"Hmmmmm," Harry says, listening to this spiel about roses and rivers with a reasonable aptitude for metaphors but certainly somewhat less ease with them than his teacher. Through his slightly smudged glasses, he looks at her-- navel !! -- and then her throat when she points to it, then her forehead. Considers the river in silence for a moment, taking his canteen from her a little slowly, reattaching it to his hip with a deliberate, none-too-quick manipulation of thin fingers. Incidentally, roses and rivers in such terms don't feel like a very Dark thing to be banging on about. He knows it's stupid to read too much into that, of course, but he wants to be optimistic about what she means.
Surely someone this enthusiastic about horticultural husbandry and flying on a broom has got to be mostly good. "That sounds quite important. We've got some old laws and limits in my world, too. I mean, not like Aurors gunning for Dark Wizards-- I mean, for example, Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration. There's a few things that magic can't make out of thin air, and food's one of them. Water, though, we can do. Right out of nowhere. Though I reckon it's less believable when we're somewhere as bloody muggy as this." He rather imagines that this tidbit will be of interest to her, that it'll buy her another couple seconds of peering at her face and wondering. Just wondering, though. Even if it's only dehydration or heart stroke, that seems like a bad time to be trying to achieve altitude with unfamiliar magic.
This is to say that Harry Potter will ultimately oblige! He takes a step back from her, giving himself a little room to work. Not that the first move is very elaborate, of course. Madam Hooch had started all of the First Years out the same way, which had been important given the mixture of those raised entirely by Muggles and relatively seasoned little assholes named Malfoy. Not that Harry's bitter, but being sensible.
He puts out his hand to his side, so that the sunshine bleeding down spreads a shadow over the shaft of the broom. He says, and he already has the snEAKING suspicion she's going to find this a bit crass if the name Hogwarts was, but, "Up."
The broomstick abruptly bounces up into his hand. His fingers and palm snap shut around it with the accuracy and timing that comes from having done it hundreds of times before, at this rate. He smiles at her and makes no attempt to attempt to mount the thing. Instead, he stoops over and sets the broom back down, but near Iezebel's feet this time. It settles easily, despite its antigravitational display a moment ago; a few native leaves are sticking out of its twigs, by now.
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Surely someone this enthusiastic about horticultural husbandry and flying on a broom has got to be mostly good. "That sounds quite important. We've got some old laws and limits in my world, too. I mean, not like Aurors gunning for Dark Wizards-- I mean, for example, Gamp's Law of Elemental Transfiguration. There's a few things that magic can't make out of thin air, and food's one of them. Water, though, we can do. Right out of nowhere. Though I reckon it's less believable when we're somewhere as bloody muggy as this." He rather imagines that this tidbit will be of interest to her, that it'll buy her another couple seconds of peering at her face and wondering. Just wondering, though. Even if it's only dehydration or heart stroke, that seems like a bad time to be trying to achieve altitude with unfamiliar magic.
This is to say that Harry Potter will ultimately oblige! He takes a step back from her, giving himself a little room to work. Not that the first move is very elaborate, of course. Madam Hooch had started all of the First Years out the same way, which had been important given the mixture of those raised entirely by Muggles and relatively seasoned little assholes named Malfoy. Not that Harry's bitter, but being sensible.
He puts out his hand to his side, so that the sunshine bleeding down spreads a shadow over the shaft of the broom. He says, and he already has the snEAKING suspicion she's going to find this a bit crass if the name Hogwarts was, but, "Up."
The broomstick abruptly bounces up into his hand. His fingers and palm snap shut around it with the accuracy and timing that comes from having done it hundreds of times before, at this rate. He smiles at her and makes no attempt to attempt to mount the thing. Instead, he stoops over and sets the broom back down, but near Iezebel's feet this time. It settles easily, despite its antigravitational display a moment ago; a few native leaves are sticking out of its twigs, by now.