Wood Works
The time without their wands and no idea how to understand any of the people in the strange land of Westeros had left Harry with an immense feeling of boredom most days. The men around the castle seemed to use up much of their time training, hunting, or mock-fighting. It was good sport for the most part, but a lot of it was too aggressive for his liking, and some days Harry didn't want to spend all his time immerged in ideas and fantasies of battle and blood.

That's where he'd developed an interest in whittling. There didn't seem to be any games in Winterfell, none that he knew how to play at least and he missed playing wizard chess with Ron. Hermione wasn't as good when he'd played against her in the past, but at least she knew how to play. And it was something to do that didn't end in bruises.

So, Harry found a small knife and some discarded wooden blocks and got to work. He thought he'd try something simple before getting to work on his chess set. Harry had the picture in his mind and flaked off piece after piece of it and after a few hours of diligent work, he held a simplified carving of a snowy owl.

The likeness was crude, but Harry still felt proud of his accomplishment and showed it to Hermione after he'd finished.

His friend had smiled and nodded in approval for the creation, pleased that he'd found something that interested him.

"It's really good." She informed him, passing the owl back over. "You should keep doing it. It could be something to pass the time."

So, Harry kept it up. Most of the time he carved out things that reminded him of home; a ragged talking wizard hat, a toad, a hippogriff, a shaggy black dog. With his progress he felt as if he was improving enough to start on the chess set. He wasn't skilled enough to recreate the wizard chess pieces that had been detailed enough to become alive and attack their opponents right on the board. Instead, he'd go the easy way this once and just do the generic chess design.

Still, this creation was difficult in its own way since he had to keep in mind that the pieces needed to look precisely the same. A few he messed up on, making them too big or too small as in compared to their companions who were all supposed to look identical. He painted the dark half and took extra care to measure and trace the square pieces on the board precisely as they were meant to be. Eventually though, he had a set that was manageable and presented it to Hermione, asking if she wanted to play it with him.

The girl agreed, since he had worked so hard on it and also because she missed those games from home so much.

They played it in the Great Hall, facing each other across one of the tables. The object eventually drew a few people towards them, curiosity making numerous onlookers ask what they were doing. Every time the two of them had to stop their game to explain and after a while there were a few people who asked if they'd be able to teach them how to play, Robb, Jon, and Arya among them.

After a while, Harry was named the winner and Jon took Hermione's seat across from him, resetting the game the way Harry showed him.

The boy took care to explain the rules to him, attentively showing him how each piece was able to move across the board as well as the tricks that could be applied to them. The names for pieces like the king, queen and knight were easy enough to translate in their language, but for the rest, there were no words he knew that would have been an appropriate equivalent, so he just left them as they were, except for the bishop which he'd renamed the septon for them.

Everyone surrounding listened and watched carefully as the two teen boys moved their pieces along the board, studying how this interesting novelty worked when it came time for their turn.

Jon was so concentrated on Harry's moves, that he seemed to forget where he was putting his own at times and the game ended in only a few minutes for the young man.

Robb was next and had been listening and watching carefully from the side during both Harry's games between Hermione and Jon. Surprisingly, he caught on fairly quickly and managed a lengthy defeat for Harry.

The young wizard nodded, impressed with his friend's success. Robb seemed to have had so much fun in the game that he asked if Harry wouldn't mind making another for him. Jon also asked if he could have one as well, offering to pay for it if that would convince him.

Stunned to be getting so much attention for his work, Harry agreed. It was the first paying job he had ever gotten.

It kept him busy for a few more weeks and by the end of finishing Jon's board, his skill in shaping smoothing and measuring each piece had perfected. The two accepted the gifts with praise towards Harry's skill. To be honest he wasn't sure how to charge them, but after consulting with Hermione, they worked out an appropriate fee for his services.

Over the next few weeks the two of them set up their boards in the Great Hall and competed against anyone who would play against them. It seemed the game was taking off rather quickly and Harry was presented with several more orders for chess boards.

Harry was beginning to get rather bored of so much chess and longed to begin practicing his skills on something else. But there were lots of ways to play chess and lots of ways to design the pieces.

When Lord Stark has asked him to create a board for himself Harry had done something extra special for the warden's order. For the wolf lord, Harry had designed the pawns to sport helmets resembling Winterfell soldiers, he made the rooks resemble the memorable design of the towers around castle, wolf heads for the knights, and the bishops were trunks of heart trees complete with their crying faces. For the queen he gave her a crown of blue winter roses that the north was famous for and for the king, rather than the generic cross-crown, he carved out a miniature likeness of the crown the last King of the North had worn. He'd seen pictures of it from the history books that Maester Luwin had shown him and spent hours perfecting the design. He didn't bother doing anything too intricate with the board and just painted it black and white, the same as the pieces. As an afterthought though, he did carve out the direwolf sigil underneath it.

The finished result was something Harry was immeasurably proud of. He'd poured his soul into the creation, wanting it to please the man that had taken both himself and Hermione in without so much as a hesitation in doing so. Harry may have put a bit more than just his soul into its creation, though. Maybe the boy had subconsciously poured a bit of magic into the woodwork, which may have played a hand in how well the final product turned out. There were even moments when Harry could swear the pieces almost seemed alive, the same way the old wizard chessboard Ron owned had been alive too.

Lord Stark had been amazed when Harry had presented the final work to him. It hadn't been what the man had expected but he was in no way displeased with the outcome, commending the boy and the marvelous work with enthusiasm. Though Harry charged only a stag for his games, Lord Stark gave him two for this particular work.

"It's good you've got a trade for yourself, Harry." Ned had told the boy, handing him the payment. "A man with a good trade will always be profitable."

The thought was a comfort to him. At least he knew his magic still worked even if they had lost their wands. If nothing else, maybe Harry could even make his own wand someday. He didn't know a whole lot about wand making in general, but how hard could it be really? All it sounded like he needed was a branch of wood and a magical core; at least that's what Olivander had implied when he first bought his wand as that small eleven-year-old.

When he brought the subject up to Hermione, she had shaken her head in discouragement.

"Harry, wand making is very complicated." She told him sadly. "People have been trying to perfect it for centuries. There's the symbolism that needs to be kept in mind when selecting the wood, then length plays a part in the creation, and where on earth do you plan to find a magical core anywhere?"

As much of a disappointment as that had been to hear, Harry had to admit she did have a point, but it wasn't enough to discourage him completely. If the day ever came where he could find a core, he'd get it and use it towards making the ideal wands for himself and Hermione.

Thankfully he hadn't needed to do so, since it had been revealed that both their wands had been kept by Lord Stark after all. It had felt so nice to have his magic back that he'd done numerous small spells that same night; levitating a few things around his room, made his bed with magic, and enchanted a few of the wooden animals to do a little dance on his work desk, just because he could.

Still, just because he'd gotten his wand back didn't mean Harry had decided to give up his new hobby. Though it seemed obvious Harry could use it someday as a possible income, it also served as something the boy enjoyed doing, so he kept at it.

He designed more caricatures, figurines, utensils, bowls, and even toys, a few of which he'd gifted to the youngest Starks. He even entertained the idea of maybe building and enchanting a broom to fly. Hermione had actually encouraged the idea, though any prototypes he worked on were kept hidden out of sight. So far, there hadn't been much luck with his models, they were either too slow, or wouldn't hover for very long, courtesy of his third-year limited training.

When he got frustrated with his broom failures, he would switch back over to his caricatures and other small creations. Soon his room was filled with the knickknacks and the floor near his desk was dusted almost completely with wood shavings, though he'd used his newly restored access to magic to keep it from getting too dirty these days, and he usually kept the shavings to give to Hermione so she could make more parchment out of it all. With his wand, he was even able to charm his works now, making them look more refined, change their color, or give them a glossy finish. And each creation just seemed to be more detailed and beautiful than the last.

Not since learning how to fly with a broom had Harry felt particularly good at anything. Mostly his skills on doing anything were acceptable at best, managing to get him through most lessons without any noteworthy aptitude. Fighting was all the boys here seemed to be expected to do well and that just didn't seem enough for him nor did it interest him very much. He didn't want to be known for fighting and didn't always enjoy it. So, he found something else to do.

Hermione had her brain and her wits to pull through this world, but Harry had something now, too, and he was immensely proud of his new-found talent.