Going through the gate – the spell of sealing, as Silvertooth had called it – was like having his whole body abruptly go pins-and-needles, a slightly uncomfortable tingling that spread through him until, suddenly, he was through.
Immediately he saw why Gringott's' had installed so many security measures. The vault was huge. Torches set into the walls and columns at regular intervals came suddenly to life, illuminating the cavernous room with unnaturally steady firelight. A vaulted roof stretched to great heights over his head, supported by marble columns that marched down the length of the room. The spaces in between the columns were filled with heaps of treasure – there was no other word for it – that towered like glittering hills almost to the roof, overflowing so that only a relatively narrow corridor of floor was left uncovered, bisecting the center of the vault.
Even his Aeons were impressed.
*My word…*
*Now you can buy yourself a new wardrobe, Harry,* Shiva sent to him, causing Harry to wonder what made females – even female (as far as he could tell) Aeons - so intent on items of clothing. Even Hermione, the most sensible girl Harry knew, could wax as poetic on the importance of being well turned out as she could on the fascinations of Transfiguration.
*Yes, yes* Quetzalcoatl sent in agreement, half-startling Harry. He relaxed again as Quetzalcoatl continued: *Get yourselves some real training-wear, not things so large you spend half your time hitching them into place as actually doing exercise. And, Harry, you will need better clothing for the training to come. Perhaps some pieces of armor, too…*
*And you need to get better clothes, period. Not just for training, but – really, Harry, the cast-offs of a pig? Further, his color-blind mother picked them out for him. You can do better.* And Harry laughed at Shiva's blithe insults before moving forward. A wardrobe? That was the least of his concerns right now. If he wanted to buy new wardrobes for himself, and for every member of his House, every month of the year, he could. And do it without making a noticeable dent in his newfound wealth.
He walked down the steps that led to the vault – where he stood, with the spell of sealing crackling furiously behind him, was the entrance-place of the vault, an alcove set into the sheer rock wall. Fifty feet below was the treasure-heaped floor of the vault.
He moved carefully; loose unset stones and various coins littered the steps, as if untidy children had left their playthings behind them. He could tread on something that would skitter off underfoot, and fling him down the steps – which, they being steep and many, would likely break his neck. And wouldn't that be grand? Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived Through Several Encounters With Voldemort, being killed by one of his own gemstones.
***
The vault was lit up clear as day, the torchlight reflected by surfaces of gold and silver and various precious stones so that the very air seemed bright. Harry didn't even need to take one of the torches along with him, just left them in their brackets to blaze as steady as Muggle lightbulbs. The light and the dimensions made Harry feel as if he were in some kind of ancient cathedral, subterranean and vast.
There was such an amount of sheer wealth here, in this vault that was now Harry's and had been his father's and his grandfather's, that he could not quite think of it in its entirety. Later, he would know intellectually that the vault contained around sixty-nine billion Galleons in various currencies, and treasures and deeds of land and property whose combined worth (if you did not listen to historians, who claimed that some of the artifacts there were beyond price) was eighty-three billion Galleons. But there are numbers so vast – especially, sometimes, when it comes to things that move the world, like money or men – that the mind does not fully grasp the true import of the numbers. So Harry walked slowly through the subterranean cavern, appreciating it not for its sheer worth – not completely – but more for the small flashes of uncommon beauty here and there.
He walked slowly down the corridor whose walls were treasure-heaps, sometimes stopping for something interesting. He scooped up a handful of golden coins, not Galleons but something older, and let them trickle through his fingers like sand, back to their pile with a sound like struck tuning forks as they fell. He knelt to examine a statue of some sort of solemn-faced deity, all massy gold and encrusted with turquoise and sapphire. There was a rolled-up tapestry near that, and Harry unrolled it to see a forest-scene embroidered onto the still-snowy cloth with vibrant-colored threads, the style grand and medieval in a heraldic sort of way.
The vault was full of wondrous things like those, and Harry's progress to the front of the vault was rather gradual. Once, he stopped, and looked to the left and right of him as he saw narrow corridors cleared through. He was, by now, in the very center of the vault and the corridors led to doors set into the walls, dividing the vault into four cardinal points – the entrance at the south, the doors to the east and west, and the front, marked by a large box on a dais, to the north. He looked at the doors for a moment before continuing to the dais.
*Harry,* Shiva sent to him. *I've noticed something. The things at the south, near the entrance, were all your sort of money, and not a lot else…but as we go further north the coins change and different sorts of stuff start cropping up…*
*It's nearly chronologically arranged,* Quetzalcoatl sent thoughtfully. If someone older and perhaps university-exposed could have heard the gray eagle, he could have told Harry that was the tone of an academic with an intellectual puzzle. But no one but Harry could hear the Aeons. *Your ancestors must have been depositing their wealth here ever since there were ancestors to deposit…and they just kept adding and adding.*
Harry nodded once, but sent nothing in reply. By this time, he was nearing the dais at the farthest end of the vault. He mounted the wide marble steps to where the box sat in great state. The box was crafted of dark oak wood, shiny not with polish but with years and years of handling, carved round with what Harry thought were runes. A strange metal, unidentifiable to Harry, banded the sides. He lifted the lid, noting the runes pulsed once with light as his hands touched the wooden surface, and began to leaf through the papers therein.
They ranged from old parchment, held from complete disintegration only by a battery of preservative spells, to modern and almost-Muggle looking sheets of paper. Harry lowered himself to sit cross-legged on the marble floor, reading with great interest.
At the very top was a thick sheaf of parchment that had the Gringott's' seal on top, which seemed to detail the contents of the vault; another sheet, also emblazoned with the Gringott's' seal, gave an inventory of his trust-fund vault, complete with records of how much he had withdrawn each year since starting Hogwarts. There were several deeds to lands and estates held in the Potter name – which included castles in England, Scotland and Wales, and other estates in several locales – each of which trumped anything Vernon could find in Majorca, even if Grunnings promoted him beyond his wildest dreams. This prospect Harry relished greatly.
There was a sheet of paper stapled to the back of the deed to the Welsh castle – which looked fairly modern, actually. Harry glanced at it casually, only to freeze when he saw the name signed with flourish at the bottom: James Potter. He sat very still for a moment, before tucking the deed into the drawstring bag.
There were other things, too, complicated-looking contracts and legal documents, which Harry got somewhat less than the full gist of. His family had something to do with a few corporations, he gathered.
*What you need,* Shiva announced with a certain tone, *is one of those people who do nothing but analyze your money for you. You're only fifteen, Harry.*
*You mean an accountant?* Harry pondered this for a moment. *That's not such a bad idea…heh,* he suddenly chuckled, switching back to regular speech. "Who would have thought I'd ever find myself needing one? The Dursleys would go mad." Harry suddenly found himself laughing hysterically. Filthy rich, filthy stinking rich, literally more money than he knew what to do with – and all it cost him was a childhood and a family. He ought to tell Ron that. It was so easy to become rich…
***
*Harry! Harry!*
He lifted his head as the Aeons' increasingly desperate calling finally registered. He wondered for how long they'd been at it. He roughly swiped a balled-up fist across his eyes, noticing that his glasses were lying on the ground and that his face was tear-wet. He'd been crying. When had he started…?
*Harry?*
"I'm…I'm okay," he said quietly. He didn't feel like sending.
*…all right,* Quetzalcoatl sent. Shiva was silent. *Are you done, then? With the documents, I mean.*
Harry looked down at the bundle of papers in his lap. He sighed. He couldn't really understand what they said, after all – not totally – and if he was going to take Shiva's advice and hire an accountant, he could review the documents with a professional on-hand later. He began to place the papers back into the box, but set the bundle down again when he saw something else in the oak container.
It was a small sphere, made of something clear like glass, and inside it was a ring. When Harry touched the sphere, the top retracted and he was able to pick up the ring. He held it up to the torchlight, using his other hand to put his glasses on as he squinted. It was a seal-ring, made for impressing house crests into wax. Harry had a strong suspicion that he was holding his family's seal-ring in his hand. It was gold, rather in the massive style of a man's ring, and bereft of any sort of set stone. Harry gauged its size with Seeker's eyes, eyes used to judging minute distances. It looked too big for his own skinny fingers – probably slip right off – but…
He placed it into the bag, along with the deed to the Welsh castle. The rest of the papers he returned to their original container, and placed the box exactly where he had found it. He walked back to the vault's entrance, going much faster than when he had been going the opposite way. He only stopped once, near the steps, to toss several handfuls of Galleons into the bottomless bag. He didn't know exactly how much he had taken, but he was pretty sure it would suffice for everything he needed. He climbed up the steps, as careful as he had been going down them.
When he stood at the threshold of the spell of sealing, he turned to look one last time at the vault. The torches began to die, one by one, leaving the place in darkness except for the faint, dim glow of the spell-energy. In the strange light, the reflections from the metals and the jewels were more unfamiliar than when they had been cast in firelight.
*Harry…*
Harry remained silent as he turned around again and walked through the spell.
***
Author's Notes
This chapter had a bit of indirect wish-fulfilment. I'm never going to be that rich, unless Bill Gates decides to make me sole beneficiary in his will or something, so I let Harry do it. I love 'Harry is rich!' scenes even more than 'Harry gets presents!' scenes. ^_^ But I hoped to make this more than just finding out he had a vault. The best 'Harry finds out how rich he really is' scene I've ever seen (pun not intended) is in the fic Harry Potter and the Year of Rebellion. I strongly suggest you guys read it. Like, now. You won't be sorry.
I deliberately left the seal on the ring undescribed because, frankly, I can't think up one at the moment. Maybe I'll have better luck later…any suggestions from you guys?
Other inspirational literature for this chapter includes 'the Arabian Nights', and 'the Jungle Book'. Soundtrack was mostly background music from Chrono Cross.
The reason why the Aeons didn't talk very much in the previous chapter is because they don't really have any more to say about the Wizarding World than Harry does. If they know something he doesn't, it's probably only because he's seen it and forgotten, or didn't analyze it as much.
I'm going to post a little outline-thingy regarding future Aeons and Harry's Summoner powers later. Many thanks to everyone who helped me iron it out. Feel free to comment and criticize the outline if you want. ^^;;
Many thanks to AthenaKitty, Orion the Hunter, wanderingwolf, Arianne, Sasha, Serpent of Light, Cornflake, ihateschool, miles militis ab perditio, and to the two who gave me some of the most thorough and informative reviews I've ever seen in my life :D Daelan and Neverwhere. I'm going to try and email replies to reviews from now on, instead of posting it since ff.net's not happy with that anymore. (thanks for the heads-up, Neverwhere!)