You're Being Hugged, Harry

by David Silver

7 - Bubbling Brew

Harry watched a cauldron, the one his mother had got for him. A stirring stick inside it slowly turned, powered by his glowing horn. An advantage of a unicorn, he could sit back away from what was inside as he stirred it. Well, there was one or two students that had cauldrons that could stir themselves through some feat of magic, but he came with it built in! Such was the benefit of his species.

"Your potions should be starting to congeal." Their teacher was moving among them, inspecting their works. "Potion making is not for the impatient. You have to keep going until it's done." He had a happy enough smile despite his words. "The results though are hard to argue with, and often far more permanent than what you get with casual magic."

Harry could feel resistance against his stirring, just a little. It was firming up. He just had to keep right on stirring. He was doing it! A growing smile spread as he turned it around and around. Not the most interesting thing in the world, but he was doing it, a real potion.

His mom, his pony mom, had spoken wild tales of a potion maker that lived by Aunt Twilight's. That potion maker was a zebra. He'd never seen one of those, but she was one of the best he heard. She could make all kinds of potions and they were usually pretty good at that. She'd pass the potion class with ease, he was sure. For a moment he wondered what the teacher would think of a zebra showing up.

"Mister Potter." Oops, his teacher had snuck up while he was distracted. "Very good. Why is your stirrer glowing like that?"

Most of the other self-stirring cauldrons did not have glowing involved, or if they did, it was a much more centralized thing near the top to let you know they were working. Harry's was glowing from the top to the bottom, his magic upon it. "Unicorn magic, sir. Anything I'm holding glows with my magic."

"I see..." He nodded at the cauldron, but his eyes were more on Harry. "I've heard things about you. You're going places."

"I am?!"

"Oh, you are. Talented souls like you deserve a little extra." He patted Harry on the back. "I'll be keeping my eye on you." And off he went to look at other students' work.

Harry watched Slughorn wander off, unsure what that had been exactly. Still, it wasn't a bad thing, right? His potion suddenly began to shift in colors and his attention snapped back to it. He was almost done! Sure, it would just be a boil removing potion, but it would be his boil removing potion, made at his own hooves. It also meant he was on the way to a good grade, so there was that.

---

Arnavon swirled his wand in the way the book had described and illustrated, but the magic was refusing to come. "Maybe..." He wasn't a brilliant sort, but he wasn't dumb either. "Maybe I need magic that's like it." Looking around, he saw no magic that would sympathize with the spongify spell, hm...

He flipped through the book. "We have lanterns. Light. Maybe heat?" He slapped a big paw down. "Let's try this one!"

Holding the wand up at the lights, he focused on them. "Need to borrow you," he murmured as if seeking forgiveness.

But the lights had none to give. They did have magic though, and he could feel it trickling. He was moving it. Good good. He turned and pointed the wand at, um... He paused, considering. He didn't want to start an actual fire. That would be... impolite, at the least.

Arnavon tapped a foot impatiently as he turned about. Of course that was the day Harry had taken his cauldron. Could have started a fire in there, no problem! Oh! He grinned as he bounded in one great step to the fireplace. "Where fires belong!" He waggled his wand at the wood inside, not burning. He'd fix that!

"Incendio!" he proclaimed with all the authority he could muster. He could feel that magic tickling around inside him, running along his fur, but no flames were coming. Had he gotten the gesture wrong? The pronunciation? He tried to calm himself. "In sen dee o," he pronounced carefully, making the precise motion. No hurrying. Calm...

Bright orange red light surged up his extended arm as the captured magic jumped free through him, into his wand, unleashed in a brief gout of flames that lit the room with a new light.

Wisps of smoke began to raise from the fireplace. The wood had caught the flames, and soon were crackling under its own power. Arnavon began to clap, only to abort almost as quickly. The very tip of his wand was lit up! With a squeak, he dunked it into a pitcher of water with a loud hiss. "Gotta be more careful..."

Still, he had done it. He pulled the wand free and set it aside to dry. It could do that on its own, he had other things to do. He grabbed a book and a quill and started scratching busily, noting his success and thoughts. "This'll make such a good book when I get back..."

When would he get back? The job of watching Harry was not a short one. The school was set up to last years, not days or even months. He could, likely, give up and go home. Princess Cadance would only be mad for a little while, if that. She was a very nice princess. But that'd leave Harry all alone.

"Mmm..." Arnavon resumed his writing. He could work on his next book while keeping an eye on Harry! Everyone won then, right? Besides, the magic school was pretty interesting. "Yeah." What was the rush to get away from it? Even if he was a magic owl there.

A pity it didn't come with the power to look behind him without turning. That would have been pretty cool.

---

"This is what you get for letting Hagrid of all people decide this." Severus scowled across the desk at Dumbledore. "Mister Potter has been... tainted in ways he likely will never recover from." Severus steepled his fingers, the scowl on his face only growing. "One of exactly two people that can do what must be done."

"He is doing well so far," gently argued Dumbledore. "He's scarcely begun."

"He is a horse." Snape slapped a fist down, making his tea jostle dangerously. "A magical horse, I will grant, but a horse. This is who we are to trust to finish this battle?"

"Of course not." Dumbledore nodded softly. "He's still in his first year. He will not be ready. It is our job to put him in that potision, so when the time comes..."

"Madness." Severus took a sip of the provided tea despite that. "Utter madness."

"He could use your help." Dumbledore drew out a book, the schedule of the school that he turned open. "Would you lend your instructions?"

"That is why I am here." He scowled at the chipper older man. "You already have one of those for that class."

"I do... but it is a cursed position, some say." Dumbledore inclined his head at his guest. "Perhaps in a future year?"

"I offer no assurances. Related but tangential, why are you permitting him to have his magical friend along? They are very clearly not an owl."

"They've delivered every letter we've asked them to, and more." Dumbledore shrugged with that little smile of his. "He's fulfilled his owl duties and is a polite creature aside that. What's the harm?"

"It is now acceptable to have unidentified arcane creatures wandering our halls?" Snape raised a brow at the one that seemed to have no worries.

"They largely restrain themselves to young Potter's chambers, where he gets along with Harry's roommate and anyone else that happens by. Don't let their size fool you, they seem to be entirely without malice."

"Like Hagrid then?" Things were quiet between them a moment. "I'll be monitoring the situation. I can only hope that our furry savior is up to the task when it arrives."

---

"Ron!" Harry threw a leg over Ron's neck from behind, rising up onto two legs in the process. The only other option was to haul Ron down to his level. "How'd it turn out?"

"A pinch too much of the last bit." He held up two fingers close together. "Got purple sludge I don't think would help much." He shoved Harry with a grin. "Let me guess, you got it?"

Harry let himself be pushed away, falling back to all fours with a clop. "I did, but I'm not here to make fun of you, Ronnie. Wanna go over it later? I bet it was something small."

"You're solid, Harry." He glanced away at the crowd moving past them before returning to Harry. "So do unicorns get any crazy potion powers?" He wriggles his fingers for effect.

"As if." Harry rolled his eyes at the idea. "Only magical horse I know that's really good at that sort of thing is a zebra."

"Get out." But Harry did not get out. "You're serious? Zebras, the horses with stripes?" Harry nodded. "Harry, zebras are not magic. They're just striped."

"Earth zebras," countered Harry with perhaps a touch of smugness, but that wore away quickly. "Equestria is not Earth, different rules."

"Which include zebras that are really good at potion making?" The idea seemed a bit hard for Ron to grapple with. "Look, I try to know a little about all kinds of magic things, but this 'Equestria' isn't even mentioned."

Harry inclined his head at his friend. "If it helps, Earth was not talked about in Equestria. I didn't know it was a thing until I was invited to come to Hogwarts. Imagine my surprise."

"A lot of us know that surprise." Ron swatted Harry's side. "Say, how's your crazy owl doing?"

They would soon find out, returning to Harry's room to discover it was dark. Entirely dark. The lanterns that normally kept that darkness at bay were clearly not working, or not on? "Arnavon?" called Harry into the darkness from the doorway. "You in there?"

"Right here." Oh, light. Every time Arnavon opened his mouth, light came spilling out brightly. "I think I..." He kept stopping, covering his snout. "Bother..."

Ronald burst into a light laughter. "Did you eat the light, Arnie?"

"Sorta." With his paws trying to cover things as best he can, Arnavon spoke, light flashing with each movement of his mouth. "I was channeling the power of the lanterns, and it got stuck. Now the lantern magic is inside me and I don't know how to get it out."

Harry frowned with thought at the problem. "Ron?"

"Arny's the first of his kind I ever heard of," he admitted. "But if you took the magic from the lanterns, why not put it back?"

"Y-yes, put it back." He turned in place, the room darkened with his closed mouth. In the dim light of what came from the hallway, they could see him looking at the lanterns, making little noises of effort, but tsuki were so much less built for sending magic back out.

Harry brightened. "Arnavon, your wand!"

"My wand!" Of course! There was a great thud as he tripped over himself, but made it to the end table he had left the wand on to dry. "Got it!" He grabbed it firmly in a great paw. "Now, uh, what spell?"

Ronald gave a thumbs up. "It isn't a spell."

"Oh, right." He waggled the wand to no effect. "C'mon..." He tried to calm himself, to focus on that flow of power, to get it out from the middle of himself. A brief glimmer on his pelt excited him enough that it was lost. "Focus..."

The light slowly reemerged and began to creep down his arm, filling the wand. With a gentle swish, he sent it back where it belonged to light up the room in the lanterns it came from.

Author's Note:

Easy to forget at times that there are prophecies in play and other people invested in this nonsense. Arnavon is trying really hard to learn this magic thing.

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Comments

[harts fire]

harry your a wizard.
for some reason that jumped in too my mind with this chapter.

this is a grate chapter so much fun in the works.

[Booster Spice]

Arnon is like Hagrid?

Mostly Harmless?

[Ponyess]

"I see..." He nodded at the cauldron, but his eyes were more on Harry. "I've head things about you. You're going places."

"I've head things about you. You're going places."
"I've heard things about you. You're going places." Heard

[David Silver]

11245043
Fix!

[Killjoy1221]

11245043
More like... herd.

[tsaukpaetra]

Interesting to note that they're still aiming for the original plan. Wonder who this Other they're talking about.
A Tsuki battery! That will come in handy!