A bit of testing

It took Harry a few minutes to process what had happened, not panic that he had set fire to the train, and calm down from the surge of adrenaline that had burned away the remnants of his nap. Once he got past that, however, he couldn't help but marvel at the burning dragon that he had inadvertently created. He could see its posture shifting, head moving to keep facing him from any angle he moved to to try and get a better look.

As he inspected the magic he had worked, his mind turned to how he had actually managed to do it. He hadn't been holding his wand, nor had the spell looked like any that he had read about in the schoolbooks Hagard had bought for him. All he had said was 'I wish', but there was no way that magic could be that simple or there would be no point in having a school for learning about it.

Right?

"I wish that the dragon I made was made out of water instead of fire."

He didn't feel anything like how his magic had reacted to his wand when he first held it, but as soon as the last word left his mouth the dragon before him was suddenly different. Instead of a burning form with burning wings, its body was now smoother and more elegant. The heat that it had been giving off stopped, though the warmth that the previous dragon had given could still be felt in the train compartment.

Harry reached out and picked up the dragon, amazed at the weight and texture of it as it balanced itself in the rougher surface of his hand. He didn't know what he had expected, but this was at least confirmation that he could use magic just by speaking.

He set the dragon back down on the table and pulled his wand out of his pocket, leveling the tip with the dragon in front of him. As he did, he could feel magic flowing through his body and the wand, causing it to faintly hum in his hand.

"I wish that the water dragon in front of me was twice as large."

No bolt of light left his wand, nor did any feeling from his magic change. However, the dragon still doubled in size between one blink and the next, now about as large as the kittens one of his neighbors back home would occasionally ask him to look after.

From there, his experimentation with his magic began to vary. Turning the dragon in front of him into different materials, shapes, and sizes; making the walls of his compartment blue or orange or steel, vanishing and un-vanishing the table in the middle - all of these things came easily with the simple phrase 'I wish'.

There were a few failures, namely when he didn't use those words or wished for a random outcome. 'Random', apparently, just meant whatever he would have chosen if asked for a random option. It was like thinking of a random number when asked, but he was both the person asking and the person providing the random response.

Eventually, his experimentation came to a stop. The compartment was back to how it had been when he first entered, and the dragon was back to kitten-sized with a body made of radiant silver. One thought had been increasingly on his mind the longer that he had been experimenting - could he make the dragon he had summoned real?

He was aware that finding out would be as simple as just saying the words, but he hesitated. Right now, it was just a part of his magic. If he wanted, he could get rid of it right now and feel no more remorse than when he had vanished the table it was currently sitting on. A real, living animal would be different. He didn't think that he could bring himself to kill anything more than an insect, let alone something he was solely responsible for creating.

On the other hand, there were a few benefits to making the dragon real. It would be an interesting pet if nothing else, he wouldn't have to worry about improperly caring for it, and he would be able to live out a childhood fantasy that countless children had, himself included. It would also be a good way to test some of the more out-there ideas that Harry had about the usage of his ability.

If he was going to do this, though, he needed to do it carefully. Harry stood up from his seat and opened his trunk, reaching up into it and feeling around until his fingers closed around a notebook and a pen.

Nearly half an hour of planning later, Harry set his pen down. The silver dragon in front of him lifted its head from its resting position, as if anticipating what would follow. He looked through his list of wishes, numbered by how far-reaching he thought they would be, and began.

"I wish that I had a book about how to care for dragons."

A thin book titled 'Principles of Dragon Rearing: Infancy to Adulthood' appeared on the table next to the dragon. Upon closer inspection, it had all of the hallmarks of a real book, from an author and a table of contents to publishing information and a copyright date. That prompted another question, though it was about on the same level as the next wish he was going to make so he asked it immediately.

"I wish that I knew whether this book was real before I wished for it."

Two pieces of knowledge appeared in the front of his mind, both feeling slightly different from how his internal dialogue usually did. The first told him that the book was a real book, and had been written by a real person before he had wished for it. The second, however, told him that this copy of the book had not physically existed before he had made his wish.

"I wish that I knew the contents of this book as if I had read through it once."

This time, the knowledge that came to him felt like his own, unlike the subtle difference that his prior wish had given him. Harry took that information in stride and moved on.

"I wish that any pet I have, had, or will have was loyal to me."

For the first time, he felt a change in his magic as the result of making a wish. It dipped ever-so-slightly before replenishing, but he felt no other changes and felt good to keep going.

"I wish that nobody would think it is strange or wrong for me to have a pet dragon."

That took more out of him - maybe a tenth of his magic? Slightly more? Either way, he could feel the wave of magic as it left his body , expanding in every direction and fading away from his perception. Looking at the paper in front of him, he was at his second-to-last and most ambitious wish on the list.

"I wish that the dragon I created was a real, living dragon with a mostly similar appearance and size and that it was my pet. I further wish that the two of us could understand one another."

This wish was just as costly as the previous one, taking another tenth of his rapidly regenerating magic reserves. Rather than a wave, however, it was all focused into a beam from his body to the dragon in front of him. Harry watched as the dragon transformed, its edges becoming sharper and eyes lighting up with life. It still happened incredibly fast, but unlike some of his earlier changes it was not instantaneous.

The dragon, once its transformation was complete, acted much differently. Rather than sitting there, it leaped and flapped its silver wings a few times and came to a rest on Harry's left shoulder. It was warm now, almost as hot as the few times that he had turned it into fire or lightning, but it felt more like the hot pads that his grandfather occasionally used than anything that would burn him.

He reached up to touch it, gently running his fingers along it in a way that made it rumble with what he assumed was happiness. Harry thought for a moment before mentally shrugging and going with his first impulse.

"I'll call you Silver, okay?"

Name good.

The feeling of his dragon's intentions was much like the knowledge that he had wished for earlier, but far more different in feeling from his own thoughts. It approved of the name, which was all that Harry could ask for given how basic it seemed.

Now, there was only one wish remaining. It was certainly less far-reaching than changing people's predispositions toward Silver, and less intensive than creating an obviously magical creature, but this was reaching past something that he knew and into the unknown.

"I wish that at some point during this train ride, someone that I could be good friends with would knock on the door of my compartment three times."

Two reactions followed from this wish in short succession - a thin wave that went in both directions that the train stretched, followed by a small targeted burst. Both were about as magically costly as his earlier wish to have his pets be loyal to him, their loss fading quickly, but it was proof enough that they had worked. Now he just needed to wait and see who would come.