Chapter Twelve - The Goblin Tongue

Saturday 13th October, 1990

CROUCH FAMILY DISGRACED… AGAIN!
FUDGE NEW FAVOURITE FOR TOP JOB
FOSTER TRAILS AS ELECTION DRAWS CLOSE

The House of Crouch faces its final disgrace after Madam Amelia Bones makes a statement revealing the details of the arrest of Bartemius Crouch Sr., Head of the Department of International Magical Cooperation, and former Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

What crime has the lauded Ministerial favourite committed, you may ask? Look no further than the wizard who faces trial alongside him: one Bartemius Crouch Jr.!

Crouch Sr. is accused of smuggling his son out of Azkaban by use of Polyjuice Potion. The DMLE alleges that Crouch Sr. and his wife, Mrs Elsie Crouch, were permitted a deathbed visit to the prison in late 1984 due to Mrs Crouch's failing health and Senior's high standing in the Ministry. According to Madam Bones, the Crouch parents took the opportunity to switch mother and son using the shape-shifting potion and left as normal. Mrs Crouch reportedly died just hours later.

In the years between the prison break and his arrest, Crouch Sr. had allegedly kept his son under the Imperius Curse at the Crouch ancestral home near Spore-in-the-Moor, in Devon. A confidential informant approached the DMLE in late July last year claiming to have seen Crouch Jr. in the house on a visit and was memory charmed to forget the incident. Madam Bones provided no explanation as to how the witness managed to overcome the memory charm.

A closed trial before the Wizengamot is set to be held on the 2nd of November after more than a year of investigation and a three-month-long covert Auror operation leading to Crouch Sr.'s arrest; an arrest which is notably after the 1990 Ministerial Election, making his candidacy ineligible due to his detainment. That law was put into place after Augustus Clipp's infamous 1903 Ministerial Election victory, which came just a day before he was tried and convicted for the Improper Handling of a Granian, and therefore ousted from the office, leaving Venusia Crickerly to take up the role.

Crouch Sr.'s forced withdrawal from this month's Ministerial Election leaves Cornelius Fudge, long-time Head of the Wizengamot Administrative Services, as the firm favourite to become Britain's new Minister for Magic since Albus Dumbledore (Chief Warlock and internationally renowned hero of the Global Wizarding War) has, for the third election running, removed himself from consideration for the position.

The Crouch trial also boosts muggle-born candidate Robert Foster's chances for the election, which begins in just under a fortnight. According to a poll this paper performed after Madam Bones' statement last night, 3 out of 10 voters approached believe that Mr Foster has a chance to win the election - the highest chances for a muggle-born candidate since Minister Nobby Leach's shock election win in 1962.

For Messrs Fudge's and Foster's comments on the Crouch trial, turn overleaf to pages 2 and 3.

To see profiles of Messrs Fudge and Foster, turn to pages 6 and 7.

'Harry, are you going like that, or do you want to get changed?'

A pull had made itself known as he'd read the headlines on the front page of this morning's Daily Prophet - a pull which had only gotten stronger as he'd read the accompanying article. The last nine years of his life had been spent intermittently becoming accustomed to the experience and recently he'd been getting better at recognising it and letting it lead him, rather than fighting it and having it just take over once it reached boiling point.

He folded the newspaper and put it back on the table before quickly gulping down the last of his squash as Mum walked into the kitchen. 'I need to come to Gringotts with you,' he said, surprising himself just as much as he surprised her.

Today, his parents were going to Gringotts for their last meeting about Mum's family tree magic. The dwarfs had already been offering the test in Velskytte's since August and it'd been wildly successful in North America. It had taken off in mainland Europe too once the Gnomes of Switzerland had followed the dwarfs example and started offering it in their branches. In Britain, the goblins were being difficult about the whole deal - as goblins often were - and Mum and Dad had been attending meeting after meeting trying to come to an agreement, while the goblins wanted a bigger cut, more assurances, more proof, or some other silly demand.

'Why?' Mum asked as she blinked in shock. 'I mean, the meetings are really boring. I think I'd prefer to spend time with Neville than deal with the goblins, to be honest with you.'

He shrugged. 'I don't know yet, but we'll soon find out. Do you know where my sunglasses are?'

'Oh!' she said, having taken a second to realise what she meant. 'Are they not in your room?'

'I don't think so.'

'Well have a look there first - a proper look!' she stressed, both of them knowing full well how terrible he was at finding things, '- and if they're not there then they might be in one of the coffee table drawers.'

Harry nodded and checked the coffee table first while he was downstairs, but the glasses weren't in any of the three drawers so he ran up the stairs towards his room. At his bedroom door he stopped in his tracks, suppressing his first instinct to check his bedside drawers; there was no chance he'd actually put them away properly after the last time he'd had them. Instead, he thought for a moment about where Mum would look first if she had to come up and find them.

With that thought, he walked straight towards the pile of clothes on the floor beside the laundry basket which had piled up from his many failed attempts at throwing shirts into it from the other side of the room. After he'd lifted up the third shirt and put it in the basket, he spotted the glasses in the back pocket of a pair of jeans. He gave himself a mental pat on the back, feeling proud of himself for how quickly he'd managed to find them, despite the fact that one of the lenses was cracked. It was the little victories, as Padfoot always said, though that was usually when he'd pulled off a pretty unimpressive prank on Dad.

'Can I borrow your magic, Mum?' he asked as he ran back downstairs into the kitchen.

She looked at the glasses in his hand critically. 'Let me guess: in the pile of clothes that you've thrown next to the basket?'

'How do you do that?' he complained.

Mum smirked at him as she pulled her wand and silently fixed the glasses in his hand. 'It's a Mum thing,' she said cryptically, as though that was any explanation at all, and herded him into the hallway.

'Are you about ready to go, kid?' Dad asked as he came downstairs, Thea in tow.

'Yeah, but I'm coming with you.'

Dad raised an eyebrow in Mum's direction, and just shrugged when she did. 'Alright then.'

'Why aren't you coming to Layla's?' Thea asked as she struggled to tug on her shoes.

Harry crouched down and helped her push her feet into the little trainers. 'I've got to see the goblins, squirt. I'll see you later when we come and pick you up.'

'Don't call me squirt,' the little girl huffed, and kicked out at him without any force. Mum still saw it though, and rounded on her.

'Thea!'

'Harry started it!' she pouted.

'And I'm ending it,' Mum said in a tone which clearly allowed no further discussion. 'Come on, get your coat on.'

-oOo-

Gringotts, Wizarding Britain's premier (and only) bank, had pride of place in London's magical district. The goblin bank had branches in a number of countries across mainland Europe and Scandinavia; the British branch was directly across from Diagon Alley's main entrance at the back of the Leaky Cauldron, standing tall and leaning distinctly to the left. Harry and his parents walked purposefully through the Alley, ignoring a few awed stares and whispers which seemed to follow them wherever they went in magical Britain. It was for that reason that they tended to stay in the muggle world.

Outside of the grand marble building, a goblin stood guard in his scarlet and gold-trimmed armour. He was maybe a foot shorter than Harry, which he noted seemed pretty tall for a goblin. The expression on his face was dour and severe, as if issuing a challenge to everybody at the same time, but nobody in particular.

In no small part because banking was dreadfully boring at the best of times, Harry had never actually been into Gringotts before. Of course, he knew from a number of books he'd read that the goblins were a warrior race, and weren't best known for their patience or sense of humour, and his parents (mostly Dad) had told him about the goblins' stubborn rudeness and how they more than made up for their lack of stature in sheer intimidation.

None of that had prepared him for actually entering the bank for the first time, though. The guard at the door bowed them in as they climbed the marble steps after studying them with a hard, critical gaze. They entered into a large, spacious foyer facing a huge set of double doors which looked to be made of pure silver, with a pair of armoured goblins standing guard on either side. An unsettlingly poetic message was engraved in large letters on the grand doors, warning against greed and theft. As they were bowed through the doors once more, Harry got a clearer view of the halberds the guards held and absently thought it'd be a really foolish thief to make an attempt on this bank.

The silver doors opened into a vast marble hall, lined on either side by two long counters, behind which about a hundred goblins sat on large stools, scribbling in ledgers, weighing gems and coins, or doing other such banking things. There were wizards queuing before many of the tellers, who didn't seem to be paying much mind at all to the amount of time they were taking.

As he looked around the room, drinking in the intricate masonry and the bustle of the bank, a wooden door in the corner of the room inexplicably caught his attention. It was nondescript - completely overlookable - but for the two guards standing guard either side of it. His vision darkened and, now recognising the next step of whatever purpose he had for coming here, he stood a little straighter and set off in that direction, leaving his parents to catch up with him once they realised that he'd marched off.

Once he had his back to the queues of wizards, he took off the sunglasses he'd donned before leaving the house. The armour these guards wore wasn't the same as those at the doors - the scarlet and gold trim was replaced with that of a dark midnight blue, and the Gringotts crest was emblazoned onto the centre of their breastplates. The goblins straightened up menacingly as he approached.

'The Chief will want to see me,' he announced without preamble in the raspy voice that was, by now, quite familiar to him. What wasn't familiar, however, was the language he spoke in. It was guttural and harsh, and he wasn't sure that humans were even capable of making some of the sounds that he just had - it had felt like he was choking on his tongue. He'd spoken Gobbledegook - the goblin tongue - he assumed, and not for the first time he found himself wishing he could call upon some of this magic at will. Maybe when he was older.

The guards glanced at each other before levelling their gaze back at him, not moving from their post. Obviously, he hadn't been clear enough.

'I see,' he continued in their native language. 'I'll leave you to decide between yourselves as to who gets to tell him that his people ignored the Master of Death.' Taking his sunglasses back out from his pocket, he smirked at their disbelieving looks. 'Who knows, perhaps one of you will even live,' he whispered in English and turned on his heel.

Mum and Dad were staring at him wearing twin shocked expressions on their faces as he started to stride confidently away. He'd barely made it five paces before the guards came to their senses. 'Halt!'

Harry stopped and turned slowly, smirking as one hastened to open the door. 'That's better. Please, after you.'

One of the goblins led them down a complex network of winding and forking stone corridors while the other remained in the hall, closing the door behind them. After a few minutes of walking in silence, Dad spoke to him in a whisper so as not to be overheard. 'I'm all for the direct method, Harry, but is it wise to be rude to the goblins?'

'There's a difference between rude and confident, Dad.'

'And which were you?'

They reached a heavy wooden door which was trimmed with gold and stopped as the goblin leading them knocked loudly three times before taking a step back. 'I think we're about to find out,' Harry whispered.

The door swung open and at the guard's signal they followed him into a large, opulent office lit dimly by wall sconces fixed to the walls every couple of feet. In the centre of the room was a large table with twelve simple wooden chairs surrounding it on three sides. On the fourth side was a bigger wooden seat, so intricately crafted and carved that it looked more like a throne than the chairs it accompanied. On the opposite side of the room was a wide desk, stacked high with a number of leather-bound volumes and reams upon reams of parchment.

After closing the door behind them, the guard hastened across the room and had a hushed conversation with somebody - presumably the goblin Chief - that Harry couldn't see for all of the clutter on the desk. A couple of minutes passed before the guard spun around and headed for the door of the room, quickly bowing to Harry and his parents as he passed them.

'I've been wondering when you'd come,' spoke a raspy, gravelly voice. 'I was expecting you years ago.'

The goblin to whom the voice belonged moved from behind the desk, finally making himself visible. Harry wasn't quite sure what he was expecting, but the mental image he would have conjured at the words 'goblin Chief' couldn't have been further from the truth. Somehow, he knew the Chief's name was Torgack - whether he'd read it in a book, or it was just a piece of knowledge that had made itself known thanks to Death, he wasn't sure.

Chief Torgack was taller than Harry was, and moved slowly, shuffling his feet more than walking. There wasn't much hair atop his head, but what was there was grey, matching a beard that reached the middle of his chest in a single braid. Beady, steel-grey eyes swept over them all before settling on Dad.

'Master of Death, you say? I knew your predecessor.'

Harry's vision went completely black as memories of previous meetings in this office suddenly flooded his mind; they weren't his, yet strangely they weren't completely unfamiliar either. The Torgack in the memories was much younger, much more well built. He stood a bit taller back then too, Harry noted as his eyesight slowly restored, though that was probably due more to the fact that the goblin was now slightly hunched with age.

'You were much prettier when I was Leland,' Harry bantered, as though this weren't the first time he'd met the old Chief. Though really, he supposed, it wasn't the first time at all.

Torgack's gaze snapped from Dad to him, and his white eyebrows raised in surprise before he barked out a laugh. 'You knew how to use your stones when you were Leland.' Harry flushed a deep red and Dad stifled a laugh as Mum glared at him. 'Well, that explains why it took you so long to turn up. I thought you were being a prick. The prophets told me you were back six years ago.'

'They're losing their touch; I've been back for nine. Harry Potter. Mum, Dad, this is Chief Torgack; Torgack, my parents James and Lily Potter.'

'Yes, yes, I know who you all are. I've not been living under a rock.'

Harry rolled his eyes as he heard Mum sternly whispering a 'Don't you dare,' at Dad, who was seconds away from pointing out that the Chief had, as a matter of fact, been living under quite a lot of rock.

'Sit down,' Torgack invited, waving at the conference table, though it sounded much more like an order. 'What can I do for you?'

'I don't know,' Harry admitted as he took the seat at the conference table directly to the left of the chair at the head. 'You tell me, you've been expecting me for six years.'

The goblin Chief grunted as he settled into his chair. 'I've known you were back for six years,' he corrected. 'I've only been expecting you for three. We've been going through old Death Eater vaults and estates as your Ministry levies more and more fines against them, and confiscated a couple of items that I kept. Thought they might pique your interest.'

'Oh?'

'What does the word Horcrux mean to you?'

It had meant nothing at all to him thirty seconds ago, but Harry's vision darkened as the knowledge of what the vile things were flooded unbidden into his mind. A shiver ran down the length of his spine as he realised just how reprehensible and magically corrupt the things truly were. 'Horcruxes? A couple of them? And you've just kept them around while you waited for me?'

Mum cleared her throat from across the table. 'What's a Horcrux?'

He screwed his nose up. 'Dirty, horrible magic. Darker than dark. They're a disgusting way to make yourself mostly-but-not-actually immortal, in the most twisted sort of way.'

'Oh,' she replied in a quiet voice. 'Somebody's cheating Death?'

Torgack hummed before Harry could respond. 'Somebody was trying to. The items are empty now though - I would have destroyed them immediately if they weren't. I was tempted to destroy them anyway. Loathsome things, they are.'

'Hold on, how are they empty if they're not destroyed?' Harry butted in.

The Chief shot him a toothy grin. 'I said you'd find them interesting. These were the Horcruxes of a certain Tom Riddle.'

'Oh.' Harry sat back in his chair and ran his hand through his hair. 'I should have guessed. Can I see them?' he asked. Torgack waved his hand, and a drawer in his desk opened from which two items soared out and came to settle in the middle of the table between the four of them. Harry reached out, but stopped himself before touching them. 'They're safe?' he asked the goblin, who nodded.

'That one was in the old Malfoy Manor, hidden away in a room full of magical shit that would make your blood curdle - some of it literally,' Torgack explained as Harry picked up one of them. It was a simple black diary with 'T. M. Riddle' inscribed in red on the spine. Flicking through it, Harry found it blank. While there was no doubt in his mind that the item was clear of Riddle's soul - every part of that monster was dead and gone - the diary still felt dirty to hold. A lingering sense of unnatural wrongness seemed to ooze from the thing.

He placed it back on the table and picked up the other item. It was a small golden cup with two finely wrought handles. On one side, a badger had been delicately engraved into the surface, while on the other were two Hs entwined in a fancy script. The second he picked it up, the room went dark once more. Looking down at the cup, he could see three threads attached to it and heading out of the room. One of the threads was a deep crimson and headed upwards and through the ceiling. While the other two were red too, they were a much lighter shade and seemed to be going in the same direction through one of the walls.

There was one more thread attached to the cup, but it didn't connect to anything else. It was a dully glowing white and seemed to be probing around as though searching for something to make a connection with - evidently, its fate was as yet undecided.

Harry looked at the table to where he knew the diary to be, though he couldn't see it. There were no threads attached to it at all. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, placing the cup gently on the table. When he opened his eyes, his vision was completely normal and he squinted against the sudden increase in light.

'There's something more going on with the cup,' he said to Torgack, who had been waiting patiently for him to speak, 'so I'd like to keep it. The diary can be destroyed though, preferably in the most destructive way possible.'

'That won't come cheap,' the goblin said pointedly.

Harry narrowed his eyes at him. 'And what price would you like me to quote to Death himself?'

Torgack huffed. 'I'm not a bloody charity.'

'You make plenty of money as is,' the young Master of Death retorted. 'Speaking of which, my parents came to the bank today for business of their own.'

-o-

After almost two further hours of discussion - though Harry wasn't involved with these ones - Torgack finally signed an agreement for Gringotts to provide Mum's genealogy tests in their branches, starting in Britain, and expanding into their European branches should they prove 'commercially viable' (read: profitable). From what he could gather, the goblins had taken a larger cut of the profits than the dwarfs or gnomes had, but at this point Mum was just happy to have them available to the British public, and so had agreed on the goblins taking forty percent.

Harry stretched as he rose to his feet once the negotiations had been finalised. He could honestly say he understood why Mum had said that she'd rather spend time with Neville than have more of these conversations. That said, he'd rather spend time with Neville than do a lot of things actually. He might not share his friend's interest in flowers and plants, but he still enjoyed spending time in the greenhouse - it was usually quite relaxing when it wasn't dangerous or backbreaking, even if he did have the polar opposite of green fingers.

'Do let me know if I can provide you with more of my charity, Master,' Torgack snarked as playfully as a goblin could, bringing him out of his musings.

Harry rolled his eyes, and went to wish him goodbye, but stopped suddenly and turned to face the old goblin fully. 'Actually, there might just be something,' he hedged, as his vision dimmed slightly yet again. 'Is that old body still capable of shenanigans?'

Torgack raised an eyebrow at him. 'I'll have you know that this old body is still capable of everything it was before Leland died.' He smirked, then added. 'Some new things too.'

Dad snorted aloud, evidently unable to hold himself back this time, and Mum huffed. He wasn't quite sure what Dad found so funny, but experience had told him not to probe into such things too much. Harry walked over to Torgack's desk, plucking a quill and a blank piece of parchment from it. He quickly scribbled down a note and folded the parchment in half before handing it over to the Chief.

'We could even call it a favour. Think you could manage that?' he asked with a falsely innocent smile.

The Chief unfolded the parchment, scanning it rapidly, and his eyebrows shot up to where his hairline had been more than a hundred years previously. 'And what kind of shenanigans would you class this as?'

'The best kind,' Harry chirped cheerfully. 'Will you do it?'

Torgack sighed and brushed his hand across the top of his nearly bald head. 'We never had this conversation.'

Harry smiled as he pushed the golden cup into Mum's bag. 'Of course not.'

A/N: There's a little bit of everything in this chapter (except Hermione - it's coming, I promise!), so I hope you enjoy it.

Endless thanks to Proton and Bob49 from the HMS Harmony Discord server for beta'ing this chapter for me, it's much better for their input, I promise. You can join the discord server by searching 'hms harmony discord' on Google. We'd love to have you.

Thank you for continuing to read and enjoy Three Hallows' Eve!

Stay well, amidland