Sebastian carefully set about making sure everything was ready. Of all of the classes, this was the one that would have student who truly loved potion making or needed it for the careers they sought after school. To his way of thinking then, this was one of the most important classes he would teach. He carefully restocked the cupboards and made sure all of the ingredients were fresh as possible.

He could hear students in the hall now moving closer so with one last check to make sure all was ready he unlocked the class room and watched at the students came in. He went to his desk and sat down giving them a heartfelt smile. "Good evening class. Congratulations for passing your O.WL.s with Outstanding  in Potions. I expect you to continue this in my class of course. You are all now N.E.W.T students and we will be working with some of the most difficult potions, where the slightest mistake can ruin your potion. I say this not to discourage you but to arm you with that knowledge." He stood again and  placed a vial in front of each table.

Once he had done so he went back to his desk. "Keep your books in your bags for right now, I want you to use only what you know. Open the vial and smell it, but do not let any touch you or drink any of it. I want you simply to describe what it is and based on that what the potion is in front of you." He watched carefully as they all opened the potion to make sure none got any on them. and after all had smelled it poitined at a hand that went up.

Harold was relieved they weren't diving into making potions right away. This was going to one of the more difficult NEWT classes for him, so he gingerly opened the vial and then began to take a few snuffs of the spiraling steam.

He first caught the eerie smell still, damp scent of rocky earth, and then he had to move the vial away as he was overcome by the heavy, blanketing scent of leaves hiding a whiff of thorny wood. Once he pulled the vial back for another snuff, he smelled tough, worn and scaly leather.

Harold gave an approving nod, "A cave, a hawthorn tree, and dragon-hide boots." The Slytherin then carefully placed the vial back on the table and pusged it far away from him.

Once Naomi had popped open her table's vial and focused her gaze on the potion's mother of pearl sheen-the sheen that reminded her of the ocean she missed-she gave a disapproving pout of her lips.

But she relaxed her expression, put the vial down in front of her and then waved some of the steam towards her nose. Her nostrils filled with cold mountain air churning with warm tropical air, salty petrichor that tingled with the threat of thunder, and the musty scent of old books.
 
"Smells like 'di northernmost Andes, an ocean storm, and library books." And since Harold smelled something completely different, but his potion looked the same as her table's, Naomi raised her hand.

Once the professor called on her she gestured towards the vial, "Are all 'dem Amortentia?"

Ayla suddenly wished she had held off on smelling her potion until Naomi had asked her question. Had she known ahead of time that they were vials of the love potion she would have given it a wide berth. Unfortunately she had popped her cap as soon as instructed and took a deep waft of the shimmering liquid. She closed her eyes as the pleasant and alluring smells invaded her senses. Fresh Cut grass, still baking cupcakes and a deep musky scent that reminded her of a morning after . . . Her eyes flew open and she turned a deep crimson, fumbling with the vial to place it as far away from her as possible.

"Are all 'dem Amortentia?"

Ayla suddenly glared at the vial and sneered, feeling betrayed by her own senses, "Holy Helga, please tell me the scent can change." She had spoken more on reflex than anything else but it was an interesting question to pose. She couldn't imagine that what she thought love 'smelled' like at nearly Seventeen would be the same as when she was twenty seven.

Sebastian nodded. "Yes they are all Amortentia. Well spotted Miss Foley. Amortentia is called the strongest love potion, it is unique in the fact that it smells differently for each person. The smells are often connected to things you love in some form." He walked back and collected each vial, making sure that all of them were sealed.  After he finished this he  placed all the vials in a case but one he turned to the class and looked each person in the eye an then uncorked the vial. "It is not something you should ever think of as a simple potion, it is in my opinion one of the most dangerous potions because it creates a powerful infatuation which mimics love, but the  potion has to be ingested regularly or else the effect dissolve and it can cause the counter of love. Hate."

He set the vial down and looked at each person in his class. "Hate and love are two sides of the same coin, if you use a love potion you risk bringing forth hatred as well. But for today we will be working on not a love potion or a hate potion, we are going to make a antidote for love potions."

He pointed his wand at the board and the instruction appeared

Add four Wiggentree twigs, or until the potion turns green.
Stir until the potion turns orange.
Add castor oil until the potion turns blue.
Stir until the potion turns purple.
Add extract of Gurdyroot until the potion turns red.
Add Wiggentree twigs.
Add Extract of Gurdyroot until the potion turns purple.
Leave the potion to simmer till it turns red.
Add more gurdyroot extract till it turns green.
Stir till it turns orange.
Add seven Wiggentree twigs.
Allow to simmer till it turns pink.

He turned the class and smiled. "Go ahead and pull out your books. We are going to begin with this version however we are going to also be seeing way we could improve this antidote. I expect most of you by now have realized that every potion can be changed,  So, I want you all to pick something you think might change the potion for the better and do so" He then went to his own desk and picked up the vial and drank the entire thing. "Be quick however. Because one of these potions you make will help counter the vial I just drank."

As the professor paused and turned to cast the instructions on the board, Harold whipped out his quill and parchment and glanced towards the Hufflepuff table as he quietly said, "I'm sure if you work hard, like a proper 'puff, it'll smell different in a week." 

Harold then rewrote the instructions as pictoral instructions, stood up to get his things sorted, and then froze at the sight of the professor drinking one of the vials.

With brows high on his forehead and his jaw recovered from the floor he added, "Merlin-you'll have a healthy infatuation with yourself, right? Please?" And Harold continued to remain frozen to the spot, as if staring would somehow undo what had just happened.

Naomi wrapped and twisted her raven locs into an updo as the instructions appeared on the board and then began to gather up ingredients as she thought of ways to change the potion.

The rowan-like[1] bitterness of wiggentree twigs, the thickness of barely-nutty castor oil, and the snot-tasting[2] gurdyroot was a horrible, healing mixture of textures, smells and tastes that was foul on anyone's senses and not easy to compliment. So Naomi was going to take a few minutes to find some ingredients that were practical and easily accessed at Hogwarts only to see Professor Darkfall down a whole vial of Amorentia.

Naomi paused and slowly blinked at the professor as she let her brain merk her previous thinking process so that muscle memory and senses could reign freely.

The Slytherin sucked her teeth and pulled out a jar of pale lemon liquid, "I'm t'inking I'll use cacao sweatings[3] as a base." She then quickly set up the rest of her equipment so she could get to work before things took a turn for the weird.

1.	listed as a magical rowan in the wiki
2.	mentioned as tasting like this in the wiki
3.	The cocoa fruit pulp that encases cocoa beans. The pulp is sweet and acidic and is left on the cocoa beans to ferment or "sweat" the beans in the sun or artificial heat to infuse them with more flavor and nutrients.

Sweat started pours out of Sebastian's forehead and his color started to pale "No mister knight, the potion I drank was made by someone else, I do hope you are working though, time is of the essence here" He collapsed into his seat eyes screwed shut as he fought the effect. "IN the real world you may need to......... Deal with a person who was just dosed with some............Thing, and have to move quick. SO we will........Be..........doing so here in class from time, to...............Time." His body shook a little as he paled even more.

He heard Naomi's idea. "Cacao, is often used in love potions.............If you intend to counter a love p-p-p-potion.......with another love potion, think about how you will counter it." He gripped the table tightly, his face going from a  smile to a grimace

Kyson had been lucky enough not to actually smell the potion when it had been first handed out. Though he was sort of curious as to what it would smell like. Then again judging by the mixed reactions from his fellow classmates (or in the case of Collins complete disgust) he was likely better off not knowing.

As he left his desk to collect the ingredients he needed he smirked at the Hufflepuff, "Knight's right, knowing you it'll just change in a week anyway." He ignored her protest and was about to fill his arms with ingredients when the Professor downed the potion himself.

So they were to brew him an antidote in time before he went mad? Sure, no pressure.

Kyson stopped by Harold's side watching the sweat bead on the Professor's face. He nudged his fellow Slytherin careful not to drop the ingredients he had managed to gather, "Think if the Professor ends up dying they'll give us straight O's for the rest of the year?"

Ayla sneered at Harold then cursed at Kyson. How dare they? Boys were insufferable. Why did she ever want to start dating again?  Here she was, thinking shs was going to finally get a break this year with all her bullies having graduated. She supposed she shouldn't have put it past any of the Slytherins in her own year to not be utterly wretched.

She pushed past Cavanaugh to collect her supplies, a worried look towards the Professor. She didn't like altering Potions. She was much more adept at altering a recipe. She knew what would happen to a cookie or a cake when she substituted certain ingredients. Potions, not so much.

She quietly got to work on her Potion. When she had a moment where her brew needed to simmer and she wasn't required to add anymore ingredients she began to dig through her bag. She pulled out a small tin and walked to the front of the class where the pale Professor was sweating and looked like he was about to lose his latest meal.

Ayla opened the small tin and offered the contents to the Professor. The small treats inside were chocolate covered biscuits with a layer of mint cream inside, "It's not an antidote but it should help with the sweating." Ayla had created the newest recipe over the summer to help cool the body down from the summer heat. With a light blush she left the tin behind and hurried back to her potion just in time to stir it and add the next ingredient.

Harold would have probably tried will things to undo themselves a little longer if he hadn't been nudged. The younger Knight startled and looked at Kyson before he gave his housemate a smirk, "Are you becoming a Shakespearean romantic on me, Kyson?"

Then Harold quickly hopped and collected his own ingredients before returning back to his table, "But with Storm as the Head Deputy? Let's not chance it."

"When I was younger I was a pill about taking castor oil, so my mum would cool it down and it wouldn't taste so bad. Maybe we can just crystallize it or the extract before adding it to the potion? Or crush the twigs a bit before adding them?" Harold turned to Kyson and shrugged as he started to get to work on his potion.

Naomi wasn't sure what Kyson and Harold had said for Ayla to sneer at and shove by them, but they probably deserved it and more. Rather than let herself join the snarking, Naomi kept her mind focused on the task. 

Once she began her brew with the pale-colored cacao sweatings, the professor's skin took on its own shade of pale and he began to produce his own sweat. As he struggled to speak, Naomi's focused gaze and deft hands worked through the process: adding twigs until it turned a bright green,  swirling it into a deep orange, adding oil til it blossomed into a blue, swirling it into a bright purple, and then adding Gurdyroot extract until the potion turned red and the professor finished his speaking.
 
Darkfall was doing an excellent job of resisting the potion's effects, but there was no telling how long he could keep it up. Naomi had only gotten far enough along to add more twigs and extract to turn the potion purple again just as Ayla had returned to finish her first simmer. Hopefully, the Hufflepuff's biscuit would buy them all some time, but it would probably be best to keep the conversation going and give the professor something to focus on.

As Naomi's potion started its first simmer, the raven-haired Slytherin returned the professor's grimace with an excitable grin, "At Callaloo we learned 'bout 'dem elements of  a cacao plant making it into a stimulant or aphrodesiac." The potion finally turned fizzed and bubbled into a deep red and so Naomi turned her gaze back to the cauldron and added more extract. "Sweatings comes from letting cacao fruit pulp ferment and heat cacao beans, where most 'dem aphrodisiac bits end up being heated away.[1]" The potion turned a fizzy green and Naomi began to swirl the potion again.

"I figured mixing any magic wit' some likkle biota from 'dem sweatings would happily eat away any affects of a love potion." Finally, the potion turned a fizzing orange and Naomi began to add the rest of the twigs.

1.	As listed here, Tryptophan and Phenethylamine (PEA), the main chemicals attributed to making cacao an aphrodisiac, are heat sensitive and often missing from processed cacao.

Sebastian kept his eyes closed but sniffed the biscuits he was offered. "A great idea.........Miss Collins..........H-h-h-however I suggest adding these ideas to your potions............ You obviously...........Have talent to create a p-potion style of your own from these........ Treats." He tried to smile through his pain and sagged a little on the table. 


He overheard the classroom chatter and snarled slightly. "Mister Cavanaugh, I expect you to be hoping for more than a death to get you O's in your classes.............. You barely made the grade to get into this class......... And hoping for the house's head to die to achieve higher grades is......... foolhardy when it comes to me in my class..." He could feel the anger rising and struggled to remain in control while fighting the potion at the same time. He nodded at Naomi's answer to Sweating "You are correct........But it doesn't remove ALL............. Of the a-a-aph-aphrodisiac affects, so keep it in mind." He got out before sinking lower on his desk, his face going from a painful expression, to almost euphoric.

Kyson flinched as he was scolded. He hissed a bit and softly said, "harsh." Before scrambling to get his potion started. Ayla and Naomi were already far ahead of him.

While he hoped the Professor had a better sense of humor when he wasn't poisoned, he knew everything he said was true. Kyson had spent so much of his previous year getting tutored in Potions just to pass his OWL, he needed to perform even better to get his NEWT or he could kiss Auror career goodbye.

Kyson rushed through his prep and added an accelerant to his potion. It would help speed up his brewing time while adding little to no effect to the actual potion itself. Well there was a small chance that whoever ingested it might end up a little hyper for a few hours afterwards.

He stirred his potion. It turned from a canary yellow to a bubblegum pink with red sparkles. He flipped back through his text. He wasn't certain it was supposed to look like that. Then again he hadn't brewed a potion with an accelerant before. He supposed as long as it didn't explode he'd be good.

Ayla looked into her potion to hide the blush that coveted her cheeks. She was a little disappointed that he didn't try the biscuit but the encouragement he gave more than made up for it, "thank you Professor."

She had been making her treats for years now and they had only become better as her skills in Charms improved. Creating new recipes had become effortless and she wondered if she really could apply that talent to Potions. She still wasn't sure that she knew well enough to substitute some of the ingredients in her potion but she was incredibly talented when it came to her Charm work.

Ayla slid her wand out and tapped it over her cauldron drawing on inspiration from her cooling chocolate biscuits. A puff of snowflakes exploded from her cauldron and the brew turned to a shocking arctic blue that made her think of a certain heart breaker's eyes. She pushed away the thought. She needed to focus on her potion and hope that adding the cooling charm to the brew would be a welcomed addition to the antidote.