Everything seemed to slow down. In the days leading up to Easter, Sean finally pushed Wizard Chess and Squirrel Cookies to Expert level. Now he had to figure out how to slip one of those cookies to Professor Quirrell without raising any red flags.
For a normal wizard, an Apprentice-level cookie would do the trick for a body-switch, but Quirrell wasn't normal. Until it hit Expert, Sean didn't dare make a move.
He couldn't let Voldemort spot him. Same went for the cookie.
Voldemort was short-tempered and prone to flying off the handle, but that didn't make him stupid. Far from it—he was terrifyingly cunning.
One shot.
Just one chance to pull this off without Voldemort ever realizing Quirrell had been body-swapped.
With those thoughts swirling in his head, Easter rolled around.
The professors had hidden colorful eggs all over Hogwarts. Lucky kids who found them got little surprises inside.
The castle was decked out in bright colors again. The tables in the Great Hall were loaded with every kind of decorated egg you could imagine.
Harry and Ron had started swapping eggs weeks ago. Hermione, meanwhile, was stressed about something else entirely.
She'd already drawn up a full revision timetable and color-coded every single set of notes.
Justin and Neville pitched in. With their help organizing Herbology and History of Magic, Hermione was flying through the material.
Harry and Ron didn't care much at first. Harry spent most days training, and Ron—still riding the high of everyone praising that giant banner—was busy practicing Transfiguration.
But the study vibe in the cottage was contagious. Especially with Hermione basically scheduling their bathroom breaks.
"Hermione, the exams are literally centuries away," Ron pleaded. He didn't want to time his toilet trips.
"Ten weeks," Hermione snapped. "Not centuries. To Nicolas Flamel that's the blink of an eye."
"We're not six hundred years old," Ron reminded her. "And anyway, why are you revising? You already know everything."
"Why am I revising? Have you lost your mind? We have to pass these exams to get into second year! They're important! I should've started a month ago. I don't know what I was thinking…"
Hermione was livid. She and the boys were speaking different languages.
She wandered toward the center of the room, casually glancing at Sean's planning chart—he'd been using something that looked like a map lately—and nodded in satisfaction.
Now that's more like it.
"Hermione, you can't compare us to Sean," Ron muttered.
"What about Justin and Neville, then?"
She whipped out Justin's jam-packed schedule and Neville's planner that basically had him living in the cottage.
"Oh, Merlin's beard… are they even first-years?" Ron whispered in defeat, then cracked open a book.
When the holidays finally arrived, the cottage still smelled like parchment and ink.
On Sean's wooden desk sat a broom. He'd already maxed out three mid-tier alchemical creations to Expert: Wizard Chess, Gobbledegook Wizard Chess, and Leisure Broom.
Now he was grinding proficiency on the Planning Map.
He handed Justin a small button—the object tied to the Summoning Charm—then added Justin's name to the map.
Depending on magical fluctuations, the name would move around.
He also slapped a reverse Summoning Charm on the button. When Justin pinched it, his name on Sean's map would light up.
It felt exactly like an NPC giving out a quest…
Sean stared at the glowing name and thought, Yep. Totally an NPC.
"Sean! How many people can this track?" Justin bounded over, eyes wide as his name slid across the map.
"As many as you want," Sean said with a nod.
"Merlin's pants—"
Justin's brain clearly exploded with possibilities.
His shout drew everyone else over, but the castle bells rang, herding them all to the Great Hall.
The Hall was a riot of color, piled high with Easter eggs. Some kids were already trading.
Sean got a ton and gave out just as many.
Ever since he started at Hogwarts, his holiday gifts had covered the entire staff table.
Every professor had helped him in some way—even Professor Quirrell had swapped gifts with him.
Sean gave the professors books. He had no idea what they gave him; for safety, he hadn't even touched the packages.
The last person who opened a gift without checking was Dumbledore—and he ended up cursed by the dark magic on that ring.
At the staff table:
Dumbledore peered curiously at his egg. Inside was a note: Honeybee Cookies.
Easy to guess who it was from.
He blinked a few times, then glanced at Minerva McGonagall.
McGonagall's egg had cats painted on it. She tucked it away, clearly saving it for later.
Professor Snape flicked his wand, extracted a stag-shaped cookie from his egg, let out a heavy scoff, and stuffed it into his robes.
The least noticeable person at the table was Professor Quirrell.
Hardly anyone gave him anything, so Sean's lone egg stood out like a sore thumb.
Quirrell stared at it for a long time, then slowly slipped it into his bag—along with the little card:
Happy Easter
…
The holidays officially began.
Bad news for the little wizards: the professors apparently shared Hermione's mindset.
They piled on homework. Easter break was nowhere near as fun as Christmas.
With Hermione reciting the twelve uses of dragon blood or drilling wand movements nearby, relaxing was impossible.
Most free time in the cottage was spent studying. Lots of groaning and yawning, but the results were undeniable.
One day, outside the window:
The sky was crystal clear, blue like forget-me-nots, with that first hint of summer in the air.
For the first time in months, they had perfect weather.
Once homework was done, everyone finally got a real day off. Ron wrestled the last patches of snow, trying to transfigure them into a snowman.
Justin and Hermione chased Neville—who'd turned himself into some kind of animal again—and before they knew it, they were near the Forbidden Forest.
Inside the forest, Sean was talking to Hagrid.
"Dragon breeding? I saw some books in the library—Dragon Species of Great Britain and Ireland, From Dragon Egg to Inferno, A Guide to Raising Dragons…"