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Harry Potter and the Cowman's Maze
by Vicky S
 Part three of an occasional series, from the Fantasy Archers topic on the , which chronicles the friendship between Harry Potter and Bert Fry.
***
It was the first week of the long summer holiday and since the Dursleys had most mysteriously and unexpectedly
("Can you remember entering this competition dearest? Run by some company called Diagonal Destinations. I've never head of them, but it looks like a lovely resort. Six two-star restaurants Dudley, imagine that.")
won a holiday competition sending them to an all inclusive resort hotel in Magaluf for two weeks, Harry had been invited to the Weasleys.
The first day had been spent in a whirl of post-school activity. Under protest hastily filled trunks were unpacked, text books and note scrolls flung onto bedroom bookshelves, the remaining dregs of unlabelled potion bottles and spell ingredient boxes carelessly emptied into the recycling bin, cauldrons rinsed and piled up outside the back door, brooms oiled and hung up and holiday homework tasks consigned beneath beds. Mrs Weasley bravely trawled through three piles of school uniform clothes, and sent back by harrier parcel post the ones that clearly did not belong, with a firm note about missing items.
"Really, Ron, that's the seventh jumper you've lost since you've been at that school. I can't understand how you can be so careless, how much effort does it take to look after your belongings. Mind you your brothers were just the same ..."
Ginny retired to her bedroom intent on writing to her best friends long and strangely punctuated owls, written in change-a-chrome glitter inks (the latest Weasley Wheeze from the twins' shop) and heavily ornamented with the ear piercingly shrill giggle-stickers that this term had been the mark of true friendship, until banned on health and safety grounds by Professor McGonagall.
Ron and Harry lay in the garden working out potential Quidditch moves with the reluctant help of five of the less obstructive garden gnomes, who in return for their cooperation had been promised an amnesty from Weasley garden games for the rest of the holiday. They had just worked out an almost successful double bludger pincer attack move:
"Oops. Sorry guys! Try it again and this time come in low but go round the birdbath,"
when Mrs Weasley called Harry to the kitchen.
When he came back he had a small scruffy owl perched on his shoulder, tenderly nibbling his ear, and held a long scroll of paper in his hand.
"Owl from Bert Fry," he explained unnecessarily, and started to decipher Bert's elegant curliqued copperplate handwriting "er ... Freda's recipe for pumpkin and parsnip gratin enclosed, I think that's for your mum ... always use a cross head posidrive screwdriver and remember that brown is live blue is neutral, that's probably for your dad. We'd better warn your mum he's still interested in electricity."
"Here we go dum di dum you remember Scruff, oh yes nice dog, new home ... mentioned possibility rehoming to Hagrid ... Yes! Oh ... llama woman offered first, shame. Maize maze, challenge, natural ability, not native species, cloudy nights, star charts, don't want to appear to be ... honour is at stake ... can we help ... any ideas, not magical nor the like but charms will do. Blimey Ron, you'd think he'd know by now that's not our strong point. Where's Hermione when you need her?"
"Portugal," said Ron in a quietly wistful voice.
There was a moments pause in deference to Ron's finer feelings.
Then he sat up.
"S'matter of fact," he said, and Harry noted with dismay an intonation of pride in Ron's voice that could only bode ill, "S'matter of fact, I think I do know something that might help old Bert. Stay here and keep an eye on that lot," indicating the gnomes who were edging towards the cover of the rhubarb patch, "they'll shoot off down their burrows if they think they can get away with it."
Ron disappeared into the garden shed and Harry listened to him banging around and muttering as he searched the detritus of Weasley throwouts. Harry amused himself while waiting by teaching the gnomes to perform backwards single-edge triple loops on their twiggy broomsticks.
At last Ron re-appeared, dusty and cobwebby but triumphant. He held a small green tin in his hand.
"This should do the trick. Directional Dust, leads you home every time, it's sort of magnetised volcanic dust, mixed with lode stones and ground pigeons beaks so it's not really a spell. He just needs to sprinkle it behind him and as long as he's holding the tin he should be able to follow the trail back. It's something Bill was working on a few years ago but he couldn't be bothered to work out the glitches so he gave up."
"Glitches?"
"Nothing to worry about, nothing dangerous. There's only one real drawback, you have to keep the stuff bone dry, but since it never rains in Ambridge in the summer that's not really a problem."
"What happens if it does get wet?" Harry had fearful visions of blazing maize mazes.
"Not much, it's just if any moisture touches it the whole lot dissolves and disappears, so as long as Bert makes sure it's completely dry where he sprinkles, and it doesn't rain, or anything, it will work fine."
Ron smiled, it was not often that he worked out solutions to magical conundrums on his own, and it felt good.
***
"Joe, Joe, where in tarnation're you off to now? We need to stick together. I ent going to be responsible for telling your Clarrie you'm lost yourself in this bloomin’ maze."
"Don't you fret yourself Bert Fry, I'm right here, but a man's got a right to a bit o’privacy when he's answering a call of nature ..."
More parodies - from Agatha Christie to Damon Runyon
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