After Lexy had finished, Aubrey sat there in silence, her mind trying to piece together what she'd heard into the mystery she just couldn't solve yet. Seeing Umbridge being a bitch or punishing people was normal but Umbridge ... pleading? Umbridge clinging to students robes in empty corridors? This was new territory and felt like the equivalent of a poodle/dragon hybrid ... in the sense that neither should ever happen.

Her gut feeling told her to investigate Umbridge but Lexy, George and even Fred argued they should start on Saskia seeing as she was their friend and not an awful teacher that hated them. What they said made sense and after a few days of intense persuading from Fred, she agreed.

Asking Saskia things had got them nowhere so Aubrey decided to take the questioning up a notch. By that, of course, she meant using one of the three truth serum pills. Still, using them on Saskia didn't give her the same exciting rush she'd felt when using it on Ludo the year before. At least with Ludo they'd had disguises and he wasn't the best of people anyway. Saskia was her friend and this felt downright deceptive but needs must.

"If you do it before you go to your meeting, I can do it whilst your gone," Lexy suggested, "I sometimes get us Pumpkin juices anyway so it won't look odd."

It was an alright suggestion, made with good intentions but Lexy should have known the chances of Aubrey letting such a vital plan slip out of her hands was close to none, "Absolutely not, hon."

"Why not? It was me and George who witnessed the Umbridge possession or whatever the hell that was," Lexy said as the two strolled through the corridors, "And you seemed nervous about doing this to her, I thought it would help."

"No, Lexy. If there's questioning, you're not doing it alone," Aubrey said firmly, "I'll cancel my meeting with Fred and we'll do it together, okay?"

"...okay."

Given last year, Aubrey had genuinely thought she'd got past her need for control but was now coming to see that it had merely been extended. She now trusted Fred with all her heart but everyone else was a different matter. Still, perhaps it came in handy now. Lexy had a tendency to be a little bit ... passionate about things and a truth serum sessions with Saskia alone would probably not go down too well.

"If you have any last minute questions tell us now," Aubrey said to the twins as they waited with her and Lexy outside the Hufflepuff dorms, "Saskia should come back from the library any minute now."

"We trust you two to do a good job," Fred shrugged.

Lexy wrinkled her nose, "Why?" before snickering, "I'm joking, of course, we'll do a good job. If we don't, we might get our legs broken."

"We still don't know that was her ... for sure," Aubrey cautiously added.

"No, Aubs, it was the wind," Fred replied sarcastically, "Well, we'd best be off, we've got stuff to do..."

He kissed Aubrey goodbye whilst Lexy and George raised their eyebrows at one another. Then the twins walked away down the corridor leaving the two girls alone. 

Saskia arrived at the predicted time by which time the two girls had already taken a seat, arranging the books and cushions so that it looked natural. Lexy was lounging like a Roman emperor on the sofa whilst Aubrey sat neatly in a chair; that was how they usually sat although now that they were under pressure Aubrey couldn't remember for the life of her what she usually did with her legs. Were they crossed? Touching the floor? Did she do anything with them at all? It was a mystery. Both of the girls also held a glass in their hands, another one on the table that they'd dissolved the truth serum pill into earlier. They both smiled as Saskia entered the room, knocking several books of desks in her state without a care in the world. She looked somewhat apprehensive, a very large history book tucked underneath her arm.

"Pumpkin juice, Saskia?" Lexy asked almost instantly as Saskia took a seat opposite Aubrey, "We nicked them from the kitchens after supper."

"It's really good," Aubrey said raising her glass awkwardly, "Very ... pumpkin-y. By the way, if you're wondering why I'm here and not with Fred, the meeting was cancelled. So, that's why I'm here, just in case you were wondering ... if you were."

Laced with vague amusement, Lexy nodded, her lips curved into an almost smile before turning back to Saskia, nudging the glass along the table, "Pumpkin juice?"

Saskia's eyes travelled up to Aubrey's lips and the glass pressed against them before she accepted. An idea suddenly occurred to Aubrey. Making sure that Saskia's eyes were focused on her, Aubrey tilted her head back and downed the entire glass. Despite the slightly grim aftertaste, she managed a convincing smile before putting the empty glass on the table.

"Ah, refreshing," She said loudly. The trick worked and after a few moments, Saskia followed suit. At first, she seemed to be fine before her nose wrinkled and she slammed the half-filled glass on the table, "That was so, so nasty ..."

"Oh my God, your taste buds must be defective," Lexy giggled, taking another sip of her drink.

"No, I think they're working just fine," Saskia murmured, shivering before flinging her book open on her lap. Last time the Veritaserum had taken only a few minutes to set in and not only was Ludo about twice the size of Saskia but they'd used less on him than her. With any luck, Saskia would be spilling her heart out in the next ten seconds.

"What are you reading?" Lexy craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the pages.

Saskia lifted the cover-up, reading aloud, "It's called 'a curious look back at  Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi and Astrology'," She said the name with ease, her pronunciation impeccable, "It's very good with more long words than short."

"Uh huh..." Lexy leant forward with interest, "Tell me, Saskia, if you had to go out with one of the teachers at our school who would it be?"

Aubrey almost choked on air, instantly alerting Saskia who leapt up, "Aubrey? Are you okay?!"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Aubrey assured her, her eyes flitting to Lexy who was watching Saskia confused. Perhaps she hadn't heard the question, Aubrey decided, Lexy seeming to come to a similar conclusion.

"Saskia, did you hear my question?"

The girl nodded as she sat back down, untucking her long, black hair from behind her ears so it fell around her face like a protective curtain, "... I did but I thought you might be talking to someone else."

"I said your name Saskia!"

"I know."

Lexy blinked a few times, exchanging a look with Aubrey as they tried to figure out whether the serum had kicked in yet. Usually on the spot thinking was left to other people but given the shocked look on Lexy's face, Aubrey decided to take over, "Saskia, hon, I heard the weirdest would you rather today. Would you rather um ... kiss Dumbledore or have Snape catch you being rude about him?"

"I'd rather have neither really. Beards are tickly and I can't think of anything rude I wouldn't want Professor Snape to hear about himself."

"Oh, that's not an option, the game is you have to pick one," Aubrey said quickly, "Imagine it's life or death and you have to pick one."

Annoyingly, Saskia merely shook her head, "But that doesn't sound very plausible!"

Technically she was correct so the truth serum could have been working but it never worked like this usually. When Aubrey had used it, the truth came out so unwillingly that you hardly had time to muffle your words let alone figure out clever ways around it.

"It could happen," Lexy shrugged, "This is Hogwarts, Saskia, it attracts weirdos ... like Umbridge. Saskia, the other day Umbridge was being very odd to you. Did you know her beforehand or something?"

Saskia's cheeks reddened before she quickly held her book up, tracing her finger around a figure, "Look! It's Abu Maʿshar ... a drawing anyway!" The two girls blinked a few times in response as Saskia giggled, "I evaded the question, did you see that? You two look so funny right now, I wish you could see your faces!"

"Well, mirrors do exist..." Lexy murmured.

"Well," Despite her cheery demeanour, her fingers had tightened around the book spine, "I'm so tired," She remained still for a moment before yawning, "See? I'm very sleepy."

"Night Saskia," They chorused.

Aubrey glanced down at her empty glass, "I wish I hadn't drunk all of my Pumpkin juice now ... forget that, maybe a Firewhisky would be better."

"Here," She glanced around to see Saskia suddenly behind her again, a small bottle in her hand, "A Firewhisky. I had one on me."

"Oh ... oh thank you," Aubrey said, uncertainly accepting the gift, "Well, goodnight now, hon," They remained silent until Saskia had disappeared, "I don't even like Firewhisky - "

"I do," Lexy said, reaching for the bottle. Aubrey obligingly handed it to her as Lexy poured some of it into her pumpkin juice, "A Tiger juice cocktail of sorts, exactly what I needed. Sorry, go on."

"Do you think it was defective?" Aubrey asked, her eyes fixated on Saskia's half-drunken glass.

Lexy grinned, "Only one way to find out..."

• • •

"You drunk something Saskia drunk?!" George exclaimed the next day as Aubrey and the twins in the library. Lexy would have joined them but due to an astounding amount of homework, she'd been forced to sit out the dramatic recital which really was a shame.

Aubrey giggled, "Inside voices, George!"

"You could be sick!" George whispered back. It was still too loud as Madam Pince stared daggers at them from her desk. Honestly, of all the things odd about the night before, the fact that Aubrey and Lexy drank the rest of the Saskia's truth serum and proceeded to ask each other embarrassing questions and giggle was far from the weirdest. The fact that Saskia had remained completely unaffected by the Truth serum was what lingered on Fred's mind. It was clearly bothering Aubrey too as laid out in front of her was a large index of potions.

"Yeah, we did."

"Did any uncomfortable truths come out?" Fred grinned, nudging her knee with his foot under the table.

"Perhaps..." She didn't look up but her lips curved into a smirk, "But I'm not under truth serum anymore so I'm sure as hell not telling you."

George unexpectedly stood up, moving around the table to sit next to Aubrey to which Fred couldn't help but add, "Alright then, George, I see how it is."

"Sorry, but Aubrey's my favourite now... and I'm just trying to have a better look," George grinned to his brother. However, within a few moments of George sitting down, Aubrey jumped up.

Fred mouthed 'karma' whilst Aubrey quickly apologised, "George, I'm not getting up because of you, honest. I just remembered I was meant to check the owlery as I think my Mum sent a letter. Keep reading, see if there's a counter-truth serum or something ... I'll be right back."

She leant across the table, kissing Fred on the cheek before darting off and turning the corner out of sight. However no sooner had she left when another girl took her place. Knowing their luck, Fred fully expected it to be Umbridge but surprisingly it was Hermione Granger. She seemed to emerge from behind a bookshelf like the Library phantom before sitting down.

"Please, take a seat," Fred said before adding, "If you came to lecture us on using first years to test our products, rest assured we stopped."

"We've moved onto Slytherins now."

Hermione looked somewhat flustered so they decided to stop with the joking around and let her speak, "I don't have very long, I have been given so much homework and of course, Harry and Ron will need help with theirs - "

"Bloody Ron," The twins agreed.

" - so I will make this brief," She leant towards them, "For the time being, this is just a hypothetical idea, I still have to speak to Harry about but we're looking into getting a new teacher for Defence."

Fred leant forward eagerly, "Aw, Hermione you are brilliant. If you need any help getting rid of Umbridge, we're happy to help."

"Or we can get Saskia to do it?"

"What?" Hermione shook her head, "No, I should have worded that more carefully. We're not planning to get rid of her, more ... work behind her back. Look, I don't know the details quite yet but it would be along the lines of Harry teaching a class on defensive spells so we're not drastically underprepared for what's out there. I just need an idea of numbers, would you be interested?"

The twins nodded instantly as Hermione continued, "Great. I'll speak to Harry and more details will follow."

"Can I bring Aubrey?"

George grinned, "She's his other half, he can't go anywhere without her."

"You should really bring your other half too," Fred grinned, "I reckon if you ask nicely, Ron will let you take Pigwideon out for the day - "

"So, three people?"

"Four ..." Fred insisted, "George wants to bring Pigwideon, I just said."

"Forget Aubrey, maybe you should bring Crookshanks instead. You're both ginger and a much better match anyway."

Hermione said nothing other than a distracted nod before leaving them alone again.

"Well, it appears everyone's having Umbridge problems," Fred grinned.

"Yeah, although not to brag but ours seems a little stronger than most..."

• • •

I end up saying this every book but I don't hate Slytherins! I am a Slytherin but whether I like it or not, the Weasleys and most of the main and I'm not about to break characters here - E x