Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
Excellent David, really good
Just a couple of points; you seem to have a tendency to use words or phrases that are slightly 'un-British', if that makes sense... obviously I'm aware that you're Canadian so I'll overlook it
Seriously though, if you need a proof-reader, I'm offering my services as a well-spoken Brit
Gender: Female Location: every which way but loose
'Hypnotised' - you can use the KMC spellchecker if you're worried about your spellings.
If you preview your posts it should highlight any errors - make sure you have the checkbox for 'Spellcheck when previewing' checked though. It's beneath the text box
Gender: Male Location: Godric Hallow, with gryffindors swo
thx Dark for coming back and saying you'll post again. i can't wiat to see the updates to this story and was wondering if you could tell us the nxt time you would post
NOTE – (laughing nervously) Where was I? Hell. I haven’t so much as picked up a Potter book in nearly a year.
They walked in silence out front.
“Why are we here?” Harry asked nervously, expecting the wrath that was Fred and George to come bursting out onto the porch at any given second, spewing obscenities and chaos. “They’ll come out and hex us.”
“No, they’ll hex me. It’s happened before.” Ron said mildly. “You had nothing to do with it. And besides, mum will burn their ears off with a hot iron if they hexed you.”
“What’ll she do if they hex you?” Harry asked out of curiosity.
“Make them clean the house from top to bottom.” Ron said happily.
Harry laughed. “Giant of a chore, that is.”
“Of course.” Ron said. “Oh, here they come. That makes, what, half?”
Harry turned and saw a long, dragged out line of guests, all along the path and stretching to the edge of the wood. It was as if an army was gradually making its way to the Burrow.
“Whoa.” He said.
Ron was delighted. “Yeah. Mum and Fleur invited quite a lot of people, as you can see.”
First to greet them was Professor McGonagall, levitating an alarmingly sized wagonload of gifts that would have put the stature of a giant like Grawp to shame.
“Potter. Weasley.” She said momentarily, as if they were running errands together, instead of preparing for a wedding few of which had seen before. Harry hid a slight smile. Professor McGonagall’s demeanor remained almost unyielding only in the exception of the most extreme or emotional of circumstances. Harry suspected that something as simpleton as an epic wedding was not about to change that.
Not just yet, anyway.
“Professor.” He greeted.
“Enjoying yourself?” she said, smiling slightly.
“Very much so.” Said Harry. “That looks really heavy.”
“Yeah, it does.” Said Ron. “And the grass right there looks really green. And the ice gnomes look really frozen. And the – “
“Weasley, try not to mock your betters.” McGonagall said shortly. “And Potter, I may be old, but I have never been stronger.”
Ron started to say something indignant, but stopped when he realized that their Transfiguration teacher was simply joking.
“By the way, Potter, Happy Birthday.” She said warmly.
“Thanks, Professor.” Harry said.
She strode businesslike up the path, the wagon dipping precariously over Ron’s head.
Two familiar figures coalesced into focus further on, one very large and one extremely tiny. As Harry and Ron watched, the very large one stumbled awkwardly and nearly trod on the smaller. The smaller figure nearly panicked. “Watch it!” he squealed in a high voice.
“Oh! Sorry, Professor.” The larger one said, chuckling nervously. “Size difference an’ all, you’d think they’d let you travel with someone a bit smaller than me. I’m fair amazed tha’ I haven’t crushed you yet.”
“Professor McGonagall was quite adamant we should travel in pairs, and that she would be escorting the other guests.” The smaller sighed. “Seemed quite sure of herself when she told us to make the trip here together. Ah, Mr. Potter! Mr. Weasley!”
“Good to see yer’, Harry.” Hagrid grinned despite the nasty-looking bruise that he sported on the left side of his craggy face.
“Morning, Professor Flitwick.” Ron said.
“Good to see you too, Hagrid.” Harry chuckled.
“Enjoying your birthday so far, Mr. Potter?” Flitwick asked cheerily.
“Yes, sir,” said Harry. “Mind you all, if I had a galleon for every time someone’s asked me that today, I would have enough now to buy four and a quarter Dungbombs.”
Flitwick laughed squeakily. Hagrid chortled.
Harry smiled inwardly at how much Hagrid and Professor Flitwick contrasted each other. Flitwick was garbed in neatly pressed dress robes, polished his glasses to a dull sheen, and taken the time to run a comb through his wispy, silvering hair. It would have taken him ten heavily-bound editions of The Standard Book of Spells, Grade Four to even come close of reaching Harry’s eye level. Three more than that to reach up to Ron, who was taller and ganglier than ever.
Hagrid, on the other hand, was dressed in a rather hideous-looking, rumpled up suit that oddly looked like it was sewn haphazardly up from dead ferrets with a large string of catgut. Despite the fact that he and Ron had rapidly been gaining height over the last few years, they still had to crane their necks simply to look up at him. His beard was somewhat tangled more than usual and Harry now noticed a slight limp.
“Hagrid, did you get into a fight?” Ron said slowly, before Harry could open his mouth.
“Of course not, Ron.” Hagrid said, suspiciously heartily.
“I’d say that was obvious from the look of him, Mr. Weasley.” Professor Flitwick said, at the exact same instant.
Hagrid looked down quickly, while Flitwick scratched his head busily.
“Ah, that is to say…” Flitwick said, playing for time.
Harry and Ron glanced at each other knowingly. Ron wrinkled his nose.
Hagrid and Flitwick were saved from explanation by the arrival of Lupin, who looked none the worse for wear. His eyes had seemed to have sunken in more (but that may have simply been a bit of an illusion on Harry’s part) but he showed no trouble in wishing Harry a Happy Birthday as well.
“Well, I see you managed to invite your teachers here,” he said and smiled, shaking Flitwick’s and Hagrid’s hand, wincing slightly at the firm crushing grip of the latter. “Good to see you, Hagrid…Professor Flitwick. Looking forward to the big wedding, I assume?”
“Very well, thanks, Remus.” Professor Flitwick said enthusiastically.
“Great, Remus.” Hagrid said.
“How’s Tonks?” Ron asked brightly.
“You can ask her yourself, she’ll be here shortly.” Lupin said. “My, haven’t you two grown.”
Ron sniggered. “You sound like my great auntie when you say that.”
Lupin scratched his face absentmindedly. “Of course I do, Ron, of course I do.”
His watery eyes peered closely at Hagrid’s newest injuries, frowned briefly then nodded slightly.
“I suggest you meet some of the other guests that are coming, Harry, Ron,” Lupin said briefly, nodding. “You’d be surprised by how many people showed up. It isn’t exactly an everyday issue when a wizard is married to a witch of Veela descent.”
After they had bid Lupin, Hagrid, and Flitwick a good day, Ron and Harry started walking again, glancing at each other knowingly.
“What do you suspect that Hagrid’s got himself into this time?” Harry said.
“Couldn’t be too much that could injure Hagrid,” Ron said, clearly troubled. “Simple jinxes and hexes couldn’t have had much of an effect, you saw already how they bounce off of him.”
During the later portions of their fifth year at Hogwarts, they had witnessed Hagrid attempting to battle with several misguided Aurors, courtesy of misguided Cornelius Fudge and his extremely misguided Ministry. Hagrid had walked out unscathed. All in all, there was not a year at Hogwarts in Harry’s life that didn’t have something extreme going on. It was yet another reason to curse his abnormal life and looming destiny.
“You think he went back to have a chat with the giants?” Ron said anxiously, breaking Harry out of his reverie.
“I dunno.” Harry said. “I hope not. Last time he went to talk to them he brought back Grawp. Hope he hasn’t brought another one back.”
“Another one?” Ron snorted, chomping on a slightly stale pumpkin pasty he had dug up from his pocket. “If anything, Grawp will have only encouraged him. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s brought back some nice old playmates for him.”
Listen up. DarkC, I really like your story. I read your version of your other fanfic, HP and the GFT, and I was sucked in. I read all of your pages (86) in 24 hours. I could not get up from my computer. now that I have started reading this one I realize that you have gotten a lot better. I have a lot of ideas and am trying to start my own fanfic so I was wondering if you have any tips or hints (this goes for everyone out there, oh, and please checkout my thread when I start it, I will post the date when I plan to start it on here.)
Well, emotion appeals to the dedicated readers, but only if it's used in the appropriate situations, if you know what I mean. They also like action, suspense, use of great vocabulary, and a mood and speed that fits the story. Personally I'm not to sure what I'm going to write when I sit down and open up Microsoft Word. If you write you have to sit and think, "What would the audience like to see?" and "What do I have to do in the plot next?" Those two have to merge perfectly, it's not really easy as it sounds and I'm not that great at it either yet.
Perfect spelling and punctuation is helpful too
(Writing some at the moment, folks. Apologies for the wait.)
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Aug 30th, 2006 07:09 PM
