Lena Luthor... Lena freaking Luthor. She had to let the others know, but first she had to prioritize her sister's issue which was to find Winn regarding on Alex's opponent. The closer she got to Ravenclaw's tower, the further the issue of Lena Luthor was pushed into the back of her mind, temporary putting aside the latter at the moment. She need to focus on one first.  

 

Kara was already panting heavily when she finally reached Ravenclaw’s tower. She only had a remaining of 15 minutes before her next class started and she had to find Winn. She cursed internally for the location of the common room which was situated at the fifth floor while praying that her legs can cope up with her. She arrived at the top of the spiral staircase and eventually greeted by a door without a doorknob or keyhole, but a bronze knocker in the shape of an eagle instead.

 

"What can travel around the world while staying in the corner?" The eagle knocker asked a riddle. When Kara was about to solve the riddle in order to get into the common room, Winn coincidentally found her while he was returning from the library with several books in his arms.

 

“KARA! What brings you here?” Winn was surprised to see her while trying to balance the books in his arms. Usually he will hang out with Kara and Alex at their rendezvous which was at the secret basement of Hufflepuff, hence it was rare for him to see Kara came forward to look for him at Ravenclaw’s tower.

 

“Winn!” Kara tried to cope up with her short of breath before continuing, “Do you know anyone by the name of Jake Spheer?”

 

“Not much. He’s a Slytherin so my sources are kind of limited, but we can find out.” Winn paused for a while before asking, “So, I guess you already know about the duel.” Winn grinned.

 

“I just knew from Mon-el.” Kara kept looking at her watch to keep track of time. “Meet me at the fountain rather than our rendezvous at 8pm later.”

 

Winn raised his brow. “Why not the usual place?”

 

“Just don’t feel like going there.” Kara already paced down the stairs before sprinting through the door. “See you later!”  

 

“Oh…” Winn already can guessed the answer of Kara’s situation.

 

--------

 

Kara ran past the fountains, the garden, several statues, gargoyles, fastening her paces as time already strike 5pm till she started almost knocking the people at the corridor who walked past her before entering the dungeon. She ran inside the dungeon like a mad woman, making her way to the specific location of the potion class, and finally pushed the door, eventually seeing heads turned towards her direction.

 

“Well. Well. Kara Danvers!”

 

Cat Grant, her potion master’s mockery tone already echoed through the class, before Kara even stepped into the class. “How early are you, hmm?” Her sarcasm pierced through her ears endlessly with her judging tone that Kara felt like burying her head in the sand or running away from class right away.

 

“I am sorry.” Kara smiled sheepishly.

 

Cat Grant raised her brows. “How charming. If you think you can get away with just an apology, you are wrong. For compensation, you have to do two different potions instead of one today.”

 

Kara opened , wanting to protest but immediately closed as she knew it was wiser not to. She knew the more she objected, the more task Cat Grant will add into the existing one which Kara had been badly experienced before. So she had no choice but to forcefully nodded her head in compliance.

 

“Now, shoo.” Cat Grant gestured her to leave and find a seat.

 

Kara turned and looked at the class. It was so full that there was not any vacant seat for her. As Potion class was a required and core subject for all students, students from all houses can be seen joining the class. Kara was trying to find several familiar faces to see whether they can share the workplace with her but it seemed that there was none, until her eyes accidentally landed at the corner.

 

“Sh*t” Not sure whether she just cursed under her breath or someone, who just accidentally broke their phial, but all Kara knew was that Lena Luthor was staring at her and the only vacant seat was beside her.

 

Kara gulped while her fingers became stiff. Her feet suddenly weighed like tonnes as she tried to move her feet towards Lena, while trying to remain composed as much as possible.

 

“Hi, can I seat here?” Kara awkwardly put down her sling bag on the ground and smiled.

 

Lena looked at her for a minute too long that Kara can’t help but to fidget under her gaze as she waited for Lena’s consent. Seeing Lena up close only freaked her out, she can see her eyelashes clearly, her green orbs that burnt into her, her nose bridge, her… she quickly stopped herself from looking further.

 

“It seems that there’s only one vacant seat. Can I say no?” The corner of curved upwards.

 

Kara blushed. Contradicting to her gaze, her voice was mellow, surprisingly pleasant to her ears that she can listen over and over. It sounded foreign and the accent immediately revealed that she was not from around here.

 

“That’s actually silly of me.” Kara awkwardly chuckled and took her seat, trying to ignore the thump of her heart while Lena observed her as Cat Grant's voice eventually brought them back.

 

“Today’s lesson…”

 

Cat Grant put a hand on her hip, pausing a few seconds for a dramatic suspension before continuing, “Polyjuice Potion.”

 

Everyone in the class immediately groaned in dismay once Polyjuice Potion was mentioned except for Lena. Lena wore an unreadable expression on her face and started taking out the ingredients, weighing, and preparing the cauldron like a boss without waiting for further instructions. Polyjuice Potion was a complex and complicated concoction which prompt many students to give up. The steps were tedious and it was considered as an advanced level, hence many failed to produce the said potion.

 

“Keep quiet everyone. If today you can’t do it, tomorrow you have to come again till you managed to show me at the end of this month, or else you won’t be sitting for your exam.” Cat Grant warned the students.

 

Every students started to murmur with worries and immediately took out their potion books without wasting any time. Soon everyone was busy preparing according to the references from the book. As time passed, the class eventually turned into chaos, when one of the student accidentally added too many leeches into his cauldron, causing the thick, green concoction to overflow, ruining his friend’s ingredients on the table, and Cat Grant had to immediately break the argument. At the other table, obnoxious odor and black smoke emitted from a girl’s cauldron, it was so horrible that Cat Grant had to cast the smoke off using her wand.

 

Lacewing flies, leeches, powdered bicorn horn, knotgrass, fluxweed and shredded boomslang. Kara was halfway stirring through the concoction when Cat Grand walked past their table and saw Lena had completed everything.

 

“My my… Lena Luthor, as expected.” She observed Lena’s cauldron, filled with bubbles and thick, muddy-like concoction. “Fast and accurate.” She turned around and announced to the class, “Everyone, this is how it should looked like. 5 points for Slytherin.”

 

Whispers of envy can be heard among the students. Cat Grant looked at Kara, “As for you, the other potion will be Draught of Living Death.”

 

Kara gaped. “But…”

 

“No buts. Show me the Draught of Living Death or you will be barred from exam. I had given you time.”

 

Kara just stared transfixed while her mind went blank. It was impossible for her to concoct this potion. If Winn had trouble doing it, which he mentioned that he can’t find the appropriated mixing and timing for it, resulting in a half-failed concoction and still experimenting, how was she going to produce one at the end of the month.

 

Kara was still dumbfounded to learn about Cat’s instruction that she just stood rooted and can’t seemed to continue anymore. On the other hand, Lena Luthor carefully filled her phials with the concoction she made before taking another cauldron and new ingredients out from underneath the table, eventually earning a what-are-you-doing-look from Kara.

 

Apparently, Lena had too much time to spend that she had plenty of time for another round of Polyjuice Potion. So Lena just shrugged while she added the new ingredients into a new cauldron. “I am just bored.”

 

Kara shook her head in disbelief before continuing her Polyjuice concoction, while her head was trying to find solutions to the Draught of Living Death. The more she thought about it, the more upset and frustrated she got. Kara was so troubled and distraught that she didn’t pay attention to her surrounding anymore. She was lost in her own thought that her Polyjuice concoction almost overflowed, before she quickly controlled the flame with her wand, while Lena had left the class slightly earlier than the others after finishing her second round of concoction without saying a word to Kara.

 

Before the class ends, Kara was not able to show the Polyjuice Potion as she was too distracted on the thought of the Draught of Living Death that the concoction was ruined by the prolonged mixing time. Hence, she had no choice but to call it a day. As she was cleaning up her equipment and the table, she realized a phial was left on Lena’s workplace. Kara furrowed her brows and picked the phial up, she thought Lena must had forgotten to take the blue phial or she might had dropped it without realization.

 

Wait a second. Blue phial?

 

The phials that all students used were usually made from transparent glass, so the concoction should be mud-like color of Polyjuice Potion.

 

Kara turned the phial and noticed something written at the bottom of the phial. The words were small and hard to be seen but it was readable if Kara paid attention to it.

 

It read,

 

 

 

 

 

“The Draught of Living Death - A gift from me.”