In transfiguration class, Harry learned that transfigured items can last in their current form for many years. Eventually, the transfiguration weakens and collapses, returning the item to its original form. The current textbook included an extensive article on the 1950 debacle in the Ministry for Magic atrium when the golden statues there collapsed back into nuggets of gold in the middle of the day. The statues had been crafted by wizards who specialised in carving sculptures from marble imported from Italy. However, in 1850, they were persuaded by the current Minister for Magic to use their talent to create memorable statues for the atrium and from Devon gold. After a century in the atrium's centre, the statues began to 'waver' and crack. Officials delayed quick action because no one in the ministry could agree on proceeding, and the statutes collapsed. Replacement statues were crafted, but many older people never believed they were as graceful and beautiful as the originals.
'Shouldn't a rune on the statue – underneath a foot where no one could see it – have kept it permanent?' Harry wondered.
He consulted a reference for runes and learned nothing designated 'forever' or 'permanent' in the runes. Now Harry pondered while scratching his head, 'If I can make the English words 'forever permanent' work in a cartouche, can I make a transfiguration permanent?'
Aggravated that he'd used up the last of his paper cartouches practising runes, he wondered how rune masters ever completed a difficult assignment if they were forever carving cartouches on sandstone plates and other stone surfaces before beginning their work.
'Can I transfigure paper cartouches into sandstone cartouches?' he thought from out of nowhere. After twenty minutes of writing down ideas in his notebook, he sighed and reached for a potions essay assignment, 'Discuss the effects of dragon scale powder in the brewing of a pepper-up potion.'
This paper was important to Professor Snape, and it was due in four days. There was a bright light on the table for a moment where a report appeared in elegant green ink on old parchment. Reading the opening paragraph, Harry found it was the draft of an article published in a potions journal in 1907 from Slyvester Cummings, a seventh-year Hogwarts student. Harry glanced through the six pages and saw several different headings, including one on uses of dragon scales in the pepper up potion.
He frowned and set the paper aside until he had written his outline, and then he read the 1907 paper for ideas and other information. Reading Cummings paragraphs on how and when to add the dragon scales, Harry remembered reading something similar in his potions textbook. Checking his current textbook for the proper reference, he wrote his paper. In the reference section of his textbook, he saw the technique developed by Potions Master Slyvester Cummings in 1924 and used worldwide.
"Thanks, Hogwarts! Slyvester Cummings was a great writer and potion brewer in his seventh year. I see why you kept this paper," Harry said as he packed his book bag. The paper vanished back into the space where Hogwarts kept her treasures, and Harry turned himself invisible to return to the Gryffindor common room. It was way past curfew, and he didn't want to disturb Dobby.
SCENERY CHANGE
In Harry's hours to explore new magic, he found that English words in runic arrays had limitations. On a Saturday morning, he tried to transfigure a sheet of paper into a sandstone plate, but the objects created never came close to a sandstone plate. After an hour, he had a pile of different types of rock, gravel, sand, and dirt.
'The word sandstone isn't specific enough for magic,' he concluded. He tried with a few other words such as water and wood – again, the results were always wet or woody but of various colours and sizes.
'Better not try something like dogs or birds – there'd be poodles, wolves, chickens and ostriches running amok in Hogwarts. The castle would laugh, but McGonagall would spit up hairballs for a week.'
Leaving his study, Harry hurried to the Great Hall for lunch. It was Saturday, and he promised to spend time with Neville and Justin this afternoon. Justin enjoyed working in the greenhouse alongside Neville, so Harry joined the two other wizards in repotting Spitting Geraniums for an afternoon.
They discussed their different classes with Harry giving hints to the other boys on how to handle a transfiguration essay, Justin explaining how to complete Flitwick's charm assignment correctly, and Neville talking about properly preparing Ginger Root for use in potions.
"It's a shame we can't do potions away from the potions lab," Justin said. "There's no chance to practice."
Neville frowned and revealed a secret. "Professor Snape provides practise labs for some Slytherins and select Ravenclaws on the weekends."
"How do you know this?" asked Harry.
"I have to harvest particular plants sometimes on Saturday mornings for Professor Sprout to have an elf deliver to the dungeons. Some potions only work with fresh ingredients."
Justin's face grew more closed off than usual, and Harry didn't comment further. After the boys finished in the greenhouse, they returned to their dorms to clean up and then met in the library to work on homework. Neville and Harry sat with Justin at the Hufflepuff table in the Great Hall at supper. Ron Weasley made a few snide remarks about the two Gryffindors needing to be resorted to be Puffs. According to' Hogwarts a History, Hermione Granger informed everyone that resorts were not allowed. After supper, Justin mentioned going back to the library to study with Granger.
Harry didn't say anything but then just nodded his head, "That's great, Justin."
"She's alone like me, so we work together on charms, transfiguration, and runes."
Neville asked, "How does she handle you being so far ahead of her in runes?"
Justin smiled, "She assumes she is ahead, and I just go along with it."
*CHANGE SCENE!
DADA / PatronusThe DADA class in the autumn term had been great compared to Harry's experiences with DADA in the first two years at Hogwarts. Everyone was excited to be taught by a real monster – the werewolf – but Remus Lupin made an effort to work diligently with the students from each house and every year. The firsties quickly got over their fear, and Remus was touched by the 'get well' cards and candies that his students always left for him when he returned after being away for three days when the moon was full. Even the snootiest Syltherin fell silent when Lupin proved adept at meeting their challenges in class and on the duelling piste where the older students practised.
In January, Professor Lupin published a weekly schedule for the entire month that would begin revising sessions for students in fifth, sixth and seventh years that included additional classes one night a week and one day each weekend. With the continued presence of the Dementors, Professor Lupin also worked diligently with every student that had the power to learn the Patronus charm. This charm allowed any wizard or witch to repel the Dementors. In September, Lupin's Patronus was a large silver wolf that every student saw on the Hogwarts Express when it helped drive the creatures away before it killed one Dementor while Professor Lupin pulled the head off another with his bare hands.
Harry and the rest of the third year Gryffindors showed up in DADA class and asked to learn the Patronus spell. This was the impetus to Professor Lupin teaching them the exercise to strengthen their core early in the year. After the new year, several third years could produce the silvery mist that provided a shield to keep Dementors at bay. Now Harry was determined to learn the charm to have a Patronus ready when the Dementors attacked again.
After class one day, Professor Lupin asked Harry to remain behind. Neville nodded and mentioned sitting together at dinner; Ron sneered about the 'mudblood needing more lessons'. Hermione looked like she wanted to say something but remained silent and hurried to her next class. Once they were alone, with the door remaining open so anyone could watch what occurred in the classroom, Lupin informed the boy-who-lived that he'd known his parents.
"We attended Hogwarts and were in Gryffindor together for seven years. James and Lily were some of the best friends anyone could have."
Harry looked at the man closely and asked, "Really? Where have you been the last thirteen years?"
The wizard replied, "I left Magical Britain after that terrible Halloween, went to university and worked in the muggle world for a long time. Last summer, Headmaster Dumbledore contacted me about coming back to Hogwarts to teach."
"You're a great teacher and powerful wizard," Harry observed. "You should hang around."
Looking away, Lupin replied, "I'm not welcome anywhere. Remember that I'm a werewolf.
"Yeah, everybody has known that since the first of September, and none of us cares," Harry snarked. "Aunt Petunia is more of a bitch than usual several days each month, but unfortunately, that doesn't disqualify her from being my guardian.
The professor's face couldn't hide his surprise hearing Harry mention his aunt. Lupin asked, "Petunia? Do you mean Petunia Dursley?"
His reasonable opinion of Professor Lupin fell some as Harry replied, "Yeah, don't get bent over it. The orphan son of your best friends went to a home where he's treated like a house-elf. Dumbledore knows and doesn't care. Besides, it's too late to do anything about it anyway."
The werewolf frowned but didn't say more about Harry's home life. He did discuss Sirius Black and warned Harry to stay away from the man when he appeared.
"So you agree that Hogwarts isn't the safest place for me? Someone broke on Halloween but escaped, and the Dementors didn't catch him. And you think he'll come back?"
"Sirius was – is – a powerful and smart wizard. He'll come back!" Lupin insisted.
Harry sat back down at a desk for a moment before he nodded and agreed to be careful and vigilant.
"I can't go to Hogsmeade anyway," he added. "So I stay in the castle and study. Say…Professor Lupin, you say you went to university?"
"Yes, I studied chemistry and engineering."
"I remember in school there was some sort of chart that explained the atoms that makeup things, like air being H20."
"No, that's water," Lupin replied. "Water comprises two hydrogen atoms bonded with one oxygen atom. Air is a combination of nitrogen, oxygen, argon, and carbon dioxide. There's more nitrogen in the air than any other element. Oxygen is only about twenty percent, and too much oxygen is dangerous."
Harry smiled and said, "You gotta talk to Hermione Granger, more professor. That sounds like an answer she would give."
"Granger?" asked Lupin. "She's very quiet."
Harry looked away and explained, "Miss Granger worships the adults too much and thinks other kids should listen to her because she knows everything. Anyway, talk to her but keep my name out of it. We're not friends anymore."
"Okay," the werewolf agreed, wondering what the dynamics in Gryffindor were like. McGonagall had nothing good to say about any of her students.
"So, H20…can you get me a copy of that chart that talks about atoms in stuff? And how about something that tells me what makes up the different kinds of stones in Britain?"
Rising from his desk, Lupin said, "Wait a minute."
He disappeared into his office and returned with two books – the first a chemistry textbook that included a periodic table of the known elements. The second book was a geologic survey of rock formations in Britain with the composition of the different types of stone, including granite, slate and sandstone.
"Can I borrow these, professor? I promise to take good care of them and return them."
"Sure, Mr Potter," Lupin replied. "Just get them back to me before the end of the school year."
++***++ CHANGE SCENERY
Chocolate Frogs and GoldStudying the periodic table for a while, Harry realised too much he didn't understand about chemical formulas to 'educate' a cartouche with the right words as runes to create an element. He went to supper in the Great Hall, his homework finished and the entire evening available for exploration of runes – but he didn't feel like it today.
Sitting with Neville at the Gryffindor table, he noticed that Granger sat with Justin at the Hufflepuff table, and they talked in an animated way that made the girl smile.
'I hope she can be a good friend to Justin,' Harry thought generously and turned his attention to his meal. After the meal was finished, Harry and Neville returned to the Gryffindor common room, where Ron coaxed them into playing several games of wizarding chess. When Ginevra tried to join them, Ron told her to bugger off, which earned him a smack in the head from a passing Percy Weasley. Unhappy, the girl did leave for her dorm room for a time. When she returned, Harry excused himself and retreated to the dorm room.
There he prepared for bed and went to sleep early. In the middle of the night, an idea popped into his mind – could he use a cartouche and runes (words) to duplicate an item laid on the cartouche? Or place the cartouche on top of something and duplicate it?
'A book? No, they got copyright protection runes that would mess up everything. What about a rock? Or a bowl? I know, a chocolate frog!'
The whole of the day, Harry was excited and wanted his classes to end to experiment with his paper cartouches and rune-words to see if he could duplicate or make a chocolate frog. Once DADA was over, he had three free hours before History class late in the day. Harry ran along the hallway, willed himself to be invisible, and turned several corners to make his way into his private classroom. The door shut behind him; he made himself visible again, set his book bag on the table, withdrew a paper cartouche, a biro and a chocolate frog. He forced himself to stop and write down his ideas in his notebook and draw the cartouche on the notebook paper with the words 'create duplicate' and left space for the chocolate frog.
'That will create one more frog if it works,' he decided. 'How do I make it more than one frog at a time?'
He wrote down several ideas; create ten duplicates, make five duplicates, cook five copies. He pulled out the three chocolate frogs in his book bag, opened the first wrapper and caught the frog when it leapt away. He was forced to bite the frog's legs off to keep it from scampering away while he wrote the words create duplicate inside the paper cartouche and left enough space for the legless chocolate frog on the paper. After placing the frog on the paper, he pressed his wand against the paper that burned up and left one legless chocolate frog on the table.
'Well…is that the original frog or the duplicate?' he wondered. He quickly prepared another cartouche with 'create two duplicates' written on the paper. Placing the frog on the cartouche, he pressed his wand against the paper again. This time after the paper burned away, there were two chocolate frogs.
Harry grinned. 'I did it! I did it! I can make duplicates!'
For the next hour, Harry experimented with making two, four and five duplicates of the frog, a quill, a pot of ink, and a biro. The muggle ink pen didn't duplicate properly, and the inkpot was a solid mass instead of liquid ink.
'I guess magic follows the patent laws that apply for ink and pens,' Harry rationalised. 'The quill is a natural thing.'
The idea of duplicating gold suddenly struck Harry. He studied a galleon for a time and decided there were probably a dozen runes protecting the coin and plenty of patents and copyright laws in place to prevent duplication of the money in Magical Britain. Then he tried a glass of water, an apple that Dobby provided when called, and a muggle paper clip. The glass and water duplicated, the apple and the paper clip didn't duplicate.
'Food and patented process again,' he decided.
"Dobby, can you look in the Room of Requirement for a golden nugget or a bar of gold? Something made of gold that doesn't have any magic in it."
"Dobby looks," the elf said before popping away. The elf returned with a small sack that he untied and poured out a handful of small rocks that were gold in colour onto the table. The tie that had been around the bag had a note attached that read, Gold found on a riverbank in California Territory in North America 1848. Andrew Fleamont, Transfiguration Professor Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Harry took one nugget and placed it on a paper cartouche with the words 'create duplicate 100' printed in blue ink. He touched his wand to the paper and passed out as his magic was sucked up in the runic array.
SCENE CHANGES HERE
"Dobby says that Mr Harry Potters is too stupid to experiment alone," the elf said as Harry woke up and realised he lay on a low bed in his classroom.
"Hey, Dobby," the wizard croaked. "How long was I asleep?"
"About one hour, Mr Harry Potters," the elf replied, his unhappiness evident in his tone. "Youse no more experimenting without Dobby here! That be final!"
Struggling to sit up, Harry found Dobby's small hand holding him up while the other hand forced a cup of chicken broth at the perfect temperature to his lips. After drinking the broth, Dobby provided a second cup of hot chocolate that was just right as well.
"Drinks all and stays in bed," Dobby ordered. Harry nodded in agreement, not wanting to anger the elf. With a pile of conjured pillows at his back, Harry watched Dobby walk over to the table and levitate down a large pile of golden nuggets.
"There's be ten tens of gold rocks here now, and they takes all Mr Harry Potter's magic for one hour to make."
"Bugger," Harry replied and, seeing the scowl on the elf's face, immediately added, "Sorry."
Shaking his head, Dobby piled the gold on Harry's lap, and the boy stared in wonder.
"I don't have much money, Dobby. This might help us have a good life away from Hogwarts."
The elf stopped his work, turned back to the wizard and asked, "What does Mr Harry Potters mean?"
"Well, you're my friend, and I thought when I get out of this crazy place, you might want to go with me and work for me," Harry said. "If I can make gold, I can pay you."
Leaping forward to wrap his arms around Harry's arm, the elf cried, "Dobby go with Mr Harry Potter without golds! Yes! Mr Harry Potters just wear clothes…no naked nudies."
Laughing, Harry promised always to wear clothes around Dobby. Then the elf added, "If Mr Harry Potters use targets for powerful new runes, won't make you sleep for an hour."
"Huh? What do you mean, Dobby?"
"Points magic at something and the runical arrays will transformationals the targets into gold," the elf explained. "That's how wizards used to make things like food when not enough foods for people."
Now Harry frowned and said, "I've been taught that magic can't make or create food."
Nodding his head, Dobby said, "But if you have a grain of wheat, Mr Harry Potters can use it to transform a big pile of wood into a big pile of wheat. Wood be something that grows and can be changed into foods for hungry peoples."
"Without changing back into wood?"
"Maybe change back in a year or two, but then it dissolved away in the ground. This be a magical that the wizards forget when they fight and kill each other long ago."
Laying back in his bed for another moment, Harry said, "What would be a good target if I want to make gold?"
"We go to Room of Requirement and try different metals, maybe stones," Dobby said. "But Mr Harry Potters must always, always have Dobby or other elves there to watch and keep wizard from being stupid, stupid."
"Yes, oh great and wise elf," Harry replied with a grin. "Can we go now?"
"Youse supposed to go to History class in ten minutes," Dobby replied.
Harry snorted and said, "I'll just sleep for an hour."
"Good. Another nap good for Harry Potters before supper. If you eat good at supper, Dobby take you to Come and Go Room tonight and let you pretend to make gold."
"Pretend? What do you mean?" Harry asked, lifting a handful of golden nuggets.
Dobby snorted and said, "Wizard, easy to prank."
Grimacing for the elf to be making fun of him, Harry thought about what he needed to do next. Then he asked, "While I am in history class, can you take these gold nuggets to Gringotts and see what they're worth?
Dobby nodded, placed the duplicate nuggets inside a paper bag he stored in his towel and the rest of the original nuggets into the old sack and tied the knot again. Once he was confident his wizard was seated in the history class with a sticking spell that would last for forty-five minutes on the seat, Dobby popped out of Hogwarts with the paper bag of golden nuggets.
Harry promptly fell asleep in history and never realised he was stuck to the seat. Dobby arrived in Gringotts with the bag of gold and ignited a firestorm in the bank.
CHANGE SCENES AGAIN