By midday, a thick blanket of gray clouds had rolled over the castle. Maurise stood in the courtyard after lunch, diligently practicing the Bird Conjuring Charm, Avis.
The spell was supposed to conjure a flock of magical birds, usually meant to distract an opponent or obscure their vision. Yet, for some inexplicable reason, every single bird Maurise conjured belonged to the exact same species. Crows. It was not that he disliked crows, but a localized murder of purely black birds felt terribly monotonous.
"Maurise!"
Startled from his staring contest with the flapping crows, Maurise turned to find Harry and Ron hurrying toward him. Both boys looked thoroughly exhausted and distinctly worse for wear.
"Ah, it is the dynamic duo," Maurise said, pausing his practice. "I heard about your little stunt yesterday."
Harry let out a heavy sigh. "Let me guess. The whole school knows."
"Oh, definitely," Maurise replied with a shrug. "It is the main event of the rumor mill."
Ron stood beside them, looking utterly miserable. He dug into his robes and pulled out a sad looking stick. "Maurise, do you have any brilliant ideas on how to fix this?"
Maurise stared at the stick. It was supposed to be a wand, but it was snapped cleanly in two and haphazardly held together by layers of ugly, clumsy spellotape.
"Is that..."
"My wand," Ron admitted miserably. "It snapped when we crashed the car yesterday." He pointed at the awful tape job. "I tried to stick it back together, but it is completely useless. I cannot even cast a simple spell. Sometimes it just randomly spits sparks or makes weird wheezing noises. It even set my pajamas on fire last night."
The importance of a wand to a wizard went without saying. Maurise offered a helpless gesture. "If this were any other problem, I might be able to help. But for a shattered core? I highly recommend buying a new one."
Ron buried his face in his hands. "I cannot. If my mum finds out, she will actually murder me."
Maurise suddenly recalled the Weasley family's notorious financial struggles. He could completely understand Ron's panic.
"Well," Maurise murmured, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "I do happen to have a stash of second hand wands in my trunk. I cannot promise they will be any better than your broken one. In fact, they might be significantly worse."
During his last trip to Knockturn Alley to buy a spare wand for his pet, Tin, the shady shopkeeper had been running a ridiculous promotion. Buy one wand, get a dozen free. Naturally, the free ones were entirely rejects. Half of them were splintered, and the other half were merely botched practice attempts by wandmaker apprentices. To any respectable wizard, they were utterly useless, unrecyclable garbage. Maurise had planned to throw them out, but Tin had taken a strange liking to them as chew toys, so he had brought them along to Hogwarts.
"Are you serious? Thank you so much, Maurise!" Hope instantly ignited on Ron's face. He looked ready to leap forward and hug him.
"Do not get your hopes up," Maurise warned him. "Even if you find one that barely works, you really should get a proper wand that chooses you. A mismatched wand could severely backfire when you need it most."
Ron nodded vigorously.
Maurise slipped away to his dormitory and returned ten minutes later carrying a bundle of mismatched wooden sticks held together by an old leather belt.
Ron tested them one by one. After several dud attempts, he finally selected a relatively straight, lightweight wand. It was the only one that managed to successfully produce a Lumos charm. Ron declared that it felt almost as cooperative as his old one.
"It looks incredibly ordinary," Harry noted.
"That is just how wands look," Ron defended the stick. "I think it has a very honest personality."
Harry frowned, wondering why on earth anyone would describe a piece of wood as honest.
---
That afternoon, the Ravenclaws and Slytherins shared Herbology with Professor Sprout in the greenhouses.
Today's lesson focused on caring for Mandrakes. Personally, Maurise was far more interested in how to chop them up and brew them into potions than he was in playing gardener.
"Who can tell me the properties of the Mandrake?" Professor Sprout asked the class.
Maurise immediately raised his hand. He never turned down an opportunity to score free house points. Besides, making a good impression on the professors was a crucial survival tactic at Hogwarts.
"Mr. Black," Professor Sprout called on him with a warm smile.
Maurise answered briskly. "The Mandrake, or Mandragora, is an essential ingredient in most strong antidotes. Its cry is highly fatal to anyone who hears it, requiring strict auditory protection. Furthermore, soup brewed from its leaves smells like rotting garbage, though it is technically edible in a pinch."
Professor Sprout chuckled. "I highly doubt anyone is attempting to make soup out of Mandrakes, Mr. Black. Aside from that unique culinary trivia, your answer is spot on. Five points to Ravenclaw."
Maurise nodded politely. He kept the fact that he had actually tried boiling Mandrake chicken soup over the summer to himself. It had tasted absolutely dreadful.
"Today, we will be repotting the Mandrakes," Professor Sprout announced, pointing to a large pile of earmuffs resting on a nearby stool. "Everyone take a pair and put them on securely. Do not take them off until I give you the signal. These are only seedlings, so their cries will not kill you, but they will knock you out cold for hours."
The students rushed forward. Maurise took his time, waiting until the frantic grabbing subsided before casually picking up one of the remaining pairs.
They were bright, fluffy pink. Not bad.
Before he could slip them over his ears, a familiar, drawn out drawl sounded right beside him.
"Well, well. Look who picked such an... adorable color. Black, your taste is truly exquisite. What are you, a little schoolgirl?"
Maurise turned his head to see Draco Malfoy sneering at him. Draco proudly held a pair of dark green earmuffs, while Crabbe and Goyle stood behind him, sniggering like oversized trolls.
Clearly, Malfoy thought insulting the color of a winter accessory was the height of pureblood superiority. Had the boy learned nothing over the summer? He was already begging for trouble.
Maintaining a completely blank expression, Maurise simply put his pink earmuffs on.
Seeing zero reaction, Draco laughed even louder, looking terribly smug. He only turned around when Professor Sprout shouted for everyone to gather close.
At that exact moment, Maurise muttered a quiet incantation. With a barely noticeable flick of his wand hidden beneath his sleeve, a silent spell shot precisely at Draco's back.
Instantly, the dark green earmuffs on Draco's head morphed into a blinding, neon pink, complete with two large, sparkling glitter bows on either side.
The surrounding students caught sight of the transformation and desperately clamped their hands over their mouths to stifle their laughter.
Draco, completely oblivious to his new fashion statement, stood proudly until Goyle hesitantly tapped his shoulder. Realizing people were pointing and giggling, Draco angrily ripped the earmuffs off his head.
When the neon pink and glittering bows registered in his vision, his face turned the color of a crushed plum. He spun around to glare at Maurise and opened his mouth to scream.
"BLACK!!"
Unfortunately for Draco, at that very second, Professor Sprout forcefully yanked a Mandrake out of its pot to demonstrate the proper transplanting technique.
"WAAAAAHHHHH!"
The piercing, shrieking wail was the last thing Draco heard, and certainly the very last thing he wanted to hear.
The world spun violently around him. His eyes rolled back into his skull, and he collapsed to the greenhouse floor like a petrified plank of wood.
Maurise chuckled silently from behind his own fluffy pink earmuffs.
That was exactly what happened when you ignored a professor's safety warnings.
Sighing in exasperation, Professor Sprout was forced to halt the lesson to levitate Draco Malfoy all the way to the hospital wing.