Harry and Dobby rode the knight bus in silence, Harry had been excited to try and find out how the knight bus worked but after the first jump he focused on not trying to throw up. Once they finally arrived they realised they needed to find a place to sleep, it occurred to Harry that in order to pay for a room you needed money and neither Harry or Dobby owned Muggle money.
They couldn't even transfigure money since Dobby had never seen Muggle money before and Harry was not skilled enough at transfiguration to make money that would pass inspection, when Harry had confessed to the innkeeper at the inn that they had no money to pay for a room he had said "Search out old Frank Bryce, he's the caretaker of the old Riddle house up on the hill down in Little Hangleton. Some of the locals may give him a bad rep but I knew him in the war, he's a good man. He probably won't be able to pay you but I reckon he would let you stay the night and give you food and the like in return for some help working around the house."
The two had needed to walk almost six miles to reach Little Hangleton and by the time they had arrived the sun had long since set, Harry had knocked on the small cottage behind the Riddle house and an old man opened the door, Harry absently noticed he was leaning heavily on his walking stick "Ehh, what ya want?" he grumbled.
"Erm, I was told you might consider letting me and my… brother stay for a few nights, we can work to make up for lack of money" Harry said hopefully, he had already warned Dobby to remain largely silent around Muggles, otherwise he would have stood out as different the moment he spoke.
"Told that, were ya? Awfully kind of em" He let out a sharp bark like laugh "You say you two can work? I might be able to find room for ya then, I'll warn ya now you may need to prepare your own food in the mornin's."
"Thank you sir, that's no problem me and my brother can both cook"
Frank let them in and showed them his spare bedroom, there was a thin layer of dust over everything in the room "This is yours for as long as you want to stay, I start work at 8 in the mornin', if ya wanna join me then I won't stop ya."
After Frank had gone Dobby had waved his hand and all the dust in the room instantly cleaned itself up and collected in a corner. Since there was only one bed against the wall Harry said "I'll let you have the bed Dobby, I'll just make a bed on the floor. Also you might want to come up with a Muggle name that I can call you in public, since the Muggles will think that your name is strange."
Dobby tried to argue and get Harry to take the bed but Harry had already formed a small flat square of mithril and a chisel, he quickly inscribed the preservation rune and gave the mithril the idea to use the excess magic to grow to a specific size. Once it had finished growing Harry broke the rune, the mithril square now looked like an inflatable mattress that had been fully inflated, just made of metal.
He then added the ideologies of comfort, softness and warmth, the two then settled down into their respective beds and quickly fell asleep, Harry did make sure to cast his typical locking charm on the door, it wouldn't stop a determined wizard but it would give him a warning, against a Muggle like Frank it would be impenetrable.
Harry and Dobby spent the first few days finding a routine, in the mornings they would wake up, prepare both breakfast and lunch for themselves and occasionally Frank, then the three would leave the cottage and go around the grounds of the manor doing whatever work needed doing, often just gardening, sometimes they would do various maintenance tasks that always seemed to sprout up with the old houses such as the Riddle Manor.
The three would go back to the cottage and eat the lunch they had prepared earlier, they would then have a short rest before continuing their work, finally Frank would call the day over and let the two do their own thing, on the first day Harry and Dobby had sorted out their room and planned what they wanted to do while in Hangleton, on the second day they had left the cottage and walked to the nearby graveyard.
Harry did not want to ask Frank if he knew where the grave of Cadmus, the main reason was that he wanted to avoid suspicion, the second was that he wanted this to be his own journey and adventure, fortunately for Harry he found the grave within the Riddle graveyard.
The grave had the name Cadmus Peverell, above the name was a familiar small triangle, line and circle symbol that was similar to Dumbledore's symbol, Harry assumed this was the original symbol for the objects of death that Dumbledore had based his own off, the symbol on the grave was also on top of the title of Dumbledore's copy of 'the tale of brothers three' he compared the small triangle on the grave with the small triangle inked into the book, they were definitely the same symbol.
The grave said that Cadmus had been born on the 9th of August 1213 and died 19th of May 1292, that meant he had died almost 80 years old. It was strange, Harry thought, he had always assumed Cadmus had died young, although now that he thought of it the book never revealed the ages of the brothers.
The only other detail on the grave was the message "May Hades see him well", Harry knew that Hades was a Greek god from his books when he was younger, he didn't think people still believed in the Greek gods by the 13th century, Harry also couldn't help wondering why a wizard's grave would have the name of a Greek god inscribed into it when every pureblood witch and wizard at Hogwarts all seemed to be atheist.
There was no other Peverell gravestone but plenty of Riddles, there were also various other names, one of the more common being Gauntus, which Dumbledore had already mentioned in his copy of the book, Harry noticed that the three most recent graves was clearly for a son, mother and father, all three had the exact same date of death almost 50 years ago.
When they had returned to the cottage Frank was resting in his rocking chair with a hot water bottle on his knee "Saw you two go down to the graveyard" he commented as they walked in "What got you so interested in it?"
"I had been told I had family buried there, I wanted to see if I could find their grave" Harry said honestly, Dumbledore had suggested in his book that the Potters were distantly related to Cadmus and that he had been buried here.
"Ahh… did you find what you were looking for then?"
"Yes" Harry said simply, not wanting to reveal what grave he had been looking for "I also happened to notice the grave of Tom Riddle and his parents and the fact they all had the same date of death"
Frank sighed deeply "Ah, I was working for them when they died, the cook went to give them their food and found all three dead in their seats, not a mark on them. The staff blamed me of course and I got to spend the night in a police cell. People still talk about it, it's own of the reasons I avoid the village since they still blame me to this day. Aside from the actual murders the only unusual thing I remember on that day was this young lad nosing around near the house… looked remarkably similar to yourself now I think about it, except he had black hair. Of course by now he would probably be old enough to be your father… or grandfather even." Frank mused.
During the evenings Harry also helped Dobby talk properly, it was hard going but the elf was learning under Harry's patient teaching. Dobby in turn taught Harry what he knew of the history of the elves, it turned out that elves were originally much more like wizards than their modern counterparts.
The elves were renowned for their powerful nature magic, wizards got jealous and started imprisoning elves and controlling their magic, even back then elves were entirely dependent on external sources of magic compared to wizards and goblins who had an internal source of magic, for the natural elves they got their magic from the environment, it sounded like the various nature nymphs from mythologies were based off the elves.
Due to the elves dependency on external magic they could not go far from the places they were born, a wizard found a way to replace nature magic with his family's magic, giving him almost complete control over the elf. The elves suffered under the wizards magic and every generation the offspring would be weaker than the previous generation, by the time Dobby was born the elves heritage had been forgotten by all but the elder elves who had been told the story by the elders of their own time.
Harry had been watching magic interact with Dobby, with a witch or wizard the aura came from within, however for Dobby he had a constant field of magic surrounding him that was constantly in motion, when Dobby used magic he formed his intent and will internally then used the magic around him to actually power it.
It was as if Dobby had none of his own magic and was just renting magic. The Malfoy magic had almost constantly tried to hurt Dobby ever since he had joined Harry but due to the mithril boots, the magic had to ask Harry for permission before it could hurt Dobby, which he had denied every single time.
After a week had passed Dobby suddenly stopped receiving the Malfoy family magic, it seemed the family had finally disowned Dobby. Harry quickly made his own magic take up the slack and then started forming a new piece of mithril, he knew this would be the most complicated piece of mithril he had ever formed.
He made a small stud of mithril and gave it several ideologies, the most important were hidden, no fixed structure, obedient and changeable. He then had Dobby hold the stud in his hand, the stud seemed to vanish instantly and he asked Dobby to think of an item of clothing, a finger-less glove formed around his hand that looked like real leather, checking with his magic Harry was thrilled to see the glove was still made mithril, it just appeared to be leather.
Letting out a breath, Harry then made the mithril generate magic to also told the mithril to only produce magic when Dobby needed it, he slowly withdrew some of his own magic from Dobby and felt the mithril take up the slack instantly, he withdrew all of his magic remaining ready to give it back if needed. The mithril was quite capable of completely sustaining Dobby. When he asked Dobby to use magic the elf was able to cast even the most complex of elf magic easily without any difficulty.
"Oh Sir, Harry had gifted Dobby his own magic! Dobby will never forget great master's kindness and generosity!" Dobby had wailed, crying with joy, it was clear he had longed for magic of his own and Harry was pleased to have been able to give such a gift, Harry then slowly removed the protective ideologies on the elf's shoes.
As he worked Harry absently noticed that Dobby's magic had changed, first his magic had gained a much healthier shade of yellow ever since the Malfoy magic had been controlled but now the yellow was extremely vibrant and had mixed with the green of Harry's own magic, except unlike how the magic of the Philosopher's Stone had interlaced with his magic, Dobby's magic had laid over the magic, the green magic also seemed to sparkle which Harry had never seen before, when Dobby transfigured the bed into a desk, the magic from the mithril had been what powered the transfiguration while Dobby's magic seemed guided it.
Harry suspected Dobby now had an unlimited source of magic just like himself, but since the magic did not use his body as a conduit Dobby could theoretically transfigure the entire planet without burning up, he wondered if he should put some sort of limit on the magic but in the end he just shrugged, if the elf did go crazy and kill everyone with his infinite magic at least it would be interesting.
Harry decided there was only one place left in the Hangleton that he wanted to look at, that was why Harry was now in the greater Hangleton library researching, Cadmus Peverell.
Despite being a wizard it seemed the muggles had still written about Cadmus, there had been a great battle for the village in 1238, it had been Cadmus who had led an army to defend the village along with his two brothers, the invaders had managed to get far into the town before being stopped and only a few of the defenders had survived.
One of the survivors had been Cadmus, during the battle his fiance had been killed. Since to Cadmus had been the leader and the battle having such a high cost for both sides the battle was known as 'the Cadmean Victory'.
Cadmus had left Hangleton after the battle and only returned many, many years later to live out the rest of his life until his death, the history book did not say what Cadmus did during his missing years but Harry had a guess.
In the tale of brothers three it said Cadmus had tried to use the Resurrection Stone to bring back his dead love, the fact he spent almost 40 years away from Hangleton gave credence to the idea the brothers made the three items rather than find or get given them, if his brothers had also been involved in this battle that could also explain why Antioch had wanted an unbeatable wand and Ignotus a cloak that was undetectable.
Harry decided he had learned all he could about Cadmus from muggle sources and knew it was time to move onto Godric's Hollow, first though he wanted to visit Diagon alley to convert what was left of his wizard money from the year before into muggle cash. He told Frank that he was planning on leaving the next day and the man only grunted to show he understood, Frank had never been overly warm to them but he had been kind enough to let them stay in his cottage and eat his food for work, he also seemed to tolerate them after the first few days, the man seemed to enjoy quiet and Harry could respect that.
Neither he nor Dobby had any possessions that needed packing, almost all Harry owned had remained in his school trunk or was made of mithril, the inflatable mattress was the only large object to pack up and Harry just absorbed the magic until it was back to its original smaller size and just chucked it into his trunk, the room looked like they had first found it, just cleaner and far less dusty. As they left Frank said "You boys do good work, if you ever need a place to sleep… well your the first to ever use that spare bedroom. Take care of yourselves."
Dobby apparated them to the Leaky Cauldron, he was unable to apperate them to either Godric's Hollow or Hangleton as neither he nor Harry had been to the villages before and did not know the location. Dobby had never been to the Leaky Cauldron either but he was able to obtain the magical location from Harry when he said the location.
That was one of the subconscious pieces of magic wizards never noticed, when a witch or wizard spoke, their magic imbued itself into their words, when Harry said 'the Leaky Cauldron' his magic automatically included the magical location of the pub and an image into the words.
A witch or wizard was not sensitive enough to pick up either but as an elf Dobby was able to feel it and could then apparate to the pub, Harry suspected the fidelius ward worked by stopping the magical location from being included into a witch or wizard's speech unless they were the secret keeper.
Apperating with Dobby was strange, it felt as if they had paused in space and the planet was moving beneath them, then once their location was close to them they would suddenly rejoin the planet which was an extremely unpleasant experience, however Harry felt it was still miles better than riding the Knight Bus.
Once they had entered the alley, Harry strode up to Gringotts and joined the line, eventually they reached the goblin behind the desk "Yes?" the goblin asked wearily
"I would like to convert these galleons to muggle money please" Harry asked politely
"Five galleons for one pound" the goblin said, not even trying to hide his look of boredom
Harry passed over 20 galleons and the goblin carefully counted them, he then withdrew a piece of parchment and asked "name?"
"I'm sorry?" Harry asked confused
"I need your name for the receipt"
"Oh, I'm… Harry Potter" Harry felt it would be a poor decision to lie to the goblin, one of the goblin's thick eyebrows rose slightly as if mildly surprised
"Ahh, Mr Potter, we expected to see you last year. Your family's account manager has been going frantic trying to reach you. Wait here" the goblin jumped off his high chair and through a pair of doors behind him, he returned a few moments later with an even smaller goblin "Follow Griphook, he will take you to your account manager. Here is your money as well."
Griphook led him and Dobby through a maze of corridors and into a small office, the ceiling was so low Harry suspected most adults had to crouch to fit, luckily even in his aged up disguise he was still a few inches smaller than the ceiling, the goblin behind the desk was the most finely dressed goblin Harry had met so far.
"Greetings, heir Potter, I am account manager Silvertooth. I need to go over a few documents with you"
Silvertooth proceed to list the properties and possessions held under the Potter name, it was not much but it was more than Harry had ever owned in his life. The goblin then handed over a small silver bowl and knife, Harry picked up the knife and felt the magic running through it. Upon looking more carefully, he realised it was made of mithril, Harry grew excited at seeing another mithril item but then remembered Dumbledore telling him that the goblins had been using mithril for generations.
He then remembered Dumbledore warning Harry against letting the goblins see his mithril as they might take it as a personal attack, suddenly conscious of the three mithril rings upon his finger and the multitude of mithril objects in his trunk at his feet he hoped the goblins hadn't seen them.
"Please get a drop of blood into this bowl for me, Mr Potter"
Harry drew the knife across his palm and thought he hadn't cut hard enough as he had felt nothing, but looking down he saw a thin line of blood on his palm, it seemed the knife had been formed to not cause pain.
Once the blood had entered the bowl Harry absently drew his magic out of his blood that remained on the knife and let it collapse back into him, Silvertooth looked at him with what Harry thought might have been respect.
"It is not often we see a wizard capable of such a level of control over their magic. Of course most wizards don't enter Gringotts with their elf, disguised as a human, by their side. Nor do they wear three meithralum rings upon they hand, you make a refreshing change, Mr Potter… no need to look so surprised, we goblins do pride ourselves on our meithralum formation and evaluation after all."
"I was warned that you might take offense to me learning how to make mithril" Harry said sheepishly
Silvertooth shrugged "And yet you strode into Gringotts with them in plain view? Rest assured, we do not care. Magical knowledge is not something to horde or hide away, now the items we make with our own hands are most assuredly ours but magic? Nobody can claim ownership of that, least of all wizards."
Silvertooth poured the blood within the bowl out onto a tablet, also made mithril or meithralum as they called it apparently. The blood was absorbed into the mithril and strange letters began being written onto it, the letters made no sense to Harry but Silvertooth nodded.
"Well Mr Potter, you are the sole heir of the Potter and Black fortunes and beneficiary of House Peverell, you have a claim over some houses but you are unable to claim these until you become Lord of house Potter. Since you are unable to claim them currently they shall remain undisclosed, you currently have access to your trust account and the Peverell emergency vault."
After getting a run down on the few properties still standing Harry was about to leave when Silvertooth said "The Peverell's may not be very well known now, but the House stood long before the wizard's government, as such when you come of age you will hold a lot of sway over their government. I would personally advise you to learn as much about their government as you can before coming of age so that you do not get taken advantage of. I would very much like to see more gold flowing through your vaults and that can't happen if you lose it all by being uneducated."
Harry had been given a temporary key to open his trust vault that would only work once and advised to talk to his key holder about getting his primary key back. Apparently Dumbledore was his key holder and despite not giving him his key once he reached Hogwarts, Silvertooth admitted that Dumbledore was not a bad key holder as no vault under the Potter name had been opened since they were last closed by James Potter before his death.
Once he had reached his vault he was amazed at how much gold was present, he knew he only had one trip so filled three large bags with galleons, he then let the goblin seal the vault after placing a featherweight charm on the bags and went back up to the atrium, going back to the original teller he placed an entire bag of galleons on the desk and said "Could you convert all of these galleons into pounds? I will take one pound for four galleons"
"Earlier you were happy with five galleons" the goblin said dully as he began counting out four galleons and then stacking one pound
"Earlier I didn't know I had so much money" Harry said self consciously
"I don't care. So long as we can get rid of these awful muggle coins I don't care what we get for them"
"Three galleons?" Harry asked hopefully, the goblin shot him a deadly look but started counting out three galleons, eventually there were no galleons left in the bag and it was filled with pound coins, Harry then loaded all three bags into his trunk and left the bank, he had gotten more than he had hoped from that trip and was looking forward to Godric's Hollow.
Many fanfiction stories either have the goblins flock to help Harry or are extremely aggressive, but I personally prefer the goblins being largely uncaring, in this story Harry is only important to them in that he has a few vaults that has money and they can get money from that money.
At the moment I am fairly interested in expanding upon the elves and how they relate to the wizarding world, when writing this chapter I was thinking "Will there be any downsides to freeing Dobby and giving him his own magic? Where did the elves come from? How do they compare to other magical beings such as goblins and veela?" in my head I have a few answers to those questions but whether those questions get answered in this story I do not know.
This chapter is named after the story 'A Cadmean Victory' by DarknessEnthroned which I strongly recommend