*Discontinued* No Longer

No Exertion!

Harry Potter**

That morning, with displeasure in her eyes, Madam Pomfrey had cleared him to leave the infirmary. She made clear to him, in no uncertain terms, that she didn't think he should, but in the end Harry was able to get out of bed and out of her purview.

"Listen closely, Mr. Potter, because I'll say this only once. You aren't to exert yourself in any way, no difficult spells, charms, hexes, curses, no difficult reading or hard to understand topics. You are not to go to classes until tomorrow, and you are not allowed to partake in any form of exercise. 

"I have all the staff watching you, including Professor Snape," she said pointedly, meeting the eyes of the black eyed professor who'd just woken up, "To ensure that you follow my instructions. It is for your health, and I won't be held accountable for whatever happens if you stray from my advice."

He'd meekly responded, "Yes Madam Pomfrey," while he internally rolled his eyes.

Balances but the woman was overprotective! Really, did she have to fuss so much over him? Harry began reconsidering his wish to apprentice himself to her at school to learn more about healing. She was just so- much. 

Of course, he hadn't actually decided to drop the plan, he wanted the information too much to do such a thing, as well as the experience. He didn't really want to ask her now though, otherwise she might make him staying in the infirmary until she was entirely satisfied with his health as a condition for accepting him as her apprentice.

Severus didn't let him out of sight except to dress and wash up, which Harry found quite embarrassing. He wasn't a five year old that needed mothering. When Sev himself needed to go to his own quarters to dress, he was left until the sharp eye of the flower healer. 

Gah! Madam Pomfrey. Her name was Madam Pomfrey, not flower healer. He had to remember that. Harry began to fiddle with his tie, and decided to learn how to tie a cravat, like a Victorian one, that looked sort of ruffled and elegant. It would go so much better with his formal looking school robes after all.

Focusing his magical ability, he thought of everything he knew about tying a cravat, and how the specific type of cravat he wanted to tie looked. Then, he imagined summoning a book with the instructions. With a quick spell, a dusty little pamphlet called, 'The Handbook of Being a Respectable Valet'. 

It looked like utter rubbish on the outside, a water stained yellowing bit of parchment, with the words in an overly fancy calligraphic script. Upon flipping it open, he discovered that what he wanted to learn was a Jabot cravat tie.

More annoying was that you couldn't really just tie one, they were better cut, folded, and sewn. Harry decided he still wanted to wear one, and used magic to just make it appear how he wished.

Madam Pomfrey, who'd been busy tending to the girl who'd gotten her spine broken and was still sleeping, looked over then.

"Mr. Potter! What did I tell you about using magic?!"

Guiltily, Harry looked away from the mirror he'd been intently creating his jabot in front of, and looked towards the healer. He was worried that she wouldn't allow him to go to breakfast and see his friends, and in that bout of nerves, his mouth ran away from him.

"But Madam Pomfrey," Harry said, eyes transforming on the flip of a coin from guilty to innocent surprise, "You just said no difficult spells, charms, hexes or curses. Simply making a cravat surely isn't categorized as difficult? And anyways, it's none of the things you listed because I needed neither word, action, or wand to cast."

She gave him a frosty look, "Mr. Potter," wow, he was really starting to hate those words from her lips, "I suggest you stop insulting my intelligence, as well as your own. You understood perfectly what I meant, and all of its implications."