From then on, my life settles into a much better routine than I was in before. Every weekend, my parents drive me over to Surrey and I compel the Dursley’s into letting Holly go. We spend a day on the history and politics of the Wizarding World, and the next day on theory, focusing mostly on runes and arithmancy for now in our self-study programs, as it proves impossible to practice the wanded classes without a wand, even after I’ve taught Holly how to get in touch with her own magic. Eventually, Holly has a spat of accidental apparation due to her cousin and learns how to get to the Granger residence on her own, so I only have to drop by once a month to drop a longer term compulsion into the Dursley’s heads to keep Holly out of the house on weekends. My weekdays on the other hand were typically spent focusing on a discipline I knew would not be taught very well at Hogwarts: Potions. This is another subject in which I’m going to master the theoretical first, because my backyard shed was very much not Hogwarts, with its fully stocked medical wing that could reverse potion accidents with no fuss.