"Fair enough." Remus nodded at the boy. "I truly appreciate this, Harry."
"Okay. Now that that's out of the way. I need help."
"With what?"
Harry sighed. "I got to thinking about Dementors the other day. It's hard not to what with them surrounding the school and all," he said and growled. "Especially after falling off my broom thanks to them. Things like that and the train incident can't happen again. I can't afford to collapse like that in a bad situation. I need to be able to defend myself."
"Well," Remus said rubbing his chin, "I could attempt to teach you the Patronus charm. However it is quite complicated. And I am certainly not willing to bring you out to the grounds to practice in on an actual Dementor. There is quite a large difference between performing it in the middle of a classroom and against the creatures themselves."
Harry shrugged. "Being taught the charm is all I'm looking for, Sir. Once I know the basic underlying principles of it I can try to make a rune cluster to replicate the effects. Whether I can perform the charm under pressure would be moot at that point."
Remus' eyebrows rose into his hairline. "A rune stone to reproduce a Patronus? That…I don't believe that is possible, Harry…"
Harry laughed. "I've invented at least five different clusters that are supposedly impossible and I'm pretty close to figuring out another three. Hell this should be simple really. I'm not making anything new, just a rune to perform a spell. Three of my primary combat runes do exactly that with reducto, confringo, and diffindo. I'll probably try to supercharge it or something in case I'm ever swarmed and I should be able to do the spell itself at least somewhat proficiently to make sure that I get credit for it when it comes time for OWLs and NEWTs but the rune itself shouldn't be too hard."
Remus's jaw snapped closed. He started laughing. "You have your father's confidence and your mother's brilliance, Harry. Let's get started then, shall we?"
Breakfast the next morning was…unusual. Harry and company had just laid into their food when a bevy of owls showed up carrying a long, rectangular, paper-wrapped package. Immediately after dropping it in front of Harry, the owls all left.
"That's new." Harry blinked at the bow. Hedwig swooped into the Hall and landed on his shoulder with an indignant hoot glaring at the package. "Hey, don't look at me, girl. I didn't order anything." She hooted again and twisted towards him. "Yes, of course if I had ordered something I would have told you so you could pick it up yourself." She hooted again and ruffled her feathers apparently satisfied. Harry reached over to his plate and held a slice up bacon up for her. "Peace offering?" Hedwig happily gobbled the snack and flew back out of the hall. "What?" he asked looking at his friends who all had varying degrees on incredulity on their faces.
All except for Luna at least who merely looked amused. "I think they are surprised that you were told off by your owl, Harry."
"Not the giant package somebody sent to me then?" Harry asked with a smirk at the blonde.
"That probably has something to do with it as well though I think Hedwig was the larger part." She tapped her finger on her chin and asked nonchalantly, "You don't suppose she might actually be a Mayan Wind Chatterer do you?"
"I admit, Luna, while I'm not familiar with the Mayan Wind Chatterer I really don't think Hedwig is anything more than a really smart owl," he said laughing.
"Shame. I've always been curious whether the Mayan Wind Chatterer truly existed or not." Luna shrugged and went back to her food.
Hermione ground her teeth and was about to say something before Ron cut in. "Well? Are you going to open the thing or what?!"
Harry rolled his eyes and shrugged. "Why not. Might as well see what it is." He opened the card that had come with it. " 'Sorry about your last match. Consider this a repayment for missing so many birthdays and Christmases.' Huh." Tearing the wrappings off Harry was presented with a brand new, mint-in-box Firebolt. The fastest, most maneuverable, best broom currently on the market. A broom worth a thousand galleons. "Urg," Harry couldn't do anything more than croak upon seeing it.
"Wow…" The sentiment was expressed by many of the surrounding people. Ron looked like he was going to faint and Oliver Wood looked torn between joining the redhead and drooling.
Harry reached out a hand to caress the broom but found his arm locked in place by Hermione's iron grip. "Harry, you can't touch that. You can't use that. Not yet!"
"But – but it's a Firebolt, Hermione!" Harry whined.
"Yes and you have at least one person out for your blood. Plus whatever the heck is going on with the Sirius Black situation. There is no indication of who sent you that broom beyond a vague reference to the problems from the match meaning they had to have heard yours was destroyed and have enough money to get you a new broom in very short order. That implies power which implies dangerous. You are going to have that broom thoroughly checked for traps or sabotage before laying a hand on it."
.
.
.
🎉The novel is available in PDF with more than 400 chapters, visit us in our Ko-Fi store🎉
🎉ko-fi.com/gokublack444🎉