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Sunlight crept through the enchanted windows like a thief testing locks, and Harry's eyes snapped open before his brain quite caught up with why. Beauxbatons. Today he'd witness the French magical education system that Fleur wielded like a particularly elegant weapon in their verbal duels.
His stomach performed a small flip that had nothing to do with hunger and everything to do with spending another day in Fleur's orbit. The constellation show lingered in his memory—not just the stellar acrobatics, but the warmth of fingers intertwined during that final crescendo.
Stop it, he commanded his treacherous thoughts. You're going to tour a school, not court disaster.
The suite's main room already buzzed with morning chaos. Tonks had claimed the entire sofa, her hair cycling through increasingly violent shades of orange while she glared at a French newspaper that kept trying to translate itself.
"Morning, sunshine," she grumbled without looking up. "Ready to abandon us for your fancy French tour?"
"Technically, Fleur's abandoning all of you for just me," Harry pointed out, sliding into a chair as breakfast materialized—croissants that flaked into perfect golden spirals, jam that shifted flavors with each bite, and coffee strong enough to wake the dead.
"Exactly my point!" Tonks flung the newspaper aside, where it folded itself with an affronted rustle. "Why can't I tag along? I promise not to accidentally set anything French on fire."
Newt emerged from his room, Itisa draped across his shoulders in her false cat form like a particularly judgmental scarf. "Harry, a word of advice about French magical education?"
"Always welcome advice that might prevent international incidents," Harry said, scratching Itisa behind her ears. She purred, but she gave him a nasty look for letting her inside the suitcase with Hedwig, who was resting nearby on a windowsill.
"The French value synthesis over specialization." Newt accepted his tea. "Where Hogwarts teaches distinct subjects in rigid categories, Beauxbatons encourages students to blend disciplines. A potion that incorporates transfiguration. Charms woven into arithmancy. They see magic as a tapestry, not separate threads."
"So basically everything Hogwarts isn't," Tonks muttered.
"Different approaches, both valid," Newt said diplomatically, though his expression suggested opinions he was too polite to voice.
Andromeda materialized at Harry's shoulder with the suddenness of a parent who'd sensed impending poor decisions. "You. Room. Now. You're not meeting Fleur Delacour looking like you dressed in the dark."
"I haven't even finished—"
"The coffee will wait. French punctuality won't."
Harry found himself marched into his room, where Andromeda surveyed his wardrobe with the calculating gaze of a general planning a campaign.
"The blue robes are too formal," she said, discarding his first choice. "The grey ones say 'I'm trying too hard.' The green..." She paused, pulling out deep forest-green robes with bronze fastenings. "Perfect. Sophisticated but not stuffy. Distinctly British but acknowledging French sensibilities."
"It's just a school tour," Harry protested, though he obediently changed.
"Nothing involving a Delacour is 'just' anything. She is the Minister's daughter, and from what I have read, she is the best young witch of the decade in Europe," Andromeda adjusted his collar. "Now, some advice about young ladies like Fleur—"
"Please don't."
"Don't get seduced."
"Andromeda!"
"I'm your guardian in a foreign country. It's my duty to ensure you return to Britain with your virtue intact."
Harry's face burned hotter than Fiendfyre. "I'm immune to her allure, remember?"
"To her Veela allure, yes." Andromeda's smile turned decidedly wicked. "But are you immune to her regular beauty? Her wit? The way she laughs at your jokes?"
The temperature in the room seemed to spike. Harry became intensely interested in a particularly boring bit of wallpaper.
Andromeda's giggle was entirely too gleeful. "That's what I thought. Here, let me fix this properly." She drew her wand, and Harry felt his robes adjust themselves—shoulders straightening, fabric draping just right, the bronze fastenings catching light at exactly the right angle.
"There," she announced. "You look like a proper wizard and gentleman. Try to stay that way."
A knock echoed through the suite. Harry's pulse quickened.
"She's here," Tonks called unnecessarily.
Harry opened the door, and whatever Andromeda had been warning him about suddenly felt a lot less like a joke.
Fleur stood framed in the morning light, and it wasn't her Veela magic doing anything. This was worse. Or better. Or both.
She wore a soft blue dress, the exact shade of Beauxbatons' banners, though lighter, like the sky just before it tipped into full summer. The fabric looked like silk but moved as if it had air stitched into it—every step made the skirt sway in a quiet ripple, never clinging, never flaunting, just flowing. It wasn't long, ending just above her knees, but the cut wasn't scandalous either. If anything, it made her look—Harry's throat felt dry—effortless. The bodice was fitted enough to remind him she had a figure that could probably stop traffic in Diagon Alley, but it wasn't designed to shove that in his face. A square neckline framed her collarbones and throat in a way that felt more elegant than daring, like she'd planned it that way.
A slim silver belt caught the morning light and gave just enough shape without looking like jewelry for jewelry's sake. Harry's eyes—traitorous things—followed the glint of the clasp before jerking away. Her hair, all that silvery-blonde shine, had been pulled partly back with a ribbon of the same soft blue, leaving enough to fall over her shoulders in waves. Simple pearl studs in her ears, the kind of detail you'd miss if you weren't staring, which Harry definitely was, made her look refined without looking like she was trying.
Even her shoes matched the rest of it: white slippers with tiny heels, practical for walking the sprawling grounds, but somehow managing to make her look like she belonged in one of those enchanted portraits you passed in palaces—grace captured and framed forever.
Andromeda's words clawed back through his brain. Immune to Veela allure, yes... but are you immune to her beauty?
Harry swallowed hard. Immune? Not a chance. He wasn't even immune to the way Fleur's eyes found his robes, lingered a heartbeat, and then flicked back up to his face with the faintest smile, as if she approved. His palms felt suddenly damp.
Her eyebrows rose as she took in his appearance. "Oh là là, Arry Potter discovers fashion. France is already improving you."
"Thank you, you look...beautiful, Fleur."
Ted's laughter boomed from behind Harry. "Are you two going to duel on the doorstep, or can the rest of us say goodbye?"
Fleur's smile warmed. "Forgive me. Bonjour, everyone. I promise to return him intact, though perhaps with dangerously expanded horizons."
"That's what we're afraid of," Tonks muttered, but she was grinning.
"Take care of him," Andromeda said, though her tone suggested she wasn't entirely joking.
"Like he was crystal," Fleur promised. "Very stubborn, British crystal that insists it doesn't need protecting."
"I'm standing right here," Harry pointed out.
"Yes, and looking very nice while doing it. Shall we go? The carriage waits, and Beauxbatons' summer session begins early."
As they walked through the palace corridors, Fleur's stride confident and unhurried, she glanced at him sideways. "You're nervous."
"Excited," Harry corrected. "There's a difference."
"Tell that to your hands."
Harry forced his hand still. "You've been cataloguing my habits?"
"Only the interesting ones. Did you know you tilt your head when you're about to say something particularly clever? Like a bird considering whether to share a secret."
"And you play with your earring when you're planning mischief," Harry countered.
Her hand froze halfway to her ear. "I do not."
"Three times during yesterday's tour. Right before you led us through the 'shorter' route that happened to pass the most impressive parts of the palace."
"Coincidence."
"Strategic coincidence."
"The best kind," she agreed, and her laugh was beautiful to hear. "You know, most people don't notice such things about me. They're too busy noticing... other aspects."
"Their loss, they are missing one of the best parts," Harry said without thinking, then felt heat creep up his neck.
Fleur smiled at him, it was a soft beautiful smile. "Come. Let me show you why French magical education makes British schooling look like children playing with sticks."
"Such modesty."
"Modesty is for people without superior schools to show off." She paused at an ornate door. "Besides, after today, you'll agree with me. They always do."
"Confident."
"Accurate," she corrected. "You'll see. Not everyone gets a private tour during summer session, you know. Only very special guests."
"Should I feel honored?"
"You should feel warned," Fleur said, her eyes sparkling with challenge. "By the end of today, you'll question everything about your education. It's tradition—we've been making British wizards doubt themselves for centuries."
"And here I thought we were allies."
"We are," she assured him, pushing open the door to reveal a smaller, more intimate carriage than yesterday's parade vehicle. "But even allies can acknowledge when one side has clear advantages."
Harry climbed in after her, already anticipating the verbal sparring to come. "We'll see about that."
"Yes," Fleur said with absolute certainty. "We will."
The carriage interior wrapped around them like a silk cocoon. Plush seats in midnight blue adjusted themselves to perfect comfort while windows showed the French countryside blurring past at impossible speeds.
"No Abraxan horses today?" Harry asked, settling into cushions that seemed determined to make him never want to stand again.
"Too much grandeur for a school visit," Fleur said, arranging her robes. "Besides, zis carriage is faster. We need speed to breach ze enchantments."
"Enchantments?"
"Beauxbatons is not like 'Ogwarts, 'Arry." The way she pronounced his name—that soft glide over the H—shouldn't have affected him, but his traitorous heart stuttered anyway. "Your castle, it sits in one place like a stubborn old man refusing to move. Ours? It dances."
Harry's eyebrows climbed. "The entire school moves?"
"Every decade." Pride colored her voice like paint on canvas. "Currently, we rest in ze Loire Valley, but in three years? Perhaps ze Alps. Or ze coast of Brittany. It keeps us... 'ow do you say... unpredictable."
"Paranoid, you mean."
"Prudent," she corrected. "We 'ave survived many wars by being impossible to siege. You cannot attack what you cannot find."
The carriage banked sharply, and Harry glimpsed vineyards stretching toward mountains that hadn't existed moments before. "Unplottable?"
"Beyond unplottable. Ze school exists between spaces—'ere and not 'ere simultaneously. Only zose with permission can find ze path." She traced a pattern on the window, and the glass shimmered. "Watch. We approach ze first barrier."
The air outside thickened. Harry's ears popped as they pushed through, and suddenly the temperature plummeted. His breath misted despite summer's grip on the rest of France.
"Why is it freezing?"
"Ze barriers require energy. Zey steal 'eat from ze surrounding air." Fleur waved her wand, and warming charms settled over them like invisible blankets. "In winter, it becomes so cold zat ice forms on ze inside of ze carriage. Very beautiful, very uncomfortable."
They pierced two more barriers, each crossing making Harry's magic fizz like champagne bubbles under his skin. Then Fleur touched his shoulder, directing his attention forward.
"Look, 'Arry. Beauxbatons."
The palace erupted from the landscape like architecture's fever dream, and Harry's brain simply refused to process what his eyes insisted was real. Where Hogwarts thrust itself skyward with Gothic defiance, Beauxbatons sprawled across the Loire Valley with the confident elegance of something that knew it was magnificent and saw no point in false modesty.
The main structure gleamed white-gold, carved from what looked like a single, impossible piece of limestone that caught light like mother-of-pearl. Three stories of arched windows marched across the facade in perfect symmetry, hundreds of them, each one tall as a giant and framed with gilded carvings that moved. Actually moved. Tiny golden figures danced along the window frames, reenacting scenes from magical history in an endless, glittering performance.
The central building stretched wider than the entire Hogwarts grounds, its wings extending outward like arms preparing to embrace the sky. Towers spiraled upward from seemingly random points, twisting like unicorn horns made of pearl and crystal. Some leaned at impossible angles, others grew thinner as they rose rather than tapering, and at least one appeared to exist in several places simultaneously, flickering between positions like a candle flame in wind.
Connecting these towers, bridges spanned empty air. Made of what looked like crystallized moonlight, they had no visible support, no cables or buttresses. Some were straight as arrows, others looped and spiraled like ribbons tossed by an invisible giant. Harry watched a bridge extend itself, growing from one tower to reach another that had just shifted position, the crystal structure flowing like liquid before hardening into geometric perfection.
Sheets of what had to be enchanted silver covered the roofs. Harry could see clouds from this morning still drifting across certain sections, while others showed last night's stars, and one prominent dome appeared to be replaying last week's thunderstorm in miniature, complete with tiny lightning bolts that cast real shadows.
But the gardens... Merlin's beard, the gardens made the architecture look restrained.
They cascaded down from the palace in terraces. Each level was larger than the one above it. Hedges grew in perfect spirals, rotating slowly like green galaxies. Flowerbeds formed mandalas that bloomed and withered in accelerated seasons, creating a constant kaleidoscope of color that never repeated.
Fountains punctuated every level, but these weren't mere water features. One shot water that froze mid-air into ice sculptures before melting and falling, another created water that flowed upward in helixes, a third seemed to be raining liquid starlight that evaporated before touching the ground. The centerpiece, visible even from their height, was a fountain the size of a small lake where water horses made of actual water galloped across the surface, manes streaming, occasionally leaping free to arc through the air before splashing back down.
The seasonal gardens Fleur had mentioned occupied the lowest terrace, and Harry's eyes couldn't quite accept what they showed. Four distinct quarters, each locked in a different season, existed side by side with borders sharp as knife edges. Cherry blossoms fell upward in spring, while three feet away, autumn leaves spiraled down in perpetual fall. Snow accumulated in the winter quarter. Harry could see students having a snowball fight, while summer's section shimmered with heat.
"Your face," Fleur laughed beside him, but Harry barely heard her. His magical senses were screaming, overwhelmed by the sheer impossibility of it all. This wasn't just a school. This was magic declaring war on mundane reality.
"That looks like..."
"Ze Palace of Versailles, oui." Fleur's smile turned sly. "Ze Muggles, zey copied us. Jacques Lemercier, ze wizard who designed Beauxbatons in 1290, 'is descendant built Versailles for ze Sun King. A pale imitation, but flattering nonetheless."
"You're telling me one of the most famous palaces in Muggle history is just someone's attempt to recreate a magical school?"
"Not attempt—failed attempt. Zey could not replicate ze moving staircases, ze seasonal gardens."
The carriage descended toward a courtyard where marble fountains launched water into impossible helixes.
"Your face," Fleur laughed, music wrapped in amusement. "Like a child seeing ze ocean for ze first time."
"It's just... Hogwarts has moving staircases and trick steps. This is reality having a nervous breakdown."
"Non, zis is reality being properly trained. Your British magic forces nature to comply. We convince it to collaborate."
The carriage touched down as softly as a whisper, and immediately Harry felt it, magic so dense it had weight, pressing against his skin. He wondered if this was a defence mechanism against foreign students.
"Welcome," Fleur said, her eyes bright with proprietary pride, "to real magical education."
The entrance doors stood three stories tall, carved from wood so black it seemed to absorb light. They swung open at Fleur's approach, recognizing her magical signature like an old friend greeting a favorite child.
"Don't touch ze doors directly," she warned as Harry reached out. "Zey remember everyone. Touch zem wrong, and zey might decide zey don't like you."
"Doors with opinions. Brilliant."
"Everything 'ere 'as opinions. Ze school is alive, 'Arry. Properly alive."
The entrance hall attacked Harry's senses from every angle. Above, the Aurora Borealis writhed across the ceiling in ribbons of green and gold, casting shadows that danced independently of their sources.
"'Ow many students for summer session?" Harry asked, his voice echoing strangely, as if the walls were tasting his words.
"Perhaps two 'undred? Most go 'ome, but some need extra study, or zey're international students who stay year-round, or—" She paused as footsteps crystallized from thin air, forming a staircase that spiraled upward. "Ah, someone needs ze astronomy tower."
A girl descended—looked maybe fourteen, robes indicating she was from the Eastern European delegation. Her eyes widened upon seeing them.
"Fleur Delacour!" she squeaked in heavily accented English. "And... et c'est... Is... Harry Potter?"
"Oui, Katarina. 'Arry is visiting today."
The girl's gaze locked onto the talisman visible at Harry's throat—he'd worn it outside his robes today, Andromeda's idea for "subtle intimidation." Her eyes went round as Galleons.
"Le créateur de talismans! Plus jeune dans l'histoire!" She switched to rapid French that Harry couldn't follow, gesturing animatedly at his necklace.
"She says you are ze youngest talisman creator in 'istory," Fleur translated, though her smile suggested the girl had said considerably more.
Three more students materialized from a doorway that hadn't existed seconds before, chattering in French that sounded like excitement fermenting into hysteria. One boy, perhaps sixteen, managed broken English: "You... you are making ze protection... pour les Aurors?"
"Among other things," Harry said carefully.
"Mon dieu!" The boy clutched his friend's arm. "Pierre, c'est vraiment lui! Le garçon qui—"
"Perhaps we continue ze tour?" Fleur suggested smoothly, though Harry caught her suppressed amusement. "Before ze entire summer session appears?"
She guided him deeper into the hall, where a fountain carved from single piece of crystal dominated the space. Water flowed upward through it.
"Watch," Fleur instructed, leaning over the edge.
Harry peered into water that shouldn't have been able to hold reflections while flowing up. Instead of his face, he saw a young man in medieval robes carefully inscribing runes onto parchment.
"Guillaume de Lorris," Fleur explained. "Our first Headmaster. If you know where to look..." She touched specific stones around the fountain's edge in sequence. The image shifted—an elderly man with eyes like stars, carefully brewing something that glowed golden.
"Nicolas Flamel," Harry breathed. "He really attended here?"
"Class of 1347. 'E was, 'ow you say, a problem student. Set fire to ze potions laboratory seven times."
"Seven?"
"'E insisted ze first six were practice."
A wall beside them suddenly developed what looked like indigestion, bulging outward before opening into a doorway. A confused-looking student stumbled through, mumbling thanks to the architecture in French.
"Ze building knows when someone is lost," Fleur explained. "It creates shortcuts, opens passages. During my first year, I was late to Enchantments, and ze floor literally tilted to slide me to ze correct classroom."
"That's..." Harry searched for words. "Actually helpful. Hogwarts just lets you be late and enjoys your suffering."
"British architecture—as welcoming as British weather."
They passed through an archway where the air shimmered like heat mirages. Harry felt magic taste him, evaluate him, decide he was acceptable. For now.
"Architecture Vivante," Fleur said reverently. "Living Architecture. Ze entire school was grown, not built. Fed magic for centuries until it developed... consciousness? Awareness? We don't 'ave proper words."
"It's watching us?"
"Always. It likes you, I think. You 'aven't been expelled yet."
"Yet?"
"Last year, a boy tried to steal from ze Headmistress's office. Ze school dropped 'im into ze lake. From ze seventh floor. Through solid stone."
Harry reconsidered his casual lean against the wall. The stone seemed to purr.
"Don't worry," Fleur said, her hand briefly touching his elbow. "It truly does like you. See? Ze portraits are all awake."
Indeed, every painting they passed showed figures craning to glimpse them. A medieval knight actually stepped out of his frame into another painting to get a better view.
"C'est le Harry Potter!" the knight announced to a gathering of Renaissance ladies, who immediately began whispering behind painted fans.
"I'm going to die of embarrassment," Harry muttered. "Death by French judgment."
"Zere are worse ways," Fleur said philosophically. "'Ave you seen British food?"
Despite himself, Harry laughed. The sound echoed through the hall.
.
.
The Enchantment Wing announced itself with the subtlety of a peacock in a library; the air tasted purple, which shouldn't have been possible, but apparently French magic had different rules about synesthesia.
"Students practice ze large-scale enchantments 'ere," Fleur explained, guiding Harry past a door that kept trying to become a window.
Through crystalline observation panels, Harry watched twelve students standing in formation around what looked like a captive thundercloud. Their wands moved in synchronized patterns while a professor, a severe woman with long blonde hair, barked instructions in rapid French.
"Maintenant! Ensemble! Plus de précision!"
The cloud contracted, expanded, then erupted into a localized blizzard that somehow stayed contained within an invisible sphere. Snow fell upward in one section, sideways in another, while the center spawned miniature lightning that struck with tiny thunderclaps.
"Weather magic," Harry breathed. "In a classroom."
"Where else would you learn?" Fleur's eyebrows arched like drawn bows. "Outside, where you might accidentally create a real storm?"
"That's exactly where Hogwarts would teach it. Probably during an actual storm. For authenticity."
"Your country's relationship with safety is... concerning."
A student lost concentration, and their section of the storm turned vivid pink. The professor's sigh carried through the barrier, followed by what Harry assumed was creative French profanity.
"Amélie always 'as zat problem," Fleur confided. "Last month, she turned a practice tsunami into strawberry jam."
"That's... actually impressive."
"Ze cleaning afterwards was not."
They descended spiral stairs, arriving at the Potions laboratories. The moment they entered, Harry's sinuses cleared, his breathing eased, and the lingering headache from barrier-crossing vanished.
"Air purification charms," Fleur noted his surprise. "Ze laboratories maintain perfect atmospheric conditions. Watch."
A student at a nearby station added something volatile to his cauldron. Purple smoke erupted, but instead of spreading, it was immediately sucked into vents that materialized from nowhere. The workspace glowed briefly orange, some kind of decontamination charm, then returned to pristine condition.
"Temperature control, too." She pointed to frost forming on one cauldron while another three stations away bubbled over open flame. "Each station adjusts to ze potion's needs. No more freezing while brewing Pepperup because someone else is making Fever-Cure."
"That's..." Harry watched a spilled ingredient vanish before touching the floor, absorbed by the stone itself. "Actually brilliant. How many students accidentally poison themselves?"
"None, since ze year 1823."
"What happened in 1823?"
"We don't discuss 1823."
They left through a door that sneezed as they passed—apparently it was allergic to British visitors—entering a corridor lined with identical wooden doors. Except Fleur walked past six before stopping at one that looked exactly the same as the others.
"'Arry," she said, her smile acquiring that particular quality that meant mischief was imminent. "What do you think is behind zis door?"
"A classroom? Storage? Another student who accidentally turned themselves into jam?"
She turned the handle, pulled, and revealed... another door. This one made of silver, with no visible handle.
"DoorSpaces," she announced, then promptly walked away.
"Wait, what?" Harry stared at the silver door, which seemed to stare back. "You can't just—"
"I can and I am." She continued down the corridor, humming something that sounded suspiciously like the French national anthem. "Come along, or ze library will close for lunch."
Harry's curiosity gnawed at him like a Niffler sensing gold. The silver door had patterns etched into its surface—were those equations? Musical notes? Both?
"Fleur—"
"Non."
"You didn't let me finish."
"You were going to ask about DoorSpaces. Ze answer is still non."
"That's completely unfair."
"Oui." She paused at another identical door, considered it, then moved on. "Some things must be discovered, not explained. Like ze proper way to eat cheese or why British people think beans on toast is cuisine."
They passed four more doors that Fleur ignored with pointed determination. One actually whimpered as they walked by.
"Did that door just—"
"Ze library, 'Arry. Focus."
The library doors, massive, oak, carved with words that rearranged themselves as Harry watched, swung open to reveal organized chaos. Books flew overhead like lazy birds, occasionally diving to specific shelves. Students sat at tables that expanded or contracted based on how many texts they'd accumulated. The ceiling showed not sky but an infinite recursion of libraries, each containing the reflections of all the others.
"'Ow do we find anything?" Fleur asked rhetorically, then answered her own question by walking to a pedestal holding what looked like a glass brain. "You tell it what you need."
She whispered something in French. The glass brain pulsed rose-gold, and three books immediately departed their shelves, gliding down to hover expectantly.
"The Library judges your intentions..." She gestured to a student in the corner, covered in what appeared to be angry butterflies made of paper. "Well."
"The books attacked him?"
"'E claimed to need books on transformation for a project. Really, 'e wanted to turn 'is ex-girlfriend's new boyfriend into a toad." She shrugged. "Ze library 'as opinions about zat."
Harry filed away yet another reason to appreciate Beauxbatons' terrifyingly sentient architecture. "So it reads minds?"
"Non, it reads character. Zere's a difference. Come, I've saved ze best for last."
Fleur's entire demeanor shifted as they approached unmarked double doors at the academy's heart—the satisfied anticipation of someone about to play their winning hand. She pressed her palm against a crystal panel, which chimed recognition, then looked at Harry expectantly.
"Guest," she told the door in French, then added in English for Harry's benefit, "A rather important one."
The doors opened, swinging wide. Beyond lay a space that rendered him temporarily speechless.
The circular room stretched impossibly wide, its domed ceiling painted with constellations that moved in real-time, showing the actual sky above France. Thirty workstations arranged in concentric circles filled the space. No two were identical; some featured grinding stones that turned themselves, others had miniature forges that burned with flames.
"Welcome," Fleur said with proprietary pride, "to ze Craftsmanship and Magical Artifacts Room. Where real magical creation 'appens."
At one station, a student worked with something that sparked violent purple, flinching each time it erupted. At another, tools floated in perfect accessibility orbits around a girl carving runes into what looked like living wood. Harry noticed the complete absence of safety barriers—students worked with dangerous materials completely exposed.
"No containment fields?" Harry's voice carried surprise.
"Non. Students learn through consequence." Fleur gestured to a small silver bell mounted on each desk. "If accidents 'appen, ze professor assists. If no professor is present, ze bell summons a 'ouse-elf to take ze injured to Medical Quarters."
As if to demonstrate, across the room a student yelped as his creation backfired, sending him tumbling. The professor, a stern woman with grey-streaked hair, checked him, and once she saw a burn on his hand, she used a spell to heal it, but still told him something that Harry did not understand. Fleur explained that she was taking him to the Medical Quarters.
"Salamander scales," Fleur explained as they watched. "'E forgot zey explode when overheated."
Harry's attention snagged on the far wall, floor-to-ceiling shelves holding ingredients that would make Slug & Jiggers weep with envy. Bottles of what looked like liquid diamond, crystallized dragon breath. A sign in multiple languages read: "For Practice Only. Wasteful Use Will Be Noted."
"Students can use anything?" His fingers actually twitched toward his pocket.
"Within reason. Ze professors monitor usage." She led him deeper into the room. "We 'ave two professors just for Magical Creation Class. Zey teach theory, practical application, and innovation."
Harry tried not to visibly react. A dedicated class for magical crafting? A whole room to create magical items and the tools and materials needed for it. Back at Hogwarts, there was no such class; all the tools were things he needed to buy himself, the same for the materials and the working desk. Well, in Hogwarts, he used the normal class desks as working desks, but it got the job done.
"Zis student," Fleur said, stopping near a workspace where a young man manipulated streams of light between his fingers, "is creating something interesting."
The student looked up, revealing intense hazel eyes behind copper-framed glasses. He said something in French, then noticed Harry and switched to heavily accented English.
"You are... Harry Potter? Ze talisman prodigy?"
"Just Harry," Harry said automatically, though his attention had already locked onto the student's project. Streams of light wove together, but they carried something else, patterns that shifted with emotional resonance. "Is that... are you encoding emotions into light?"
"Oui! A musical artifact—it will translate ze feelings into melody. But..." The student's face crumpled with frustration. "Ze protection matrix, it collapses when ze emotional resonance exceeds certain frequency."
Harry found himself leaning forward, his mind already dissecting the problem. "May I?"
The student. Marcel, he introduced himself, eagerly gestured Harry closer. The matrix was elegant but flawed, like a beautiful building on an unstable foundation.
"Your base structure can't support the emotional volatility," Harry said, his fingers tracing the air above the construct without touching. "Emotions spike unpredictably, your matrix needs flexibility, not rigid structure. Think of it like... like a tree in wind versus a wall. The tree bends but doesn't break."
"But 'ow do I—"
"Layer your protection." Harry pulled parchment from nowhere. Fleur must have conjured it, and began sketching. "Primary matrix for stability, secondary for absorption, tertiary for overflow redirect. Like flood barriers with controlled spillways."
Marcel's eyes widened with understanding. More students had gathered, drawn by the impromptu lesson. Harry barely noticed, lost in the familiar joy of problem-solving.
"You see here?" He added a runic sequence to his sketch. "This creates flexibility without sacrificing protection. The Egyptian symbol for water, it flows around obstacles rather than breaking against them."
"C'est brillant!" Marcel immediately began adjusting his construct.
Harry became aware of the growing audience; at least a dozen students now watched with the intensity of Nifflers spotting gold. One girl held a partially constructed combat talisman, another clutched notes covered in failed equations.
"Questions?" Harry asked, then immediately regretted it as hands shot up.
For the next thirty minutes, he found himself in impromptu professor mode. The girl with the combat talisman had overcomplicated her defensive layers ("Simplicity is its own protection—too many shields can interfere with each other"). A boy trying to create self-warming gloves had his thermal runes backwards ("Heat rises—work with natural laws, not against them").
Through it all, Fleur watched from the sidelines, her expression unreadable except for the satisfaction that lurked in her eyes like a cat with cream. When Harry finally extracted himself from the eager students, she was examining a display case.
"You enjoyed zat," she observed, not looking at him.
"They had interesting problems."
"Zey 'ave interesting problems every day. With two professors to guide zem. And proper materials. And a dedicated classroom for experimentation."
Harry recognized the trap closing but couldn't quite resent it. "Subtle as a Bludger to the head, Fleur."
"I don't know what you mean." Her innocence was so exaggerated it circled back to mockery. "I'm simply showing you our facilities. If you 'appen to notice 'ow superior zey are to anything Hogwarts offers..."
"Hogwarts has character."
"So does a 'aunted house. Zat doesn't make it optimal for education."
A student approached hesitantly. "Monsieur Potter? Your design for ze Italian Ministry. Could you explain ze power distribution matrix?"
Harry caught Fleur's triumphant smile and knew he'd lost this round. As he began explaining his innovative approach to magical energy flow, surrounded by eager students in a workshop, he couldn't entirely disagree with her unspoken argument.
Maybe Hogwarts was holding him back.
The thought settled into his mind like a seed in fertile soil, and Fleur's smile suggested she knew exactly what she'd planted.
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