After a quick check, Melvin confirmed that both Harry's and Hermione's magical cores had grown noticeably. Harry was now flirting with full adult-wizard levels, and even Hermione (a little behind him) could hold her own against most fresh Hogwarts graduates.
That didn't mean they were ready to duel grown Aurors yet.
Raw power is only one piece of the puzzle. Dueling skill comes from magical strength + spell technique + actual combat experience. Power is honestly the least important of the three.
The real payoff from their boosted cores showed up in how fast they learned new magic now.
Back in first year, their magic had been average for eleven-year-olds. Turning a match into a needle or getting a feather to float took an entire class of sweaty repetition, and even then it was shaky.
Third year? They were mastering standard Charms spells and inanimate-to-animal transfiguration in a single lesson (way ahead of everyone else).
Their dueling had skyrocketed too. In the after-hours Duelling Club practices, when they actually tried, either one could finish an opponent in under five minutes. Because of that, Melvin had decided to drop straight duelling drills from their remedial lessons and move on to advanced charms instead.
Harry and Hermione still had little flashes of light in their eyes from the diagnostic spell, but they were practically vibrating with excitement.
Melvin glanced out the window. Thick night clouds drifted past, and every now and then the shadowy shape of a Dementor glided by on patrol.
Decision made.
"I originally gave Harry that stack of Patronus Charm theory hoping he'd bug Lupin or Flitwick about it (it's literally their job)," Melvin said. "Since that clearly hasn't happened, we'll just cover it here."
"The Patronus Charm?" Hermione's eyes lit up like Christmas.
"Expecto Patronum," Melvin began. "Latin: 'I await a guardian.' One of the oldest and strongest defensive spells in existence. Primary use: repelling Dementors and Lethifolds…"
He paused and looked at Harry across the low table. "That's all in the intro I gave you. Harry, your turn, go."
Harry froze. "Wait, what?"
We're in the middle of a lesson and he's cold-calling me?!
He sat there on the sofa stammering, basically repeating whatever he'd half-heard five seconds ago.
"Did you actually read the stuff I gave you?" Melvin asked mildly.
"…Yes," Harry mumbled, face turning red. "I read the table of contents and the preface… then Hermione borrowed it."
Hermione's head whipped around, scandalized. "I borrowed it for five minutes to show Madam Pince I already had a copy! I gave it back the same night!"
"You threw off my whole reading schedule—"
"Enough," Melvin cut in. "Hermione, you take over."
She huffed, then launched in like a textbook come to life. "The Patronus takes the form of a silvery animal that reflects the caster's personality. Only a small minority of wizards can produce a corporeal (fully-shaped) Patronus. An incorporeal one is just a wisp of silver vapor, limited protection only. A full Patronus is solid enough to physically interact with the world, can take hits for you, run messages, etc."
Harry listened quietly, but his mind wandered. He suddenly remembered the train back to school: thunder, lightning, the Dementor at the door… and then, through the window, a massive silvery stallion galloping across the storm clouds with a rider on its back, glowing like some kind of god.
He still wasn't sure if that had been real or a hallucination right before he passed out.
"The Patronus is the only known spell that can drive off Lethifolds as well as Dementors," Hermione went on, practically glowing with enthusiasm. "To cast it you have to focus on an intensely happy memory while saying the incantation…"
Melvin's remedial lessons were always fast-paced; one-on-one with two overachievers? They moved at the speed of light. Theory over, time for demo.
Most spells they'd learned so far were just incantation + wand movement. The Patronus was their first real taste of high-level magic: it required genuine emotion. It was pure positive energy (hope, joy, courage), the direct opposite of the Dark Arts.
Melvin slowed his voice deliberately, drawing out the words.
"Expecto… Patronum."
A silvery, semi-transparent shape shimmered into being (ghostly, misty). He'd scaled it down on purpose so it was easy to see: long, elegant horn, scaled hide, coiled lower body, raised upper half. A hiss like faint music. A serpent's tongue flicked.
"An Occamy?" Harry blurted.
Horned serpent, right out of their fourth-year Care of Magical Creatures textbook.
"Patronuses vary from person to person," Melvin said, letting the serpent dissolve. "Usually normal animals, sometimes magical creatures like dragons, thestrals, phoenixes. A few ancient casters even had extinct ones. Andros the Invincible supposedly had a giant."
He looked at them both. "All right. Your turn."
"That's it?" Harry asked, still dazed. "You're just gonna let us loose? No tips?"
"Everything that can be explained with words has been explained," Melvin said. "The rest you learn by doing."
"But this is advanced magic! You only showed us once—"
Hermione elbowed him and whispered, "Practice in the real world, Harry."
Melvin pretended not to hear the whining (or maybe he genuinely didn't care). While they bickered, he casually topped off the oil lamps, strolled over to a shelf, and closed the glass dome he'd left open earlier, sliding the whole thing back into its wooden case.
The office turned into a mini light-show. Harry and Hermione stood on the rug in front of the desk, waving their wands over and over. Every time moonlight hit the window they thought they'd done it, then realized it was just the moon and got disappointed all over again.
"Focus on the happiest memory you can find," Melvin called from behind the desk, stowing the wooden case in a drawer.
Harry tried. The Dursleys definitely didn't make the cut. Everything happy was Hogwarts: the Sorting Hat, his first broom, Christmas in the Great Hall…
He swung his wand again. For a second the room felt weightless.
A thin ribbon of silver mist shot from the tip.
"I did it!"
It vanished almost instantly. He spun to Hermione; she'd managed the same thing, cheeks pink with excitement.
"Practice alone isn't enough," Melvin said cheerfully, grabbing a medium-sized carrying case from under his desk and setting it on the rug. "You need stakes."
Hermione's eyes went wide. She had a bad feeling.
Melvin tapped the lid with his wand. Click. The clasps sprang open.
Instantly the temperature in the room plummeted. A stench of rot and damp filled the air, like the bottom of the Black Lake: dead fish, mud, and despair.
Hermione sucked in a breath. "Expecto Patronum! Expecto Patronum!"
Her thin silver mist didn't even slow the thing down.
A hooded, ragged figure glided out of the case.
Harry froze. That distant screaming started echoing in his ears again.
His eyes rolled back and he hit the carpet.
Hermione stood there gaping. Harry (reliable, troll-slaying, basilisk-stabbing Harry) had dropped before the Dementor even got close.
Again.
The Dementor was right in front of her now. Under the hood: no face, just a gaping, crusted hole that inhaled with a wet rattling sound. The air tore out of her lungs. Ice crawled over her skin. The world turned into the frozen Black Lake; she was sinking, drowning in silence.
A burst of pure silver light flared between them (no shape, just thick mist), but it was enough. The Dementor recoiled, drifting obediently back into the case.
Melvin snapped the lid shut and locked it.
Hermione clutched her chest, gasping like she'd been underwater for minutes. Warm blood rushed back into her fingers.
Melvin pocketed his wand, pulled a handful of chocolate frogs from his robe, and handed them over. "Eat. Give him one too."
"Professor…" Hermione croaked, shoving chocolate into her mouth and then into Harry's limp one. Only then did the question form. "Why do you have a Dementor?"
"Dementors are XXXXX-class creatures," she added weakly. "And Azkaban guards. You can't just keep one…"
"It's a Boggart," Melvin said, perfectly straight-faced while checking Harry's pupils. "Boggart wearing a Dementor costume. Best way to practice."
Hermione stared at him.
If it was a Boggart, why did you use a Patronus instead of Riddikulus?
She opened her mouth. Closed it again.
…
"Up you get—"
Harry came to with Hermione shoving chocolate into his face. The window was cracked open, cool night air drifting in. Professor Lewinter's quill scratched across parchment. The creepy case sat locked in the corner, crystal chandelier swaying gently overhead.
"I passed out again, didn't I?" His voice was hoarse from melted chocolate.
He'd dreamed the same dream: falling through white mist into Godric's Hollow, his mum's scream echoing…
Hermione lowered her voice. "Do you even want to learn the Patronus? You couldn't get a single word out when it showed up…"
"Yes!" Harry sat up fast, swallowing the last of the chocolate. Heat was coming back into his arms. Embarrassment burned hotter. "I have to."
Why was he so useless against Dementors? Because of that night when he was a baby? Dementors were bad, sure, but were they worse than giant snakes or Voldemort himself?
"Come on," Hermione said, offering one more piece. "Curfew's soon."
"Practice on your own," Melvin called as they headed for the door. "Ask Flitwick if you get stuck. Lupin's got a Boggart in a wardrobe too; he'll let you use it."
Harry glanced back. The case in the corner seemed to swallow the lamplight.
The clock on the wall had moved maybe fifteen minutes. Second time around he'd stayed unconscious less than on the train, and he didn't feel quite so drained.
Lesson over (passed out before he could even ask Professor Lewinter about the night his parents died).
…
Once the kids were gone, Melvin pulled the glass dome back out. The Gaunt ring sat inside, ancient and ugly. Only a shallow layer of memory-revealing potion remained; he topped it off.
Tom Riddle's teenage shade flickered into view, hovering in mid-air, glaring toward the door.
"What do you think of our Boy-Who-Lived?" Melvin asked conversationally.
Riddle turned, lip curling at the rumpled sofa where Harry had landed. "Empty-headed. Slow reactions. Faints dead away the second a Dementor looks at him. The only thing he has going for him is raw power he didn't earn."
Melvin didn't argue. He traced the resurrection stone's setting. "Speaking of raw power… I've always wondered something about the Dark Lord everyone said was unmatched."
Riddle's eyes lit up despite himself. "My power was unmatched."
"As a relatively young wizard you could fight Dumbledore (a century of experience) to a standstill. Dumbledore's the strongest wizard in a hundred years: technique, knowledge, battle experience, everything. Yet you, decades younger, matched him. How?"
Melvin leaned forward, genuinely curious. "The soul is the source of magic. You ripped yours apart over and over, stuffed pieces into objects. Logically that should weaken you. Instead your power kept growing. Why?"
Riddle smirked. "Because magic is stored inside the soul, like water in a sealed jar. Most wizards never break the jar, so only a trickle leaks out as they age. Children have fragile souls; magic seeps through the cracks. Once the soul hardens in adulthood, growth slows to almost nothing."
He looked positively smug now.
"When I made my first Horcrux I felt the dam break. That's why I kept making more."
Melvin nodded slowly. "That explains the old records: wizards who survive massive trauma often surge in power. The bigger the crack in the soul, the more magic pours out."
"Exactly," Riddle said. "I just took the idea to its logical conclusion."