Tie Game

Chapter 1- The Contest

Professor Slughorn handed Lily back her essay on the many uses of the various parts of the unicorn. "Not your best work Miss Evans." He said as he moved on to the next table. Lily looked down at her paper, an E.

James Potter, who sat next to her because Slughorn insisted his two best students sit together at the front of the class, leaned over to look down at her paper too, "Ha! An E? I got an O!" he said triumphantly. Lily rolled her eyes at him.

"Only because I didn't have enough time to revise it because the irresponsible, immature Head Boy forgot." She breathed heavily, stuffed her essay in her bag and turned to listen attentively to Slughorn, who was explaining how the Strengthening Solution potion was used.

However she was interrupted by a voice whispering in her ear, "I still beat you!" Lily was furious: the one time James Potter beat her in Potions he had to rub it in her face. Not wanting to get caught talking during class, she scribbled on a piece of parchment under the pretence of taking notes. She slipped it across the table to James.

"This is the first time you have ever beat me in anything! I could beat you at anything, anytime!" she wrote.

He read it with interest, smirked and wrote back, "Actually, I have beat you in quite a few things over the years, but name it and we can find out once and for all who is better."

Lily was intrigued, but not quite sure what he was implying, "What do you mean?" she wrote back.

"I mean a contest, a battle between us to see who is better at… everything."

Now she was very interested. Competitive by nature, Lily agreed. "Ok, I can beat you in anything intelligence related, anything to do with schoolwork."

"Oh, come on, I'm nearly as smart as you in almost everything, I'm better at some subjects!"

"Yeah, Transfiguration and Defense Against the Dark Arts, I'm better at everything else."

"Well, I could beat you at Quidditch,"

"I'm on the team too you know."

"Yeah, but I'm better. I always score more goals than you."

"Well, Quidditch is not my best sport. I'm better at swimming."

"I'm a fair swimmer."

"You've never seen me swim have you?"

"Well, I could eat more than you!"

"Eating? You're such a child. How about something that requires real talent, like chess? I doubt you have the attention span for chess."

"You've got me there, I can't stand chess. I only play when Moony makes me. But, I can still beat you at eating!"

"You never seen me eat either, have you?"

James raised his eyebrows at her. This was getting interesting. "Chess is too boring. I need something more interesting, with more action. How about a wizard's duel?"

"A duel? Alright, I think I could beat you at that. Now, we need a task that's creative. How about acting? I've always loved acting. It's a shame Hogwarts never puts on a play."

"Acting eh? I'm dramatic."

"Melodramatic, more like… Now how about one more challenge? Something out of the ordinary."

"How about cooking?"

"Cooking? Are you serious? You don't exactly strike me as the cooking type."

"Well maybe you just don't know my type."

At this point, it was no longer plausible that they were taking notes as Professor Slughorn had stopped talking. He swooped down upon them to ask them why they had not yet started working on their Strengthening Solution. They mumbled something incoherent and got to work. As they began slicing ginger root, James said, "Hey, let's make this our first task, best potion wins."

Lily grinned, she was always the best in potions, and Slughorn tended to favour her, she would win this one easily. "Sure." She agreed.

The two of them concentrated even harder on perfecting their potions. James read and re-read each line carefully to make sure he did each step correctly. James smirked, Lily had just added powdered unicorn horn to her potion, that wasn't anywhere in the ingredients. He would win this one easily.

With ten minutes left in the period, Professor Slughorn came around to every table checking each student's work. "Excellent job Mr. Potter, a perfect potion." He informed him. Lily saw him puff himself up and smirk at her. "And Miss Evans," Slughorn continued, "This is magnificent!" he proclaimed, "I see you added Knarl quills to offset the unpleasant aftertaste of old socks, but those do tend to cause boils to form, but, ah- do I detect a bit of powdered unicorn horn?" Lily nodded. "Yes, yes, very clever Miss Evans, very clever. I t would prevent boils as well as giving it a pumpkin juice like consistency, rather than that of wet cement, much more pleasant to drink. Very well, top marks again Miss Evans." The bell rang from somewhere overhead. "Alright everyone, you may go."

Lily gathered her potion supplies, hitched her bag up on her shoulder, whispered, "I win." to James, joined her friends Mirena and Catherine, and left the dungeon.