The reason Casey was disinclined towards Potions could be summed up thusly: when the mere stank of the dungeon stores brought you congestion nausea and headaches you wouldn't want to focus on the subject as well as you should either. It didn't help that Casey considered Potions something of a waste of time. Their effects may be more potent than any spell but there was a lot of similar magic that could be cast in mere moments.

However, under the di Luca professorship of the subject Casey was not going to be skating through the class with minimal focus, much to his annoyance. Beyond academics, however, there were things Casey should pay more attention to with the subject given his numerous allergies and the extent of how that effected what kinds of potions and medicines he was able to take.

That, unfortunately, led to the humiliating circumstances of requesting tutelage from an older student via the bulletin board in the Slytherin common room. And giving up select weekday evenings but that was a milder chagrin. Because no doubts there were going to be judgements made, some older grade student(s) deciding to lord things up with their knowledge and availability and in the inverse portray how meager of a thing Casey was for his potions score. It would likely be as miserable of an experience as those horrid Herbology lessons until Casey had been allowed back into the regular class.

It also didn't help that Casey had a smarting-painful burn on his palm, a tidbit he was hiding with a sleeve folded too long. Hopefully this wouldn't be recognized by Theo Whitman but Casey doubted it, this was the Whitman who considered his Slytherin Prefect-hood like a kingship (in attitude and not literately, because that would mean Whitman would set up a throne in the common room and refer to people as pages, squires and peons). At least his family had caliber so there could be worse tutors to be had but it wouldn't be the Slytherin Aristocracy Club if people weren't trying to one up each other with their heritage.

Casey was already feeling tired and they hadn't even started anything. He wasn't about to look fatigued as he maintained a high sitting posture behind the work table covered with the text and equipment. These sessions had been scheduled in one of the surprisingly numerous private labs apart from the larger classroom.

One hand tucked into a pocket and the other curled around the worn, leathery spine of his old A Collection of Above Three Hundred Receipts in Cookery, Physick, and Surgery, Theo had entered the room early, expression more polite than it was bored, although for all it lit upon the fourth year’s form there was a distinct lack of enthusiasm.

Tutoring. As a prefect, a student with near perfect grades and reputation, a known Potions talent, the indubitable favorite of the current professor of said subject, and one of her aides… tutoring was expected of him, an obligation that, while officially voluntary, was one that he had been expected to take on—by others as well as himself. Offering his services had been the next logical step, after all things had been considered, that it only seemed natural to cement a (mostly) sterling reputation with an image of benevolence. Whether the sentiment was genuine or not mattered little, for what did was that he had offered at all, knowing well that he would be expected to deliver. What had been meant held little value, nowhere near as much as what one actually did…

And so here he was, spending a rare evening not in the company of friend nor esteemed professor, but with an underclassman whose existence he was only vaguely aware of. Theo knew the name of every Slytherin currently attending, if not every student in the castle, but beyond that he knew only the basics and wasn’t particularly interested in rectifying that; fourth years were something of a trifle—amusing at best, but boring overall, more so when there was little worthy of note in terms of self worth or otherwise. Potential… usefulness. Save for a very select few– whose own importance were largely tied to their older acquaintances anyway–the prefect had little interest in them to begin with.

Luckily– or perhaps not so luckily; Theo would be one of the first to concede that his attention wasn’t always welcome, though it was an admission by intimation, rather than elaboration– Casey O’Doherty could count himself among them. The fourth year’s ambition was as secret as Harcroft’s ineptitude, and that, Theo supposed, was worth noticing.

…Probably. If Casey thought he would use the evening as an opportunity to lord one over an only marginally interesting fourth year, then Theo suspected that the fourth year would, at worst, see this as an opportunity to ‘prove the upperclassman wrong’. At best, the younger Slytherin would simply have to grit his teeth and bear it– for hierarchy existed in their House more than it did in the others.

Quietly, graciously, Theo waited until he deemed Casey to be fully settled in—for that slight pair of shoulders to slump, his cue to begin. “O’Doherty,” he drawled, his gaze slowly lifting from the book he’d been flipping through, “welcome. For your session we’ll be working on a Girding Potion this evening. You’ll find it on page two hundred and eighty-three, in the Enhancements section,” and with a thumb closely pressed at the anthology’s spine, he briefly held it up for a glance. “I trust you know which shelves to browse.”

Although… “Unless there is something else you would rather work on instead,” Theo went back to reading, flicking over the next page, visibly disinterested. No, whatever tidbit Casey was hiding was not lost on him; while it was next to impossible to surmise what exactly that tidbit was, from where he was, the sixth year– already well-versed in injuries after causing so many himself –could hazard a guess.

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