Harry was leafing through some of Riddle's less dark looking books (skipping over such enchanting titles as Blood Magick: Curse Thy Moste Traitorous Friends and Vile Enemies and Torture in Ancient Sumer: An Illustrated History & Guide), when the woman in question glided in from the bedroom.
Or she assumed it was Riddle anyway. Standing there was a person-shaped wool cloak with the hood up and a smoky, gray obscuring spell cast where the face should be.
"That's a lovely skulking about cloak," she said.
And it was. The dark green reminded Harry of the thick woods surrounding them. Embroidered black vines of Devil's Snare coiled along the hems and shimmered in the light as if slowly creeping free of the fabric, ready to strangle all they met. The whole thing exuded an elegant sense of menace. She wondered if it was gift from a follower.
Riddle lowered the hood and her head popped into view. She looked impeccable, as ready to mingle with the underworld as attend a gala. She was equally untouchable by all.
Her dark brown hair fell in big waves, curling underneath to just above her shoulder. Her brows were perfectly manicured despite everything, starting thick and elegantly tapering to frame her long black lashes and ever suspicious blue eyes. Cheekbones so sharp that she could stab a man and he would be grateful.
Harry couldn't help but watch today's deep blood red colored lips as Riddle spoke.
"I have to go gather some information about the mountains. While I'm gone, do you think you can manage to exchange funds and get supplies?"
"Good. Great even. Um, I mean that I'm really great at sneaking into banks. Yes," Harry said as she bounced back into reality. What was she even doing? Riddle being whatever the 50s equivalent to a supermodel was a universal fact. You did not acknowledge it. And you certainly didn't near swoon about it like a teenager.
Riddle made a disbelieving hum.
"I don't know why I even bother to ask you things sometimes."
"I'll just need a quick makeover first. Basic beauty spells shouldn't set off any of the security alarms."
Polyjuice potion would have been better, but a few quick spells later and her hair had lengthened, straightened, and changed to a sandy blonde. A full face of makeup later, it was like she was a different person. She certainly didn't feel like herself.
The glasses remained since apparently not even magic could do anything for that bad a prescription.
Riddle cocked her head, examining the changes.
"You look adequate."
"Thanks, Riddle. Be still my beating heart."
Unlike its muggle counterpart, the heart of Magical Albania was in Gjirokaster rather than the more modern Tirana. The balance had sifted some in Harry's time to keep pace with population centers, but Gjirokaster was still where anything important actually got done.
And where things got done, there was a Gringotts.
Harry wound her way through the sloping light gray stone streets and bright white stone buildings, looking for the Turkish-style coffee shop that marked the entrance to the magical side.
She fiddled with her headscarf, trying to act natural. The long skirt underneath billowed out as she walked and she hoped that she didn't need to run for her life today. Why couldn't Riddle hide out somewhere jeans were popular? She looked old fashioned compared to the other women walking about, but less out of place than she would have looked before.
Harry racked her brain, trying to remember any of Hermione's impromptu history lessons, but it was near zilch. While they were living in the tent trying to find the horcruxes, she had expressed Voldemort was wandering around here in the 1950s and explained that the country was a dictatorship, its borders largely closed to even the other communist countries. Which sounded kinda dangerous and Harry would really like to avoid the whole "arrested and shot as spies" thing Plaka mentioned.
And there was the coffee shop. Harry watched a family slip in, taking off their coats to reveal wizarding robes. She followed after them, marveling at the brightly lit cafe filled with travelers talking together over their drinks. It felt worlds away from the homey but dingy Leaky Caldron.
She made her way out of the white archway in corner, heading straight for the gleaming columns of Gringotts that she could see built into the hillside.
Once inside she walked purposely to the nearest open teller, making sure not to make herself stick out by gawking. This was casual, every day, absolutely nothing to see here business.
"Are you aware that several of these coins have not yet been made?" the goblin asked once she had poured out her collection.
Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.
"Maybe?" Harry finally settled on. What was the right answer to this sort of thing?
The goblin harrumphed.
"Maybe she says! Wand wielders," he said with disdain.
"Is that alright?"
The goblin looked at her incredulously before looking back at the small pile of galleons.
"Do you plan on destabilizing wizarding currency or causing any damage to Gringotts, either monetarily or to its reputation?"
Past physical damage probably didn't count since it had already happened. Would happen. Whatever. Merlin knows she had already paid the massive (and inflated - how much could a roof even cost?) damages for that already.
"No," she answered decisively.
"Be aware that you will not like the consequences if you do" he said, his grin somehow managing to show every single one of his very sharp teeth.
"Consider me to be very aware," she said with a vigorous nod.
She had heard lots of stories from Bill about all the sorts of things that happened to those unfortunate to cross or double cross the goblins. Being an economy destabilizing time anomaly was probably even worse in their book.
She highly preferred all her limbs to be attached to the correct places and her organs to be kept internal, thank you.
A black shadow detached itself from a nearby column. She turned to look, but then was distracted when the teller continued on.
"And that you will not have access to any accounts that may or may not exist already until you have been added to them in your natural time. Bets under a certain threshold may be placed, but with a considerable percentage fee to be paid to Gringotts."
"No accounts, maybe bets. Got it."
"Then no. Gringotts does not concern itself with the problems of wizards, no matter how unusual or ridiculous."
"Oh. Okay. That's — that's great news. Thank you," she whispered, glancing around at the other customers to check for any eavesdroppers.
She was undecided if this was her second or third weirdest time at the bank.
Afterward she wandered through the streets. It was set up more as a long bazaar filled with stalls in front of each store.
She stopped at a display of impossibly stacked books, browsing for any titles that looked suitably sickening enough for Riddle's tastes yet not "giving ammunition to the enemy" future dangerous. She settled on a book of local legends, handing over some coins.
She watched a little boy try to catch a toy snitch at a nearby stall. Next to it, two wanted posters caught her eye.
Badly done police style sketches of herself and Riddle glared (well, Drawing Riddle did anyway. She mugged for the camera and glared and positively sneered at Drawing Harry and the little boy. She was kind of cute in her tiny ferocity though and Harry wanted to put her in her pocket to keep forever. Drawing Harry meanwhile was smiling away like a right plonker and occasionally waving to passersby like it was a parade.)
Was this where Riddle got the idea for "Undesirable No. 1" in the future?
Oh, her reward was much higher. Riddle was going to hate that.
Sounds of a scuffle erupted from a nearby alley and Harry heard a frightened cry. She raced towards it.
Two men with their wands drawn had cornered a young woman, a baby clutched tightly in her arms.
"Hey! Get away from her!" Harry yelled, enhancing her voice so it boomed along the alley.
"This doesn't concern you, witch," the taller one said, glancing at her before turning his attention back to the younger woman and saying, "hand over the baby and you won't be harmed. Your family will get him back once the ransom is paid."
"I said get the hell away from her," Harry yelled again as she sent a warning blast to their feet.
They turned, wands still drawn, and fired back a bombarda and diffindo that Harry ducked.
The woman was frozen in panic behind them. Harry tugged her head to the side, hoping that the woman would understand the signal to get going. Her eyes widened, and she quickly edged herself towards the alley entrance.
"Where do you think you're going?" the shorter man asked, trying to grab at the baby, but Harry knocked his arm away with a bone breaking curse. The woman raced down the alley and disappeared around the corner.
Sneaking into Gringotts? What the hell was Harry up to in the future?
Tamsin couldn't imagine that someone who refused to even steal from a muggle could be a bank robber. Was Harry in danger in her time? It didn't truly matter since she would never get back there, but it was concerning all the same.
Tamsin did not like her toys getting damaged unless she was the one doing it.
She sent off an owl to Abraxas Malfoy to gather information on if there were any pure blood families with a daughter under eleven named "Harry" or any variation of it. If she was a half-blood or mudblood, then there would be little or nothing to find. But then why conceal her real last name if it wasn't important?
She peeled off from the more sun filled streets filled with shoppers, heading into the more dangerous part of the city. Decorative awnings crisscrossed above the narrow avenue, darkening the streets enough to make it comfortable for dark creatures and those who didn't wish to be easily identified.
She pulled down her hood and pushed open the thick wooden door at a tavern, the wordless sign displaying a blood dripped saber.
It was largely empty of patrons, except for a few scattered vampires and hags that eyed her intently before returning to their drinks.
"Voldemort, I didn't think I would see you again so soon after your trouble with the viscount," said the bartender. His toothless, ghoulish grin poked out from underneath his too large mustache.
He gestured to various wanted posters plastered along the far wall. A caricature of her face looked sullenly back while Harry, in the next poster over, waved and beamed up at her like it had seen its favorite person in the whole world. It was rather adorable. She tamped down the ridiculous urge to wave back.
Even more embarrassingly, her poster listed Tamsin as "Unknown English Revolutionary's Accomplice" and scaled her bounty accordingly. Her insides burned. She was the visionary, the revolutionary! And breaking out of jail had been her plan in the first place.
But business first. She could avenge herself later, after she had taken over Europe. She would have whoever made the posters put to death then while she overhauled the clearly incompetent auror force.
"I seek an audience with Vivaldi," she said.
The bartender signaled towards the dark hallway behind him.
He brushed against her as she went by, his worthless hands running along her side. She whirled around, knocking him backwards as her wand dug in painfully at his throat and her sleeve-hidden dagger pressed against his side.
"If you ever dare touch me again, I will fillet your skin into ribbons and then let stray dogs tear apart your still alive body in the street before your mother's house," she hissed.
He nodded, his hands in the air as he slowly backed away. She looked around the bar to see if anyone else wanted a fight. A hag nodded approvingly to her while the rest of the patrons pointedly focused on their drinks.
She continued on, letting her eyes adjust to the darkness. Dim yellow light poured out from underneath one of the far doors. She knocked firmly, her knuckles echoing against the wood the only sound in the hallway.
"Enter," a low voice drawled.
Vivaldi sat behind his desk. He was a tall, gangly man, all lean muscles and sinews. A large burn scar disfigured half of the vampire's face, continuing down his neck and disappearing underneath his shirt collar. It was rumored to be from when Nero burned Rome. Some even whispered that he was Nero. Or maybe Caligula, given his reputation.
"I've come for a map of the Accursed Mountains. What is your price?" she asked as she stood in the doorway. She kept her tone calm and polite, but not subservient.
He nodded to the chair by the door and she settled in sideways, keeping both him and the open doorway in her line of sight.
"Even with a map, there is little chance of you returning," he said. It was deep and lulling. She felt the vampire's natural compulsion laced into it, but it dissipated like mist at her occlumency barriers.
"We'll just have to settle payment up front then, won't we?" she answered in a matching drawl as she withdrew a thumbnail sized vial of basilisk venom and set it on the desk. The glass glittered in the lamplight.
"Basilisk venom. Even a single drop is fatal. There's no counter," she said.
He examined the tiny bottle closely, bringing it towards his working eye. The milky white liquid sloshed slightly at the movement.
"Do you not want to also barter safe passage? It could be arranged at a small additional price. It would not even need to be your own blood. Your new friend would do just as well," he said.
"She's off limits. I have plans already," Tamsin answered.
He laughed. Tamsin felt a chill go down her spine at the sound but let nothing show. She was not sure if vampires being able to smell fear was true or only a well cultivated myth on their part.
"I accept your offer," he said, "Inna! Bring me a map of the mountains."
A moment passed, silent between them, before a corpse pale woman-like creature appeared. Her long red hair, stringy and wet, glistened and nearly covered the white linen draped dress, like some sort of perverse Rapunzel. Inches of fabric dragged along the floor as she moved. A sweet, murky smell permeated the room. It promised still waters that hid their dangerous depths.
She presented a rolled parchment, handing it to Tamsin at Vivaldi's nod.
"This foolish young woman is headed into your homeland. Do you have any advice?"
"Do tell my sisters that I said hello," Inna said, before fading back into the darkness of the hallway. Tamsin desperately hoped that the rusalka would be long gone by the time she needed to transverse it again.
Tamsin examined the map, quickly scanning its features and the runes marked along it. Their business concluded, Tamsin made her way back to the street as quickly as she could get away with in a leisurely stroll.
Back in the dim daylight, she let out a shaky breath and pulled her hood back up. She paused at a stall selling all manner of dangerous antiques that would look at home in Borgin and Burkes.
A pair of matching silver necklaces with circular pendants caught her eye. In the center of each was a single pale blue, iridescent stone with star rays etching out from them. She had read of lover's moonstone before, but it was rare to see an intact pair. After being connected to a couple's magic, the stones crack upon the first lover's death.
"You've a good eye," the shopkeeper said, "with these you will never lose track of your love again as long as even their spirit remains. It's a good investment in these dangerous times. For a pretty lady such as yourself, it's only 2 galleons."
Tamsin loudly scoffed and they bartered back and forth before settling on a price.
She headed towards her favorite bookstall on the main street. The laws here were non-existent when it came to books that would get her sentenced to life in Azkaban back in England.
A small crowd had gathered next to it and Riddle could hear the muffled sounds of a battle.