It was Saturday, the seventh of September, the first Saturday of his first year. He’d been in here for eight hours already, reading books and learning magic far beyond his status in school. Already this week he had mastered a number of useful spells for dueling, such as the Stupefying Charm, the Shield Charm, and the Impediment Curse, none of which would be expected of less than a fifth year. Also among the spells he’d learned were a great number of simple dueling charms, hexes, jinxes, and curses. But even simple spells could be devastating when backed up with enough power. And power was something Harry had to excess.
But where Harry had been concentrating his focus had been more advanced spells in Transfiguration and Charms. Dumbledore had surprised Harry by joining him in the room on Monday, and had given a demonstration in which he’d conjured stone statues out of thin air, brought them to life, and held conversations with them, and then dispelled his creations – and he’d done all this with only waves and twists of his wand. Harry knew that Dumbledore must be a mighty wizard if he didn’t even need to utter incantations to for conjuring and animating objects.
Dumbledore had shown him spells to make streams of fire or water leap from the tip of his wand. With the proper focus, a stream of fire could be used as a rope, or as a cutting surface; a stream of water could be used to push objects in one direction or another. Dumbledore had told him that ultimately, magic was about intention and not incantation. If your focus was strong enough and the power was there, the desired effect would happen.
The demonstration lasted more than an hour, and then Dumbledore had left the room. But he’d left Harry with a piece of advice: power was sometimes best hinted at, kept in reserve, than bared in full measure only when most needed. Harry followed the logic down its inevitable progression: if your enemies didn’t truly know what you were capable of, they were less likely to fear you. And then once you really needed to, you could go all out and defeat them.
It was a very Slytherin idea, the advice Dumbledore gave him: Never let your guard down. Your enemies are everywhere. And they’re watching you to find your weaknesses.
With that in mind, Harry decided he would only display enough in class to complete any work IN class. But in this room, this Room of Requirement (Harry loved its name), he would work to his fullest.
To that effect, this week Harry had quickly read and completed all the Transfiguration and Charms work for the second and third years. He had done the first year before he’d even come to school. His work in the room would give him most of a three year head start. Today, he was working on some fourth year Charms.
He pointed his wand at a pillow across the room, and muttered <Accio>. The pillow zoomed towards him, and he caught it. Well, he thought, that’s the Summoning Charm down. When he turned the page to find the Banishing Charm, he suddenly realized he could Summon or Banish objects telekinetically, entirely mitigating the need for a spell...or his wand. He then practiced that for a few minutes, until he could do it effortlessly. After a few more hours, he settled down for about six hours of sleep.
When he left the Room, he realized he’d been inside nearly twenty hours, and not twenty minutes of real time had passed. It was a sobering thought.
But, he decided...if he was to defeat Voldemort whenever the Dark wizard managed to return, he would need to use whatever advantages he could get.
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(Posted Wed, 28 Jan 2004 05:41)
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