A/N: A'righty, so this is an idea that I randomly had. Feel free to send me reviews, because I think I may actually enjoy writing this. I don't particularly care if you give me flames, but keep in mind that I'll use them to keep warm. I'm freezing. XD Read, review, and enjoy!
Disclaimer: I OWN NOTHING!
Chapter One:
Unexpected Plans
Harry was laying flat on his back, thinking hard about the events of the previous year. The basilisk at the end in the Chamber of Secrets made him start thinking. He could speak Parseltongue, which – according to Hermione – hadn't been spoken in at least a thousand years, but he hadn't known about it until that year, which made him decidedly cautious and reflective. 'I know I could speak Parseltongue before... I did it before my first year... Hang on!' He jerked into a sitting position on his bed, and quickly grabbed a quill and parchment, scribbling down several ideas. 'Alright, so Parseltongue... Gringotts, they might have something that can tell me if there's anything I don't know, but I'll want to do research on the subject... Hermione might be able to help me out with the research aspect. Training, as well. Running, conditioning... if I can figure out something to do for the summer, I can also sign up at the local gym that I keep seeing whenever I manage to get away from number four for any length of time...' Harry paused to nibble on the end of his quill, before blinking a few times as he paused. 'I could probably go right now...'
He put the parchment and quill on his desk when he was finished, before sprawling back out on his bed, his mind whirling with the possibilities as he stared up at the ceiling of his room. He knew that the likelihood of him returning to number four, Privet Drive after his Gringotts visit was almost nil, but that meant that he needed to clean out as much as he could of the room first, and he wanted to start the conditioning as soon as he could. That last thought held onto him until sleep claimed him.
At six o'clock AM, Harry got up, having woken up at about 5:30 AM as per his usual wake-up time, and dragged himself outside to go jogging. He spent about an hour jogging out, then jogging back, so it was roughly eight o'clock when he returned. He quickly got on the shower, the hot water helping relax his muscles as well as rid him of the sweat that the workout had given him, and got out, drying and dressing quickly, before heading down to the kitchen to make breakfast for the Dursleys and himself, deciding to ignore what they said about 'wasting food'. If he was going to work on endurance and conditioning, then he was going to do it his way, and that included lots of food.
After breakfast, he cleaned up, then headed out to the yard to weed, careful not to let himself stay still for too long, still fairly limber from his run, and not wanting to lose that. Several hours later, he finished weeding, mowed the yard, did a pack of thirty push-ups and sit-ups, then promptly went jogging again. When he was finished, he started doing make-shift pull-ups, though he was only able to do two or three of them. When he finally managed to drag himself back into the Dursley's home, he got into the shower again, then stretched to prevent stiffness as much as possible, before collapsing on his bed, mentally promising to write a letter to Gringotts about setting up a time for the appointment and as a chance for him to find out what the Goblin Nation had by way of inheritance rituals.
Almost a month later:
Harry looked at himself in the mirror, and smirked. He'd grown several inches, and put on some muscle, although not much, which he expected, after all, one doesn't become muscle-man with just a month of lean-muscle building workouts. And with the scars that littered his body, he'd be surprised if anyone asked about them. A few people had, and he'd shown scary proficiency with lying to someone's face by telling them that he used to get into knife-fights a lot with a perfectly straight face, like he was just discussing the weather. The residents of Magnolia Crescent attempted to avoid the boy like the plague from then on. He'd let his hair grow out, and it now hung in a low pony-tail that reached about halfway down his shoulder-blades thanks to an unexpected spurt of magic while he was in the middle of practicing something he'd seen a dojo doing at night. His bangs hid his scar perfectly, and from how quickly his hair was growing, he'd probably have hair that fell to the middle of his back, roughly.
He smiled a little wider, before going out for another jog to start off his day, which was followed by the usual tedious chore-load, before heading back inside. He jogged upstairs, cat-like, and started stroking Hedwig, who enjoyed the jogs as much as he did, because they gave him a reason to let her out, and the familiar often joined in with her master with the morning and evening exercise. He'd upgraded his workout to about a hundred pushups and situps, on top of a faster jog so he could cover more ground faster.
Hedwig rubbed her head against Harry's hand, ruffling her feathers softly as she preened in the attention, making him laugh softly. Soon, far too soon for both human and owl, he stopped, and sat at the desk in his tiny room, and started drafting letters to his friends and Gringotts. He figured that he could get the major information out of the way, such as bank statements and possibly a full account audit, as well as setting up periodic audits. He also inquired as to when a Gringotts employee would be free to handle the Inheritance Ritual, as well as a request for a date and time – preferably the summer next – to handle everything that may come up.
He signed all the letters as Hedwig fluttered over to the desk, holding out a leg for him to attach the letters to. Harry attached them, before gently stroking her feathers again. "Be safe, girl," he said softly. "Fly fast, wind beneath thy wings easing your flight, and the stars above guarding you from all that seek to harm you." He wasn't entirely sure why he'd said that, but it flowed fairly naturally off his tongue.
Hedwig gave him a searching look, before gently bumping her head against his hand, nibbling his fingers as if to say, 'I'll be fine.' Harry smiled at her, before the owl took off, heading for his friends and Gringotts. Harry watched her white profile as she flew away, before turning to finish the chores, and going out for another jog.
And so, Harry's summer passed quietly, though fairly eventfully. Letters fairly flew between Harry and his friends, and he got a Gringotts bank statement with an attached note stating that it was the latest sent by messenger hawk specially bred to be more magically resistant and not nearly as prone to tampering, often attacking the person attempting to tamper with the contents of whatever said hawk was carrying.
It was a quiet summer overall, Harry decided, stretching out on his bed. He figured it was about time to head downstairs where his Uncle Vernon's sister was sitting in the dining room, wondering – not for the first time – how the hell he was supposed to keep his temper from making her expand like a balloon like he'd entertained safely in his skull a few minutes' prior. As he walked into the room, he spotted a tall young woman with semi-straight dark brown hair that fell down to the middle of her back in the entryway, playing with a key-chain that appeared to have a shield of some kind on it, tossing it up and down, up and down, the keys jingling softly as they bounced off each other, the chain, and the shield. Chocolate brown eyes darted over to him, examining him in an instant, before turning back to the brewing drunken conversation and – if Harry's instincts were right – a drunken fight. He examined Aunt Marge, taking in the rosy blush she had from the wine, and winced inwardly – he was probably going to get into an argument with her.
The woman recaptured his attention, though, and he quickly took in her heart-shaped face, strong jaw, slightly visible cleft chin, the warmth in her almond-shaped chocolate brown eyes, her tall, lithe build, and the fact that she was wearing a dark gray, almost smokey-gray, long-sleeved, oddly patterned T-shirt, and a sleeveless lighter gray shirt over the top of it. Faded dark pants that looked oddly greenish on the thighs where they were faded topped off the black boots that Harry had a feeling were more for heavy lifting, and as such were probably pretty heavy. She was about six feet, one inch, Harry guessed, and based off of her rough size probably weighed about a hundred and eighty pounds. A black wrist-watch was on her left wrist, and a long trench coat was tossed almost carelessly over a nearby chair-back.
The Dursleys, including the drunken Marge, were all giving her odd looks, almost as though they were frightened of her. She sized him up quietly, before nodding slightly to herself, as though he had passed whatever non-verbal test she'd given him, before saying, her voice soft but no less compelling, "Hey. Call me whatever you like, but my actual name is Anne White."
Harry stuck his hand out to her. "I'm Harry," he replied. "Harry Potter."
He was understandably surprised when she shook his hand with a surprisingly firm grip, before laughing softly at the expression on his face. She sobered up fairly quickly. "I'm fairly sure you know how this is going to play out, Harry. Might as well get it over, yeah? You can stay with me afterward."
Harry stared at her in befuddled confusion. "What..." he trailed off, very confused.
Anne waved a hand at him. "I'll explain later," she said. "Might as well get this confrontation over, yeah?"
"Yeah." Harry steeled himself as he stepped into the dining room proper, where Aunt Marge had already had quite a lot of wine, Harry could see it. Her huge face was very red, and he could almost feel Anne wince in sympathy behind him.
"Just a small one, then," she chuckled. "A bit more than that . . . and a bit more . . . that's the ticket."
Dudley was eating his fourth slice of pie, Aunt Petunia sipping coffee with her little finger sticking out, and Harry could reliably see Anne cracking up at the sight of it, as it made her look slightly ridiculous. Harry really wanted to disappear into his bedroom, but he met Uncle Vernon's angry little eyes and knew he would have to sit it out, though he felt Anne's comforting – though confusing – presence behind him.
"Aah," said Aunt Marge, smaking her lips and putting the empty brandy glass back down. "Excellent nosh, Petunia. It's normally just a fry-up for me of an evening, with twelve dogs to look after. . . ." She burped richly and patted her great tweed stomach. "Pardon me. But I do like to see a healthy-sized boy," she went on, winking at Dudley. "You'll be a proper-sized man, Dudders, like your father. Yes, I'll have a spot more brandy, Vernon. . . ."
"Now this one here –"
She jerked her head at Harry, who felt his stomach clench. The Handbook, he thought quickly.
"This one's got a mean, runty look about him. You get that with dogs. I had Colonel Fubster drown one last year. Ratty little thing it was. Weak. Underbred."
Harry was trying to remember page twelve of his book: A Charm to Cure Reluctant Reversers.
"It all comes down to blood, as I was saying the other day. Bad blood will out. Now, I'm saying nothing against your family, Petunia" – she patted Petunia's bony hand with her shovel-like one – "but your sister was a bad egg. They turn up in the best families. Then she ran off with a wastrel and here's the result right in front of us."
Anne was starting to lose her patience, so she slowly stepped forward, setting on hand on Harry's shoulder before she passed him, an odd knife in her hand as she approached Marge. "You're eating my patience, Marge Dursley." Anne's voice was decidedly deadly as she tossed the double edged dagger to her right hand, the odd gap through the center of the blade making it look like an odd tuning fork with edges. She sheathed it, making the blade disappear as she turned, stalking away back to her previous position, before turning to Harry. "I'd recommend you pack, Harry," she said. "If I have anything to say about this, you won't be returning here to this..." She looked at the Dursleys over her shoulder with disgust, "filth."
Vernon roared with rage at that last comment, surging to his feet, only to have Anne's dagger suddenly in her hand and pointed at him. "Make another move, Dursley, and you'll find yourself airless," she said flatly, her hand not wavering. "You speak ill of the dead, and you will find yourself with much, much more than a barely-trained wizard on your hands." Her tone was no-nonsense, although the strange edge of fury that sharpened her words made Dursley pale and sit back down heavily.
Harry had made his escape the minute Anne's dagger had appeared in her hand and pointed at Vernon, quickly running upstairs to grab his trunk, and letting Hedwig out of her cage upstairs so that she could go fly. "Find me where I'll be, girl," he whispered urgently. "It's not safe here anymore."
Hedwig looked into his eyes searchingly, before bobbing her head in an unmistakable nod, soon flying out of the bedroom window and into the cool night air. When Harry came back into the kitchen, leaving the cage and trunk in the hallway, Anne was wearing her black trench coat, and her dagger was no-where to be seen, though the Dursleys were terrified of her. The woman in question smiled brightly at Harry when she spotted him. "Ready to go?" she asked.
Harry nodded, and they were soon out on Privet Drive, and they walked along, Anne carrying Harry's trunk with little effort on her part, until they were a good distance away, before nudging Harry, and her dagger appeared in her hand again, making him nervous, until she raised it in the street. Much to her surprise, a purple triple-decker bus came out of thin air with a loud BANG!, bright light blinding both of them. A conductor in a purple uniform leapt out of the bus and began to speak loudly to the night.
"Welcome to the Knight Bus, emergency transport for the stranded witch or wizard. Just stick out your wand hand, step on board, and we can take you anywhere you want to go. My name is Stan Shunpike, and I will be your conductor this eve –"
Anne muttered something that sounded like 'old meddlesome fool playing games', which shut the conductor up quickly. "Who're you, miss?" he demanded rudely.
Anne raised an eyebrow at his blatant arrogance, before saying simply, "I could be your worst nightmare, Stan Shunpike. Take us where we want to go, and no blood will be spilled this night. Your blood."
Stan was nervous, but he let them both on board. "Where are you two headed?" he asked.
"London," replied Anne, before giving him an address.
With another almighty BANG! the Knight Bus disappeared into the night.
When the Knight Bus stopped outside of the only house in an abandoned district of the city of London, Anne and Harry stepped out of the Bus, and into the house. "Welcome to my humble abode, Harry," said Anne calmly. "You'll be staying here when not at Hogwarts, alright?"
Harry nodded, eyeing the building distrustfully. It looked like it was about to collapse at any given moment, given the way it was leaning. Anne chuckled at his distrustful look. "It looks better inside," she promised. "The building isn't in any danger of collapsing, it just looks that way. This whole section of London is dillapidated and run-down, so having a fixed-up building in the center of this place is like sticking a neon sign to your forehead. Much better to keep it looking dillapidated. The whole building is actually mine, as this is, or rather... was, I should say, an apartment complex. Welcome, Harry, to Skyline Heights Apartments. I happen to be the landlord, so if you need something, well..." she grinned at him. "You know who to talk to. Miss Anne White, your landlord. I trust you not to do anything too stupid, because, let's face it, we all do stupid shit. Just try to keep the noise and idiocy down around here. You may be killed by one of the other residents because of it." She tossed him a set of keys with the same shield key-chain that she had had out earlier, before pulling her own out so she could unlock the front gate to the place. They stepped inside, as she added, "You're in room twelve thirty seven, on the second floor. You can do pretty close to whatever you want in this place, but no disturbing the other guests, you don't want to have to deal with the people I put up with regularly."
"Now that hurts, Anne," said an odd man with short black hair in the courtyard. "You only put up with us?"
Anne just grinned at him. "Put up with you, no, put up with your antics, yes. Demos Chaoscoat, Harry Potter. Harry, this is your floor-mate Demos." She fixed Demos with a flat look. "I trust you'll take care of Harry, Mister Chaoscoat. If you don't, you'll live long enough to regret failing that simple directive, understand?" Her voice had become startlingly dangerous.
Demos immediately bowed. "Aye, Mistress," he replied quickly, before showing Harry to his room. He took one look at Harry's confused expression, and elaborated more than he thought he should. "We have all kinds of races here, as this is a magical refuge. Mistress White is often known to be fair, but she's very dangerous to cross. She managed to put a Vampire Lord flat on their face without much in the way of effort, and we have yet to figure out if she's just a human or something else entirely."
Harry nodded in understanding. "I hope you don't mind a few questions," he said slowly. At Devos' nod, Harry continued, "This is a refuge for races? If you don't mind a semi-personal question, what race are you? And what's with this shield key-chain?"
Devos laughed. "Jumping right into the deep end, aren't you? Well, here's your room, you unlock it with this key." He pointed at one of the seven keys. "Yes, this is a refuge for races. Skyline Heights is often considered one of the premier race homes in Britain, seeing as Mistress White refuses to accept that incompetent Ministry's laws regarding werewolves and such. She sees them as people who need help and support, not mindless and dangerous animals. A Remus Lupin has actually been offered a room here, multiple times, in fact, but he kept turning the offer down. Something about him being a danger regardless." Devos snorted. "I highly doubt he could hurt a fly in this place, a were got loose once, and White had her pinned in almost no time flat before she could hurt anyone. No, I don't mind that kind of personal question, as you could probably tell, I'm a dwarf. I use the third key instead of the first, seeing as Dwarves prefer the underground, so my apartment is very different than yours. The shield key-chain is partly so you don't lose your keys, partly to show that you're under Mistress White's protection now, and partly to show that she saw something in you that she saw in few others. She'll explain later, probably some-time this week, if your lucky. Now, go rest, lad. The remaining questions can wait until morning." With that, the Dwarf stomped off, his short, stalky build suddenly making sense to Harry, who turned to his room's door, and unlocked it using the key that he'd been shown, before cautiously opening the door. The apartment was very dark, and very quiet, so he quietly turned on the lightswitch nearby, illuminating the hallway. There was a left turn off it, which, when he investigated further, lead to a kitchen, which wasn't stocked, he saw, so he set a quill and parchment on the shining-ly clean counter from his trunk, before looking around. There was a coat closet, a guest room, a washroom, the master bedroom, and a dining room. There was a small covered porch out back, which confused him, but as he examined the place, he began to feel something strange. A sense of belonging.
A slow smile crept across Harry's face, and he quickly stretched out in the currently-bare master bedroom, before having a sudden idea. "Dobby!" he called. With a soft pop, the house-elf appeared in front of Harry.
"Master Harry Potter, sir!" said Dobby, nearly shouting as he hugged Harry hard. "Master Harry Potter, sir called Dobby, sir, what can Dobby do for sir?"
"Air!" gasped Harry, which resulted in Dobby releasing Harry immediately, but Harry stopped him before he could punish himself for hurting Harry, or so the house-elf saw it. "And no punishing yourself for that," he snapped quickly. Dobby nodded quickly. "I was hoping to hire you as my personal house-elf, Dobby."
Dobby was speechless, doing a remarkably accurate impression of a stranded fish for several minutes, before glomping Harry again, sobbing, "Master Harry Potter sir wants Dobby to work for him! Thank you, Master Harry Potter sir!"
Harry smiled at Dobby, gently resting one hand on the back of his new house-elf. "I'll pay whatever you need so that you can get to work immediately," offered Harry. "Proper uniform and all. I want you to look good, as well as get this apartment furnished."
Dobby looked around, examining the apartment, wandering around, before nodding. "Dobby can do that, Master Harry Potter, sir," said the house-elf, returning to Harry's side.
Harry nodded, and said, "Dobby, go rest. We'll start the renovations and furnishing tomorrow."
Devos was talking to one of the other Dwarves on the second floor when Anne approached him. The Dwarf quickly turned, and with his companion following suit, bowed to her. "Mistress White, how can we help you?" he asked, straightening.
Anne smiled slightly at the formality. "First, drop the formality, Devos. You know I hate it. What I want to know is how Mister Potter is coming along in terms of his stay here," she said.
Devos stroked his black beard with one hand. "You know I won't let it go, simply because it bothers you, right?" he teased Anne. "Harry seems to have settled in well, and from what I can tell, he's currently out job-hunting in Diagon Alley. He's received several distressed letters from people I would loosely call friends, given that they both had compulsion charms on them."
Anne's eyes narrowed. "Sounds like a meddlesome old man needs to be taught a lesson," she said after a moment. "Good thing I've been holding onto the letter said meddlesome old fool sent me all those years ago."
Devos nodded. "I trust you'll be going with Harry, then?" he asked.
Anne nodded. "It's not in my race's nature to just leave a meddler in place, like a fat spider in the center of their web," she said with a slightly evil grin. "You think the fights the males have are intense, you have yet to see me meet one of my kin. Female fights are usually well-hidden, but when we get involved, it's the stuff of legend." She shook her head slightly, her smile dropping. "I'll have to go to Diagon Alley, though... Think you can handle the bills while I'm away?"
"Of course, Mistress," replied Devos. "There've been few times where someone's driven you to interfere directly, and I'm interested to see what the old fool's been doing in that castle when you come pounding on his door."
"Assuming he even allows me into the castle," replied Anne sourly. "You get my cell magic-proofed?"
Devos nodded again, handing said cell phone over. "Hacked a few nets in the process, so you have reception damn near everywhere," he replied. "Don't be a stranger. We both know that the Epsilon Knights aren't going to take your disappearance well."
Anne made a face at the reminder. "I understand how I'm the Grand Master, but how does that make me the most important person in the Knights?" she asked irritably. "I keep hearing shit like 'You're too important to lose' despite the fact that I already have a successor in mind and have even announced it, or 'There's something that you have to do, but this is not it' with 'this' being anything from killing to dying." She snorted. "You have any idea how it feels to be mollycoddled by the order you founded?"
Devos' smirk at her just made her want to slap him. "Let's see how you'd like it if you had at least six guards on your back at all times anywhere but headquarters," she said flatly, making Devos wince.
"Yeah... No," he said, raising both callused hands in the air in surrender. "No thank you. I might kill anyone who followed me."
Anne snorted, turning and heading back to her room, room triple oh-one. She made a face at the reminder, before stepping inside, and immediately made a beeline for her bathroom so she could soak and plot. Assuming she didn't fall asleep, she thought wryly. What a glorious end. Drowning from sleeping in the tub. She snorted with laughter. "Oh, let's see what tomorrow brings," she said out loud, laughter coloring her voice.