Ch 12 Homework? Part-1

Sirius woke up very abruptly—one second he was completely unconscious and the next second all of the neurons in his mind started flaring all at once. He groaned as he tried to get up from where he was lying and immediately realized that something was wrong when he felt the distinct sensation of grass under his palms.

He opened his eyes and stood up as he looked around, and the scenery that appeared in front of him was utterly unfamiliar to him, he was inside a small clearing with rays of sunlight streaming in from above and he seemed to be surrounded on all sides by dense plants and trees that did not look normal.

His first instinct was, of course, to panic and scramble to find a way out of whatever this place was, but thankfully before he could do something reckless a refreshing scent suddenly filled his nose and all of his worries disappeared as he instantly calmed down.

He looked down and found the source of scent to be a vivid green flower petal, that was slowly burning away inside a small bowl. Sirius bent down and after examining it for a few moments, he surprisingly identified what this petal was.

It was the second most commonly used antidote in the Wizarding World after, of course, Beozar, and while this one was a lot less powerful, and worked a bit slower, the one striking advantage it had was that it was very cheap and easy to find.

"So you finally woke up..." A woman's voice drifted into Sirius's ear and he immediately stood up with a start and started looking around alertly. But even after he circled his eyes all over the clearing, he couldn't find where the voice originated from.

On his second observation, Sirius tried to search a bit more intensely and it paid off, as the moment his eyes passed through a particular spot on the left side, he felt a soft poke inside his mind as if there was something wrong with what he was seeing.

He focused a bit more intently on that spot and after a few more moments the notice-me-not unraveled like a transparent waterfall and a middle age woman appeared in front of his eyes where there was no one before.

The first Sirius noticed was the woman seemed to be in her 50s, and she seemed a bit familiar to him. She was looking at him with a sharpness that he could only compare to Professor McGonagall from his memories. Her blond hair was tied in a bun, and she was wearing a comfortable green witch's robe while standing in a relaxed manner.

"Oh... You noticed me a lot quicker than I expected," she said in a calm voice, "It seems you're not completely hopeless after all,"

"Who are—" Sirius started to ask her but stopped midway when he recognized that the woman before him matched the description that had been explained to him, "Are you Beth Breaker? The Curse Breaker?"

"Indeed I am," Beth answered easily and continued before Sirius could follow up, "But before you ask me anything else—Let me ask you this, What were you exactly doing before you arrived at my place? Partying with some of your old buddies?" She asked while raising an eyebrow.

Sirius was confused about her question for a moment, but the moment he tried to focus on his memories, his mind was suddenly bombarded with images of what happened the last time, and how he had behaved when he Portkeyed over.

'Oh Shit—What the hell was I thinking!' Sirius shouted inside his mind as hazy memories of his antics started to appear. His face immediately started burning from embarrassment, as Sirius couldn't remember ever feeling this stupid in his life.

"Y-You've got it wrong! Miss Beth. I wasn't partying or anything, what happened was..."

Sirius tried to explain the best he could and Beth stood silently while listening to his side without interruption, "—and then I sniffed the Magical weed before my elf could warn me against it. And coincidently the next moment the portkey went off, and you know what happened after that..."

"So, let me get this straight, You were checking on your greenhouse, and accidentally sniffed a flower— while acting like a stupid first-year, I might add— that happened to be a rare one only used by old pureblood families. Are you sure, you weren't pranked by your elf," She asked while looking at him with disdain.

"Yes," Sirius answered, as he was sure that it wasn't deliberate because a couple of days after he became Kreacher's master, he had made sure to close all the loopholes in all the ways that the elf could hurt him intentionally or unintentionally.

"And it wasn't my fault that I didn't recognize that plant at all," Sirius mumbled while trying to look through his memories, "I don't think we were taught about it at Hogwarts,"

"Of course, you weren't," Beth said with a snort, "They wouldn't teach about "Magical Weed" as you say, to a bunch of teenagers. It's supposed to be taught during your NEWT years, but that doesn't excuse you from sniffing an unknown plant just because it looked pretty,"

"Ugh!" Sirius groaned as he didn't need her to remind him of his stupidity.

"And let me remind you— since it doesn't look like you took Herbology NEWTs," Beth said while waving her hands at her surrounding, "Don't go sniffing around on any of the plants surrounding you, as you won't be waking up again if you do,"

"W-What these are all poisonous," Sirius stuttered while looking at the plants surrounding the clearing, and on a second glance, he noticed that the plants did look a little weird, as all of them were either purple or violet colored.

Sirius immediately stopped breathing, hoping that the small amount of poison he had inhaled, wouldn't affect him too much. He immediately tried to summon his wand from his holster to cast a bubble-head charm but couldn't—as he noticed for the first time that he didn't have his wand on him.

"Don't worry, you're safe for now," Beth said calmly, "I placed a ward around you that filters the air—among other things," Sirius breathed a sigh of relief, all the while his eyes were searching around where he stood, wondering if he had dropped the very important stick, "If you're looking for your wand, then it's here," She raised her left hand and Sirius immediately recognized his wand resting on her palm.

"Oh! thank you," Sirius said gratefully while walking toward her but when he was a few steps away from her, he suddenly bounced back. He barely kept himself from falling on his back and when he looked ahead, his eyes found a thin light blue semicircular barrier separating them that completely encircled the clearing.

"You didn't think it would this easy for you to get away after disrespecting your teacher," Beth asked while tilting her head, "Did you?"

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