The commotion eventually died down, and the corridor gradually returned to normal.
Malfoy took the opportunity to sidle up beside Lucien, acting as though the previous embarrassment had never happened to him. Or perhaps, with Harry having been dragged into an equally awkward situation, Malfoy simply felt a little better.
After walking together for a few steps, Malfoy spoke.
"Lucien, there's something I want to ask you."
"Why can't those Cupids deliver letters to you?"
Hearing Malfoy's question, Harry and Ron exchanged a glance, both seeing the same curiosity in each other's eyes.
What, had someone tried to send Lucien a letter?
Lucien said, "I gave the Cupids instructions to politely decline anyone who tries to send me greeting cards or love letters."
"Instructions?" Harry repeated, puzzled.
Lucien nodded. "These Cupids are all alchemical puppets I made, so I can give them certain clear instructions."
"Alchemical puppets?!"
The others exclaimed in unison.
Those little fellows could fly, laugh, act cute, had skin as soft as a baby's, and could even judge whether it was appropriate to disturb someone depending on the time.
And they were alchemical puppets?
Not living creatures?
Malfoy instinctively thought of the alchemical puppet his father kept in his collection.
That thing could indeed serve tea, pour water, and bow in greeting, but its movements were as stiff as a corpse, and its hollow eyes were unsettling enough to make people uncomfortable.
Compared with these Cupids, which looked so lifelike they seemed to possess intelligence of their own...
Ron, on the other hand, thought of the simple alchemical animal he had been struggling to make, an owl that could only screech and run around but couldn't fly at all.
He had left the thing in the dormitory, only for it to start screeching nonstop in the middle of the night and get chased around and beaten by his roommates, with Harry being the only exception.
Compared with these Cupids, which could fly, recite letters, sing, and play music...
Ron silently swallowed.
He decided he'd better study harder and make a few more adjustments.
Lucien looked at Malfoy suspiciously.
"Why do you ask?"
Malfoy's gaze drifted away.
"It's just that a younger Slytherin student asked me to find out." He paused, then asked in return, "But why do you want to refuse all those love letters and greeting cards?"
Lucien didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he pulled a beautifully wrapped box of chocolates from his pocket, opened it, took one out, and handed it to Harry.
"Take a look."
Harry was caught off guard by the gesture and instinctively accepted it, already moving to put it in his mouth.
Black lines practically appeared across Lucien's forehead, and he hurriedly stopped him.
"Before you eat it, 'look' and see whether anything has been added to it."
Harry's hand froze in mid-air.
He lowered his gaze to the chocolate in his hand and examined it carefully.
The chocolate shell looked perfectly normal. In fact, it was rather exquisite, with delicate patterns carved across the surface, clearly showing that whoever made it had put considerable thought into it.
Seeing that Lucien still had an entire box in his hand, Harry figured it wouldn't hurt to break open the one he was holding.
He gently snapped it apart.
Snap.
The chocolate shell cracked open, and a dreamy blue-pink liquid slowly flowed out from inside.
At the same time, tiny bubbles rose from the liquid in little spirals before spinning apart and vanishing into the air.
"Whoa..." Ron leaned closer and sniffed. "That's strange. It's obviously chocolate, so why does it smell like baked pie?"
Malfoy had been standing to the side with an air of superiority, but upon hearing this, he couldn't help sneering.
"Baked pie?" He lifted his chin slightly. "How ignorant. This is clearly the aroma of dragon blood wine."
Malfoy paused, seemingly enjoying the chance to show off his refined knowledge.
"Never mind how rare the ingredients are. To bring out the best flavour, dragon blood wine has to be aged in a cellar for at least fifty years. Even a small glass..."
He had been about to say that a small glass of properly aged dragon blood wine would be enough to buy the Weasleys' entire Burrow, but remembering that Lucien was still standing nearby, he forcibly swallowed the second half of the insult.
Ron was just about to retort when he suddenly thought of something and chuckled.
"Ahem."
He cleared his throat and began reciting in a rhythmic, theatrical tone,
"Your grey eyes are deeper than the fine wine in the cellar, your sneer is more noble than jewels. If I could, I would want to become the Slytherin badge on your chest, forever pressed against your heart..."
Malfoy's face instantly turned from pale to as red as Ron's hair.
"Weasley!"
Could they not move past this already?
Harry ignored their bickering.
He stared blankly at the broken chocolate in his hand, breathing in that faint, elusive scent.
It wasn't baked pie.
Nor was it dragon blood wine.
It smelled like fresh grass.
Like the scent of grass brushing past the tip of his nose when he flew low over the ground during a Quidditch match.
And there was also a faint trace of...
Something burnt?
Like the lingering smell of charred air after lightning had torn across the sky.
Harry frowned.
Why did everyone smell something different?
He looked up at Lucien and found him watching with the same expression he usually wore when quizzing him.
Something clicked in Harry's mind.
He looked back down at the chocolate in his hand. The blue-pink liquid, the spiralling bubbles, the fact that everyone smelled something different...
Why did all of that sound so familiar, as though he had read about it somewhere before?
It wasn't in his Potions textbook. Second-year Potions hadn't covered anything like this yet.
But perhaps it had been in one of the extracurricular books Lucien had recommended...
"It's a Love Potion!" Harry suddenly exclaimed. "It's filled with a full dose of Love Potion!"
Ron and Malfoy stopped arguing at the same time and turned to look at him.
The more Harry spoke, the more certain he became.
"And it's a very high-quality Love Potion. That's why everyone smells something different!"
Lucien nodded.
"Correct. It's a Love Potion. One of this quality can also be called Amortentia. It's usually only covered in advanced Potions classes in the sixth or seventh year. This box of chocolates was sent to me by owl this morning. There are several more 'gifts' like it."
Amortentia was considered the most powerful Love Potion.
But it could not truly create love. It only caused the person who drank it to develop an intense obsession, and the same was true of other so-called Love Potions.
Love Potions were also one of the types of potion capable of directly affecting Muggles.
Voldemort's mother had used such a potion to make Voldemort's father, Tom Riddle Sr., a Muggle, "fall in love" with her, a witch.
But how could love created by a potion ever be real?
Once the artificial obsession faded, all that remained was resentment and distortion.
Harry and the others fell silent.
It seemed... being popular wasn't necessarily an entirely good thing.
If Lucien hadn't instructed the Cupids to refuse letters sent to him, he might have had to spend the entire day listening to them recite and sing one confession after another.
And then there was the spiked chocolate...
Ron imagined the scene and couldn't help shuddering.
He looked at Lucien and asked tentatively,
"Then... do you have no plans for Valentine's Day today?"
"I do," Lucien replied.
"Remember to go outside the castle tonight. There's still a special event."
________
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