Mr Arcturus Hollingbury
277b Diagon Alley
London

Ms E Mordent
The Infirmary
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Scotland

4th January, 2012

Dear Arc,

Not sure if you heard, but Storm’s idea of congratulating me on qualifying was to send me to Hogwarts!

There are lots of children up here with Praecantatio Deliquus and they have no healer on staff. Headmaster Greyfriar has been trying to look after things, but as you can imagine, it’s escalated. Storm promised to send someone and told me to pack my bags and go straight away, yesterday.

There’s twenty-odd kids up here locked in the school infirmary, one long ward. I managed to head into London and buy some muggle remedies before I came up here, as our potions haven’t been much use. The suppression of magic in the kids seems to mean that only the most basic remedies - the non-magical ingredients - make an impact on their symptoms.

If the boss heard I was doing this she might well have a fit. She doesn’t like muggle healing at the best of times, but Arc, this seems to be working! The kids feel better, even if their magic is still gone. They’re able to sit up in bed and sleep a little easier at night.

Unfortunately that means they are a little more crazy than the average St Mungo’s patients. If they weren’t so contagious I’d let them all out to try and do their lessons without magic and see how much they enjoyed it!

I’ve got limited supplies here to do analysis, but I’ve enclosed a sachet of a dissolvable medicine called Lemsip for you to test. See if we can come up with something that will ease symptoms at the very least.

Let me know if you find anything. I think I’m up here for a week or two at least. Don’t sub-let my room for cash while I’m gone!!

Love you lots and miss you

E xxxx

Elixa Mordent
The Infirmary
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
Scotland

Arcturus Hollingbury
277b Diagon Alley
London

Dear Elixa,

...this is the first time I've ever been asked to analyse Muggle medicinal remedies. But since it's you I tried anyway.

Magical analysis methods don't really work with analysing Muggle medicines. They don't react well, and none of my potion formulae take into account the extensively named ingredients of the remedy. Most of the results I should be getting yield no conclusive evidence or are negligible, and I double and triple checked what I'm doing. I've tried a few less conventional formulae but the results are so off the mark it's not worth mentioning what they ended up to be.

Muggle medicines work because based on what I know (which the Head Healer would also probably lambast me for knowing) they alter basic building blocks and their processes into a more favourable position. In the absence of magic, that's all we have left. That said, there are experts on this subject in the Muggle world who study for as long as we do about it and I'm not one of them. What I just wrote was a gross oversimplification of how they work.

If you want to ease the heat off of you in using modern Muggle remedies, perhaps you could look up the more holistic methods? The symptoms are similar, if not the same, as a Muggle cold or the flu? Correct me if I'm wrong. Homeopathy and the like have worked for centuries. Some ingredients in modern Muggle remedies are based off the substances found in natural plants.

What are the side effects of taking the medicine, if any? I am aware of the Muggle remedy you sent me but I've never used it myself, though my mother has sworn that her parents used it as a first line of defence.

How is Hogwarts?

Rustle misses you. I think.
I'm not letting out your room.

Arc