Ron’s Care of Magical Creatures

by Bruce Grimes

I was dreaming of a class with Hagrid. It was a class to go hunting for magical snowballs. 

This was back in 2010. Harry Potter was riding a broomstick to McDonald’s. After he bought some food there, he rode through Taco Bell drive thru. He bought all the food there for Hermione, who was a kitty cat at the moment after drinking a transfiguration potion. 

Then Ron drank potion to turn into a rat. Hagrid had put a spell on him to become a rat, so Ron could fit down the drainpipe if a mountain troll attacked him. Hagrid had a troll trapped in the castle. 

Hermione the kitty cat met Ron the rat and they didn’t recognize each other. They cried, “Ahh!” The kitty cat chased the rat into the dark forest. They ran into the magical car that Harry Potter was driving. They both jumped into the car. Harry Potter called out, “Oh no, what should I do now? I can’t transform you guys back!” Hermione suggested, “Try saying a spell with your wand.” But she could only get out the words by saying “Meow.” Harry could sort of kind of understand her. He thought she said, “Meow meow, let me out of this body!” So he tried this spell: “Hocus pocus, abracadabra, let me out of this body.” 

It worked! Hermione suddenly turned into her human self. They both said the magic spell for Ron too, and he turned into an eagle! Hermione said, “Oh no, we’ve got to get Ron out of this! Go to Professor McGonagall and ask for help!”

They ran into Dobby the House Elf. Dobby said, “Let me try.” Dobby said a spell, and Ron turned into Dobby! Ron said, “I’d rather be an eagle than a House Elf.” That made Dobby sad. Hermione thought, “What do we do now? It’s almost time to ride the train back home from Hogwarts.” Ron couldn’t ride the train as a rat, an eagle, or a house elf. He was stuck as a character . . . until they played Wizard Chess. 

Hermione and Ron played together. Ron decided the moves, and Hermione moved the pieces. They were playing against Professor McGonagall, who was trying to learn how to play chess. She knew that Ron was a chess champion, and wanted to learn from him. 

Ron wanted to learn transfiguration from Professor McGonagall so he could turn back into his human self, and Professor McGonagall wanted to learn chess from Ron. Maybe we can make a swap, they thought.
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They taught each other what each wanted to learn. They finished the chess game – Hermione and Ron beat Professor McGonagall – and Ron transformed again . . . this time into a frog! Poor Ron. He said, “Oh no, now I have to stay at the castle instead of going home.” They were worried about the mountain troll in the castle. So they trapped the troll with little pieces of candy: They placed the candy in a line leading to a hidden cage. The troll picked up all the candy, eating it along the way until he suddenly found himself trapped inside the cage. The kids said, “It’s about time we got this mountain troll under control.” Hagrid said, “Now I can stay at the castle with Ron the frog.” Ron replied, “Ribbit ribbit ribbit” which meant “Let me out!” Then he turned into an owl – Harry Potter’s owl Hedwig. Ron thought, “Now I can go on the train and be back at home with Ginny.” They caught the train just in time.