Trying was perhaps a strong word, but he nodded vaguely all the same. Typically, Tiberius' intellectual pursuits fell into one of two very distinct categories. Things that caught his interest and merited further study occupied a great deal of his thought and most, if not all, of his free time (and even some of his time at the Ministry, as well). He devoted a seemingly endless store of energy to them until he had exhausted every avenue of study. Things that did not catch his interest, on the other hand, he could not be bothered to waste an once of exertion on, even if the Department of Mysteries was paying him to do it, and he would never touch the subject beyond the barest glance through the material. There was seldom any overlap between the two. The subject of becoming an Anigamus would have fallen into the latter group, had he not once bragged to her that he could do it; now, setting it aside for other tasks seemed to be almost a sort of defeat.

That being said, he hadn't touched the stuff in a month or more. After reaching the end of what he could learn through casual study, he had balked at actually setting himself to the physical tasks such as the mandrake root. What was the point, when it seemed (by now, anyway) unlikely ever to come up again?

Except here it was, coming up, at the strangest of possible times.

"It hasn't been the only thing I've been working on," he said noncommittally. "But I've made a good deal of progress. Why? Are you still interested in trying it?"