Further Adventures of HP, Wand-For-Hire-Who-Lived
Harry awoke to find himself sitting up and moving. He was tied up with tight ropes, and seated in an open carriage pulled by two black horses, being carried up a mountain path. While he was worried, he was also relieved – because he could tell that whoever had kidnapped him never realized that he always slept with his wand taped to his forearm, under his shirt. (You never knew when reaching for it on the side table would be a second too slow, and his odd luck had now proven itself again.) The air rushing past was pleasantly cool.
After a long and winding trip, the horses slowed and then stopped next to a bare open-air hut. An old witch sat at a table, while a cauldron bubbled beside her. He recognized her at once: Baba Raga, the evil great-granddaughter of Baba Yaga. She was the very witch the Bulgarian minister had begged him to come here and deal with.
Baba Raga was waving her crooked wand over the cauldron, causing it to slowly stir. To his surprise, Harry found the concoction smelled good, and his mouth watered.
"Ah, Harry Potter! Just the man who wanted to see me! Welcome to my – summer home! But where are my manners?" With a few more waves, she conjured a chair for Harry, and a wooden bowl and spoon on the table; and then lifted Harry through the air, and deposited him in the chair. With another wave, a swirl of the liquid in the cauldron rose through the air, and landed gently in the bowl. "My mother, Baba Gaga's famous chicken soup; hope you like it!" she cackled. Then she waved again, freeing his right arm from the binding ropes.
Harry had no plans to even taste the soup, not doubting that it might contain any number of potions, some of them probably lethal. Though it did smell delicious – but with restraint, he smiled, took up the spoon, pointed it at the cauldron and whispered, "Verto!" but said aloud, "Chicken soup?" She nodded, grinning. Then he pointed the spoon at Baba Raga and said, "Thank you!", but whispered, "Verto!"
Baba Raga's grin froze; her eyebrows rose; and then she fell sideways onto the ground.
Harry muttered, "She's no fun, she fell right over!" The tight ropes slackened, then vanished. Standing and stretching, Harry pointed his wand at the horrible dark red liquid in the cauldron, and said, "Evanesco," and it vanished. Pointing at Baba, he said, "Dessicare," and she shriveled. Pointing at her again, he said, "Incendio," and she burst aflame and turned quickly to ash.
Just then, with several loud pops, four uniformed men appeared. It was the Bulgarian Aurors, too late as usual. The leader exclaimed, "Mister Potter, are you all right?"
"A bit hungry, but otherwise I'm fine," Harry replied.
"Vas it Baba Raga?" the auror queried.
Harry pointed at the big pile of ashes, and the aurors swore loudly in Bulgarian.
"Could you please tell us vhat happened?"
"Baba Raga had me tied up, and was going to feed me her mother's famous chicken soup." The aurors swore loudly again. "Fortunately, I had my wand taped to my arm, and I was able to do a switching spell between her blood and the cauldron of soup. I figured that even if she were immune to the potions in it, and even if her heart could pump it, her brain couldn't run on it. She quickly passed out and died, and I dried her up and burned her."
The lead auror smiled and said, "Your tactics are unorthodox but effective, as usual, Mister Potter! Ve are grateful. Unfortunately, vithout ze body to show off, ze minister vill probably only pay you half ze bounty."
Harry shrugged, and said, "I kind of expected that; don't actually need the money that badly, fortunately. Say, do you boys know where I can get a nice bowl of some really good chicken soup?"
Fin
[It came to me in a dream!]
