35 Chapter 35: The Snowy Day

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2 November 1991, Hogwarts

Having enough of terrifying the boy, Harry cancelled the illusion which was looming threateningly over the downed Malfoy and simply cast a disarming charm, "Expelliarmus!" from his original position. The boy was sent back with his arm far away from him.

"I expect a written letter of apology tomorrow or I will send one to your parents," Harry spoke up before turning and leaving for his dormitory.

The following morning, Harry woke up to something pecking his head. He tried to shoo it with his hands but hit nothing. He let out a tired groan, and muttered, "Stop it!!!"

And yet the pecking didn't stop. Having lost his sleep entirely decided to see who was bothering him. Slowly sitting up, he was accosted by a white figure that seemed to be glaring at him.

Harry frowned at the figure and put on his glasses to see more clearly, "Hedwig?"

The owl's glare seemed to have intensified. It was far too intense for a bird to have. Harry immediately realized what was wrong. He really hasn't visited Hedwig for weeks and he was feeling a bit guilty at the thought of his negligence towards his friend.

He gave the owl an apologetic look, "I'm sorry Hedwig. I haven't hung out with you for a while."

The snowy owl let out a reproachful screech in response and Harry grimaced, "tell you what, I don't have classes with you today, so why don't you hang out with me all day? Spend some quality time together. We can even pass by the kitchens to get some breakfast before anyone else. We might even get some yummy bacon. You'd like that, wouldn't you, girl?"

The owl hooted softly, which the young Potter interpreted as an agreement. Harry gave his companion a warm smile and continued, "Tell you what, I'll take a quick shower, get dressed and we'll leave."

The snowy owl bobbed her head in agreement and Harry decided to get ready. While taking a shower, a thought entertained his mind. His fight with Draco was somewhat expected, but Harry would have thought that the blonde would have tried to ambush him or at least do it privately in case something goes wrong, and not in the common room. It was a risky manoeuvre, and the boy had embarrassed himself immensely.

Oh, Harry knew that Draco was stewing at Harry's superiority in practically their classes. Even in potions - which he had heard from Crabbe that the blonde was tutored by his godfather during his childhood - where Snape visibly hated Harry, the Malfoy scion was overshadowed by Harry's talent. Draco's father was probably the one pushing him to excel so far. Maybe the boy thought that Harry's painful unlocking of his family crest was a sign of weakness, or that maybe Harry hadn't unlocked his at all. But family crests do not make wizards better at magic, especially when Draco's father still held the primary crest.

Honestly, Harry didn't know what was going on in Draco's head. He seemed insistent on aggravating everyone. From Longbottom to Harry himself, the Malfoy scion seemed determined on making enemies. The worst thing is that Harry had tried being cordial, and even befriending the boy, but he was insistent on continuing this petty one-sided rivalry.

Deciding not to ruin his morning with thoughts of Draco Malfoy of all people, he finished showering and put on some clothes. The moment he exited the bathroom, his own immediately flew to his shoulder and gave him an expectant look.

Harry chuckled at his owl's antics, "You really are a diva, Hedwig."

The owl preened proudly and pecked him on the head once more. He was going to have some breakfast first, and then go to the Room of Requirements for his daily bath. Harry had gotten rough directions to the kitchens from one of the upper years a round a week back, and he was going to abuse the hell out of it.

Harry walked to the Great Hall and went to the passage under the entrance. Technically, the kitchens were in the dungeons, but for some reason, they were no direct way from the common room without going to the above floor. It was probably because it was close to the Hufflepuff dormitory.

Still, Harry had gotten a bit lost after he went down the stairs, and instead of asking the paintings, decided to take out his wand and murmured, "Point me, Kitchen Entrance!"

The wand immediately levitated itself and spun around pointing towards Harry's right. But the Potter scion didn't care; he was too preoccupied with the telltale burning of his condition but suppressed the urge to scream. His flinch however was noticed by his companion who gave him a penetrating look. For some reason, Harry felt as if he had to explain himself, "Don't worry, Hedwig. It's a temporary condition of mine. A side effect of unlocking my family crest. After breakfast, I'll take care of it for the day."

The Owl nodded and pointed towards the floating wand. With a chuckle, the Potter scion followed the wand's direction, and a few minutes later, the wand pointed to the painting of a giant painting of various fruits. Harry tentatively put his hand up against the painting and tickled the painted pear.

The damn thing actually giggled and turned into a giant doorhandle. Harry grabbed the pear and opened the door revealing a giant high-ceilinged room as large as the Great Hall, on the other side. There were four long wooden tables that were positioned exactly beneath the four House tables above, in the Great Hall. They already seemed to be full of food, ready to be sent up through the ceiling to their counterparts above.

At least a hundred little elves were standing around the kitchen, beaming, bowing, to Harry. They were all wearing the same uniform: a tea towel stamped with the Hogwarts crest and tied like a toga.

One of the elves finally decided to speak with him, "I bes Tweak, young student. Why yous be in our kitchens."

Harry frowned at the broken English but smiled immediately after, "Well I heard that you were all the most hard-working elves in the country, and I wanted to see for myself."

The elves preened proudly at that, "Of course, Wes being the most hard-working. Wes Hogwarts elves."

Harry chuckled, "Of that, I have no doubt. Tell you what, Tweak, do you mind getting some bacon for my friend Hedwig here? She's very hungry. As am I for that matter."

Before he even finished his sentence, Harry was immediately pushed towards one of the tables and a plate of food was summoned in front of him. Hedwig, on the other hand, had a plate full of bacon just for her.

Harry gave the elves a gracious smile, "Thank you for the meal. I am sure it will be delicious. Oh, can you get me some coffee too? It's a bit of a morning ritual for me."

A cup of coffee practically materialized next to his plate, "Thank you. You really are amazing."

The elves seemed to be slightly teary but still had blinding smiles on their faces. Perhaps, they just weren't used to people giving them compliments, or thanking them for that matter. But at least they didn't jump at him and burst into tears like Dobby did to his counterpart in the stories.

And the meal really was delicious. Hedwig practically devoured her small pile of bacon, and both Harry and his companion left the kitchen with full bellies, ready to continue their day. Harry then proceeded to walk towards the seventh floor to take his daily ritual bath. The room of requirements really was god sent; the Potter scion really didn't know what he would have done if it didn't help him with his condition. Harry didn't want anyone, especially not Dumbledore or Quirrel to find out about his abilities. He was staying out of their little pissing match as much as possible.

Harry walked by the door three times, while wishing for his ritual bath, and as expected the door appeared. Hedwig's questioning hoot was very amusing, and Harry started to explain, "It's called the Room of Requirements, it's supposed to turn into anything a person needs. Here, let me show you."

As Harry disrobed and took a dip into the bath, he groaned in relief as the excess magic was siphoned off his body. He then gave Hedwig a wink and suddenly the room started to shift into a giant forest. Harry gave Hedwig a small smile, "Go on, girl, have fun."

The snowy owl hooted and flew away. Harry, though, decided to use this time to take out a book he was slightly putting off reading. Its title was 'An Introduction in Alchemy'.

It was one of the required books for sixth years taking the alchemy elective. With all this talk of philosopher's stones and immortal alchemists, Harry had wanted to get a preliminary understanding of the field, even if it was probably far above his competence.

Harry had copied the book, in the library, not wanting to let anyone know how advanced his studies truly were. And he started devouring the theory. Funnily enough, the concept is very simple and could be summarized into two words: Equivalent exchange. Well, magic was technically based on the concept, but the exchanges made using alchemy were permanent ones.

It was an entire overhaul of the wand magic system because it wasn't based on wands at all but on ritualism. With alchemy, transfiguration became transmutation. Charms became permanent enchantments, Potions became permanent elixirs, and Curses became unanchored and permanent. It was a very delicate concept of magic, that could easily backfire with permanent consequences.

The fact that this was taught to sixteen-year-olds was disturbing. Then again, a first-year could accidentally burn someone alive with a spell, so that wasn't out of the ordinary. And yet, Alchemy was by far, the single most dangerous type of magic that Harry had read about so far.

No wonder Alchemists were so much in demand all over the world; they were the only ones capable of making permanent serums that can stop certain diseases. It was very hard though, and most people quit after a couple of lectures. Yeah, Harry couldn't see a teenager with a subpar magical theory education understanding a word of this. That made Dumbledore practically the only competent alchemist in the country and that gave him a monopoly over all alchemical regents in the nation. That man made himself quite literally indispensable to magical Britain, and it was disgusting.

His political positions in the Wizengamot, in the ICW, and as Headmaster of Hogwarts, let alone the only source of alchemical elixirs in the country, quite literally made him untouchable. Should he lose all these positions, the political and economical ramifications would be massive.

Alas, Harry had no wish to confront Dumbledore. He didn't even want to be on the man's radar. Let him distract himself with useless concepts of fate and destiny, while Harry grows as a wizard. The Potter scion put the book down with a huff. The contents were heavy, even for a scholar like him, and Harry realized that he would need to have a competent understanding of Runes to start making sense of the specifics of the field. And it's not like Harry had any plans on using any sort of Alchemy without a teacher. Yeah, permanent magic was scary.

Harry took out his wand and murmured, "Tempus!" and realized that it was almost noon. He had spent over five hours in the room and he needed to hurry up to get back to their daily meeting in the library. After all, he had a few things to say to her about Halloween.

Harry called Hedwig back and got dressed. A few minutes later, he and his owl left the room and headed towards the library.

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