careful what you drink, because Romilda Vane looked like she meant business,” said Hermione grimly.

She hitched up the long roll of parchment on which she was writing her Arithmancy essay and continued to scratch away with her quill. Harry watched her with his mind a long way away.

“Hang on a moment,” he said slowly. “I thought Filch had banned anything bought at Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes?”

“And when has anyone ever paid attention to what Filch has banned?” asked Hermione, still concentrating on her essay.

“But I thought all the owls were being searched. So how come these girls are able to bring love potions into the school?”

“Fred and George send them disguised as perfumes and cough potions,” said Hermione. “It’s part of their Owl order service.”

“You know a lot about it.”

Hermione gave him the kind of nasty look she had just given his copy of Advanced Potion-Making.

“It was all on the back of the bottles they showed Ginny and me in the summer,” she said coldly, “I don’t go around putting potions in people’s drinks… or pretending too either, which is just as bad…”

“Yeah, well, never mind that,” said Harry quickly. “The point is, Filch is being fooled, isn’t he? These girls are getting stuff into the school disguised as something else! So why couldn’t Malfoy have brought the necklace into the school—?”

“Oh, Harry… not that again…”

“Come on, why not?” demanded Harry.

“Look,” sighed Hermione, “Secrecy Sensors detect jinxes, curses, and concealment charms, don’t they? They’re used to find dark magic and dark objects. They’d have picked up a powerful curse, like the one in the necklace, within seconds. But something that’s just been put in the wrong bottle wouldn’t register—anyway Love potions aren’t dark or dangerous—”

“Easy for you to say,” muttered Harry, thinking of Romilda Vane.

“—so it would be down to Filch to realise it wasn’t a cough potion, and he’s not a very good wizard, I doubt he can tell one potion from—”

Hermione stopped dead; Harry had heard it too. Somebody had moved close behind them among the dark bookshelves. They waited, and a moment later the vulturelike countenance of Madam Pince appeared around the corner, her sunken cheeks, her skin like parchment, and her long hooked nose illuminated unflatteringly by the lamp she was carrying.

“The library is now closed,” she said, “Mind you return anything you have borrowed to the correct—what have you been doing to that book, you depraved boy?”

“It isn’t the library’s, it’s mine!” said Harry hastily, snatching his copy of Advanced Potion-Making off the table as she lunged at it with a clawlike hand.

“Spoiled!” she hissed. “Desecrated, befouled!”

“It’s just a book that’s been written on!” said Harry, tugging it out of her grip.