"Yeh've got just two pieces ter be getting to make yer a wand Grawpy…you got yer core, and yer twig. I'm settin' oot to find sumtn magical ter make the core now. I'm sorta supposing yer to trek down a cupla twigs 'd make a good wand whilst I'm gone. Yer think yer could do that Grawpy"?
"Twig Hager?"
"Sure's yer could g'on an find some twig's Grawpy, some l'il sticks that would fit in like Hermoine's li'l hands Grawp, now g'one w'yer".
"Her-Min-ninny hanz Hager?"
"Tha's right Grawp, twigs fer Her-mi-ninny's hands, now g'one".
Hagrid was not all that sure about this plan at all. During the destruction and rebuilding of Hogwarts after the final you-know-who showdown, it was difficult keeping Grawp out of trouble. Sure, he was instrumental in moving the great blocks of masonry around as Howarts balustrades and towers were reassembled. But even then Gwarp had to be watched carefully, he was even more clumsy then Hagrid himself.
Once the heavy lifting for Hogwarts had been completed, it was all Hagrid could do to keep Grawp out of trouble. One minute he'd be jumping naked into the water causing huge ripples across the lake and embarrassing and angering the merfolk. Then, the next minute he'd be spying the roof off of some Hogsmeade tavern hoping to pilfer kegs of Butterbeer. As it turned out he had an insatiable addiction to the heady stuff. The final straw occurred when Grawp had fallen asleep on top of the train tracks, numb from six gallons of Butterbeer, and blocked a trainload of frustrated students from arriving at Hogwarts for the first day of school. It had taken every student on the train and the entire Hogwarts' staff just to roll him off the track.
Professor McGonagall had been the one who strongly suggested that Hagrid needed to train Grawp in an occupation suitable to Grawp's peculiar talents. She had told Hagrid that as his older brother, he needed to prepare Grawp to be able to support himself. As she worded it, Gwarp needed to become a contributor to the Hogwarts community if he was going to be allowed to stay. If nothing else, she felt Grawp just needed to be kept busy. Hagrid knew the wise Headmistress was right about that.
Hagrid had already made several unsuccessful attempts to reform the young giant. As Hogwarts' gamekeeper, he had tried to teach Grawp the care and feeding of the magical animals living around the forest, but Grawp just had not been able to catch on to the feeding part of his job. Just as he'd start to slop down a bowl of unicorn kibble, his huge tummy would start rumbling and he'd end up eating the whole barrel. Sometimes he'd even try to add the creature he was supposed to be feeding onto his own plate. Giants were just not adaptable to leaving food out for others, their natural tendency were to being the ones properly fed.
Next, as Keeper of the Keys for Hogwarts, Hagrid had tried to make Grawp a set of his own keys. That turned out to be a disaster, Grawp's huge hands made holding keys pretty near impossible. Hagrid had been at a complete loss as to how to train Grawp to be productive, until George Weasley had made the wand suggestion. Hagrid had thought at the time that George was pulling his leg; as he knew George was want to do at times. But the more Hagrid had thought about it, the more it made sense. Ollivander had been in a semi-retired state since his capture and release. Another maker, Gregorovitch, had passed on behind the curtain and was no longer out their making competitive wands. This made the Wand Making occupation wide open to a new generation of makers.
The first problem to conquer was that Hagrid did not really know how to make a wand. When he had talked to Hermione about it, she had done all kinds of research for them. What she had found out was wand making was a pretty secret occupation. Wizards who held Wandlore skills were loathe to share anything. There were also ministry laws preventing publication of Wandlore. The laws were in put in place to prevent magical creatures other then wizards obtaining wand technology. The best that Hermione could discover was a very general idea on how wands were assembled. Hagrid was pretty handy with a carving knife, and after all, he had been able to fashion his umbrella into a serviceable wand of sorts. He pretty much figured that with what Hermione had surmised, and a little trial and error, he'd be able to work out the wand technology himself. George had told him that if he was able to come up with some wands that really worked, he was pretty sure he could market them at his novelty store.
With Grawp off to find some suitable twigs, Hagrid started on his own search for suitable magical creature parts for the core. He knew the forest had unicorns and other creatures that might be sufficient to the making of a wand core. The first magical creature that Hagrid came across was the blue Ford Anglia that Harry Potter and Ron Weasley had flown to Hogwarts all those years ago. He discovered the Anglia in a duel with a huge brown spider, possibly one of Aragog's descendants. They seemed engaged in a territorial battle of some sort. There were all sorts of honking and fang snapping going on, but neither creature seemed to be able to gain the upper hand. Hagrid watched as they wrestled and battled for position in the suppressed light of the deep forest.
The Anglia made a forward charge toward the spider, smashing into it broadside. The Spider jumped up over the Anglia, tearing off the radio antenna as it crashed onto the hood. The Anglia braked hard, turned sharply left, and the Spider slipped off to the right, smashing into a tall oak tree. The spider spinnerets left a trail of magical web all over the Anglia. Both the Anglia and spider crashed off into the forest in different directions. As they did so, Hagrid gathered both the magical web and the Anglia antenna, thinking they both might be useful in a 'core' sort of way.
Hagrid also found some arrows stuck into the side of a maple tree near where Professor Umbridge had battled with the Centaurs. Certainly those would have magical powers of some sorts. And it was stroke of luck that Hagrid was able to find two stingers from various Blast-Ended Screwts that had not survived their freshman year at Hogwarts. He grabbed those and stuffed them in the big burlap bag he had thrown over his shoulder.
Back at his shack he laid out the various potential cores. He had to stretch them out straight and weigh them down, if crooked they would be difficult to slide into the wands. The Screwt stingers would be a bit thick, so he whittled on them with his knife, slicing them into sections small enough to serve as a core.
As he was working, he smiled fondly when he heard the thundering footsteps of Gwarp returning with his 'twigs'. A shadow shielded him from the sun as Gwarp's jolly grin smiled down upon him. "Hager got core?", bellowed Gwarp. As Hagrid looked up at Gwarp his face turned to a worried frown. "Me w'rd Gwarp, whar'd yer get them bruises?" Gwarp's face and arms were covered with swelling black and purple marks. Gwarp answer thundered across the grounds.
"Twigs naht come peesful Hager", bellowed Gwarp. Hager was stumped. Gwarp threw down a large bundle of large wand sized sticks. The sticks were twitching and rattling. One snapped up and flicked Hagrid on the side of his large calf muscle. Hagrid, curiosity bubbling to the surface, asked "Me word Gwarp, jus' where 'xactly did you fin' these twigs?" Gwarp pointed toward a large old willow centered on the school grounds. "Twigs naht come peeseful Hager".
"Cert'nly not the Wamp'n Willow, Gwarpy, yer not tell'n me that, are yeh?" Gwarp just nodded his bruised head. Hagrid let out a chuckle. "Well now, les hav'r look at these bruises now, brother." He retrieved a wash cloth from his shack, dampening it with some well water and rinsed off Gwarp's face. "Ahh believe ahh got's somthin' fer that swellin Gwarp". He went back in his cabin for a minute, returning with a large dragon filet. He laid the filet over the largest swelling bruise on Gwarp's round mug. It stayed there only a minute before Gwarp starting chewing on it. Hagrid just chuckled a bit more.
"Well, le's have er look at these twigs now", said Hagrid, chuckling again. He picked up one of the potential wands and then it snapped dangerously at his cheek. Hagrid pulled out his carving knife and started whittling away at the small branch, shaping it into a rough wand. He pulled out some sand paper and started smoothing out the rough edges. He had to be a bit careful; the wand would occasionally take a hard snap at him.
"Now Gwarpy, how d'we hollow oot these thar twigs?", asked Hagrid…almost to himself. Gwarp gave him a oblivious shrug of his huge shoulders. Hagrid tried to twist the tip of his knife centered in the wand, making a mark. He could tell that would take him an eternity to do. He pointed his umbrella at the tip of the wand and chanted 'trillix'. The wand simply blew up in a puff of purple flame.
"Codswallap", muttered Hagrid. Le's haver 'nother try, eh Gwarpy?" He picked up another twig and quickly cocked his head as the twig snapped at his check. Hagrid quickly whittled that one down to look like a wand and sanded it. Hagrid looked at Gwarp. "Yer gots an idear how we holl'o these ert Gwarp?", asked Hagrid, not expecting any reply. "Flberw'rm Hager?" replied Gwarp. Hagrid took a second look at his brother. "Now, thas'a thought br'thr', Hagrid said. He went over to a big oak barrel sitting beside his shack. He popped open the top and reached his fingers in, pulling something out.
In his hands he had a large brown worm, perhaps 24 centimeters long. He placed the worm at the end of the wand, held up his umbrella and chanted 'engorgamonda'. A golden light flashed from the umbrella and struck the flobberworm. Immediately the flobberworm started gnawing into the core of the twig. Hagrid had to hold down the twig to keep it from snapping at the voracious flobberworm, but the process seemed to be working. "Attaboy Gwarp, yer mite be onner somthin here", said Hagrid proudly. Gwarp opened a huge smile 'Atterboi Gwarp", Gwarp repeated.
Hagrid and Gwarp were able to hollow out six or seven of the twigs this way. The next step was to fit in the magical object into the core. Hagrid handed the twig and a piece of the Anglia antenna to Gwarp, and said 'Giver a try, Gwarpy'. Gwarpy used his giant fingers to thread the antenna into the twig, surprisingly he was able to do this quite nimbly, even with his fat fingers. He smiled and shook the twig at Hagrid, but the antenna slid right out of the wand.
"Well now Gwarpy, guess we gotta fin'er way to keep it in 'eer", chuckled Hagrid. He thought about it for a few minutes. Something occurred to him. "Be ri't bak, broth'r", he said. He went into his shack. He remembered he had set aside some Rock Cake batter. He grabbed the wooden bowl of batter and took it out to Gwarp. "Try'er 'gain w'this tuff, Gwarpy". Gwarp reassembled the wand, this time stuffing it full of Rock Cake batter to hold the core in.
"Bet'r lay'r out'ta dry Gwarp, les try 'nother", directed Hagrid. By dinner time, then had six of them layed out to dry on the green carpeted Hogwart's lawn. "That'll do fer now Gwarp, les see 'bout them 'n da morn'. How 'bout les have a bit to eat now". Gwarp answered 'Gwarp hungry Hagger'. Hagred had left a flank side of wild wilderbeest for Gwarp cooking over the outdoor fire, and they went and had their small feast.
The next morning, bright and early…was a spectacular Hogwarts sunshiny day, the kind you get right before the waning days of fall. Hagrid and Gwarp looked out over the six assembled wands. Hagrid examined the core of several wands, and was satisfied that that Rock Cake batter had hardened sufficiently. "Shall we giv'er try, Gwarpy". He picked one of the homemade wands up gingerly. Pointing the wand at one of the garden scarecrows, he pointed the wand and chanted 'obliterate'. The wand let out a loud booming crack, dull green light erupted from the tip toward the scarecrow, and the scarecrow was completely vaporized in a violent eruption. The booming sound echoed off the walls of Hogwarts. Some trees on the edge of the forest toppled. Where the scarecrow had been standing there was a huge 8 foot crater, smoke wafting up.
A curious crowd had gathered in front of the Hogwarts entrance. Onlookers were gathered inside windows on the castle wall. Hagrid could see Professor McGonegall sprinting like a rabbit across the scenic rolling lawn toward them. Gwarp was clapping his huge meaty hands. 'Good Lord Hagrid, what on earth was that explosion', shouted the HeadMistress breathless as she stared at the huge crater.
"Hagre gotsa rocka booster", boomed Gwarp, with a mischievous grin on his face. Hagrid smiled proudly, and looked over at the head mistress. "Well HeadMistress, looks as though the Elder wand gotter comp'tition now". "Think'n we mihter found us'er occupation fer Gwarpy now', and his smile was broad and proud.
Fin
nca