"Oh really now? And what d'you need a workshop for, then?" Hagrid asked, clearly intrigued.
Julian lifted his hand and let Greed catch the light as it twisted lazily around his finger. "I make rings. I need a proper workshop so I can actually practice my craft," he replied plainly.
Hagrid's eyes widened a little at that, surprised but obviously impressed. "Ring looks a bit strange, that one," he remarked honestly. "The way it wriggles about like that, seems like it'd itch somethin' awful."
Julian slipped the ring off and flicked it toward him. "Not at all. Try it on," he said, sounding entirely confident.
Hagrid caught it carefully, brow furrowing in confusion, but he did as asked. Before their eyes, the ring stretched and thickened, resizing itself until it fit snugly around his enormous index finger. Everyone except Julian stared in open disbelief.
"Well, would yeh look at that!" Hagrid exclaimed delightedly. "Fits like it was made just fer me, an' I can't even feel it wigglin' about!"
...
"Hang on, I thought you said you bought it," Tracy cut in, frowning as something clicked in her mind.
Julian's lips curled into a grin and he shook his head. "No, I said it took a huge amount of effort to get. I never claimed I bought it," he corrected, eyes gleaming with mischief.
The two girls mentally replayed that earlier conversation and realized, with no small amount of annoyance, that what he said now was exactly true.
"You tricked us!" Tracy burst out, glaring at him. Daphne's expression sharpened into the same accusatory look.
"I did nothing of the sort," Julian replied calmly, almost lazily. "You tricked yourselves. I was completely honest the entire time."
"You knew we thought you bought it though!" Tracy shot back defensively. "She even said you could afford loads more after getting that bloodline test!"
"And why would I correct you," Julian asked smoothly, "when she was not wrong?"
He looked so smugly satisfied that Tracy visibly floundered. Her mouth opened and closed a few times, like a goldfish gasping for water, as she scrambled for a comeback and came up empty.
"See?" Julian said lightly. "You cannot even find an argument, because I am right. Relax, it is not that big a deal."
Tracy huffed and folded her arms, lower lip jutting forward as she pouted, clearly unconvinced but unable to refute him.
...
Hagrid chuckled at their back-and-forth, shaking his shaggy head. "I never asked properly before, but what's that thing actually do?" he asked, nodding toward the strange ring on his finger.
"Oh, that?" Julian straightened, excitement sparking in his eyes. "That is my favorite creation so far. Normally, it just acts like a storage device, kind of like an expanded bag. But if someone tries to steal the ring, or take something out of it without being the rightful wearer, it changes into their worst fear and attacks them." He spoke with open pride. "I called it Greed, because, like the sin, if you give in to it, you can get hurt."
To emphasize his point, he called up the enchantment, reached toward the now-resized ring on Hagrid's finger, and pulled out a brownie to show them, as casually as if he were retrieving it from his pocket.
...
"Sounds a bit like a Boggart," Hagrid muttered with a frown. "Nasty critters, those. They like to lurk in the empty classrooms, they do, an' no one ever has a good time when one pops out."
"I did take inspiration from Boggarts when I designed it," Julian admitted. "The storage enchantment, though, that part is not originally mine. So I cannot just recreate it on a whim, unfortunately."
"We thought it was just a storage ring," Tracy said slowly, staring at the vibrant, shifting band with renewed caution. "You mean this whole time it could have turned into our worst fears?"
Julian shook his head, reassuring. "No. It only transforms when someone who is not the current wearer tries to take the ring itself, or steal something from inside it. Otherwise it is completely harmless."
...
"My things are pretty useful in general," Julian went on, the confidence returning to his voice. "If I understand a subject well enough, I can make an item that does nearly anything related to it. Think of something, anything that sounds helpful to have."
He glanced at Hagrid, inviting him to test the idea.
Hagrid leaned back and scratched his beard thoughtfully. "Hmmm. Well, I'm always fightin' to keep slugs outta my gardens," he said after a moment.
Julian's eye twitched minutely. Out of all the possibilities he had been prepared for, slug repellent had not been one of them.
"A bit on the simple side," he admitted, "but yes, I could make a ring that keeps slugs away, if I decided to."
"If yeh can do that, I'd be more than happy ter pay yer for yer work," Hagrid said eagerly. He already spent a small fortune buying normal slug repellent every year, and it never lasted long enough.
Julian nodded, immediately shifting into a more businesslike tone. The mention of payment brought his inner goblin to the surface, eager to haggle. "How large of an area do you want the effect to cover from the ring?" he asked.
"Hmmm," Hagrid mused again. "If yeh could set it up so it covers all o' my gardens, I reckon that'd be perfect."
...
"Hold that thought," Julian said, rising to his feet. He slipped outside the hut and walked around, carefully taking stock of the surroundings.
If I make the hut the center, about twenty-five yards in all directions should do it, he calculated silently as he paced, mentally tracing the boundary.
Satisfied with his estimate, he headed back inside and reclaimed his seat.
"I can make the ring project slug-repelling magic over a radius of twenty-five yards," Julian said. "You could hang it somewhere in your room, and it would keep slugs out of all your gardens."
He paused there, watching Hagrid to see if that setup met his needs.