Holly & Yew

C30

Chapter 30: Oh, will wonders ever cease? ... Blessed be the mystery of love

They stayed up until midnight for Tom's birthday like they did every year.

"Happy birthday," Harry wished, kissing Tom's cheek when the clock hands changed.

"Thank you, Harry," Tom said, kissing him back.

"First, cake!" Harry said dramatically, pulling out a small white cardboard box he'd hidden in his desk. The box had cooling charms on it, courtesy of the elves. He passed it to Tom eagerly. "The elves helped me make it for you."

It was the first time they'd ever had a proper cake for one of their birthdays.

Tom opened the box, revealing a miniature heart-shaped red velvet cake.

"I wanted it to be green," Harry said nervously. "But the elves said it wasn't proper. They're very strict about cakes. Do you like it?"

Tom pulled Harry to sit beside him on the bed before wrapping his arms around Harry tight.

"It's so perfect, Harry. It doesn't need to be green. I'll just pretend it was dyed with the blood of my enemies."

Harry snorted.

"Ew. That would taste gross," Harry said, wrinkling his nose. Tom was so silly.

"I think it would taste like victory," Tom joked, pinching Harry's nose.

Harry pushed Tom's hand away to conjure up two spoons. They demolished the cake happily together, scraping the cream cheese frosting from the sides of the box until there wasn't even a crumb left.

Harry gasped.

"Wait! I forgot the candles!"

Tom burst out laughing and Harry blushed with embarrassment. He'd gotten too excited to eat cake.

"We'll just have to do it next year," Tom said, bumping Harry with his shoulder.

"Next year," Harry agreed. "Now for your actual present."

Harry pulled out his wand. He sketched an infinity sign in the air which burned green.

"Come, serpent of light," Harry hissed.

The snake materialized out of beads of light, merging into a long, anfractuous whole. It was formless, more the abstract concept of a serpent than a real one. It iridesced, the vague aura of a rainbow, but the light it gave off was more comforting than blinding. Harry put away his wand and held out his hand. The light snake approached. It had taken weeks to craft; Astrid had helped him with it.

"It's a spell I thought up for you," Harry said.

Tom's eyes widened.

Harry touched the snake's forehead, thinking of a message before letting go.

The snake slithered over to Tom, delivering the message ( 'Happy Birthday, Tom!' because Harry was so creative) before disappearing in a rain of sparks.

"I noticed when we went to that Exhibition that you were looking at the walkie-talkies," Harry said. "This isn't exactly like that, but I thought this way we could send messages if we're apart. The snake would find you no matter how far."

"How—?" Tom asked.

"I started from the light orb," Harry explained. "I figured it didn't have to be an orb, and I know you like snakes, so that part was easy. Astrid taught me how to link the magic to words and wand movements, so I came up with some that I thought made sense. I thought parseltongue would be neat to use since it's our special language. That part was a little hard because, in the books, it said that when you're making a spell that's based on another spell, you should tinker with the words and movements for the starting spell for your new spell, but I don't know what the starting spell for our light orbs are. As for the messaging, well, to be honest, I'm not sure why it can do that. I discovered it by accident when I was trying to figure out what else to do with the snake."