Chapter 38: 38 The Cleaning

Everyone gathered their things and left the class in a rush and the shocked teacher stood there and didn't say anything. Thorfinn Rowle hadn't seen anyone cast such a powerful spell on their first try before and he lamented the fact that it was a muggle-born witch that did it. He completely missed the fact that Harry had instructed her and hadn't cast the spell himself.

“We're off until supper.” Ron said from behind Harry. “Let's go to the Great Hall early and eat.”

Hermione gave him a glare and Harry had to distract her.

“I think I should report to Mister Filch now.” Harry said.

“I'm sorry that Professor McGonagall wouldn't reduce your detention.” Hermione said, genuinely sad.

“Two weeks of cleaning the castle is going to suck.” Ron said. “Your arms are gonna fall off!”

Harry let out a huff and then smiled. “Don't worry about me.” He said and came to a stop in the Entrance Hall. “Hermione, here's those cauldron cakes I promised.” He took out the small box from a pocket in his robes and enlarged it.

“Harry, you really didn't have to...” Hermione said, her face slightly red as she took the box.

“Just make sure you eat some and don't leave them on the table.” Harry reminded her and she nodded. “I'll get you that book at supper, or later tonight if Filch doesn't break to eat.”

“Thanks, Harry.” Hermione said.

Harry walked over towards the closest staircase.

“Hey, where are you going?” Ron asked. “I thought you were going to see Filch?”

“I have a stop to make first.” Harry said and lifted the bundle of books and things he had, then he ran up the stairs. To his surprise, the stairs shifted and he arrived at the Griffindor Tower fairly quickly. “Thanks.” He said and pat the railing and walked down the hallway to the large painting of the Fat Lady.

“Password?” The Fat Lady asked and looked down at him.

“That's a pretty dress.” Harry said.

“Thank you.” The Fat Lady said and swung herself open. “No, wait! That's not the password!”

Harry chuckled and stepped into the common room and ran up the stairs. When he opened the door, he was very surprised to see six really short and grey wrinkly creatures with large ears as they struggled to pull his trunk off of the bed.

“Try pulling the blanket underneath.” One suggested and that didn't work. The trunk held the blanket in place, because if they moved the blanket, then the trunk would move, or be potentially stolen, so it stayed still.

“What do we do?” The second one squeaked in a panic. “We've been here for hours!”

“We pulled it, pushed it, kicked it, punched it, tried to lift it, dropped things on it, and tried to tip the bed.” The third one said. “Even magic won't move it.”

“Hurry up! Use your head!” The fourth one said.

“Good idea!” The fifth one said and dove as he tried to headbutt it. His head hit it with a comedic thump, he bounced up and over the trunk, and tumbled into the sixth one and they landed on the floor right in front of Harry.

“AHH!” The two of them yelled for a second when they saw him, then they popped out of existence.

“AHH!” Four more yells responded as they all looked at Harry, then they disappeared, too.

“What the heck was that?” Harry asked into the empty room. “Why were you trying to steal my trunk?”

No one responded, so he sighed and walked over to the trunk. He was glad that he had been smart to get it enchanted by the goblins for anti-theft. It was such a relief that he could leave his trunk and didn't have to worry about someone opening it or stealing it, even by other magical creatures.

Harry opened the trunk and put his things into it, then took out a few other things that he had tucked into it, namely his Christmas presents. He wasn't going to leave them at home and let his aunt or Dudley ruin them or use them up while he was at school. He shrunk them and put them into his pockets, grabbed one of the boxes of food he had left that was full of different kinds of sandwiches and shrunk that, too. He closed the trunk and put the food into a different pocket, then left the common room.

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“You need to say the password!” The Fat Lady said to his back.

“Caput Draconus.” Harry said and smiled when she sighed in relief. He went down the stairs and followed Professor McGonagall's directions to get to Mister Filch's office. It was on the first underground floor in a kind of dungeon. He knocked on the door and heard something be knocked over with a clanging sound, then heard several more clanging sounds as whatever it was must have been kicked. The door opened to show him an old and angry face peering down at him.

“What do you want?” Mister Filch asked angrily.

“MEOW!” A cat said loudly from between his feet.

“I'm off until supper, so I wanted to start my detention early.” Harry said.

“You what?” Mister Filch asked, his anger slightly offset by confusion.

“I want to start cleaning.” Harry said. “Are you busy? I can come back later tonight if you are.”

“Are you pulling my leg, boy?” Mister Filch asked and Harry shook his head. “Supper's not for another two hours and you really want to help me clean instead of goofing off with your friends?”

Harry nodded.

“You ain't allowed to use magic.” Mister Filch said and squinted his eyes. “It's supposed to be punishment. I bet you'll think twice about breaking a school rule again, won't you, eh?” He smiled and it looked more like a grimace. “Hard work and pain are the best teachers, if you ask me.”

“Who needs magic?” Harry asked as he pulled out a tiny mop and made it normal sized, which gave it a fluffy head that was over a foot wide. He took out a large bucket that it could easily fit in and added some of the fancy scrubbing soap he had gotten as a present to let him scrub the driveway. His uncle had bought it as a joke and Harry had actually used it, just to spite him.

“Gimmie that!” Mister Filch said and swiped it from Harry's hand. His eyes read the side of the bottle and he gasped as he saw the things it could do to clean stone, pavement, rocks, concrete, and masonry.

“Meow?” The cat asked as she stared up at the shocked Mister Filch.

Harry let him ogle the bottle and used the water spell to partially fill the bucket, then used a household spell to stir the water for a moment to get the suds really going. Now that he had a container with a liquid in it, he used the refilling charm to fill the large bucket to near the top. He wouldn't need any more of the soap as long as he never emptied the bucket completely and kept refilling it.

“Where did you get this great product?” Mister Filch asked, his anger completely gone.

“A muggle hardware store.” Harry said and took out the shrunk down vinyl broom he had, as well as the duster with an extendable handle. He made them all normal size and Mister Filch stared at him. “I'll get more during Christmas break.”

“More?” Mister Filch asked, his eyes sparkling. “What's your name again?”

“It's Harry. Harry Potter.”

“I'm Argus Filch and that's Missus Norris.” Filch said. “If this thing works even half as good as it claims...”

Harry dipped the large mop into the bucket and then splashed it onto the stone floor. He scrubbed a five foot round area for about ten minutes and stepped back. The difference between the clean area to the rest of the floor was like looking at a new fireplace and a soot covered chimney.

Filch smiled and bared his slightly crooked teeth, then darted into his office. There was a bunch more banging around, as if he was searching for something.

Harry knelt down and held a hand out to the cat. “Hi, Missus Norris. I'm Harry. It's nice to meet you.”

“Meow?” The cat looked at his hand and then at him, almost to see if he was going to trick her or something. Harry kept his hand steady and didn't move it. She gave the hand another look, then bumped her head against his fingers. He wiggled them for her and she dug her head into them to get them behind her ears.

“I found it!” Filch said and practically jumped out of the office. Neither the cat nor Harry were startled as he loomed over them with a mop that was twice the size of Harry's.

“I think we need a bigger bucket.” Harry said and used the enlarging spell on the bucket, then used the refilling spell to fill it almost to the top.

“Yer a good lad!” Filch said and plunged his mop into the giant bucket and splashed a bunch of water and soap out onto the floor. “Now put yer back into it!” He said and both he and Harry started scrubbing the floors in earnest.

Filch started to hum softly as he worked and Missus Norris would add in an occasional meow as an accent. Harry ended up humming the same tune, whatever it was, and they worked for the next two hours, then kept going all through dinner... and through the evening... and deep into the night.

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