Chapter 99: 31st October 1991, Thursday: Part 1

The alarm clock chimed at eight and a ball of lightning was summoned to awaken George. His whole body spasmed, causing him to flail off his bed. His eyes immediately opened upon making contact with the cold tiled floor and he sprang to his feet with an unbridled amount of vigour. He saw orange and black banners draped across the four beds, there were small pumpkins with carved faces placed beside the large windows overlooking the Black Lake. A fake human skeleton was seated on an ivory chair in the corner of the room beside the fireplace which was decorated with rubber bats and fake cobwebs.

These decorations served as a great reminder to George that today was Halloween. He had gone to bed early last night, just like every other night, and he must have slept through Grant, Quinton and Theodore decorating the room because it didn't look like this yesterday. There had been posters up in the Slytherin common room encouraging the students to decorate their rooms in anticipation of the Halloween feast for the past week, the cousins must have finally got around to doing it last night.

Although he had been counting the days, George was still surprised to find how quickly October had been and gone. Ever since the weekend of his first transformation at Hogwarts, George had gone back to the grind with zero restraint. Halloween had only been five weeks away and he needed to prepare for the upcoming fight. There would rarely be a chance to test his strength against a powerful opponent during his time at Hogwarts, fights to the death were uncommon, to say the least. The troll would serve as a perfect opportunity to test his capabilities in real combat.

George may have to fight powerful people and creatures in the future if his patron deemed it necessary. Therefore, he could not afford to exclusively advance his academic skills, practical experience must be a part of his training as well. To prepare for today, George had spent every second he had to spare for the past month progressing his fighting capabilities so that the opportunity today wasn't wasted. Now the day had come and his combat prowess could be put to the test. Not only that, but today would mark a crucial change in his relationship with Hermione who was by far the most important pawn in his mission.

There would be no better opportunity this year to cement his friendship with her, George couldn't afford to mess this up. Since this day was so significant, he reached into his sack and pulled out a vial of Calming Draught. He had continued to further discipline his mind for the past few weeks and had made great improvements in his self-control. He'd become more accustomed to his anger and had learned the triggers that risked jeopardising his emotional instability, by far the highest contributors were aspects of life that challenged his pride or gluttony.

Learning the Engorgement charm ensured that there was never a time when he went without a meal so his hunger was easiest to satiate. The only negative side of the charm was the slowly dwindling rations he had been whittling down because he simply found it too inconvenient to return to the Great Hall every time his stomach rumbled. This wasn't a big issue because he could simply stock up when he returned home for Christmas.

Pride was a little more difficult to control but simply avoiding problematic people that might antagonise him such as; the majority of the Slytherin students, Ron Weasley, Pince the librarian and Peeves the poltergeist worked well enough. Basically, George became a hermit and avoided all social interactions except for his time with the cousins and Neville. This wasn't simple to achieve since he had to attend his lessons, but his commitment to preparations for Halloween helped distract him from the mild bullying.

Unfortunately, the one thing that was out of his control was the side effects of sleeping fewer hours than his body desired. Twelve hours was simply not enough, but George wasn't willing to sleep anymore, so he had to cope with the side effects. This drowsiness affected his patience and his ability to think coherently, even his memory suffered to a minor extent. His only solution was to sleep for eighteen hours during the weekends, but that only provided him with a short repeal. In the end, he was still using the Calming Draught on rare occasions such as when he had to speak in class and during some of his more intense training in private.

George had made sure to go to sleep extra early the previous night and had transformed last weekend so that he could be in the best state of mind for today. Even then, he wanted to take every advantage he had so he uncorked the vial and down the entire bottle. This was the first time he had drunk an entire bottle in one go since he had brewed his first batch over a month ago.

Due to his self-discipline, the effects of the potion had remained potent and a full vial should still theoretically last him the entire day. He felt the reassuring cool minty sensation travel down his throat and all of his emotions disappeared with the sparkly blue liquid flowing down his oesophagus. George used his newly found clarity to revise everything he needed to do in preparation for this evening before getting dressed and leaving the dormitory.

George walked down to the Great Hall and sat down at the end of the Slytherin table in a spot that seemed to have been reserved for him since there were no other students seated remotely close by. Although he predominately avoided contact with his fellow Slytherin students, he still had to sit beside them during his meals to their dissatisfaction. Now they kindly left him a spot at the end of the table for every meal which he was more than willing to accept, that meant he had an entire platter which would normally serve four students.

He looked around the room and recognised that it had been decorated festively for the spooky holiday. All of the candles which would have been floating in the air had been replaced with pumpkins and the bewitched ceiling now perfectly mimicked a dark winter sky with a full moon peeking from behind a pitch-black cloud. Even the breakfast food had been displayed with a Halloween theme, the house elves had outdone themselves once again. The toast was branded with images of ghouls and goblins and the eggs were cooked in the shape of ghosts. The sausages and bacon were arranged to look like human organs spilling out of a freshly killed corpse, Hannibal Lecter would have been in heaven.

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George was indifferent about these subtle changes as long as the elves kept the flavour rich and the portions plentiful. Today he treated himself to twin extra servings of sausages with his full English breakfast since he was going to need the energy. Sadly, he was reminded after his first bite of the blandness of dining under the effect of the Calming Draught. It was a mistake to drink the potion before breakfast.

Whilst downing a pot of baked beans, George looked a few seats down and saw the cousins talking with Theodore whilst eating their breakfast. Grant and Quinton were eating a full English, just like George, and Theodore was eating a single slice of buttered toast. It was no wonder why that boy was so scrawny, it would have been life-threatening for George to attempt to live on a similar quantity of food. Grant noticed George looking at them and turned his head to nod and smile before resuming his conversation with Theodore.

The cousins were becoming more familiar with George as he had now spent nearly two dozen sessions playing around with them in the private exercise club. They still weren't willing to talk to George in public but that wasn't because of the prejudice against him, but instead due to their promises to their parents. George hadn't had the time to research their family yet since it was not a priority but he was still very curious to find out their mother's family tree. Perhaps they were a modern-day equivalent of Sirius Black, their usefulness had infinite possibilities in the future.

George kept to himself for the rest of the meal and emptied his plate before anyone else, he had a habit of arriving last and leaving first. He wasn't bothered by any of the first-year Slytherins since they seemed far too distracted talking about the upcoming Halloween feast and were wondering what Hogwarts had planned. They were speculating over a fake-out scare arranged by the professors, in a way their predictions were half right. It was a pity that George wouldn't be there to watch their horrified reaction to Quirrell's announcement this evening. It could have acted as revenge for all of the lengths he had to go through to avoid provoking their hatred towards all things muggle-born.

As George placed his knife and fork on the plate neatly and stood up to leave, he quickly peeked over the heads of the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables to see how things were progressing with the trio. Today was just as important of a day for him as it was for them, even if they didn't know it yet. George needed to make sure that all the dominos were in place, ready to be knocked over this evening. Everyone in Harry's dormitory was seated together and talking amongst each other, even Neville was happily engaging in conversation.

George looked a little further along the table and found Hermione seated with a large book open in front of her, she was multitasking to the extreme. He had to give her some credit, Hermione was managing to shovel bacon and eggs into her mouth with one hand whilst reading and turning the pages of the book with the other hand. When it came to general knowledge of magic, she had probably already overtaken George since he was spending so much of his time on progressing his niche abilities.

Most importantly, Hermione was sitting by herself and wasn't talking to anyone, the students around her were paying her no mind as if she didn't exist. Their private eating situations were surprisingly similar except her isolation was completely self-inflicted, George didn't ask to become an outcast but she welcomed it with her impossibly high standards. He nodded his head and was happy with how events were occurring, everything looked ready for the incident in the Charms class as long as Hermione continued to be an insufferable know-it-all and Ron an inconsiderate blabbermouth.

George's first lesson today was Herbology so he decided to set off early to the greenhouses and peruse the gardens while he waited for the rest of the class to turn up. Even though it rarely garnered attention from the students, the Hogwarts Gardens are one of the most impressive and beautiful aspects of the entire school. George had visited a few manor houses with the Linwood family and seen some incredibly well-maintained and intricate gardens, but none of them could hold a candle to what Hogwarts had to offer. Just beside the six greenhouses was a vast and colourful maze of artwork composed of vibrant petals and gravity-defying hedges, it was an impossible feat of gardening architecture which could only be achieved with magic.

Even though George felt no attraction towards the field of Herbology like Neville did, the accomplishments made by the masters in that field left him in awe. There had been more than a dozen times over the past month where George had felt his rolling emotions beginning to boil to the surface only to have them quelled by a brief visit to the Hogwarts Gardens, it was a little slice of Eden he could visit whenever he wanted. He had learnt of the indescribably therapeutic nature of the gardens by accident whilst looking for new places to run with the cousins, he wasn't sure if this sensation was unique to him or if it affected all other students the same way.

This time, he needed the gardens for another purpose since he wasn't the one in need of calming. George walked down the winding gravel path and held his hands out wide so he could feel the leaves brushing against his fingertips, they were so soft that they felt like finely woven silk. The winding path continued for over one hundred feet and led him past a plethora of bushes cut in the shape of mythical animals, the limbs of the creatures swayed in the morning breeze in a way that made them look alive. At the end of the path, where it forked into two trails leading left and right, was a humongous flower bed in the shape of the Gryffindor badge.

George looked to his left and right and found similar huge flower beds in the shape of the other houses' badges. The Hufflepuff badger was slightly larger than the rest which was almost definitely not an accident since it was predominantly Hufflepuff students that maintained the gardens. It was at these flower displays that students could find the most beautiful and best-smelling plants at Hogwarts and maybe even the whole of the Wizarding world. It was the end of October, yet every flower was still in bloom as if it was the middle of summer.

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