12:34 p.m.
Lunchtime.




Through the cold, murky depths, Shona swam, her braid streaming behind her like a tail—the rest of her just a thin, slip of a shadow moving as fast as it could. It had been almost an hour since she’d ingested gillyweed, and she could already feel its effects beginning to fade. Her breathing grew tight, strained; her toes and fingers began to throb. And the ache would only grow with time, until the webbing totally ebbed away.

Behind her, a seething mass of sharp clicks and tentacles followed– promising retribution if she failed to reach the surface. As soon as she neared another column, Shona hooked a hand at its crumbling base and sharply swung herself in the other direction– losing them, hopefully, before the gillyweed tapped out; she already had a smattering of ‘kisses’ peppering her wrist and cheek, and she wasn’t interested in seeing what else might be in store for her. Nothing nice, that was for sure…

After all, that was what egg-stealing got you.

More shadows emerged from the tall, swaying kelp, their lipless mouths revealing rows of needle-like teeth; swearing, Shona twisted into another direction, pushing off with a powerful kick of her fins. The only thing that offset the hassle (possible death, even) now was the thick, translucent sack she gripped tightly in one hand, sagging with the weight of soft, mottled eggs– eggs that their owners trying to take back.

Lucrezia was so going to owe her for this.

The bright, rippling light of the surface was getting brighter now—closer. With new, desperate determination, Shona kicked against the drag of the water harder than ever, even as her fins began to shrink and she struggled to breathe. Her lungs burning with need, the witch began to claw her way up, breaking the form that had propelled her so smoothly before; for the first time since she’d dived in, a thread of panic zipped through her, like a spark that stayed to grow. She was so close–

Something grabbed her ankle, thin and soft but undeniably strong—suction cups latching on with a vengeance. And it yanked.

A few bubbles escaped her mouth. But rather than breaking out into a full-on panic, she whirled on it, brilliant eyes glaring. More tendrils of hair slipped free from her hair; in that one second of stillness, they floated about her face with a buoyancy the situation lacked. Aw, hell no, she thought, and lifting up her other leg, Shona brought it down on the demon’s head with a vengeance– kicking off that, too.

Pointing her wand, she aimed. Relashio, she snarled, and a jet of boiling hot water teared towards its face. She had less than a second to see the ugly ripple of pain splash across its face before her head broke through the surface, brown-black hair flung back like a whip. Breathe, her lungs burned, and she gasped for air.

Reaching the shore? Felt like forever. And– there was someone there. Feet, in the very least.

But by then her limbs felt like lead, that even an upward twitch of her head felt was just nope. So she slumped onto the dirt and rocks, feeling so numb with exhaustion that they didn’t bother her at all. (She did, however, spend the last good bit of energy she had setting the sack gently on the ground. It glistened like a giant dewdrop under the sun.) “Hey,” she croaked– her voice slightly muffled by the wetsuit-clad crook of her arm. She was too tired to look up. “Can you just,” and she waved pathetically at a nearby boulder, where her clothes– and a towel– lay.

She was really glad it was a Friday. She felt like a tar slug, beached liked this.

It wasn't really that she was worried about Professor Donovan's fate on her quest for the grindylow eggs that Lucrezia[1] so required, it was merely out of respect for the newest staff addition that she was here. Four inches deep in mud in her new heels with a disgusted little scowl on her face, the Potions Mistress waited patiently on the shore of the Black Lake. When Shona Donovan finally resurfaced she looked quite... under the weather. With a raised eyebrow, Ezia looked from the woman to the boulder where her things where and back to the Creatures Professor.

With a little hum, Di Luca sidestepped and leaned for the towel grabbing it cautiously between two fingers and presented it to Donovan. Once she was unburdened of it, she took a few steps back, dragging her heels through the rocky shore, until she was finally back on flat surface. "I see you were successful on your quest" she said conversationally, looking at the sack settled at the beached woman's side. "Here—Pepperup" Ezia added after she cleared her voice, extending her hand with the little vial. That was as good a thank you as any, wasn't it?

"And then this" she offered another vial, a thick murky green liquid inside of it. "So you won't develop a rash from the tentacles." She waited for her colleague to imbue the potions ad retrieved the vials, placing them in her pocket. It was at that point that the stench of the lake finally hit her nose and she coughed violently, taking a hand to her face. Now this was why she never harvested marine or aquatic ingredients. Not to mention she was not very fond of being in deep water.

1.	Courtesy of Libertine Ltd.

Shona supposed it was good a ‘thank you’ as any. It was certainly hard to complain, when your limbs felt like lead and a cure was dangled right in front of you like a bone as a reward for hard work. Pushing up into something resembling a sitting position felt like hell, but it was worth, so worth it, to feel that familiar peppery taste and the subsequent heat rush through her bones. In a span of a few seconds she was already feeling human enough to reach for the other vial– ugh, this stuff was really strong.

Once the steam dissipated into the air (accompanied, of course, by a timely swear), Shona passed back the empty vial and tipped the second one against her lips– “Ye gods,” she gasped, choking back a swallow. A droplet trickled down her chin. “That is vile.”

But like a trooper Shona downed the rest without further aplomb. She might have taste buds (-which, ha, so long, buddies, she knew thee well), but she wasn’t stupid. (Just a teensy, teensy bit dramatic, maybe.) Grindylow rashes were ugly as all hell, and the most efficient way to get rid of them wasn’t necessarily the best way.“What the hell do you put in there?” she grimaced, making a face as she handed back the second one—and the satchel too. “It tastes like swamp and misery.”

She watched her fellow colleague ingest the Pepperup, waving a hand at eye level, to help dissipate the steam, courtesy of the wind direction and pursed her lips slightly. "Yes, I suppose it rather is... I've experimenting with altering the taste for—ah, easier ingestion for a few years now, but I've yet to find something that doesn't alter the main properties of the brew" she said conversationally, lips still held in a tight line. What, was she five? Did she need a spoonful of sugar with it? "Perhaps lemongrass" she said absently, as the possibility just popped in her head.

Turning her head slightly sideways, she frowned and puckered her lips in a sort of confused, yet analyzing expression and hummed softly. "Most antidotes require the antibodies from the host creature's blood created by injecting the toxin into the creature from which the toxin derives from" she said matter-of-factly, with a pleased little smile. "And activated charcoal, as well as epinephrine, of course" she continued, eyebrows furrowed, as if that was, obviously, common knowledge. "And flobberworm mucus, for the consistency. It needs to be slowly absorbed into the tract."

She couldn't help snort a little at Donovan's comparison, as she leaned down for the vial and the satchel. "Yes, I suppose that's a rather accurate way of describing its taste" she said with a twitch of her nose. It was one thing for Lucrezia, which had by normal standards a very sensitive nose as well as taste buds, but she supposed it would be ten times worse for Donovan, with her... condition. Waving her wand to the boulder, she levitated Shona's garments in front of her, waiting for the woman to dry herself off. "These eggs will be put to very good use" she offered apropos to nothing, feeling rather conflicted, seeing as the professor had obviously been through quite an ordeal to procure them.