Chapter 1: Moving In
"Well met, Harriet Potter."
"And you, Mr. Holmes," Harriet greeted Mycroft cautiously. The man gave the appearance of being a typical bureaucrat, with his suit and tie, receding hairline, and small potbelly. But his cold, keen hazel eyes almost immediately belied that impression; Harriet felt as though she were being x-rayed by those eyes, the same feeling that she got from Dumbledore's twinkling blue ones.
"My younger brother, Sherlock, is currently looking for a flatmate," he began lightly, "since his previous one, John Watson, recently moved out. Would you be amenable to living with him?"
Clearing her throat, Harriet responded, "Yes, of course. What does he do?"
Mycroft smiled thinly. "You'll find out. Now, if you don't mind my asking, why would a prominent witch such as yourself request aid against Lord Voldemort from a Squib line? Surely, you could turn to other light-sided families, such as the Longbottoms or the Weasleys, even if you don't trust Dumbledore?"
Startled, Harriet blurted, "You know about magic? But your father promised to not -"
Mycroft waved off her concerns. "Yes, I know about magic. No, my father did not expound on your identity or situation to me. The nature of my position is such that I occasionally collaborate with the Ministry of Magic, so I pick up a few tidbits here and there."
"From your scar and your name, I was able to surmise that you were the famed Girl-Who-Lived. Due to the Daily Prophet, I knew about an attempt to steal a valuable object from Gringotts last August and about the recent death of the Hogwarts Defense Professor, Quirinus Quirrell. Since his death, my wizarding sources have apprised me of rumors that the object in question was a Philosopher's Stone."
"But how did you know that Voldemort was involved in this and that I don't trust Dumbledore?" Harriet queried, startled by his rapid-fire deductions.
Mycroft responded, "My mundane sources have reported legends of a wraith and mysterious murders in Albania, both of which suggest a dark wizard of considerable power who is currently weakened. The most prominent recent Dark Lord was Voldemort, and the Daily Prophet obituary noted that Quirrell visited the country last year, so I concluded that Voldemort must have possessed Quirrell in order to get hold of the stone and use the Elixir of Life to strengthen himself. Had he been stronger, we would be seeing mysterious deaths, not to mention heightened Death Eater activity, within Britain itself, and the entire venture might not have even occurred. Moreover, had Quirrell been colluding with anyone else, he would have been alone at the scene of the crime and would have been captured alive, given Dumbledore's well-known distaste for killing."
"Finally, your presence here confirms all of my aforementioned conclusions since your history with Voldemort would have heightened your concerns about his return. Had you trusted Dumbledore, you would have stayed with your relatives this summer, as per his request."
Harriet shook at her head in wonder. "Merlin, that was incredible!" she burst out.
Mycroft smiled thinly at her praise. "Elementary deductions, my dear. Now, we are back to my original question - why did you turn to the Holmes family for aid against Lord Voldemort, as opposed to Dumbledore or the Potters' light-sided allies from the last war?"
Harriet laughed awkwardly. "Well, a part of the reason is because I don't know much about the last war, so I don't know who else to turn to. Most books cover the topic in broad strokes - the locations of attacks, number of casualties, prominent figures who were killed, and so on. But they don't explicate the nature of the resistance against Voldemort, other than simply referring to it as 'The Order of Phoenix.' I have tried asking Dumbledore and my other professors about it, but they dismissed my inquiries, saying that I was too young to know about such dark matters."
"Well, you are only an eleven-year-old," Mycroft said calmly, his eyes inscrutable.
"I may be young, but I had to face Voldemort this past term," Harriet retorted waspishly. "I barely managed to escape with my life from that encounter, and my impression was that Dumbledore set up the entire situation as a 'practice run,' if you will. That, along with Dumbledore's refusal to answer my question about why Voldemort specifically targeted me and my parents in the first place, convinced me that I would eventually have to deal with the madman once and for all before I could move on with my life."
She continued, "Now, why the Holmes family specifically? I first heard of you from my Mum's History of Magic essay, one of several mementos that Professor Snape kept in his desk drawer - detentions are excellent exercises in information gathering. Like I told your father, your family has a history of having dealt with Dark Lords and driving innovation and change within the Wizarding World. I don't trust Dumbledore because he is hiding vital information from me, and I get the feeling that he is primarily concerned with maintaining control over me. Even if I knew who they were, I can't turn to the traditional light-side families since Dumbledore is a hugely influential and venerated figure among the wizarding populace."
"On the other hand, even in the old days, the Holmes were publically neutral; I did not see any mention of the family name in recent wizarding events, so I concluded that you are far enough removed from Dumbledore or Voldemort's influence to be trustworthy allies. It is in your best interest to help me since I have stopped Voldemort twice as it is, and he would be a menace to both of our worlds if he were to return full-force."
Mycroft delicately sipped at his tea. "Excellent reasoning. Are you sure that you aren't interested in politics? With a bit of training, you could be an canny political operator, much like myself."
"To be honest, I wouldn't rule it out," Harriet replied. "However, my highest priority at the moment is to determine a way to beat Lord Voldemort, so that I can live long enough to be whatever I want."
"Very well then, Ms. Potter. Let us proceed to 221B Baker Street then. My brother should be most useful to your endeavors."
"How so?"
"Know thine enemy," Mycroft lectured. "To win a war, one must understand how the enemy operates. At the end of the day, Lord Voldemort is a terrorist, albeit a magically-enhanced one. Let us just say that my brother has expertise dealing with his ilk - I would recommend reading Dr. John Watson's blog and catching up on the Muggle news."
Mycroft paused. "Also, my brother is not aware of your world. Please keep things that way."
"Hello, little brother. Glad to see that some things never change," Mycroft said tightly as Sherlock looked up from the cadaver on the table.
"Mrs. Hudson, I specifically requested that you tell Mycroft that I was at Barts!" Sherlock shouted.
"Don't bother, Sherlock. I would have known had you left the flat."
"I am in the middle of a very important experiment, Mycroft," Sherlock retorted waspishly. "Either give me the case, or get out."
"Oh, I don't have a case for you, Sherlock. Just a flatmate."
Sherlock dropped his knife and took off his goggles. "I am doing fine, Mycroft. Anderson and his fan-club have already searched the flat - they found nothing and destroyed my sock index yet again. You really don't have a heart, do you?"
"Brother dearest, you have been moping within this flat, doing god-knows-what for a month. You've obviously tried removing John's armchair -"
"Merely to clear the path to my kitchen, so that I could see the experiments on the dining table."
"in order to get over his decision to move into a new place with Mary, but that hasn't worked, has it?"
"Mycroft, I have merely been busy with alternative pursuits lately. Nothing to worry your or Mummy's head over."
"Sherlock, you have been receiving a bucket-load of cases but haven't taken a single one of them. It's only a matter of time -"
"None of them were interesting." Sherlock hesitated and sighed. "And even if you're right - John was a diamond in the rough, and it took two years to train him. What are the odds of finding another like him?"
Mycroft smiled thinly. "Slim to none if we are talking about adults. But what if I give you someone who is more plastic? Someone who would eagerly embrace your particular skill-set?"
Sherlock looked at him incredulously. "You want me to take in a child? Why can't you handle it yourself?"
"Sherlock, I'm still practically raising you. Between you and the British Government, my hands are full as it is; I don't have time to train a child. You, on the other hand, need a companion - an eager, enthusiastic audience, if you will. I am giving you one."
"Please, Mycroft - I don't have time to attend to a whining brat and change its nappies," Sherlock snapped.
"Which is why I am giving you an eleven-year-old. The perfect age really - not too old to be too set in his/her ways but not too young to require constant care and attention."
Mycroft paused and laid the bait - his brother could never resist the lure of competition. "Surely, Sherlock, you're not afraid of mentoring someone? I mean, as I said before, I trained you, and my limited time is the only reason that I'm not handling the current situation myself."
"Don't be ridiculous, brother," Sherlock responded bristling. "And I see what you're doing by the way."
"Of course, you do," Mycroft agreed with a faint smile. "But you're going to give in anyway."
Sherlock gritted his teeth and growled at Mycroft before giving a faint nod.
A young green-eyed ravenette entered the room at the moment. 'Of course,' Sherlock thought grimly. 'Mycroft probably had her stationed right outside the door and told her to wait until I nodded or he gave some inane gesture.'
She held out her hand and said self-consciously, "Harriet Potter."
Sherlock stepped forward and gave a brisk handshake. "Sherlock Holmes."
The girl looked around the room, and Sherlock half-expected a typical exclamation of disapproval or horror. Instead, he was most surprised when a bemused look appeared on her face. "Why are you conducting an experiment with different types of rust?"
"I am studying rust formation on metals from different parts of the city, so as to ascertain the relationship between the amount of rust and the amount of air pollution in the area."
"Why would that matter?"
"Because if there is a directly proportionate relationship as I suspect, then we could develop methods for determining the number of vehicles in an area during a given time frame purely from the rust on a building alone."
"What are you doing with the body then? Or is that a different experiment?"
"Different. I am beating it in different ways to study bruising patterns. For example..."
Harriet knew that Ron, Hermione, and most of her friends would probably think that her new guardian was insane.
"Blimey, Harriet! The man beats up dead bodies!" imaginary Ron said in her head.
"Harriet, what if he's a serial-killer? Even if he's just a grave-robber, he seems like a law-breaker of some sort," imaginary Hermione cried. "And who on Earth studies rust?"
But Harriet was fascinated by Sherlock's wide-ranging experiments and loved the fact that he patiently answered all her questions. The Dursleys wouldn't even give her the time-of-day, and even Hogwarts professors got irritated if she got a bit too curious. Snape was no better than the Dursleys, McGonagall was ok as long as she stuck to whatever they were doing in class that day, and Flitwick, for all his enthusiasm, was usually hogged by the Ravenclaws. Furthermore, all of them generally exhibited mild irritation if they didn't really know the answer to a question and told her off accordingly.
On the other hand, Sherlock never exhibited such impatience with her. Oh, he definitely got exasperated with her "slowness," for not reaching a conclusion as quickly as him, but even then, he took the time to break down his thought process and show her how he got there. Moreover, even when he didn't know the answer to a question, he considered it seriously and gave it his best shot; at the very least, he pointed her to solid resources.
Starting on her second evening in 221B Baker Street, Sherlock began giving her Latin lessons. "You will find that Latin is an extremely useful language in the demesne of science. It is also excellent as a foundation for learning the other Romance languages, such as French, Spanish, and Italian."
Harriet nodded enthusiastically. She didn't let on that Latin would also be useful in her spell-work as most of the spells relied on a bastardized form of the language.
On the side, Harriet tried to piece together her mentor's occupation.
"You perform a myriad of experiments, many of which deal with human bodies and people's interactions with the environment. You have a skull on the fireplace and are proficient with firearms, as evinced by the perfect smiley-faces that you've shot on the walls. You began with foreign language lessons but have since progressed to algebra, anatomy, and logic lessons. From all this, I surmise that you are a detective of some sort? Or that you do some kind of work related to criminology?" Harriet guessed after a few days.
Sherlock nodded approvingly at her deductions. "I am a consulting detective, to be precise."
Seeing that he wasn't elaborating, Harriet asked, "And what exactly is a 'consulting detective?'"
Sighing dramatically, Sherlock responded, "Officially, I am called in to provide support on cases when the Scotland Yard hits a dead-end. Unofficially, I solve the cases for the Scotland Yard since they're too much of dunderheads to do so themselves."
Biting back a giggle at Sherlock's overt disdain, Harriet queried, "The only thing that seems a bit out of place in all this is the logic -"
"Logic and deduction," Sherlock interrupted, "are essential in every endeavor, none more so than criminology. For example, you only have a limited amount of time to inspect and draw deductions from a crime scene; forensics and bystanders only need a short amount of time to contaminate it. During that time, a solid grasp of logic will enable you to piece together the chain of events that occurred there from a limited data set."
Harriet looked confused.
Sighing, Sherlock said, "You are currently living with me because you are in a position of some importance to Mycroft, and your previous guardians were abusive to say the least."
Harriet paled. "How did you -"
"On the day we first met, I noticed that you did not wear any makeup at all and had only small briefcase worth of clothes. That could have indicated that you came from a poor background, but your speech suggested that you attended a boarding school somewhere in Scotland. Furthermore, when our hands made contact, you flinched a tad bit. This, along with the aforementioned observations, suggested a distant relationship with your previous guardians. There was also the fact that you are much shorter and thinner than your peers, and your eating habits appear to be as appalling as mine. So, not just distant but downright abusive."
'Not good, Sherlock, not good,' John's voice urgently whispered in his head; since John had moved out, that voice had been becoming more prominent in Sherlock's mind, but Sherlock had long practice in ignoring real John, so mental John wasn't too difficult to overcome.
'Hush, John, I'm in the middle of my deductions speech. We have an audience, we have deductions, and now, the presentation will make or break the case.'
"All of this was further corroborated by the fact that you were staying with me now. This doesn't seem to mesh with the fact that you attend a boarding school, so a heiress to a great fortune then? If so, wouldn't your guardians have control of that? Unless they do, and one of the stipulations on that fortune is that you attend the school, so an alma mater for your parents then? Anyway, Mycroft is virtually the British government, so if you got his attention, that meant that you had to be someone important. Now, out with it, who are you?"
Before Harriet could respond, Sherlock barreled on. "I originally thought that Mycroft was simply implanting a spy within Baker Street to keep an eye on me. You were certainly younger than the usual ilk, but your youth could just be a ploy to make me less suspicious. But then, you expressed genuine interest in my experiments (some of the more gruesome ones were purely an attempt to drive you away, by the way) and have shown a unique level of inquisitiveness that even John never displayed, so I became convinced that you were no mere spy. Moreover, even a spy would know better than to pretend to not to know who I am, which suggests that you were isolated until recently. At any rate, back to my question - who are you?"
Harriet panicked. 'Oh no, I can't tell him about magic! Mycroft told me not to, which means that I have no protection from the Statute of Secrecy in this situation. What should I tell Sherlock?'
'Well, well, I'm..." Harriet stammered before a brilliant idea occurred to her.
Raising her head and imitating Sherlock's cool air, she responded, "I took the time to observe your activities and deduce your occupation. Wouldn't it be fair for you to take the time to the same with regards to my identity?"
Sherlock's eyes gleamed at the challenge. "Excellent suggestion, my dear! Rest assured, I will uncover all of your secrets!"
Harriet smiled back at him weakly. 'Whew, bought some time there! Good thing that I got rid of everything but my wand and Invisibility Cloak before moving in. And that I had the foresight to send off Hedwig to Hermione's place.'
Shaking her head, Harriet praised Sherlock effusively. "That was brilliant! Could you teach me to do that?"
"It is just a simple matter of observation, Harriet," Sherlock responded calmly; his gleaming eyes showed that he was extremely pleased by her praise and enthusiasm though. "Most people, I have noticed, tend to see but to not observe. For example, how many steps are there in our flat's stairs?"
"Around twenty?" Harriet guessed.
"Exactly twenty-three," Sherlock informed her. "A seemingly minor detail. But the idea is that a collection of minor details can build up to a valid deduction. Remind me to teach you about probability and statistics at some point, so that we can discuss the weaknesses in my methodology."
"Your brother mentioned that you tangled with a terrorist at some point," Harriet said slowly. "Was that a part of one of your cases?"
Sherlock looked at her slowly and consideringly. 'Hmm, she is young, but even so, she seems woefully uninformed about recent events. Then again, since her guardians were abusive, it is possible that she was far more focused on survival rather than on keeping up to date with current events. But what about the boarding school - wouldn't she have kept up with the news there?'
"I would suggest that you take a look at this blog," he replied smoothly, taking his laptop and pulling up John Watson's blog. "I also suggest that you read the news daily from now on, if only so you can help me find interesting new cases."
Harriet was reading about the Hounds of Baskerville with great fascination. John Watson was an excellent writer, she decided. The man was able to effectively capture the easy camaraderie between himself and Sherlock, along with Sherlock's own prickly personality, without losing sight of the detective's brilliance.
"John's blog is a bit too romanticized, Harriet," Sherlock said absently as he cut out a liver from a corpse. "I suggested it to you so that you could get an overview of the method and my cases. If you want a deeper understanding, my blog would be better."
Harriet made face. Sherlock may have been a genius, but an effective communicator he was not. His blog WAS interesting, but it was more akin to reading a textbook. An excellent learning experience but low entertainment value.
Mrs. Hudson came up the stairs, footsteps echoing lightly. "Sherlock, dear, someone is demanding to speak with you. Says he has a case that's right down your alley."
"Send him up, Mrs. Hudson," Sherlock said, dropping his surgical tools and rubbing his hands. "I do hope that we have one today."
"Harriet, dear, you're so thin! Are you sure -"
"Mrs. Hudson, red-haired man, waiting downstairs. Surely, it's rude to keep him waiting," Sherlock said sharply.
Mrs. Hudson scowled at Sherlock for interrupting her attempt to mother Harriet. Harriet looked to Sherlock gratefully; while she appreciated the woman's fabulous cooking and obvious solicitousness towards her welfare, she was eager to see the man in action, especially after reading through his cases.
Over the last few days, she had seen Sherlock dismiss several clients after a few moments of deduction alone.
"My pearls are missing -" / "It's obvious that your husband is having an affair and decided to give them to his mistress since you'd never worn them before."
"My aunt -" / "Is a drug addict. She pawned off your car for money. It wasn't stolen by the neighborhood thugs."
Harriet was extremely disappointed as Sherlock solved these cases within mere minutes. 'It would be cool to go on an adventure like he and John did!' she thought mulishly.
And here was her opportunity. A well-dressed red-haired man entered the room.
"Mr. Holmes, the name's Weasley. Lancelot Weasley. I believe that I've been scammed, but I don't know how."
COMING NEXT: The Red-Headed League
