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"I'm the one who brought most of them here," she said simply, a fierce pride in her voice. "It would look bad on me if they all just tried to mooch off of you. But enough about that. The mines have been started, and that's that. Now, what are you doing?" she asked, as she approached his large, cluttered desk.
Harry, with a kind, almost practiced gesture, transfigured a simple wooden stool into a comfortable, padded chair for her, which she gladly sat in. He then looked back down at the piles of parchments and maps spread out before him. "Boring logistics, for the most part," he explained.
"I'm comparing how much it currently takes to feed our growing population, and then comparing it to how much more food we will need if the kingdom continues to expand at this current, surprisingly rapid, rate. I also have to factor in any unexpected, large population increases, for whatever reason they might occur. We're doing fine for now, but soon, very soon, I will have to make sure we have more livestock. I have a potion I've developed to help increase the fertility in most animals, and I plan to slowly, carefully, introduce it to our current livestock."
"Why slowly?" she asked, a practical question. "Wouldn't it be much faster to just have them all take it at the same time?"
Harry nodded. "Faster, sure," he conceded.
"However, it would also be much, much harder to control a livestock population that increases so quickly, so exponentially. Plus, we need to make absolutely sure that all of the current animals are perfectly healthy before we let them add to the genepool. We don't want to accidentally spread any unnecessary, or potentially magical, diseases. I also need to make sure that the potion has no other, unforeseen, adverse side effects on the creatures themselves."
"I thought only sorcerers could take potions," Merri pointed out, her brow furrowed.
Harry observed her for a moment before nodding, a little taken aback by her surprisingly accurate, if somewhat limited, knowledge of potions. "Some potions, yes," he confirmed.
"The ones that require a magical core to properly process. That being said, I know how to make some potions that can be safely used by non-magical humans, or even creatures, if I want to."
Merri nodded, though she still looked like she didn't quite understand something. "Is that allyou have been doing over here?" she asked, gesturing around the cluttered office. "I mean, you have been shut in here, by yourself, for almost a week now."
Harry frowned at that particular tidbit of information. He had not realized he had been cooped up in here for so long. Then again, he rarely slept for very long, unless he was hibernating, so time kind of just… faded into the background for him sometimes.
"No," he admitted with a sigh. "I have a… a problem, a magical one, that I have been trying to solve, and it has, so far, yielded very, very little results."
"You want to explain it?" she offered, a small, amused smirk on her face. "I hear that talking to someone else about a problem can often reveal the obvious, simple mistakes that we overlook when we're too close to it."
Harry smiled back, a genuine, tired smile. "I suppose it couldn't hurt," he said. "I have been trying to use magic, specifically a complex form of divination and scrying, to help me find useful, untapped places to mine for precious gems and other rare minerals. So far, I have not made much progress at all."
Merri was silent for a long moment, a thoughtful expression on her face. "Well," she said finally, after her long pause, "you were right. I have absolutely no idea how to help you with that."
Harry just laughed at her blunt, honest response, a loud, genuine laugh that echoed through the quiet office. She just glared back at him, though he could see her face going a little red with embarrassment.
"Fine!" Merri said, standing up with her chin held high in mock indignation. "See if I ever try to help you again, you arrogant sorcerer!"
"Oh, come now, Merri," Harry said, as he tried to calm himself down, to stifle his laughter, but he just couldn't seem to, not as he looked back at the fierce, annoyed glare on her face. He just burst into another fit of helpless, happy laughter.
"I'll get you back for that, Sorcerer," Merri shot back, though a smile was now tugging at her own lips. "No one gets away with laughing at me!"
Harry had to actively avoid looking at her, because he knew that with her arms crossed stubbornly over her chest and her chin raised in mock indignation, she would just cause him to start laughing all over again.
"Okay, okay," he said, finally managing to stifle his amusement. "I'm done. No more laughing, I promise.
So, besides getting my mines up and running – and thank you for that, by the way – what have you been up to for the last week?" Harry asked her politely, trying to steer the conversation back to something productive.
Merri smirked back at him, her pride clearly restored. "I have been hunting, of course," she said, unconsciously puffing her chest out a little. "I've almost single-handedly killed enough game for everyone here to feast for a week."
Harry just leaned his head on one of his hands, which was now propped up on the desk by his elbow, and looked at her. "You're a humble one, aren't you?" he asked rhetorically.
Merri just stared back at him, her expression one of firm resolve. "There is nothing wrong with taking pride in one's accomplishments," she said, her voice firm. "I worked very hard to become this skilled, you know."
Harry gave a single, slow nod in acknowledgement of her point. "To an extent, you're right," he said, his own voice turning more serious. "Everything in moderation, after all. Just… make sure your pride does not blind you in the future, Merri. I have seen it be the downfall of many of my friends and my allies, as well as many of my enemies."
Merri stopped puffing out her chest at his serious, almost paternal, words, and she seemed to deflate a little, a look of thoughtful contemplation replacing her pride. "Have you… have you ever fought in a war, Harry?" she asked him, her voice suddenly quiet, her curiosity piqued.
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