Quill

Harry tumbled sideways from his chair as a spell flashed before his eyes. His friends, Ron and Hermione, had been arguing. Ron wanted Hermione to look over his homework, but she was refusing. From the looks of it, it seemed the argument had developed into a fight. Crawling back to his feet, Harry looked around to survey the damage.

However, as he looked up, he saw Hermione calmly sitting on the couch reading Ron's homework. Ron was looking at him weirdly. He blushed as he realised he had overreacted, and had simply seen Hermione snatch the parchment from Ron's hands. Harry climbed back in his chair, determinedly hiding his face behind his potions essay, only to realise he had finished it just a minute before. Hesitantly lowering his essay, he looked over at Hermione.

"Do you mind also taking a look at mine?"

Hermione glanced at him for a second before returning her attention to Ron's homework.

"Of course, Harry," she sighed.

"Thanks," he said, glad that she wasn't being difficult. Ron looked at her in mock annoyance.

As they waited for Hermione to finish, Ron and Harry complained about their classes.

"I can't believe McGonagall and Snape, don't they understand that we have two more subjects than last year? We don't have time for all that extra homework!"

"It's not just them though. It seems like all our professors decided that this is the year they kill us by drowning us in homework," Harry added sullenly.

"You should put that in your Divination homework," Ron joked, "I'm sure Trelawney would like that."

"Don't remind me. It's going to take hours to finish that."

"Tell me about it. Why couldn't Flying class be an elective?"

"Oh! I'd have signed up for that in a heartbeat! No homework, no taking notes, just flying for a couple hours more every week," Harry said excitedly, as if expecting it to suddenly show up in his timetable. Before Ron could reply, they were interrupted by Hermione.

"Ron…" she said, sounding uncertain. "What is this?"

"That bad?" Ron asked.

"Well, unless you think Snape would appreciate you describing the process of making the Shrinking Solution as 'cathartic and vaguely reminiscent of taking walks after summer rains, enjoying the smell of petrichor in the air', then yes, it's that bad."

Harry raised his eyebrows. "How did you even come up with that?"

"That's what I'd like to know as well. You even use words like 'dapatical', and I'm quite certain you don't even know what that means." Ron fidgeted as Hermione stared at him intently.

"Um, well, I was complaining to Fred and George about my homework and they said they had the perfect solution. They gave me a quill that they said would make anything I write sound 'intellectual'."

"And you believed them?" Harry asked disbelievingly as Hermione shook her head disapprovingly.

"I was desperate! I still hadn't started it and I didn't want to spend the entire night doing potions, so I thought I might as well try it. Anyway, you can fix it, right?" Ron looked hopefully at Hermione.

Hermione shook her head.

"I… can't. I tried, but whatever Fred and George did to that quill is preventing me from changing anything," she said, sounding slightly annoyed.

"Actually, that's my doing," Percy said from behind them. "It's my quill, I'd like to have it back, please."

"Sure," Ron said, quickly handing back the quill. "But why you'd want that thing, I have no clue."

"Usually it works quite well, I often use it for my essays. Judging from your essay though," Percy said as he glanced at Ron's homework, "I'd say Fred or George messed with it after they stole it from me."

"But, having a quill that writes for you, isn't that cheating?" Hermione interrupted, sounding quite upset.

"Not at all, they're widely used. Some people have quills that write entire paragraphs for them, mine merely switches out a word here and there." Percy's voice sounded suspiciously similar to a professor's as he started to lecture.

"But I'm not surprised you don't know of them. They work best when designed by the user themselves, to cater to their specific needs. As such, they can't be made by thirteen-year-olds. You'll have to make do with a regular quill for a couple more years, I'm afraid. Though of course, they're never allowed on exams here at Hogwarts, that is considered cheating. Now, if you'll excuse me." Percy turned around briskly and left, leaving a pensive Hermione and a bored Harry and Ron who were idly drawing stick figures on Ron's ruined essay.

The next day found Harry, Ron and Hermione in the library, doing research on enchanting quills.

"I don't understand why we're doing this, we're just wasting our time," Ron complained.

"I thought you'd like this Ron, after all, if we can make a quill like that, then you'd be able to do your homework much faster."

"It's not worth it if we first spend weeks trying to figure out how to do it though," Harry argued.

"Exactly," Ron agreed. Hermione looked at the two of them, annoyed.

"Fine, then I won't let you borrow it once I've finished my quill." Hermione huffed as she walked off.

"That wasn't really necessary, Ron. It's not like we were really researching anyway," Harry said as he glanced at the book in his lap.

"Yeah, but she'd have found out soon anyway. I can only read so many different ways you can commit murder with a silver tongue as weapon before I start laughing." Ron chuckled.

"Do you think Percy has fixed his quill by now?" Harry asked suddenly.

"Yeah, probably. Why?"

"Why make a magical quill ourselves when we can just borrow one?" Harry suggested, smiling mischievously.

Notes: Entry for the HG competition.

Prompts used:

Word: petrichor

Dialogue: "I… can't."

Character: Percy Weasley

Weapon: a silver tongue

Subject: Flying Class