Ron-Weasly book 1. V2

I chuckled,

"Well, yeah. She doesn't need buns. She should have caught someone. And by the way, Harry, do you know how many owls live in the owlet house? You can't feed on all the rats in the forest."

Hermione shook her head, but not sternly, but with a slight smile:

"Potter, owls need meat. And it's better not just a piece, but... well, you know. Bones, feathers— all together. They keep special food for the postal owls in the kitchen. The brownies know."

Embarrassed, Harry put the bun away.

"I'm sorry," he said softly to Hedwig. "I just wanted it to be delicious for you, like it is for me." The owl tilted its head slightly, as if forgiving this awkwardness, and hooted softly. And then, as if to comfort him, she bumped her warm side into his shoulder, saying that the main thing was that you thought of me.

"Harry, go to the kitchen, if you want to go together. And we'll arrange with the elves to supply your owl with mice or quails. Dad arranged with Mili to supply quails for Eroll, and Percy went to find out about his owl, too. Or write to Mrs. Moore at her pet store."

"Yes, let me write to Mrs. Moore at her pet store after school before lunch."

The evening in the Gryffindor common room was cozy and noisy: someone was arguing about Quidditch tactics, someone was rustling parchments, and Harry was sitting by the window, where Hedwig was sitting calmly on the back of a chair. She clicked her beak softly from time to time, as if listening to the conversations, but on the whole she looked pleased — she only glanced at Harry from time to time as if she wanted to remind him: "What about food?"

Harry sighed guiltily, took out a crumpled envelope and an even more crumpled bag from his pocket and muttered:

"I'm sorry, I fixed it. Honestly."

Мне очень жаль, но я все исправил. Честно.

"Dear Mrs. Moore,

I have a polar owl, Hedwig. I accidentally tried to feed her human food, but she doesn't seem very happy. Tell me, please, what is the right way to feed postal owls? If possible, send me something suitable.

Sincerely, Harry Potter."

And in the evening, the brownie brought him a neat bag with the seal of the store and a short note:

"Dear Mr. Potter,

a special food with pieces of quail, dried insects and a drop of strengthening infusion is best suited for the polar owl so that the wings do not get tired. And if you want, go to the Hogwarts kitchen and ask the elves: they have special treats for owls that have been tested for centuries. As a Hogwarts student, you can ask the brownie to feed your pet while you are at school. This is included in the cost of your tuition, which was paid for by your parents.

Yours truly, Mrs. Moore."

Harry carefully untied the ribbon on the bag, and a spicy, slightly wild smell hit his nose — not sweet, not flour, but some kind of forest, real.

"Look," Harry said softly, handing Hedwig one piece in his open palm. "It's from Mrs. Moore. There's... well, as she wrote, quail and something strengthening. So that you don't get tired."

Hedwig tilted her head, studied the treat carefully, then gave a short hoot, as if checking to see if he was joking, and carefully picked up a piece with her beak. She swallowed, blinked her amber eyes, and immediately reached for the next one.

Harry exhaled, as if he had been holding his breath for a long time.

Next to me, I looked up from a bar of magic chocolate from the Sweet Kingdom, squinted at the bag and chuckled:

"Well, at least it's not a bun. This is already progress."

Percy, who was sitting next to him in an armchair, looked up from his textbook on ancient runes and grumbled:

"Mrs. Moore knows her stuff. She also gave my owl such treats when she was with me on vacation. They say there's even a little frost extract in them to keep owls warm on long flights."

"Frost extract?" Harry asked, raising his eyebrows slightly. "Is it... safe?"

"Absolutely," Percy nodded confidently. "It's magic. Everything is calculated. By the way, the extract is extracted from the berries of the snowberry, mixed with blue mountain flower."

I snorted,

"The main thing is that she doesn't start breathing ice like a Hyperborean dragon. They say they can exhale not only flames, but also ice or poison there. And also to transform into humans or elves there. They moved to us from another world in ancient times, where people began to hunt them. They say our founder is like the Malfoys of these dragons. Only the Malfoys, unlike our Bridget Wesley, had an ice dragon as their founder, and ours was a fire dragon. That's why we're always fighting.

Hedwig squinted at me, as if seriously considering the prospect of breathing ice, and hooted softly again.

Harry smiled and carefully tied the bag, leaving a few more pieces inside.

"You know," he said softly to the owl, "I'm going to be smarter now. I'll ask first, then I'll suggest it."

The owl tilted her head to the side, as if she understood every word, and gently nudged his shoulder with her warm side.

And Harry thought that the best thing about this day wasn't that he'd finally found the right treat, but that Hedwig hadn't been offended. She was just waiting for him to figure it out.

* * *

I finished chewing on a piece of pumpkin biscuits taken from the breakfast table in the great hall and waved towards the corridor leading down to the kitchens:

"If you want Hedwig to fly at all and not look at you like you're feeding her as punishment, go to Mili. She's responsible for the owls. Dad had made an agreement with her about Errol when he started to give up completely: to make him a separate diet, with strengthening broth and all that. Mili is kind, but strict: if you say "I want something delicious," she will lecture you about squirrels and toadstools."

Harry chuckled, but Ron's words were true: after the bun story, he wanted to do everything right. He tucked the bag from Mrs. Moore deeper into his pocket, just in case, as a safety net, and nodded:

"Okay. I will go. But Ron, it's probably expensive."

Harry, first of all, you now have money, as a last resort you can go to Professor Dumbledore, he is responsible for orphans of students at Hogwarts, and can give you more money for Hedwig or clothes. And secondly, the cost of feeding pets and students is included in the tuition fee, as well as teachers' salaries. That's why it's so expensive. As much as one hundred galleons a year for an apprentice." Harry's eyes were wide in shock.

"Ron, how did you get into school?"

"The older brothers passed on a free quota from the board of trustees. And our grandfather Ignotius Pruitt paid for me and Ginny. Even though he grumbles that Mom married Arthur in the last year of school, he still loves us in his own way. And Grandma Lucretia insisted that it was not a good idea for Black to study at a Welsh school."

"Awesome. Well, you have relatives. Will you show me where the kitchen is?"

"Finish your porridge and let's go. And by the way, Harry, you have a grandmother named Dorothy from the Blacks, why did Draco offer you a cake? He's your close relative. His mom Narcissa is also Black by blood."

"I can do without such relatives." — my friend muttered angrily, pushing his favorite porridge away. But Blackie, that's a kind of dark sorcerer, isn't it? Seamus told me about them."

"Yes, buddy, but my grandma sent them to the forest, as did Nymphadora Tonks' mother, by the way. She's your cousin."

"Is she the one who studies at Halfpuff with pink or purple hair? Is she clumsy? I thought she was Muggleborn."

"Yes, she. She has a Muggle-born father, like your mother. There was such a scandal when Andromeda Black married him. They say Nymphadora is a metamorph, she has coordination problems because of this. The gift has become too strong due to Tonks' fresh blood, and she cannot cope with the changes.

"Damn, I have so many relatives in the magical world, and all my life I thought I was an orphan. Where were they all when I was starving in the Dursleys' closet?" Harry thought resentfully. "Okay, Weasley, they're beggars like me, but where were the others?"

"Harry, at least have an omelet, it's delicious today."

"No, I'm not hungry."

"Well, at least you can eat toast with orange jam, you love it. Just recently, the harvest in the greenhouses of the school has ripened, so the jam is fresh. In the meantime, I'll finish the omelette, unlike you, I'm always hungry and I need a lot of energy. And you eat more if you want to grow up and gain meat. Look at yourself in the mirror, how skinny you are.

"Ron, I just can't eat much, I throw up right after eating. She can't really eat anything either, she's afraid of getting fat. Aunt Petunia can't really eat either, she's afraid of getting fat."

"Harry, can we go to the hospital wing after the kitchen?"

"Come on, I'm tired of being a suffocator. Aunt Marge grumbles all the time that I have worms. She even gave me and my cousin medicine once."

Harry spread a generous layer of orange jam on his toast, inhaled that warm, sunny scent, and for a second seemed to forget that a cool mist lay in a cloud on the grass outside the window.

"You know," he told me, "sometimes it feels like this jam is straight out of summer. It's like someone took a piece of July and rolled it into a jar."

I grunted, took a huge bite of his toast, and mumbled contentedly:

"Yeah. These are all greenhouses. The professor's Spraut got a lot of stuff growing there. Not just oranges, but in general... well, it's like a piece of the south right under the glass."

Neville, who was sitting next to him and diligently crumbling a piece of bun for some invisible mouse, suddenly looked up and quietly, but with noticeable pride, added:

"Oranges are the sweetest in the second greenhouse right now. I helped collect them myself. And there are lemons, figs... and mint is so thick that if you put it in a little tea, it immediately warms your soul."

Harry smiled:

"It's like you're talking about the house."

Neville blushed a little, but he didn't look away:

"Well, for me, greenhouses are almost a home. It's quiet there. And everything alive. Even if it's prickly or poisonous, it's still... well, like it's trying to grow. And I'm used to tinkering with my grandmother in our greenhouses, they've been with the Longbottoms since ancient times. We are the main suppliers of medicinal herbs in Mungo."

I glanced at him, then back at Jem:

"And most importantly, it's delicious. I wish they could bake buns there right on the spot."

Neville didn't pay any attention to the joke — he was already talking about greenhouses again, and there was that quiet excitement in his voice that appeared when it came to plants: And sage, and St. John's wort... Professor Spraut says that you need to prepare for winter in advance. Colds will start as soon as the wind starts blowing from the mountains. Supplies are already being prepared in the fifth greenhouse: herbs are being dried, syrups are being infused, and ointments are being made. Everything so that Madam Pomfrey doesn't have to run around and find where to get what she needs."

He paused for a moment, as if remembering something, and added softly:

"She once said to me, "Neville, if it weren't for your herbs, I'd go crazy here. Students are always catching colds, falling off brooms, and we should always have a supply." So... I'm trying. To make it happen.

Harry looked at Neville in a new way — not as someone who was always dropping textbooks and blushing when addressed, but as someone who was quietly, without unnecessary words, doing important things.

"So it's this jam," Harry tapped the jar with his spoon, "It's not just jam. It's... part of this very preparation."

Neville nodded, as if that was the right explanation:

"Yes. Mint in tea, rosehip syrup, and even those bouncing brownie bulbs are used to make a paste that helps if your throat hurts. Everything is connected. Greenhouses feed, treat, and... well, keep you warm, even if it's a blizzard outside."

I chuckled after chewing:

"Okay, we're convinced. Now I'm going to think that I'm not just eating jam, but... a strategic reserve against winter."

Neville smiled, just a little, almost imperceptibly:

"That's good. It tastes better then."

Harry took another bite of toast, and now the taste seemed deeper to him: he could feel the warm greenhouses, the caring hands of the housekeepers, and the quiet work of Neville, who harvested herbs in advance so that no one would freeze or get sick.

It was still pouring rain outside, but inside the Great Hall it was bright, noisy, and cozy in its own way. And it seemed that as long as Hogwarts had greenhouses where oranges ripened in the middle of winter, and someone like Neville remembered the supplies for the Healing Wing, no amount of cold could really get inside.

Part 7.2 Getting to know Miles.

The kitchen was noisy, warm, and smelled so good that any student would feel dizzy: fresh bread, spicy sauces, caramel, and something else cozy, as if the room itself had been designed to make everyone feel full and calm. Brownies scurried between cauldrons and shelves, deftly picked up plates and disappeared with them in the blink of an eye.

Harry hesitated a bit at the entrance, not knowing who to approach, but then a small housekeeper in a starched rag cap, with big attentive eyes and a very serious look, poked her head out from behind a huge pot.

"Why are you standing here like you've been sent to work?" She asked with her fists on her hips. If it's for pies, then tell me, I'll give it to you. There are those red-haired gobblers who come running for pastries all the time. But if you've come to feed the owl a bun again, then I won't even listen to you."

Harry blushed, but tried to look confident:

"No, that's not what I'm after. I... I want to know about Hedwig. About her diet. Mrs. Moore gave me food, but I want her to... well, to always have something to eat. Ron said you're keeping an eye on the owls. And that Mr. Weasley made arrangements with you about Errol."

The housekeeper softened a little, but her gaze remained stern, like that of a real housewife of the kitchen.

"My name is Miles," she said, tilting her head slightly. "And yes, I remember about Errol. An old owl, stubborn but diligent. They cooked a separate broth for him so that he wouldn't lose his strength. And your Hedwig is a polar owl, a proud northern bird. She needs meat, but not simple, but with a special approach."

She flicked her ear, and immediately a clean plate appeared on the table next to Harry with neat slices of dark, almost amber meat, sprinkled with green crumbs.