Trouble With Teapots

“Harry James Potter, you utter troll,” at Hermione’s comment Harry looked up from his transfiguration project which he was carefully tweaking to fit his vision.

“Oh, come on Hermione, I don’t smell that bad I showered this morning, I haven’t smashed up any bathrooms recently, plus my ballet needs work,” Harry replied.

“Harry you know what I mean. You can’t make your teapot resemble Mrs Potts from Beauty and the Beast,” She said giving the teapot in question a dirty look where it sat on his workbench.

“Ah, but I can and in fact have,” Harry said with a grin while proudly looking at the near-perfect replica of the character on his desk.

“It’s cheating,” reprimanded Hermione.

“Hardly, I used my own magic to make it. I mean you have to know what a teapot looks like to transfigure one and there was no way I was making Petunias floral nightmare or Umbridge’s kitten monstrosity and McGonagall wouldn’t be impressed with the austere, heavy-duty thing used by the W.I. at their annual shindigs. My teapot exposure is limited, I needed inspiration.”

“Inspired my ass Harry, that’s a Disney lawsuit waiting to happen.”

“Thank Merlin for the Statute of Secrecy then,” Harry replied cheerfully.

“Harry stop being flippant,” Hermione rebuked but Harry could see she was fighting a smile.

“I’m not, well maybe a little bit. But Hermione tell me that Malfoy isn’t coping his mother’s favourite teapot?” using his wand like a board pointer he indicated towards Malfoy’s teapot. “It’s covered in daffodils and peacocks.”

“I hardly think it’s his mother’s favourite, its rather tacky. Probably his father’s.”

“I like how you don’t deny that they own the teapot, but you aren’t upset that Malfoy is using a reference for his magic,” Harry pointed out.

“Well at least Malfoy’s is…” she trailed off frowning at the teapot. “I was going to say subtle, but it really isn’t. Honestly, I’m slightly concerned about what one of those peacocks is doing to the flowers. It’s practically the birds and the bees talk going on over there.”

‘You can say that again. Just wait till he gets around to animating it later in Charms, that’ll be educational,” Harry said with a snort of laughter.

“Shush Harry I’m almost sympathising with the git about the emotional trauma he most have gone through drinking tea from that thing while growing up. Still, yours isn’t exactly flying below the radar, especially after you enchant it. I am assuming that you’ll be doing so to make it act like Mrs Potts?”

“Yeah, I figured I’d give it a go,” Harry shrugged, enchantment wasn’t his forte, but he figured he could at least animate the pot even if he couldn’t get it to make any noise. “But while we’re on the subject that was a rather muggle saying there, Hermione. What would Umbridge say?”

“She hasn’t banned them… Yet. And you have a rather muggle teapot Harry,” she snarked back looking away from Malfoy’s desk and back at their projects. “Rebelling are you; I doubt she’ll notice.”

“But unlike your saying the magic raised in this room or elsewhere in the castle aren’t going to notice my muggle intrusion into their lives, plus it’s Disney, the most magical place on Earth, or so they say. That’s surely enough for them.”

“They’d be horrified, and you know it. Anyway, Dean will give you away if you’re not careful, he’s never had a very good poker face.”

“True, but he’s the only one in the room apart from you who might and he’s a bigger troll than the pair of us, haven’t you noticed there’s a theme in all of his transfigurations?” Harry asked raising an eyebrow in query.

“Well yes, but Harry that doesn’t mean you should join him, it’s not a competition. No Harry don’t try puppy eyes on me, Sirius is better at them anyway.”

“He has an unfair advantage,” Harry pointed out. Spending nearly a decade in his animagus form had left Sirius more canine than he had once been. Harry looked back down at his cheerfully anthropomorphic teapot; he was rather proud of it.

“But let’s be honest Hermione how else am I supposed to picture turning an armadillo into a teapot. It’s a ridiculous challenge. I have never looked at an armadillo and though I think that will make a nice teapot. Let alone thought I want to drink something that came out of a former armadillo, they smell,” Harry said nose wrinkling at the memory.

“I don’t think that’s the point, Harry. It’s done to teach you precision and control in your casting,” Hermione said looking rather dubiously at her own willowware patterned pot. “But I can see your point tea services aren’t going to get us far with a war brewing,” Harry snorted at her comment as Hermione’s hands flew to her mouth.

“Nice pun there Hermione.”

“Oh, shut up Harry it was an accident.”

“Mind you we did see that witch in St Mungos with a teapot as her head. Think we could do that to the Death Eaters, most of them are hot heads anyway. Ow.” Hermione thwacked him in the arm at his pun. “So only you are allowed to do gallows humour. Good to know.” He rubbed his arm while putting on a wounded expression.

“Stop pouting Harry, you’re going to draw McGonagall’s attention,” so far, their teacher had been busy helping Lavender with her transfiguration; it kept rolling up at the sight of the milk jug. Looking back down at his representation of Mrs Potts he prodded it with his wand. The pot didn’t react, he pushed the milk jug closer and smiled when his pot didn’t so much as twitch.

“When did you see the movie Harry, I can’t imagine the Dursleys took you to see it?” Hermione asked distracting him from testing the pots reaction to sugar tongs.

“They didn’t the local library help public screenings over the summer holidays; I went there to avoid them. Because it was public it was all Disney stuff,” Hermione nodded her head in understanding.

“I saw them over the holidays too. Mum got them on tape for me.”

“Yeah? They have new ones coming out too don’t they? They also built a new resort in Paris, Dudley begged to go but his parents refused, it was too magical for them,” Harry said with a snort.

“Well once this is all over, we’ll go, I think when all this is said and done, we’ll need the escape,” Hermione promised.

“Sounds fun,” Harry smiled at her.