James and Sirius stood on the platform waiting for the Hogwart’s Express. Among their personal items, which they brought with them on a regular basis, was one extraordinary item. It was a large wooden box. Their normal items, which were stashed in their respective trunks, went unnoticed by their fellow students. The extraordinary item caused a bit more notice. James and Sirius were used to being noticed. In fact, some suspected that they went out of their way to be noticed. This time, they definitely wanted to be noticed.

“I don’t know, James,” Sirius said, trying to exude his usual nonchalance. “Do you really think this will work?”

James shot his friend a sideways glance, drawling, “It had better, mate, or I am a dead man.”

“It is safe in there, isn’t it?” Sirius asked, looking at the box suspiciously.

“Yes,” James began, irritation edging into his voice. “You know as well as I do that at this stage, the potion needs a very low flame. Besides, I encased it with a Protective Charm.”

James and Sirius were in their last year at Hogwarts. James had been on the Quidditch team for the last five years. All five years the Gryffindor team had been beaten by the thugs that passed for a Slytherin team. Watching the Slytherins win the Quidditch Cup for all six of the preceding seasons had been painful enough, but when Slytherin House won the House Cup at the end of last term, and some of the Slytherin Quidditch players had proceeded to pantomime what they were planning to do to James this season, both boys knew it was time for action.

They stayed up late that night debating various charms, spells and hexes. Transfiguration had been ruled out as too obvious. The consequences of their actions never bothered either of them, but the idea of going to all this trouble, only to have the Gryffindor team disqualified was unbearable. James had seen some amazing cheating done in the name of victory, but obvious magic, never.

Finally, Remus Lupin recounted a brilliant spell his aunt had once used on a cheating boyfriend. She had put a curse on a string of rope she had knotted and sewn it into his robe. Each knot had been cursed with a specific element. It didn’t do any huge damage, except it made things go wrong, little, subtle things that could be put down to being careless or unlucky. The cumulative effects, however, were devastating. The poor wizard ended up friendless and penniless.

James and Sirius had rehashed the curse numerous times, certain that it contained the answer they were searching for. Finally, it hit James. A magical object was good if you had easy access to your victim’s belongings, but a Potion was better. Especially a Potion that your enemies thought was brewed to give you an advantage. So, that night they went over and over the various ingredients and elements of the Felix Felicis Potion. It was a brilliant idea if they could do it correctly. After all, there were no rules against brewing Felix Felicis, only taking it during competitions. If they could make their fellow students think James was daft enough to use it during a Quidditch match then they could get the Slytherins to take it of their own accord.

“I think,” said Sirius solemnly, “that the answer is in the addition of some key ingredient, not many ingredients. The problem is that everything has to be done just right, or some dire consequence will occur. We don’t want to actually hurt those geezers, just fumble ‘em up a bit.”

“What about ‘Golpalott's Third Law of Antidotes’?” James said quietly, moving his wand across his Potions book to impel it to turn to the proper page, reading. “‘It states that the antidote for a blended poison will be equal to more than the sum of the antidotes for each of the separate components. If Golpalott's Third Law is true and the potion's ingredients have been properly identified, then the primary aim is not the relatively simple one of selecting antidotes to those ingredients in and of themselves, but to find that added component which will, by an almost alchemical process, transform these disparate elements.’"

“It’s a bit of a stretch to assume that Golpalott’s Laws are good for anything but Antidotes.” Sirius said, deep in thought. “But it seems to me that old Slughorn addressed that during one of his lectures. If Golpalott’s Law can be used across the board in all potions, then we don’t need to come up with many, specific additives, but just one, super additive.”

“The almost alchemic process,” James repeated, “if we brew the Felix Felicis Potion properly, but instead of using healthy oak, we used oak that had been infiltrated by a parasitic plant, perhaps that would skewer the luck part without kicking in the dire part. Theoretically, that would be the tangle we need, wouldn’t it?”

“Mistletoe does tangle up healthy oak.” Sirius said, “It definitely qualifies as an ‘added component.’”

The first thing James and Sirius did upon arriving home for the summer break was set out into the woods to find an oak tree with mistletoe invading it. They found various specimens, but sadly, the trees had been knocked down during storms, and the mistletoe had touched the ground, which compromised the magical properties. Finally, they found just the tree. It was a good, old oak tree, barely living, but still standing, with a healthy batch of mistletoe entwined around its middle.

That night, as Sirius was getting his caldron and wand, James went to the familial stores and took out the topaz and the May bug wings. His mother had been especially thrilled that he had asked about these, as this years crop had been particularly handsome, larger and more golden that normal. They had started the tincture of pomegranate pulp, which required soaking the pulp in alcohol, as soon as they had decided on this potion. James took the ingredients, and his Potions book and met Sirius out back. They had chosen a spot a little way from the house because the methodology of this potion was a little more advanced than they were used to and they truly didn’t want to take any chances on setting any buildings on fire.

“Alrighty, mate,” Sirius said, excitedly, as he’d never made a potion requiring his caldron to hover in mid-air before.

“Incendio,” he waved his wand at the wood he had piled, and was currently hovering about waist high and it caught into a blazing fire.

James jumped back a bit, surprised at the size of the flame. Sirius grinned at his friend’s distress, then turned his attention back to the flames. Sirius compelled his caldron to rest in the center of the flames, as both boys intently watched the fire. Eventually, the salamanders started forming in the embers. The boys watched as they turned to bright scarlet.

“Umm, James?” Sirius asked, levitating one of the salamanders with his wand. “I know the instructions state that we need to select seven salamanders that are uniform in color and size, but it didn’t say anything about deformity.”

James started levitating salamanders with his wand as well. Some of them had extra legs and short tails, or half legs and extra tails or no legs and seven heads, but none of them seemed to match.

“Body weight,” James said, authoritatively, although both boys knew he was bluffing.

They each held up salamanders, carefully selecting seven that seemed to be the right color and weight. They carefully filleted them with their wands and impelled the pieces to gently float into the caldron. James took the small topaz and threw into the center of the now liquid beasts. They took turns gently stirring the mixture counter clockwise seven times, and then clockwise seven times, until the salamander pieces dissolved the gemstone. Sirius made sure the heat over the mixture remained high as the salamander pieces began disappearing after six hours, leaving the hot, dissolved stone. James added the pomegranate tincture and the wings, a little bit of each in turn, until all of the wings were floating in the caldron. Again they took turns gently stirring clockwise seven times then counter clockwise seven times, repeating until the mixture showed the proper leaping large drops. They extinguished the flames and put the caldron on a low flame device that would keep the temperature uniformly low for the necessary six months. When the ashes were barely warm to the touch, Sirius added the seven pinches of ashes and stirred the required seven times. They had both been a little shocked, although neither would admit it, that the potion seemed to be working. They had put the caldron into the box with the prescribed low heat and Protective Charm, and had pretty much forgotten about it until it was time to return to Hogwarts.

~*~

“You realize your time line is off by more than a week, don’t you?” Lily asked when the boys explained to her their plan.

“Not necessarily,” James replied. “In certain cultures, a month is only 27 days long. Under that scenario we’re roughly six days to the good!”

“Besides,” Sirius chimed in, “It’s technically not a Felix Felicis Potion. It’s our potion, the Tangle Potion. The singularly most boring potion in the world, I might add.”

The fun of the potion had been in the making. By now, after months of weekly stirrings to keep the bubbles jumping, Sirius was ready to move on. He was impressed with Evans, though. She was the only person they had told about the potion who hadn’t made mistletoe jokes, like that wasn’t obvious.

“Umm, James?” Sirius began. “You realize that the Slytherin match is less that a week away and we haven’t had any takers yet. You don’t think they’re on to us, do you?”

“You sure about that, mate?” James ushered Sirius over to the caldron. There was an almost invisible green aura shimmering around it. “The Slytherins have struck!”

~*~

The day of the Quidditch match was a gloriously crisp autumn day. Perfect weather for Quidditch! James flew about the pitch, waiting for the game to start. The Slytherins took the field glowering at Potter, obviously proud of themselves. James looked down at the stands and caught Sirius’s eye. The boys exchanged thumbs up and the game began. The Tangle Potion worked marvelously. The Slytherins were unable to score a point. The bludgers seemed to have homing devices built in to them, plummeting Slytherins at will. James and his team managed to score 100 points before the Gryffindor seeker finally caught to Golden Snitch. They had finally beaten Slytherin!