The shafts of the sunlight fell on the green vane of its feather, highlighting its beautiful gradient of dark green fading into an extremely light shade of the colour. The white shaft ran down its middle, dividing the feather into two parts such that the dark green was on one side and its sudden transition into a lighter green on the other. This was the great quill, the one so much desired by the renowned writer, Rita Skeeter.
The quill lay on the brown tabletop, the sunlight falling on its side hard and warm. Its tip had been sharpened recently and glowed bright, the light reflecting off the tip spectacularly. It had been an hour or two when Rita had last used it, and it had used this time to regenerate, lying down in the calm and tranquil spot under the sunlight. Enough time had been wasted. He needed to practise his writing skills as soon as possible before the arrival of Rita from her house. It got up and twisted its shaft, turning this way and that. No paper was in its vicinity, not even a leaf he could write on. It had been two days since it had last practised its writing, a long time in which he had already forgotten several things (its memory cannot sustain more than a few things at a time without constant practice). Unfortunately, it would have to start again from the eight rules in his grammar rule book.
It looked round again; no soft surface was in its reach. All were down on the ground, hundreds of centimetres below. In desperation, it flung itself on the tabletop, staring at it in thought. Well, the tabletop sure looks a lot smoother. Ah, smooth as butter. Nothing should be so smooth. Even I, the greatest quill on Earth, cannot write without making creases in the paper! Well, its doom has come at last. Thinking this, it laughed, so inaudible that a human ear just a centimetre could not hear it. Standing up, it hopped up to the edge of the table and pushed its tip down.
He cood tail at wons that the kaereed defirint shots oh babel baath mikst weith tha woota, thooug et wosent babel baath aj Horry hud evar ekspiriensed et. Won tap gusht peenk und bloo babels the saaise of footbolls, unuther poored aaise-whait fom so theeck that Herry thout et wood hav sappoted hiss weigt if hid ceared ta test et; a therd zent heveeli pefumd parple klaud hovereenk ovar the serfase of the woota. Hurry amoosd hemself for a waile tarnink the taps on und off, pertecoolarli injoing the effekt of won whoos jet baaunsed off the serfase of the woota en laarg arks. Then, wen the dip pool wos fool of hot woota, foam und babels (wich tuk a veri short taim cunsidring ets saaise), Hurry turnt off oll the taps, pullt off hiss pujamas, sleppars und dresseenk-kown, und slid unto the woota.
Et wos so dip that hiss feit beialy toucht the botam, und he akcually did a cauple of lenths befor sweemink bak to the saaid und tredink woota, sterink at the egk. Haihli enjoiabl thoog et wos to sweem en hot und foamy woota weeth klauds of defirint -kalared steem woftink oll araunt heem, neu strauk of breelliunce keim to heem, neu suddein baast of anderstandeenk.
Perspiring, the quill fell back on its back. It was gasping inaudibly (though it was very much for him), its feathers rustling at its sides. The feathers fell silent, and the shaft down the middle heaved up and down. It had gone beyond its limits; too much force he had been applying on the table, trying to engrave on the table. All around it lay brown dust, and he was lying in a bed of it.
It got itself up with great effort and looked ahead. The words were engraved there, sure enough. But they were too dim, the quill not being able to penetrate too much into the surface even after applying too much pressure on it. And they were also invisible due to the accumulation of brown dust. It seemed folly to go to such a great extent to practise when it could have gotten it a little later on. He would've been placed into Rita's bag shortly, and there were several sheaves of parchments in it. As soon as this thought struck its mind, the glass door slid aside, and out stepped Rita. Looking over the walls at a passing couple, she picked up the quill and put it into her purse, apparently blind to the dust. Hitting a hard surface, the quill looked down. Sure enough, there were many parchments there. The quill put its back against the walls of the purse, evidently in disbelief.
*Extract is from Chapter 25 of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, The Egg and the Eye.