"He's your head of house," Miranda points out. "But if you want me to ask first I will."

"Yeah, which means he's the likeliest Professor other than Spukhafte herself to have heard of my incident today and of the fact that I refused to give names."

"Okay, I'll ask."

"I want this one first," she says as she grabs Alchemical Metaphor.

"Alright, I'll take this one," he says, picking up The Alchemist's Handbook.

"Of course," he sighs. "Well, I guess we won't be able to solve death and then take over the world before twelve, so we probably won't be as famous as Harry Potter."

"If we take over the whole world we can probably be more famous than he is outside Britain."

"I suppose," he concedes.

"It's a good thing Potions doesn't seem that hard."

He nods. "Mostly very fiddly, but it sounds like the subject that's most amenable to direct improvements due to lots of studying."

"Yeah, we could coast on just following the recipes but the principles are pretty interesting and not that hard to memorize."

"Yeah. Guess I have an actual reason to study during the year now. I wonder what Slughorn will think of me if I'm simultaneously one of his best students and also one of the largest causes for grief amongst the Slytherins."

"No idea. He didn't actually promise to do the tutorial, you know, he said he'd consider it, if he can't stand the idea of dealing with you for another couple hours a week..."

He blinks. "Nnnnnooooooooooooooooooooo!" he wails. "...maybe Professor Robledo would be more help, he likes me, and there's some stuff related to Transfiguration in Alchemy, right? I mean, the Stone turns stuff into gold and stuff..."

"Professor Slughorn teaches the actual NEWT-level Alchemy course," Miranda says. "I imagine this is because he's best suited to it."

"What makes you think I'd be any good at teaching you things I was only just learning myself? Or that you'd be allowed the materials and equipment you'd need to do anything if you weren't supervised by a teacher?"

His face falls again. "Whyyyyyy is everyone trying to make me behaaaaave," he moans.

Willow giggles and pats Sadde's back in a 'there, there' fashion.

"As long as you only get into trouble that doesn't look like your fault, and never with Miranda - or me, I want to do alchemy too - and never in class, Slughorn won't necessarily care."

He blinks, and beams again. "Karen, I could just kiss you! You're a genius!" That first part probably means little and less, given the whole 'pre-pubescent kid' thing.