The Black Bloodline of Hogwarts

"Oh no!" Elizabeth quickly extinguished the flames. "It might be Filch on night patrol!"

"That's impossible," Julien said, looking at the door. "The Room of Requirement can only be accessed by its user..."

The doorknob turned.

The three frantically tried to hide their belongings. Julien tried to stuff the shadowdial into his pocket, but the alchemical device caught on his robe. Elizabeth waved her wand to extinguish the light source, but ended up knocking over the plate of cookies. Liria came up with the best idea—she tried to jump into the walking copper barrel and hide herself.

The door opened.

Albus Dumbledore stood in the doorway, wearing a dark blue nightgown embroidered with silver stars and a nightcap with a pom-pom at the tip. He held a candle in one hand and lifted the hem of his robe with the other, as if on his way to the toilet.

The room was so quiet you could hear the candles burning.

"Ah," Dumbledore blinked his blue eyes behind his half-moon spectacles, his gaze sweeping over the messy alchemy table, landing on Liria, whose head was only half-exposed in the copper barrel, then at the corner of the shadow dial peeking out of Julien's pocket, finally settling on Elizabeth's wand, which she hadn't had time to hide properly. "Looks like I've interrupted a...late-night academic seminar?"

"Professor, we..." Julien opened his mouth, only to find that any explanation seemed inadequate.

"Alchemy, what a wonderful subject!" Dumbledore walked in, his robe trailing on the floor, and curiously examined the peacock-shaped still.

"An interesting choice. I did something similar here when I was young, but back then I wanted a room to hide banned books—and they gave me a library instead."

Elizabeth and Julien exchanged a glance: What does that mean? Not getting points deducted? Not getting reprimanded?

Dumbledore bent down and picked up a piece of alchemical symbol biscuit that had fallen to the ground. He examined it closely, then took a bite. "Hmm, this tastes much better than mine. I got the salty garlic flavor back then, even though I preferred the honey flavor."

He walked to the workbench, looked at the still-present liquid starry sky, and a knowing glint flashed in his eyes:

"Oh? 'Elemental Distillation'? Don't be surprised, I'm very familiar with the style of the runes on it—like I'm familiar with my own handwriting," Dumbledore said meaningfully.

Julien's heart leaped into his throat.

“Don’t worry,” Dumbledore said gently, taking another bite of his biscuit. “I won’t ask where you learned all this, or what you plan to do. After all…” he winked slyly, “the Room of Requirement is for keeping secrets.”

He turned to leave, then looked back at Liria huddled in the copper barrel: "However, Miss Liria, that barrel was used to dispose of discarded dragon livers. Although it's been cleaned now, you might still want to... come out?"

Liria jumped out with a "whoosh," her cheeks flushed red.

“And also,” Dumbledore paused as he turned toward the door, the pom-pom on his nightcap bobbing, “if you need any extra Moonstone Extract, I know there’s some in the second storeroom on the left on the fourth floor—collected from the edge of the Forbidden Forest, and of good quality. Of course,” he winked, “that’s Professor Snape’s prized possession too, don’t tell anyone I told you.”

The door was gently closed again.

The three looked at each other, then simultaneously breathed a sigh of relief and slumped to the ground.

"He seems to know everything," Elizabeth murmured, "and...he even seems quite happy?"

"This is Dumbledore." Julien smiled wryly as he rearranged the shadow dial. "Alright, let's finish this distillation before Dumbledore comes back from the toilet."

-----------------

When Julien sneaked back to his dormitory, Kayson Moretti and Edgar Finch were still awake.

The two sat cross-legged on the wooden floor of the dormitory, with a three-dimensional wizard chess board suspended in the middle, where gold and red pieces and silver and green pieces were fiercely clashing.

"General!" Kesen shouted excitedly, his knight threatening King Edgar, "Admit defeat, Edgar! Your defense is riddled with holes, just like Crabbe and Goyle's moral bottom line—"

"Shut up, Kayson." Edgar pushed up his glasses, his gaze never leaving the chessboard. "Don't disturb my thinking."

The door was gently pushed open, and Julien slipped inside, his robe still damp with night dew. His two roommates didn't even look up—clearly, Julien sneaking out late at night was nothing new.

"Which girl did you spend the night with tonight?" Kayson asked casually, tapping his fingers on the edge of the chessboard, urging Ed to make his moves faster.

"Girls," Julien said, taking off his robe and hanging it on the bedpost, "in the plural."

"Merlin's aunt!" Edgar finally looked up, his eyes wide behind his glasses. "Rosier and that girl from the North? At the same time?"

"Don't look at me like that," Julien said with a laugh, waving his hand and pulling a chocolate frog from the bedside table. "It's just some academic research. Really."

"Academic research?" Kayson rolled his eyes. "Of course. At midnight, with two beautiful witches, researching 'academics'. I get it, I get it perfectly well."

"You don't know anything." Julien took a bite of the chocolate frog, watching it struggle to escape from his hand. "By the way, what classes are we having tomorrow morning? Why aren't you guys asleep yet?"

The topic was successfully shifted.

Edgar immediately forgot his predicament on the chessboard, his eyes lighting up: "Looks like you really have gotten carried away with dating... oh no, with studying so hard, you've got your magic creature protection class tomorrow."

"This is a new elective course that just started this year. Finally, I don't have to stare at the textbook in the classroom anymore. But that book, 'The Monster Book of Monsters,' is really tough to deal with," Kayson chimed in, his expression also quite excited.

"Actually, I think 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' is more suitable as a textbook," Edgar pushed up his black-rimmed glasses, "but to be honest, based on the content of this textbook, Hagrid might take us to some real—"

"Haha, dangerous creature." Kayson finally gave up urging Edgar and recalled his knight.

"I heard from last year's seniors that they were still learning about the Flobber caterpillar last year, but Hagrid said that this year they're going to upgrade it. I hope it's not the exploding tail snail, those things really do explode!" There was no fear in Kayson's tone.

"It's a hippogriff with the head of a horse and wings." Julien said as he bit off the head of the chocolate frog, the sweetness melting on his tongue.

"Is it that exciting?" Kayson's eyes lit up.

"How do you know what it is?" Edgar asked astutely. "Hagrid said it's a secret and he hasn't told anyone yet."

"I saw it this afternoon when I passed the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Hagrid was setting up a fence, and the creature had silver-grey feathers and a wingspan of at least—that big." Julien gestured haphazardly.

"Really?" Edgar asked skeptically.

“Whether it is or not,” Kayson lay back down on his bed, “it’s better than Professor Binns’s history of magic. I dare say, even a Bombtail exploding in class would be more interesting than listening to the ‘1639 Code of Werewolf Behavior’.”

"It's 1637," Edgar corrected habitually, "not 1639. You wrote it wrong on last year's exam, and you still can't remember."

"Anyway, they're all good materials for hypnosis. Goodnight."