A/N: Thanks for all your continued support! For those of you who have asked for more stories of Harry growing up, I will try not to disappoint! Expect some interludes, flashbacks, or tale telling later in the story. As to why the American schools haven't contacted Harry, well, maybe I just haven't told that part of the story yet!
Disclaimer: Not mine, no profit.
The following evening, Minerva sat in the living room of Andromeda Tonks receiving a brief lesson in how to use a telephone. It seemed fairly straightforward, though Minerva found the idea of instantaneous communication across the world to be a novel concept. The things Muggles thought of! Apparently they weren't limited by national networks like the Floo. Mrs. Tonks had also explained that "email" was another form of international instantaneous communication, for letters instead of conversations.
After the lesson, Minerva was left alone to make the call. She took a deep breath and dialed.
"Hello?" said a female voice after a few rings. Minerva jumped; she wasn't used to disembodied voices. At least a Floo call allowed you to make eye-contact while talking.
"Hello?" she repeated, scrambling to remember the phone etiquette she had just been taught. "Oh, uh, this is Professor Minerva McGonagall from Hogwarts. Is this Ms. Devereaux?"
"Good morning, Minerva!" the woman sounded quite pleased. "I wasn't sure we would hear back from you. Yes, this is Sophie Devereaux."
Minerva's eyebrows shot up. She wasn't used to people calling her by her given name without a much longer acquaintance. The woman didn't even have the excuse of being American: her accent was obviously British.
"Ms. Devereaux, I received the letter from your," she paused here for a second. What was the precise relationship between Harry and this woman? He had referred to her as a caregiver, not as an adopted mother. "Ward," she finally decided. "Although Hogwarts isn't open during the summer months, I would be honored to arrange a meeting with you and your ward to discuss Mr. Potter's magical education."
"Why isn't the school open for tours?" Devereaux asked, sounding surprised. "Surely we aren't the first prospective family to be interested in our child's education."
Minerva frowned down at her lap. Discussing the wards around Hogwarts could be a very touchy subject with Muggle families.
"No," she admitted, "you aren't. Most magical parents attended Hogwarts when they were young, and already anticipate sending their children here. However, about a quarter of the children we invite to Hogwarts come from non-magical families. We usually hand-deliver letters to these families and provide practical demonstrations. Unfortunately we cannot invite them to tour the school as there are strong wards designed to repel non-magicals. I must impress upon you the secrecy of our community. The only non-magicals who are allowed to know about the existence of magic are those directly related to a witch or wizard. Those who violate the Statute of Secrecy face severe consequences."
There was silence on the other line, then a male voice asked: "What kind of consequences?"
Minerva was surprised. She hadn't realized that more than two people could participate in a telephone call.
"It depends," she said. "If Mr. Potter were to tell his friends, for example, his friends' memories would be erased and Mr. Potter would be placed on probation. A second infraction would cost him his wand and his access to magical education. If one of his guardians were to tell other adults, everyone involved would have their memories erased." She decided not to mention that the Ministry would likely seize the opportunity to remove Harry from his Muggle home. She didn't want to scare them before they had agreed to let him come to Hogwarts.
"You can do that?" asked a new male voice. "Erase memories?" He sounded profoundly uncomfortable.
"Yes," said Minerva. "Magic can do many things, though mind magic is restricted by the Ministry."
"What's to stop you from erasing our memories and stealing JP if we agree to meet you face to face?" The man's voice was calm and curious, but Minerva thought she could detect a threat in the way he said it.
"Quite a bit," she said firmly. "First, my own morals would never allow it. Second, it is illegal to steal a child from his legal guardians. Third, erasing a child's mind like that would do irreparable damage to his magic."
"I notice that you didn't say it was illegal to erase our memories," said Ms. Devereaux.
Minerva winced. "It is only legal to obliviate a Muggle who has wrongly learned of the existence of magic."
There was another pause, and Minerva got the feeling that they had no trouble at all reading between the lines. This call was not going as well as she had hoped.
"Ms. Devereaux, I can assure you that you will be quite safe meeting with me. I only mentioned memory erasure because I don't believe in lying to the families of my students, and you asked me a direct question. I also believe the rest of this conversation would go best in person."
"Very well," said Ms. Devereaux.
"I would advise a meeting in London," Minerva suggested. "There is a hidden shopping center there where you can purchase Mr. Potter's school supplies."
It only took a few minutes for them to agree on the details of the meeting. Minerva hung up feeling pleased, but also a bit worried. Harry's guardians sounded quite cautious. Hopefully she could convince them to come around the next time they spoke.
The day before they were supposed to fly to London, Uncle Hardison invited JP to spend the afternoon at his apartment. JP was shocked; ever since they had determined that he was infected by gremlins, he'd stopped getting invites to Uncle Hardison's house. It had hurt even as he had assured his uncle that there were no hard feelings.
JP waved to Aunt Sophie as she dropped him off. He ran all the way up the stairs, too excited to wait for the elevator.
"Uncle Hardison!" He gave his uncle a brief hug before pushing past him into the apartment. It was just as he remembered it: a spacious living room with an epic entertainment center and closed doors leading off into a bedroom and a work area.
"Hey kiddo," said his uncle, following him into the room. "Wanna go a few rounds of Mario Kart?"
"Yeah!" JP jumped slightly and ran for the leather couch. Uncle Hardison laughed and followed at a more sedate pace.
They spent the afternoon playing video games and eating junk food. JP loved every minute of it. He hardly ever spent time alone with Uncle Hardison. His other relatives tutored him in the family business, but Uncle Hardison had remained "just" an uncle after JP had proven himself incompatible with technology. When they did spend time together, it was always like this; all fun and no business. Uncle Hardison occasionally lost a game system when JP got too worked up, but he always took it in stride and never made JP feel bad about it.
After a few hours, Uncle Hardison put the game on pause and turned his full attention on JP. Curious, JP put down his controller and looked at his uncle.
"I thought about that letter," said Uncle Hardison. "This whole magic thing seems kinda weird, but Eliot says we should take it seriously. So I did some research and ran some experiments on you."
JP's eyebrows shot up. He hadn't noticed any experiments. Well, he'd noticed Uncle Hardison fiddling with his backpack once or twice, and someone had painted the hall phone (the only one JP was allowed to use) a rather ugly red-orange color. Honestly, though, he was used to having gps trackers slipped into his backpack along with a lunch sack, and he'd learned not to question the decoration decisions of his relatives.
"What did you find out?" JP assumed that his uncle had come to some conclusions since he was bringing it up. He could feel his excitement building up and did his best to calm down. High emotions tended to invoke the gremlins.
"Be as excited as you want," Uncle Hardison told him with a broad grin. "I think I might've figured out a way to keep the gremlins from wreaking havoc."
He held out a wrapped box, and JP tore into it without a second thought. It took him a minute to work out what exactly he was holding: a brick masquerading as a phone. Like the hall phone, it was painted reddish orange. It had a fine metal mesh covering it completely which made the screen difficult to read, but not impossible.
"Try it," urged Uncle Hardison.
Hesitantly, JP dialed HQ. He had a brief chat with Uncle Nate before hanging up. It had worked.
"Will it keep working?" asked JP, staring hopefully at the ugly device. Cell phones sometimes lasted weeks with him before they exploded or stopped recharging.
"I think so. It's coated with iron and silver, which are supposed to keep magic away, and it's surrounded by a faraday cage. If that's not good enough, well," Uncle Hardison shrugged. "I think you're doomed to be a luddite."
"I'll just make sure to recruit a good hacker for my team," he said with a shrug. "Or maybe there're magical equivalents?"
"I'll look forward to hearing all about it," said Uncle Hardison, pulling him in for a hug.
"I still don't think it's a good idea for all of us to be here," said Sophie, carefully keeping her voice low. "She did say she could mess with our memories. Wouldn't it be better to keep someone – or somethree – in reserve?"
"We've already had this argument," Nate pointedly avoided looking at her. "And we agreed that presenting a united front was more important."
"At least send Parker to the other room!" Sophie glanced over at the blonde thief who was sitting on the hotel room bed, timing JP as he raced to open a series of padlocks. She lifted her arms and cheered as JP opened the last one. Sophie smiled fondly as her nephew crowed in triumph.
"How do you think she would feel being excluded?" whispered Nate, following her glance. "She loves that boy and she has as much of a right to meet this professor as the rest of us."
Sophie had to admit that was true. If Parker were capable of being a parent, JP would be calling her mom by now. Still, it galled her to walk into a potentially dangerous situation without at least one ace up their sleeve.
Before their conversation could devolve into a full-on argument, someone knocked on the door. Sophie immediately sat back, squared her shoulders, and dropped into character. JP jumped off the bed and hurried to the door, pausing for a moment to follow Sophie's lead. She smiled proudly as the excited little boy fell away and was replaced by the calm, mature image he intended to project this afternoon.
JP opened the door and smiled politely up at the woman. She was tall and rather tense. Her bun was too tight and she was trying to hide how uncomfortable she was in her conservative pantsuit. She looked, Sophie decided, like a stereotypical schoolmarm.
"Good afternoon," said JP with his I'm-really-cute-and-it's-okay-if-you-underestimate-me smile. "You must be Ms. McGonagall." He stuck out his hand and gave her a polite, firm handshake. "I'm Harlin, but most people call me JP."
"My, what a gentleman," she said with a rather tight smile. Sophie could tell that she was falling for it, though. "It's a pleasure to see you all grown up, Mr. Potter."
JP gave her another smile as he ushered her in the door. "Please come in, ma'am. Let me introduce you to my guardians."
Sophie stood as Minerva entered and JP shut the door behind her. They had spent a long time debating how to present themselves and their relationship to JP. On the one hand, they wanted to make sure that they had an obvious legal claim on the boy. On the other hand, they didn't know how much this woman knew about his actual past. It seemed likely that she knew more than they did, since she kept referring to him as Mr. Potter. Eventually they had decided on something very close to their original legal fiction.
"Sophie Devereaux," she introduced herself, sticking out her hand. She smiled warmly as they shook hands. "This is Nathan Ford," they shook hands. "We've been raising JP since his adoptive grandfather died, per Mr. Leverage's wishes. Nate is CEO of the company JP will inherit upon his majority."
"A pleasure," said Minerva, though she didn't look entirely pleased by their claims. She looked pointedly at the other three adults in the room. "Ms. Devereaux, I thought I made it clear that this matter was to be a private affair between myself and Mr. Potter's guardians."
"As the governing board of Leverage & Associates, legally we're all Harlin's guardians," Hardison chimed in with a less-than-friendly smile. "Mr. Ford and Ms. Devereaux are simply the closest thing he has to parents. Consider us his aunts and uncles."
"And you are?" asked Minerva sternly.
"Alec Hardison." They had decided against fake names. If JP did decide to go to this school for the next seven years, it would be more effort than it was worth to maintain believable alter egos.
"Parker," said Parker, still sitting cross-legged on the bed, surrounded by popped locks. She got Sophie's pointed glance and added, "Jessica. Parker."
That wasn't the name they had originally agreed she would use, but it probably didn't matter. At least she'd come up with something normal sounding.
"Eliot Spencer," said Eliot from his guard position by the door that connected to the next room.
Minerva looked like she was trying to decide whether it would be worth the effort of objecting. Finally she sighed, apparently deciding to accept the situation for what it was.
"Very well," she said, "we may as well get started."
"Please have a seat," Nate invited, gesturing to one of the empty chairs around the table. Minerva, Nate, and Sophie all sat down around the table, with JP quickly joining them. This put Eliot directly behind their guest, with Parker in her peripheral vision and Hardison leaning against the wall behind Sophie's left shoulder.
Minerva launched into an explanation of Hogwarts. She described the curriculum, demonstrating some of the things that JP would be learning in each of his classes. It was all Sophie could do to keep her mouth from hanging open as she watched as the witch turned the lamp into an owl, made several pillows fly around the room, made JP's chair tap dance while he clung to it and laughed, conjured a glowing silver cat that seemed to radiate peace, and provided JP with a vial of yellow liquid that temporarily turned his nails pearlescent. She gave them a brief explanation of the wizarding world, explaining their government and providing a few examples of post-Hogwarts careers. It sounded both wonderful and incredibly backwards.
"Ms. McGonagall," said JP, after asking a series of school-related questions, "I've been hoping you could tell me more about my birth family. We assumed Potter must be my birth name, but Grandfather never could find my birth certificate. How did you know?"
Sophie folded her hands on the table and watched as Minerva focused her attention on JP. Her stern façade was not holding up very well to JP's onslaught of cute-innocent-and-mature.
"Ah, Mr. Potter. You look just like your father, but you've got your mother's eyes. They both attended Hogwarts, you know. As fine a witch and wizard as ever graced our halls. James Potter was especially talented at Transfiguration, which is the subject I teach. He was a mischievous one, but he grew up to be Head Boy. Lily, now, she was the best witch of her decade, despite being Muggleborn."
"What's Muggleborn?" asked Sophie. She didn't like the sound of that 'despite.'
"Someone whose parents aren't magical; Muggles, we call them. I don't put any stock in the theory that purebloods are inherently better at magic, but Muggleborns are at a disadvantage when they enter our world, as I'm sure you can imagine."
"I see," murmured Sophie, who still didn't like the sounds of this. She exchanged a pointed glance with Nate.
"So what am I?" asked JP with a little frown.
"You're a Muggle-raised pureblood," said Minerva, looking somewhat put-out with the direction the conversation was taking. "Though some might call you a half-blood, since your mother was Muggleborn. Your father's family, however, was one of the oldest and purest."
"Do I have any blood relatives on my father's side?"
Minerva's face tightened even more. "No immediate relatives," she answered, "though you have any number of second and third cousins. All the pureblood families are related, you see."
JP nodded slowly, then asked the question that really had them all curious: "What's my birth name?"
Minerva looked startled. "Harry James Potter," she said immediately, with a tone of voice that got Sophie's hackles up immediately. That sounded like reverence. No one should say an eleven year old boy's name that way.
JP made a face. "Harry?" he repeated. "Ick. I'll stick with Harlin or JP, thanks."
Sophie watched through narrowed eyes as Minerva seemed to go through a quick series of emotions: disappointment and amusement were prominent, as well as worry.
"You don't think he'll be able to go by his chosen name?" Sophie questioned sharply.
Once again Minerva's face tightened. There was something she really didn't want to tell them, and Sophie was becoming desperate to know what it was. If there was anything out there that might threaten her little boy, she wanted to know now. Her mind flashed back to Eliot's report of magical terrorism and dangerous men.
"Tell us the truth," Sophie added when it looked as though Minerva was going to choose to bite her tongue. "We've done our research. We know magic can be dangerous. If this has anything to do with my child…" She bit off her words, recognizing that her voice was getting a bit too shrill.
Her words had an immediate effect, though not the one she was hoping for. She was hoping that her little outburst would get Minerva to hastily reassure them that JP would be completely safe at Hogwarts and that her hesitation stemmed from something else – anything else. Instead Minerva's face drained of color so fast that Sophie thought she would faint.
"What does Harlin have to do with the magical terrorist attacks from the 90s?" asked Nate, voice steely. She didn't bother to look over at him.
"How," gasped Minerva, knuckles white as she gripped the edges of the table. "How on earth could you know?"
"Let's start with you explaining the connection, Ms. McGonagall," said Nate. "You've confirmed for us that one exists."
So Minerva told them the story of the Dark Lord and the Boy-Who-Lived.