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HRA# Chapter 83: Ron’s Mishap with Love Potion and the Oddity of the Invisibility Cloak
🕑 Added 2025-03-30 20:35:10 +0000 UTC“There’s no such person at Hogwarts! — Wait, love potion?” Harry suddenly realized something. “Chocolate, come here.”
The next moment, the chocolate Ron had been clutching flew into Harry’s hand. He unwrapped it in a few quick motions and sniffed it—honestly, he couldn’t detect anything strange.
Love potions were a broad category, encompassing any brew that made the drinker infatuated or obsessed with the person who gave it to them. Though Harry had never brewed one himself or seen one up close, he’d read about their common traits in books. For instance, Amortentia had a mother-of-pearl sheen and spiraling steam that shifted scents based on each person’s preferences. But those were traits of the potion in its raw form—once mixed into food or drink, they became nearly impossible to detect.
“…I really want to see her, Harry,” Ron mumbled, stumbling forward a few steps, his face full of longing and fantasy. “She’s so beautiful, so perfect… ah…”
The kid was even sighing dreamily now, despite being an oblivious eleven-year-old who, just minutes ago, had zero interest in girls.
“Beautiful? Perfect?” Harry was barely holding back laughter. “You’ve never even met this Lottie Lawrence, have you? For all you know, she’s already a mother of several kids.”
Suddenly, Ron froze, as if a glitch had stalled him. The potion’s power was wrestling with this contradiction.
“I haven’t seen her,” he admitted in that same dazed tone. Then his head seemed to clear slightly, his eyes lighting up with hope. “But I can go find her! Harry! You’ll help me, right?”
“Hermione and Neville really shouldn’t have gone home for the holidays,” Harry said with genuine regret. “They’re missing out on way too much drama.”
“What do you mean, Harry?” Ron snapped, suddenly furious. “I won’t let you mock Lottie!!”
“Petrificus Totalus!”
That was Harry’s response.
A flash of red light streaked through the air, and Ron turned to stone mid-step, frozen in a pose that looked like he’d been about to lunge at Harry and fight.
Ron’s last shout had been too loud—Harry could already hear Mrs. Norris’s yowling, and it was getting closer fast. Thinking quickly, he dragged the petrified Ron into a nearby empty classroom and draped the Invisibility Cloak over him. Seconds later, Mrs. Norris darted around the corridor’s corner, with Filch’s faint yelling trailing behind.
“Meow! — Meow~”
Her tone shifted almost instantly. Harry had a decent relationship with Mrs. Norris—actually, he got along well with most small animals, like Kel’Thuzad’s cat, Mr. Bigglesworth.
By the time Filch huffed his way up the stairs, he found Mrs. Norris rubbing against Harry’s legs, purring and meowing nonstop.
“Aha! A student out after hours!” Filch bellowed as he reached the top, “Caught at last! I’ll have you polishing— Harry Potter?!”
His voice choked off mid-sentence, his eyes widening as if someone had grabbed his throat.
“Good evening, Mr. Filch. Happy Christmas,” Harry said, standing to greet him. Thanks to Mrs. Norris’s friendliness, his relationship with Filch wasn’t exactly warm, but it was at least civil. If Ron weren’t currently under the effects of a love potion and in such a questionable mental state—where he’d remember everything once he snapped out of it—Harry wouldn’t have bothered hiding with Filch around. It was all to spare Ron’s dignity and protect his friend’s sense of shame.
“I ate a bit too much at the feast earlier and didn’t have much dinner,” Harry explained to Filch. “So I’m a little hungry now and thought I’d check out the kitchens.”
“Oh, uh… Happy Christmas, Happy Christmas… Hungry, huh? Well, you should eat something then,” Filch said, rubbing his hands together awkwardly. Harry recognized that look—it was the same one Filch got when he wanted to ask for a favor but was too embarrassed to spit it out.
“Need help with something, Mr. Filch? No need to hold back,” Harry said, raising an eyebrow. “Did *Did you run out of cat food again? I can write to my aunt and have her send more.”
“Er, no, it’s not about the cat food,” Filch said, looking like he was about to break into a sweat. He was visibly nervous. “It’s about that—your club, I mean. Is it still possible to join?”
Filch hadn’t attended the first session of the Shaman Priest Club, but after the students spread word of what happened in class, he’d been kicking himself ever since. What the students didn’t know was a secret Filch carried: despite working at Hogwarts, a school of magic, he couldn’t cast spells. He was a Squib. It was hard to say if his usual hostility toward students stemmed from jealousy—envy of those young kids who could wield magic so freely.
“You want to become a shaman priest?” Harry asked, surprised, unaware of Filch’s Squib status.
“N-no, I mean—yes!” Filch practically gritted the word out.
“I see…” Harry considered it for a moment, then pulled a vial of Earth Spirit Pact potion from his dragonhide pouch. “Normally, we wouldn’t take new members until next year’s first-years arrive, but since you’re practically staff, Mr. Filch, here you go.”
He placed the vial in Filch’s trembling hands, which were shaking with excitement.
“I assume you’ve already heard the process from the students,” Harry said seriously. “Go to the new shaman altar near the mountain’s base and drink it there. I can’t guarantee it’ll work, though—you need to be prepared for that, Mr. Filch.”
“Of course! Of course!!” Filch nodded eagerly, having memorized every detail of the lesson. “If I’ve got the talent, I’ll connect with the earth elementals! Then I could— ahem! Anyway, thank you so much!”
Filch cut himself off with a cough, then said, “You know where the kitchens are, right? Down this corridor, turn right, follow the main castle stairs down to a stone basement hallway. There’s a painting of a fruit bowl—tickle the pear to get in. Just tell the house-elves what you want.”
Filch was almost overly enthusiastic, even offering to guide Harry himself. It took several refusals before he finally left, practically sprinting off with a grin. No doubt he’d head straight to the shaman altar to drink the potion that night. Harry silently wished him luck.
Once Filch was out of sight, Harry pushed open the classroom door. Oddly, he couldn’t sense Ron at all—as if he wasn’t even there—until he reached out and pulled off the Invisibility Cloak.
Ron’s presence hit him instantly.
In terms of effectiveness, Harry had to admit the cloak was impressive. No need to keep it stuffed at the bottom of a trunk anymore. If all wizarding invisibility cloaks worked this well, he’d have to be extra cautious outdoors from now on.
—But something felt off.
A nagging instinct kept tugging at him, refusing to let it go.
What was wrong?
Had he overlooked something?
Invisibility cloak—invisible—how does it work—materials—invisible—Invisibility Beasts!!
A bolt of realization struck Harry. He suddenly understood what he’d missed.
According to the books, wizarding invisibility cloaks were woven from the fur of Invisibility Beasts. But once separated from the creature, the fur gradually lost its power, making the cloaks consumable items. Even the best-crafted ones rarely lasted more than a decade.
But what had Dumbledore said?
Your father’s keepsake—meaning even if James Potter had acquired it just before his death, it would still be over ten years old by now. Yet this cloak showed no signs of aging. Its invisibility was flawless… and Harry hadn’t even noticed any frayed threads or rough edges.
Especially the fur—he couldn’t find a single trace of it. The cloak felt more like a liquid, a silvery-gray fluid, smooth and flowing, almost like water if poured into a cup. From the outside, there were no visible signs of weaving.
But more than the material, what unsettled Harry was how it masked the wearer from his senses entirely.
It was as if they vanished from the world—no presence, no trace, nothing.
—Not even Invisibility Beasts could do that.
Harry had seen Invisibility Beasts before, inside Newt’s suitcase. Just the day before he’d visited, Hagrid had helped deliver a litter of them, and Newt had shown the kids the difference between the monkey-like creatures and their offspring, even letting them touch the beasts. Harry distinctly remembered that, even when invisible, he could still sense them—their breathing, their warmth.
This cloak’s effect was something else entirely.
Was it some wizarding enchantment added during crafting? A special technique?
But that didn’t add up either. If wizards had such skills, invisibility cloaks wouldn’t have expiration dates.
If he weren’t in such an inconvenient spot, Harry would’ve planted a totem right then and there to ask his father about this cloak.
—He suspected it might be a unique Potter family heirloom.
For the moment, he set Ron’s situation aside. A small dose of love potion wouldn’t harm him, and the effects would wear off naturally as long as he didn’t take more.
Right there in the abandoned classroom, Harry began studying the cloak—testing it with wind slashes, lightning bolts, even fire.
Not a scratch.
If invisibility cloaks weren’t so rare and priceless, Harry might’ve bought another just to compare. Even so, he was certain this one was different.
Suddenly, he whipped around.
“Who’s there!”
Like a chameleon dropping its camouflage, a figure emerged from the wall behind him—Dumbledore.
“Disillusionment Charm?” Harry raised an eyebrow. “What did you say about Professor Trelawney the first time you mentioned her to me?”
“Let me think… Oh, I believe I said she has real talent,” Dumbledore replied, recalling with a smile.
“Fair enough,” Harry said, lowering his hand. “Why are you here?”
“You know, Harry,” Dumbledore said with a wry smile, “you look more like a headmaster than I do sometimes. If I’m not mistaken, it’s past curfew.”
“Sorry, I thought sneaking around at night was a Hogwarts tradition,” Harry quipped. “I didn’t expect to run into you here, Headmaster.”
“Nor did I,” Dumbledore chuckled. “Nice vigilance, Harry. You’d get along well with another friend of mine.”
“He makes you verify his identity every time you meet?” Harry asked.
“Indeed,” Dumbledore said with a shrug. “And he’s far more extreme about it—he won’t even eat or drink anything from outside.”
“Then he’s definitely learned that lesson the hard way,” Harry nodded. “Some mistakes only take once.”
“Ah, that sounds like something he’d say,” Dumbledore mused. “So, Harry, care to explain why you and your petrified friend are lurking in such a remote spot in the middle of the night?”
“Night wandering,” Harry said simply. “Thanks to your Christmas gift, Ron couldn’t wait to try it out.”
“Reasonable enough,” Dumbledore said with a subtle smirk. “And the Petrification Charm?”
“We stumbled across a secret room during our wanderings. Ron found some chocolates inside,” Harry sighed. “Turns out they were laced with a love potion—made by a student years ago.”
Even Dumbledore, with all his experience, looked faintly bemused.
“Every Valentine’s Day, Madam Pomfrey gets a flood of kids who’ve accidentally taken Amortentia,” Dumbledore said, bending down to check Ron’s eyes. “I thought you’d have a few more years before hitting that phase. Hmm… Finite Incantatem.”
In an instant, Ron jolted back to life, springing up.
“Harry!!” He didn’t even notice Dumbledore standing there, growling under his breath, “You didn’t even undo the spell right away! You were messing with that cloak instead!!”
“Calm down, Ron,” Harry said, glancing at the still-smirking Dumbledore. “It was just a tiny piece of chocolate. You’ll sober up naturally in a bit. Honestly, it’s a miracle that chocolate still had any potency left.”
It wasn’t his imagination—Harry caught Dumbledore’s hand pause mid-stroke of his beard when Ron mentioned the cloak.
“You could’ve at least lifted the Petrification!” Ron huffed, accepting Harry’s explanation but still fuming. “You have no idea how awful that felt—sorry, Headmaster, we broke the rules.”
Though they’d all eaten at the same table before, Ron still got jittery around Dumbledore outside of casual settings—a mix of nerves and awe, probably.
“No harm done,” Dumbledore said with a teasing grin. “I’ve no doubt you’ll grow into a fine young man like your father—handsome too. But until then, don’t eat things others give you. Especially from witches.”
Ron’s face turned redder than his hair in an instant. He mumbled a long string of excuses, but no one could make out a word, which only made the moment funnier.
“So why are you here, Headmaster?” Harry asked.
“Actually, you two are the unexpected arrivals, Harry,” Dumbledore said with a deep sigh. “I’ve been coming here almost every night lately.”
“Here?”
As he spoke, Harry took his first real look around the abandoned classroom, searching for anything unusual. It didn’t take long to spot it—a pristine mirror stood in the corner, stark against the dusty, broken desks and chairs.
Harry approached it.
It was a grand mirror, reaching the ceiling, framed in ornate gold with clawed feet at the base. At the top of the frame, an inscription read: Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi.
An easy riddle—just reverse it. Harry didn’t even need the decoding tricks Brian Bronzebeard had taught him.
“I show not your face but your heart’s desire,” Harry said softly.
“The Mirror of Erised,” Dumbledore said, stepping beside him and gazing at its surface. “Very old, very mysterious. No one knows how it works.”
Harry noted how many magical items in this world could peer into the mind. Things like that often carried hidden dangers until their workings were understood—but still, he looked into the mirror’s clear center.
As he’d expected, he saw what he already knew, what he longed for most.
His home.
Not the house built inside Newt’s suitcase, but the real one…
The home of Harry Bloodhoof.
