Snips and Scars In Which Houses are Sold, a harry potter fanfic

Chapter 43, everybody! We're making progress! :D

In other news, my goal is still to update every week this summer, so we'll see how that goes. Hopefully well.

Onto the fic…we're kinda addressing a bunch of Sirius-related stuff that pops up in later books, not the least of which is Kreacher. Well if Sirius doesn't want all that stuff….

Thanks for the review, slytherinsal! It's so weird when we first get new glasses because we just kinda resign ourselves to 240 and then get it bumped up to 4K. :O Pigwidgeon is definitely a silly name and yet weirdly it fits. XD

Thanks for the review, James Birdsong! Thanks! I hope the next one is just as pleasing! :D

Everyone took a few days after returning from Diagon Alley to enjoy their new acquisitions—Mrs. Weasley tried to tell Sirius they could pay him for everything but Sirius waved her off, telling her the purchases had been "thanks for being told he was a good boy even when he wasn't."

"It's good for the self-esteem, you know," Sirius said.

Hedwig took Neville's present after Harry wrapped it, giving a very pointed look at Pigwidgeon (the name had stuck, to Ron's chagrin) before flying off with all the dignity she could muster.

They did top up on potions ingredients on a later trip, Remus supervising when Harry was brewing ("Sirius near a cauldron is just asking for trouble," he had said, which Sirius couldn't exactly argue with).

Other than that, the only trips worth of note were when Sirius had to go for his follow-ups at St. Mungos (at Remus's insistence) and when both Sirius and Remus went off to undisclosed locations during the full moon. At least until Sirius got an official-looking letter from a handsome sooty that told him that Gringotts' curse-breakers had finished with his house. Sirius was happy to send a letter to Dumbledore before writing back and saying that he'd be in to sell it as soon as he could get a date nailed down.

"Pity I can't sell the house elf that comes with it," Sirius muttered. "Kreacher was left to his own devices for too long, I'm afraid—skulking about the house while my mother's batty portrait screeched at him."

"Told you rich old families have house elves," Ron told Harry.

"What does happen to him?" Harry asked Sirius.

"He stays with the family—me, unfortunately," Sirius said, grimacing. "I'm not too thrilled about this—he's hated me since I took off, and he has a habit of parroting some of the family's worse prejudices."

"Can't you ask him not to?"

"I've told him that it reflects poorly on the family, which got him to cool down somewhat—and then I had to send him to Hogwarts for a while because he kept trying to stop the curse breakers from working the house over. How dare this filth touch my mistress's things," he said, affecting a shrill tone. "I swear he loves the family junk more than I do."

"Why not give him all that then, since you don't want it?" Harry asked. "I mean, as far as I know all you can't give him is clothes, right?"

"Bribery, then," Sirius said. When Harry nodded: "Well I suppose it can't hurt."

Harry and Ron followed him outside, curious, nodded politely when he said that he didn't think summoning Kreacher in the house was a good idea, and then called the house elf.

Harry could see why right away. While Dobby and Mipsy were both fairly tidy, Mipsy much more than Dobby, Kreacher was a mess. Harry had honestly thought Sirius had summoned a pile of dirty rags at first, and its language wasn't much better.

"'Blood traitor'?" Harry asked Ron.

"Present," Ron said, raising a hand. "All Weasleys are, it's a thing."

"All right knock it off," Sirius said irritably. "Kreacher, we've talked about you talking like that."

"Mistress would approve," Kreacher muttered treasonously.

"I'm sure. Now, Kreacher, the filthy half-blood godson of mine whom you so insulted actually brought up a good proposition. I told you I was selling the house—I forbid you to interrupt with a tantrum wait until I'm done—and since I'm not taking any of the family heirlooms, I'm letting you take them."

Kreacher froze. "What?"

"Every last stick, down to the last least fork—you can even take Mom if you can get her unstuck from the wall. I'm selling the house completely furnished, I'll let Dumbledore know what's going on, and when I get the new house bought or built or whatever I'll make sure you have a nice shed or something to keep it all in. Sound good? Kreacher please stop crying."

Kreacher wasn't, Kreacher was blubbering about how good and wonderful Master Sirius was for trusting poor Kreacher with his mistress's most beloved heirlooms—Harry danced back when he moved on to sobbing at his feet for making such a kind-hearted suggestion master's godson is so kind and good—eventually did stop crying long enough for Sirius to tell him to go take stock, which Kreacher did at once.

"So that was unexpected," Sirius said.

"I think I've been lucky so far to have avoided the other house elf encounters," Ron said, still staring at the place Kreacher had been.

"Dobby was about the same," Harry told him. "I'm wondering if it's a house elf thing."

"Perhaps. Well then!" Sirius said. "I guess the only thing left to do is sell the house—and find a new one I can't keep sleeping on your mother's hearth forever, Ron."

"Dad and Percy are starting to complain about having to step over you to go to work," Ron agreed.

"A mark of a good dog then."

Sirius left the next day for Gringotts with the intent to sell his house, said he didn't anticipate this taking too long. Harry and Ron decided to pass this time with walking to the Lovegood's and checking in on how Luna was handling her gnome following.

Very well, if the little houses everywhere were any indication.

"Gnomes are frightful good luck," Mr. Lovegood told them, gesturing a little with the small house he was holding. "The Muggles obviously know this as well—Arthur told me about these little gnome houses that they put out to attract gnomes."

Harry wasn't really sure how to explain to Mr. Lovegood that Muggle concepts of gnomes were entirely different from the wizarding reality (it hadn't gotten any easier since he had the same question about Luna), decided to ask instead if they would be able to go to the Quidditch World Cup Final or if they'd be listening in from home.

"We're undecided," Luna said. "The Quibbler has been doing well enough we could afford tickets, and there's certainly a chance of humdingers showing up…."

"But there's also a chance of rowdy Quidditch fans," Mr. Lovegood sighed. "Although considering it's in the general neighborhood for once…we'll see."

They turned down the offering of turnip tea and headed back for the Burrow, Ron assuring them that he'd send any gnomes he saw their way. "We've got a surplus," he assured them.

Once they were out of earshot: "So that was mental," Ron said.

"You don't have as many gnomes to deal with," Harry pointed out.

"True…and I hate to say it, but what if they're on to something? What if Muggles really do put out those houses to attract gnomes?"

"I'm pretty sure like ninety percent of our neighbors in Privet Drive had those houses because they thought they were cute, not because they were hoping to attract gnomes. Muggles think gnomes look like little bearded men, not potatoes with legs."

"That's not really a better image—I mean, I don't want some hairy little guy living in my yard."

"I don't think anyone does, Ron."

By then they were back at the Burrow, Mrs. Weasley putting out tea, and finding that Sirius wasn't back yet.

"They probably wanted to go over the house with him," Mrs. Weasley told them. "He'll be back by dinner."

Sirius was not, dinner came and went and Remus and Mr. Weasley and Percy came back well before Sirius finally stumbled through the fireplace, looking dazed.

"Sirius!" Harry barked, hopping up and running over. "What happened?"

Sirius waved them off, Ron and Remus asking the same questions, the Weasleys asking if he was all right—"I'm fine. Ish," he said finally. "I need a drink first, though."

"Why? What happened?" Remus asked as Mr. Weasley got a measure from the bottle he kept in a high cupboard. "You were supposed to be selling a house what took you so long?"

"So the goblins wanted to go over everything before the house officially changed hands," Sirius said, knocking back the glass before handing it back to Mr. Weasley. "Thanks, need another one, might want to pour yourself one too—actually everybody of drinking age. Not sure if you kids should be hearing this—"

"What happened," Harry said, irked at that. Sirius seemed to sense it, although his next question made Harry wish he had taken him up on that offer.

"Have any of you lot ever heard of a Horcrux?"

Harry, unfortunately, had indeed heard of a Horcrux, as had the Weasleys, and explaining this to Sirius robbed him of whatever color he had regained from Mr. Weasley's bottle of firewhisky.

"So I was wondering why Dumbledore got that house elf to bring that ratty old diary," Sirius said. "He met me at Gringotts, I told him I didn't want to spend any longer on that house than I needed to and I told Griphook—that's the goblin that was handling the sale—that it was fine—"

"Oh I know Griphook," Harry said. "He's the one who handles my vault."

"Well it's good to know he's got good taste. But anyway—he and pretty much every goblin in Gringotts was not happy with this, because apparently the locket that they found that had this Horcrux was Slytherin's old locket and they have opinions about old goblin-made stuff being tainted like that. So do I, come to think of it—I had a bit of someone's soul stuck in my house. And not just any someone's—"

"Voldemort."

"How'd you guess?"

"The diary," Harry said. "Dumbledore said it was a piece of Voldemort and if he wanted to compare the two—"

"And You-Know-Who had to be the heir of Slytherin to be able to open the Chamber of Secrets," Ron agreed.

"I don't know, all Harry had to do was speak a little Parseltongue and that worked," Fred pointed out.

"Yes well—wait what?" Sirius asked, looking at Harry.

"It's a long story," Harry said.

"Harry can talk to snakes, it doesn't take that long," George said.

"Asides, you saw him have a little hissy conversation with Mauve last year," Fred added.

"But then again, a lot was happening then, so we can forgive him for that slipping his mind."

"True, George."

"We were revisiting this later," Percy said. "Back to there being a second Horcrux."

"Yes well—Dumbledore and the goblins did a bit of magic to see if the pieces of soul actually came from Voldy, the unfortunate answer is yes. which then led to the question of how the piece of gross got into Grimmauld Place to begin with—"

"Maybe You-Know-Who was actually giving bits of soul to really Dark families," Ron mused. "I mean he gave the diary to Malfoy—"

"Which is what Dumbledore said, which reminded me that my brother Regulus was a Death Eater—and well, Kreacher liked him and he liked Kreacher so that led to me calling Kreacher and asking him about it—

"Kreacher threw a whole fit and a half at the sight of that locket—said that Reggie had gotten sick of what Voldy was doing and found out about it, got Kreacher to help him go get it—by the way there's Aurors heading to where that thing was because apparently Voldy left some nasty stuff there—and Reggie told Kreacher that if he failed then Kreacher needed to get rid of it and…Reggie was a good guy," Sirius said, looking at Remus in consternation. "I mean yes he followed the family business and worked for the biggest jerk since Grindelwald but…he ended up trying to do the right thing in the end."

"Some people change," Remus said, Snips bowing his head in what Harry thought was respect for the dead. Sirius nodded, coughed, continued.

"So anyway, the bit of gross in the locket is gone, finito, no more," Sirius announced. "Terminated with extreme prejudice by the goblins, and now Dumbledore has the house. Which means I need to go back to house-hunting after a long shower to scrub that whole thing out of my thoughts—"

"We tried," Ginny said.

"It doesn't help," Ron said sourly.

"And also I have concerns about what you kids get up to at school because from the sounds of it you put us to shame. And that's with us sneaking out late every month."

"Harry just has that special talent that every troublemaker needs," Fred said.

"Now if only he used it," George sighed, earning the twins slaps upside the head from Mrs. Weasley.

Sirius looked at Harry for a long time, like he was deeply considering this. "I mean on the one hand I agree, but on the other I'm not sure I'm ready for gray hairs."

"I'd like a much calmer time of it, to be fair," Harry said, Snips nodding fervently.

"We all do," Mrs. Weasley said. "Now bed—the lot of you."

It still took a long time for them to exhaust talking through the horror of someone making two Horcruxes, and by the time Harry fell asleep it was the late hours of the night.

Falling into a disturbing dream that he didn't quite remember the next morning wasn't appreciated, nor was his scar prickling when he did wake up.

He decided to just chalk it up to talk of Horcruxes and move on with his life, such as it was.