_When the Hidden Snake Strikes; _

Post war: Almost cannon. Victim of Corruption, betrayals by ministry and others. Harry uses his intelligence, hidden allies and a family artifact to go back in time to make sure he lives to be 19 and get a little payback. Smart/powerful/Dark/cunning Harry. Bad ministry/Dumbledore/Weasleys. Very cliched.

*This story is pure self indulgence and uses many ideas and themes other authors have used on some great stories, many of them in my favourites list, e.g. Wrong Choice by Unusual Suspect and Harry Potter and the Grangers take on the world, Harry Potter and the Rejected Path and many sadly removed from this site. It heavily features house elves, the ROR, rituals and an equally fed up and abused and misused Neville and of course time travel. If you don't like cliched stories please don't read. Harry will be dark as will his friends and there may be some similarities to Grey Lords.*

*Disclaimer: I do not own or claim any rights to Harry Potter or of the characters etc. portrayed in the book and films of that name. I thank Ms JK Rowling for allowing us to play with her creation.

Edited by the wonderfull Daddypa bear.

Chapter 1: The beginning of the End_

Black Family Town House; 8 am November 1st , 1998

Harry Potter stood in the completely empty library of Grimmauld Place with his personal house elf Nipps as the house ward-stone in front of him was glowing from the amount of power it was absorbing from the spells of the ministry forces outside the house.

Forces that had come to arrest him. He was now quote 'a risk to the Wizarding world'. 'Guilty of the use of the dark arts to gain power and defeat Voldemort.' Guilty no doubt of the many other 'crimes' that they would invent or 'discover' between the time he had been informed by his ministry insiders a month ago and when he went to trial. If he made it to trial and they didn't kill his first- which from the look of things was the plan.

The really sad thing was he hadn't been a threat or guilty of anything other than withdrawing from Wizarding societies view. No, he had spent the last 6 months getting his affairs in order and salvaging his families' legacies. All he wanted to do was leave this cesspit of a country that had done nothing for him except cause him pain, misery, grief and use and abuse him as they saw fit.

But, by the goddess, he was a threat now and not just to wizards. No, not just to wizards. Oh no, what about the useless selfish muggles who ignored the pain of a child, the obvious signs of abuse, neglect and malnourishment? The same muggles who believed a scrawny undersized 5 year old was a hardened criminal and pathological liar. Let's not forget the goblins, the traitorous greed driven goblins, who had confiscated his vaults and family heirlooms because of damages. Yeh right, they would shortly find that they had taken a second hit in 24hrs. It was highly unlikely they would open for business tomorrow.

He thought back to what had brought him to this point. Well, it all started a week before the end of his second year at Hogwarts in June 1993.

*Flash back: Hogwarts, 2pm Friday June 11th, 1993 *

Harry was making his way back from his confrontation with Lucius Malfoy and his freeing of the house elf Dobby when said little elf popped in front of him. Looking up at Harry with drooping ears and a frightened but determined look on his face. Harry was about to ask what Dobby wanted when the little elf spoke up. ''Dobby must be talking to Master Henry, yes, he must.'' Dobby grabbed him and for a second he was in total darkness before a flash of light. He was standing in a room that appeared to be full of junk and broken items. Dobby was again standing in front of him.

Getting a word out at last and to say the least irritated and not a little unsettled, he asked, ''What's happening Dobby?. Why am I here? Where are we?''

Dobby concentrated for a second and a chair appeared behind Harry. Dobby nodded, ''Master Henry will be sitting down and must listen to Dobby, must let Dobby help master Henry! Master Henry must listen to Dobby!''

Having seen this same elf fling a fully qualified dark wizard into a wall not 15 minutes prior to this, all he did was nod. He may as well get this over with. Besides, he acknowledged, it was unlikely he could get away from Dobby if he tried.

Over the next hour what he heard shook his world.

Dobby, whose name was really Dobbs, had been a Potter family elf bonded to Master Henry (Harry) himself when Harry was born. He and all the other Potter elves had been stolen and enslaved to other families by the Bad White Whiskers wizard. Yes, Dumbledore. Only five of the other elves the others had died, too old to serve their new masters,when they were now bound to the Potter family heir, him.

Dumbledore came and took the elves and many of the things, treasures Dobby called them, from the Potter Houses as he called the manor, before hiding Master Henry and stopping the elves getting to their real master. When they tried to approach him the wards burned them. He had done bad things to Harry; the elves knew on a deep level they could feel their master.

But then Harry had come to Hogwarts and although they couldn't approach him to tell him about their plight and the other bad things, they had still kept an eye on him and helped him when they could. Dobby told him that Petunia was not his Aunt. Mistress Lilie had been adopted when she was five years old. She had been with her mother and father when they were killed in a car crash when visiting London. The elves knew. They knew everything about the family they served. His mother was born in Switzerland. She and her family had moved there from Germany when the big muggle and Wizard war broke out in Europe.

There was something else, all the elves sensed it. The bad dark man, yes, Voldemort, had done something really bad to Harry in his scar and Dobby had to fix it, all of it.

After an hour of this Harry or was he Henry sat thinking about what Dobby had said. He gave himself an headache trying to deny what the elf had told him, but there was just too much that made sense to Harry.

He came from an old pureblood family on his father's side and a nearly as old Austrian pureblood family on his mothers. But all he knew of his parents was that he looked like his father and had his mother's eyes. He didn't even know what they really looked like, that is until Hagrid gave him the photo album at the end of his first year. He had looked for references of the Potter family and found nothing-the Longbottoms, Bones, Greengrass, Blacks, all the other supposed old Wizarding Families, but not his. His Aunt looked nothing like the pictures he had of his mother and would the doting parents he saw in those pictures leave him, an obviously adored son, with someone who hated magic, who beat him, starved, worked him like a slave and made him live in a cupboard. No. Something was really wrong here.

Taking a leap of faith, Harry looked at Dobby, Dobbs, whatever, and said, ''What do you need me to do?''

Tears running down his cheeks, Dobby answered, ''Yous must be calling other Potter elves, Master Henry, wees will all be needed to fix bad men's spells and poison.''

''Pp..p..poison Dobby,'' asked Harry letting his fear out for the first time?

''Yes Master, bad potions that greasy dark mans give to Master. Mitzy be telling Dobby about it; she couldn't stop new master hurting real master.'' He stopped, looking sad.

Harry took time to collect himself. That greasy vile creature Snape was using potions on him as well? Right, let's get this done. With new determination Harry asked, ''Tell me how to call the others?''

''Master must be saying 'The head of Potter calls all family bound elves to him' ''. With that Harry had done just as instructed and within two minutes five other poorly dressed and downtrodden elves appeared. He had bonded them all to him personally as well as reinforcing the bond to the family. This broke the weak imposed slavery bonds and it was a great feeling as he watched as all six stand up straight, healed of all injuries and glowing with energy.

After putting up elf wards to seal the room, the elves took charge. They made him lie down, before placing their small hands on his head and in squeaky high pitched voices chanted in a language that bore no resemblance to any he had ever heard.

What followed was pure agony. His head felt as if it was going to explode particularly the area of his scar. Rivers of molten lava ran through his body originating in his chest and radiating out until it felt like he would burst into flames. At one point he was sure he had died as he was looking down upon himself seeing black wisps of oily smoke pouring out of his scar. He saw similar sickly yellow, grey, brown and acid green vapours seemingly pouring out of his mouth as he screamed. Finally just before he was slammed back into his body something resembling blood red ropes or chains lifted from around his entire body and he had known no more.

He had woken up twelve hours later feeling better than he had ever felt in his life. The elves had apparently put a clone of him in his bed, making it look like he was asleep. As it was Saturday he would not be expected to be up early. Except it wasn't Saturday, it was only 4.30pm of the same day. How? Well it seemed this room was called the 'come and go room' by the elves as the room actually appeared in time of need equipped with what the person wanted. Dumbledore wanted a toilet, that's what he found. Filch needed some cleaning supplies, a broom cupboard was there, if the elves needed to store unwanted or lost items, it was a huge storage room. At this time they needed space and time for their Master to recover as they had much to tell him.

They found out that the room was on a 1:1 ratio as in 1 hour to 1 day. Ergo, Harry had only been asleep 30 minutes and a clone was in his bed taking a nap.

The elves were: Dobbs who had been sold/given to the Malfoys, Nipps who Dumbledore had enslaved, the same with Mitzy to Snape, Giggs to Augusta Longbottom, Cole to Minister Fudge and poor Daisy (who had been his nanny) to the Parkinsons. She did say that poor Miss Pansy tried to help her and was really kind, but her father beat Pansy as much as he hit Daisy.

It had been decided that he would not make an appearance until after 9am on Saturday-17 hours giving him 17 days.

He had found out lots of things during this time. Voldemort had left a piece of himself in Harry that was siphoning off his magic making him weaker, but more importantly it was blocking part of his brain making it difficult for him to remember and comprehend some things. It was how the bastard survived. On top of that Dumbledore had used his blood to tie his magic to the wards at Privet Drive. When he asked what that meant, a book appeared: a prisoner ward, the bastard had put a prisoner ward on him. The ward only allowed him to have enough magic available to barely function. It was a vicious cycle, the stronger his magic the stronger the wards; he didn't get anything but the bare minimum.

Nipps had immediately popped out and 'fixed' the monitor in the Headmaster's office to show the wards at full strength. While he was there he found others attuned to his master and 'fixed" those, too.

Dumbledore would never know.

Snape's potions were forcing loyalty to the Headmaster, the Weasleys and keeping him weak both physically and mentally.

Fudge was corrupt and in Malfoy's and other's pockets. Dumbledore was stealing from Harry's Gringotts vaults, but not his Leu Swiss Gnome held account. Learning that, Harry sent a letter to Leu Bank in Zurich instructing them to transfer one-half of all his Gringotts holdings and all heirlooms to his Gnome held account. Giggs immediately popped out at that and didn't return for two full hours of real time.

Oh, his 'friends' were spying on him for Dumbledore: Ron because he was ordered to by his mother and bribed with school positions and a guaranteed pass in classes; Hermione for Harry's 'own safety'. He didn't know which of them was worse.

Neville was beaten by his Great Uncle and reviled by his Grandmother who was also stealing his inheritance, because it was 'wasted on a squib brat'. Harry resolved to swear Neville to secrecy and tell him everything. He had read somewhere about an unbreakable vow, yes, he would get Neville to do one of those before telling him. He would also be a better friend to him from now on.

Pansy was horribly beaten and denigrated by her death eater father, because she wasn't a boy. She was really pretty and wore a glamour to hide her true looks. It hadn't stopped that scum Malfoy though, he had raped her on his 13 birthday just a couple of days ago. He would do the same with her as Neville he decided. However, he would have to be careful-it would not do for him to be seen being friendly with a Slytherin. Mmm, he would think on that, Daisy and Mitzy could help.

He had come out of the room a totally different person to how he went in. Powerful, the wards had acted like weights to body-builders and strengthened his magic. Intelligent, determined and with his Slytherin side fully awake and in control. He was too young and inexperienced to challenge those who where controlling him, so he would play the game; be the perfect Gryffindor Golden boy. But his Slytherin side would make all the decisions now, he would act from the shadows, train, study and be prepared for the time he could break the shackles.

It was decided that Dobby and Daisy would stay with him (hidden of course); Nipps, would stay with Dumbledore, Giggs the Longbottoms, Cole with Cornelius Fudge and Mitzy, the Grease Ball. They would be his spies. Much as Daisy wanted to help Pansy he wouldn't let her, but he had learnt some spells that he would be casting on Mr. and Mrs. Parkinson soon, very soon.

He had spent the next week playing the game. He spoke to Pansy privately after Daisy had literally kidnapped her and swore her secrecy with a modified Unbreakable Vow he had found in one of the books in the room, before telling her his plans. She had agreed and a friendship started.

He purposely disagreed with Ron on things and openly made friends with Neville, informing him of what he had learned and taking him to 'The Room' or ROR as they started calling it. He considered changing his elective choices from Divination to Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, but decided against it. If Dumbledore had gone to this much effort to keep him ignorant and downtrodden, it wouldn't do to suddenly become a studious high achiever. He had gently told Hermione off for nagging and resolved to only tell the overbearing bitch inconsequential things from now on. He put a small amount of distance between himself and his 'best friends'. Not enough to cause scrutiny, but enough to give him some breathing room as he purposely made friends with others across all four houses. He would need allies before the game was over and who would fault him for being more outgoing and friendly. He played the game.

He played the game, except at night. Every night from then on at 10pm Dobby and Daisy popped in to his dorm; they put Ron, Seamus and Dean to sleep before popping out with Neville and Harry to the ROR. They were popped back in at 7am the next day (8am on weekends) and their dorm mates woken up. They trained and they studied. They sorted all of the 'junk' in the Room and made a fortune from it all, repairing their family fortunes. They also found lots of useful books, magical artefacts and more important for Neville wands. In fact they kept all the wands they found, you never knew when you might need a spare.

The elves rendered the dead basilisk, great Circe who would have thought a dead snake would fetch 250,000,000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Not to mention still having enough potion ingredients for their own use and enough skin to make armour and battle robes for at least 20 people. He and Neville settled for an hidden vest and a pair of very stylish boots, at the time.

He hadn't been able to stop Arthur Weasley shooting Sirius through the veil at the ministry of magic fiasco, bloody Weasels and the know it all had to interfere; If just he, Neville and Luna (who had become a friend) had gone Voldemort would have been dead. He played the game in the tournament and got in lots of Room time using it to pull further away from the Weasels. He failed to catch Wormtail, but he had stopped Pansy being beaten and she had joined them in the ROR in 4th year, followed by Susan Bones after the Yule ball later that year, she was brought up by elves without love in the care of a cold uncaring Aunt. With those 70 extra days a week, they had racked up between 30 years (Harry and Neville, the tournament was good for something), 20 years (Pansy) and nearly 17 years (Susan). They studied well past Master's level in all their subjects. Not that it showed in class. They were all in the top 10 just not the top 5, it was part of staying safe and not bringing more scrutiny.

They had passed their 'important OWL's with an Outstanding, but purposely got Acceptable in classes like Astronomy, History, Muggle Studies, Divination and in Harry's case Care of Magical Creatures. While he was now at Runes and Arithmancy Masters level, he would not risk being found out if he took the exam's.

Harry had found out about his mother's family. Her real surname was Lilie Marie Bayer, she was born in the Town of Lutry in a Schloss on Lake Geneva. Her Great Grandfather Friedrich Bayer had been born in Austria from an old Pureblood Wizarding family. Whilst he was a wizard, he wasn't strong enough to go to Durmstrang so he had been thrown out of the family. He was good at making potions and moved to Germany to work as a potion maker. When he was 22 in 1863, he inheriting some money and property from his maternal uncle. Using this he founded a muggle drug company making simple Wizarding potions that worked on muggles. It was a huge success. He married a potions mistress late in life at age 64 and had a son Heinrich in 1908. Heinrich despite being a strong wizard chose to work with his father, becoming a Potion Master and running the company after his father's death in 1932 at age 91.

Heinrich had married Rosmarin Ponte the Heiress of an old Swiss family in 1928 and his only son Heinrich II was born in 1930. In 1938 he was killed by Grindlewald's forces and Rosmarin fled with young Heinrich into exile in Switzerland in her family Schloss by Lake Geneva. The Nazi's confiscated the company which by this time was international.

Fortunately the Gnomes of Switzerland protected the Bayer interests and in 1946 took control back. An Executive officer was appointed, while Heinrich was trained to take over which he did in 1954 after when he married. Marie, his wife, like his mother was a strong witch and was a Charms Mistress.

The couple had a daughter, his mother, Lilie Marie Bayer in January of 1960. In 1963 Rosmarin died unexpectedly in a boating accident on the lake.

Heinrich and Marie took their daughter Lilie with them to England for a sightseeing trip and to meet business associates. Unfortunately, they were involved in a car crash just outside London, Heinrich and Marie were killed instantly and Lilie was injured. When she was released from hospital a week later, she was taken to an orphanage and within 3 months the beautiful 5 year old was adopted by the Evans' who had one daughter and were unable to have any more children. Lilie Marie Bayer became Lily Evans.

Even Harry had heard of Bayer, it was written on the box of his Aunts favourite head ache tablets.

He had contacted the Gnomes and in the summer following his 5th year had slipped out of Privet Drive with the help of Dobby and a time turner, claimed the estate and inspected the Schloss.

It was a beautiful turreted castle on the shore of the Lake on one side and the historic vineyards and Medieval town of Lutry on the other. His plans for when he was of age started to take shape. He, Daisy and Cole worked to prepare the Schloss for him to move there and have the wards upgraded. A profitable holiday that, he was a billionaire at age 16.

For the next 5 years he played the game, he had destroyed Voldemort's Horcruxes well before 7th year with the information stolen by Nipps from Dumbledore's office, but he used the excuse of hunting for them to get away from the scrutiny of the Order of the Phoenix or was it burnt chickens.

He had applied memory charms to Ron and Hermione to get away and continue to hide who he was.

The games culminated in his sending a clone into the Forbidden Forest while he was strategically placed under his invisibility cloak. It was easy to kill Voldemort and come out the hero. The highlight was watching Snape die, looking deep into the creature's eyes and smiling telling him that he had thought about saving him just for the pleasure of torturing and killing him himself, but really he didn't want to dirty his house with such a contemptible piece of filth. Besides, he did have plans.

But he wasn't the hero for long, he was hounded by the ministry, the press and the Weasleys. When he had written to Gringotts to formalise his inheritance from his godfather (something he couldn't do when Dumbledore was alive to keep his cover), he had found out Sirius had blood adopted him at the ceremony when he became his godfather; he was as much a Black as a Potter or Bayer. The Goblins, however, had responded to his request with the news that all of his vaults had been confiscated as a fine for breaking into the bank.

The Weasleys and the Ministry, including all the pardoned death eaters were plotting against him according to the reports from his friends and spies.

It had all come to a head yesterday when he had been told they were going to arrest him today and he was not expected to survive the arrest process. He contacted Neville, Pansy and Susan and sent them to the Schloss.

He called in all of his elves including 2 he had bonded at Hogwarts- Ash and Polly. His biggest regret was losing Dobby when he had rescued Olivander and Luna. If Ron hadn't been such a bloody idiot and Hermione a stubborn bitch they would have got away without loss.

It was just 24 hours before the attack that he had cast an ancient spell he had found in the ROR and had been waiting to cast since he found out the extent of Dumbledore's and the Weasleys theft. The fat bitch had never returned his key and had emptied his trust vault every year for the last 6 years.

They stood in the largest empty cellar of Black House and cast 'Recollo substantia de jure de familia Potter et Black et Bayer, vindicata summa extincito magica'. He had never in all his training and fighting cast such a complex spell. The magic had swelled and swirled around him before shooting out in hundreds of individual balls of blue fire. He felt a pull on his magic so strong that it left him light headed.

He had used magic to recall everything ever taken by illegal means or without consent from all of his families; the penalty if the thief or their family could not return what was taken was their magic. He knew he didn't need the money, but they had plans for the future and it would be very useful then, besides the bastards did not deserve any clemency from him.

The room he was in was huge magically enlarged and as big as Wembley Stadium. It had been full when he had finished: gold, portraits, rare books, property deeds, magical artefacts, even potion ingredients and of all things un-hatched phoenix eggs. The list went on and on. All 7 of his elves had worked non-stop for a solid 26 hours, cataloguing and storing everything in magical vault trunks before portkeying out to Lutry and then returning for more. They would have collapsed after a couple of hours if not for being able to draw on his magic. He knew that over the years various factions and individuals had tried to break the power of the families he was now head of, but the sheer amount of returned property was staggering.

Only one more act before he could rest and he could finalise the plans with his love and his best friends.

*Present: Black House, 11am 2nd November 1998*

He gave a brief harsh humourless laugh. Yes, one more spell that all 4 of them would cast. His thought process was halted at that thought by Nipps, ''Master Harry, we must get ready the wards are going''. Goddess, he had been brooding for over 3 hours. Bugger, time to get his act together.

Smiling down at the little elf he said, ''Take my hand on the yellow flash we go.'' When he looked earlier, well 5 hours ago, more than 200 ministry sheep dressed in Auror blue led by none other than the Hero of the Light and Senior Auror Ronald Billius Weasley. Who he noticed was not casting the ward breaking spells the others were. Had he squibbed the Weasley family? Yes, they were casting ward breaking curses at the Black House wards. Idiots, Orion Black, his blood adopted grandfather, had spent a third of the considerable Black fortune on those wards. Did they really think that their puny anti-portkey and apparition wards had been successful on an house as heavily warded as this? They had been destroyed the minute they touched the Black wards. Did they really think they would still be alive now if he had wanted otherwise?

Violet... Right concentrate Potter... blue... yes... YES! there it Goes. With that Heinrich James Bayer-Potter-Black and his devoted elf vanished. The portkey signature was lost and now untraceable in the massive explosion of magic that destroyed the house and everything else within an 800m radius, including the sheep and thousands of muggles or ostriches as he had taken to calling them. He did feel slightly guilty about the muggles; but once the ministry started to attack the wards, it had been inevitable. Whether caused by the wards collapsing or him using the offensive wards, destruction was guaranteed. The Black Family had designed them that way.

*Schloss Ponte, Lutry, Lake Geneva Switzerland, 12.10 pm CET*

Harry landed with only a small stumble and only just had time to release Nipps' hand before he was knocked to the floor flat on his back by his sobbing girlfriend; all 5ft5in, 8st 10lb of curvy brunette by the name of Pansy Parkinson. She was sobbing showering kisses over his face repeating ''Your here, your here, you did it, you did it...''

After about 5 minutes of this Harry sat up, lifting her with him and sitting in one of the arm chairs in the room. He continued holding her and making soothing noises until she eventually calmed, except for the occasional hiccup.

A throat clearing and a giggle brought both of them back to an awareness of their surroundings.

Looking up Harry met his best friends eyes and smiled. ''All right there Mate,'' Harry asked?

''Oh you know, me resting up, topping up the winter tan, making love to my girlfriend, waiting for for my best friend to finish his latest dangerous adventure. You know same old, same old.'' Neville Longbottom replied.

Walking over to Harry with his left arm still firmly wrapped around Susan Bones, reaching down to grasp Harry's hand for a few seconds before going to sit in the love seat opposite where the other couple were sat.

After a couple of seconds of silence while they all settled more comfortably Susan asked, ''How did it go Harry?''

''No problem, I was exhausted yesterday and it took 7 elves 26 hours right up until the attack on Grimmauld started to get all the ...mmm how did I describe it... Yeh, all the returned stolen goods were transported to the largest cellar we have here.'' He paused running his hand through his shoulder length hair and looking at the gob smacked expressions of his friend's faces, before continuing, ''Yes, even I was surprised at the sheer volume, not to say value of what had been taken illegally from my Houses.'' With a sigh, ''Dumbledore and others of his ilk raped House Potter far more completely than even I had realised and House Black didn't escape unscathed. Having said that, Nipps reckons it's still missing about a quarter of the Potter money that my grandfather had. Apparently, Dad gave it to Dumbledore to help support the Order of the Flaming Pigeons in the first war.'' He looked down then, meeting the stormy grey eyes of his fiancée and kissed her briefly before drinking in her lovely face, so different without the disgusting glamour she had worn most of the time. Without them she was the doppelgänger of her squib cousin, Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Pansy smiled and spoke up for the first time since she had snuggled into Harry ,''What now darling?''

''Now,'' he said with a truly wicked grin, ''we 4 are going to pick an empty cellar each and the 4 of us are going to cast one more spell before grabbing some sleep and then we'll finalise the plans.'' Pausing for a few seconds whilst the others waited for their leader he resumed, ''we are safe here; we're 500 miles from London where all hell is kicking off with more to come.'' Again the wicked grin, ''No-body knows about my mother's real family and on top of that we are un-plottable and under the fidelius with me as secret keeper. Oh that reminds me, Nipps, Cole.'' Almost instantly the elves popped in. ''Nipps, can you go and check what's happening back at Grimmauld, safely, that is?''

''Yes, Master Henry,'' was the response after a short pause. With that Nipps popped out and Cole went to bring the requested drinks and snacks, returning quickly with scotch whiskey, warm butter beer and a plate of pastries and sandwiches.

Harry stood up pecking Pansy on her nose before stretching up to his full 6ft 1in- short for his family due to Snape's bloody potions and still thin thanks to early malnutrition, bloody Dursley's and something which he had plans to put right, soon, very soon. Quickly regaining feeling in his limbs from having Pansy cuddled on his lap for the last 30min, he transfigured the chair into a love seat and grabbed a ham and Dijon sandwich and a mug of butter beer. All 3 of them were quiet as they were eating having been too busy- Harry- or too worried Pansy, Neville and Susan to eat anything much at breakfast.

After about 45 minutes, the snacks were gone. There was no butterbeer left and there was a significant drop in the level of the 1936 Glen Grant.

With a satisfied sigh Harry called, ''Come on then you three. Time to cause some more chaos.'' Then grabbing Pansy's hand and dragging her off to the very extensive cellars below the Schloss, he was quickly followed by Neville and Susan.

Harry led them though the heavily warded door and down to the Dwarven built cellars which extended under the lake.

Eventually, after about 10 minutes walking down bright torch lit corridors, they came to the first empty cellar and stopped. Looking at them he asked ''Who's going to be first to cast Praedia Bellica?''

Harry could not help himself; he laughed so hard he bent over with pain in his stomach, while the other 3 just gapped at him. Collecting himself he said, ''What did you think it was going to be? We have all 'conquered' people death eaters in particular and seeing as the ministry has let them off I think it is up to us to. how should I put it...hmmm... yes, it's up to us to extract the payment and enact punishment for their many crimes, don't you?''

After just a short pause they all began to smile and they were not pleasant smiles, in fact Neville looked quite vicious as did Pansy. Pansy spoke up first saying coldly, ''I'll go first, I want payback on dear Draconis''. Nobody begrudged her this, she had suffered more than anyone at the hands of that rapist.

After casting the spell with the addition of a block so 'loot' as Susan called it was called. but not people. Not the chattel;this was a very simple spell compared to what Harry cast the day before and it was a few minutes before items came rushing into the cellar.

When it stopped there was a good pile of valuables and other useful magical items. Pansy snorted and said, ''It appears to have cost Lucius a fair part of his vault to say out of Azkaban this time.''

While they all laughed at this they moved onto the next room and Susan cast the spell. There was less than Pansy had, but then she hadn't been a Slytherin.

Neville was next and they had to move out of the room as more came in, he ended up with a room piled high with what he also called loot. He had cast the Substantia de jure spell when he hit 17 and locked Augusta out of his house and his vaults. Susan had done the same with her cold- blooded Aunt.

Harry was last and he picked a huge cellar that was more like a home for a flight of dragons. It turned out to be needed; they watched as the loot came in as he stripped all the remaining death eaters and some others of all their worldly goods. With a final satisfied laugh they headed back to their bedrooms, for an afternoon nap and in Harry's case make slow passionate love to his sexy girlfriend.

They needed their energy for the plan later today and tomorrow. ...


AN. Let me know what you think. It is very cliched I know. It won't contain graphic sex but will leave that up to your own imaginations. It will contain violence as the 4 get revenge and Harry will be much darker that in Grey Lords.

BTW. If you haven't read it I recommend Black Vengance by Teufal, a really great revenge story with Sirius taking the lead and a unique idea to get rid of Voldemort.

Cheers and thanks for reading.