Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling owns the Harry Potter Universe all other claimants to anything to do with the H.P. story are simply hangers on to her glory. I thank her for allowing us mere mortals to play in her world and I promise that while I have Harry in my care nothing bad will happen to him. I will leave that to J.K.R. herself in her books.
LOVE CONQUERS ALL
Chapter 5 Chudley Salterton.
Or was it indeed the Headmaster, it certainly looked a lot like him?
"Hello Harry," the Headmaster look-alike said, "I am Aberforth Dumbledore and I am your headmasters elder and as I have been assured many times, quite disreputable and eccentric brother. I insist that you all call me Aberforth as it will save a whole lot of confusion." He offered his hand to Harry.
Harry thought for a moment and then he put his wand away and shook Aberforth's hand, "Why did you hesitate Harry?"
"I had to decide if I trusted you."
"Good. That pair don't though, do they?" Aberforth said, pointing at the Aurors.
Harry turned around to look at the Auror and the driver, who were both scowling and pointing their wands.
"Aberforth you old scoundrel, where's Daisy?" said Molly, seeing him for the first time and rushing forward.
"Molly how wonderful to see you, alas poor Daisy is no longer with us," Molly went to Aberforth and they embraced.
"Who's Daisy?" asked Tonks."
"A rather infamous goat." Aberforth replied, with a twinkle in his eyes just like his brother.
"And not many people know that," said Molly smiling.
Moving over to the fireplace Aberforth threw in a pinch of red Floo powder. "Albus."
"Yes."
"They are here," said Aberforth, within half a minute the headmaster appeared and the distrustful pair put their wands away.
"I do not believe that we need to detain Kingsley and Jenks any longer," the Headmaster said to his brother, so everybody said goodbye to them.
Aberforth took the now friendly pair out to the lift, he came back in and shut the door then said, "I don't like doing that, why don't we all sit down."
"What don't you like doing?" asked Harry as they were all finding places to sit.
Aberforth answered, "I have had to modify the memories of Kingsley and Jenks, now when they get outside they will completely forget about this flat and this building, they will think that they came to bring you all to the sea front. What they will however remember is what happened earlier and that is what we would like to know. So what happened earlier please Tonks."
"A minute," said the Headmaster as he went over to the fireplace and threw in a pinch of normal silver Floo powder then he said, "Arthur Weasley, Minister for Magic."
"Albus?"
"Arthur, they have arrived."
"Can you carry on, I'll be about fifteen minutes Albus."
"We await you," the Headmaster said and came to sit down.
"So Arthur knew," said Molly, sounding a trifle miffed.
"Yes he thought it would be a pleasant surprise for you," said Aberforth patting her hand, she smiled at him.
"The first thing we have to settle is that while we are here, I am always to be called Albus and my brother is to be called Aberforth, anything else will be just too confusing," said the Headmaster, "so, will you now, please tell us what happened, Tonks?"
She explained about identifying the fake Jenks and the resultant duel in the corridor in which Ginny received the Cruciatus Curse.
The Headmaster stopped her. "Did you give her some chocolate?"
Ron replied, "We only had one Chocolate frog between us, but she had a mug of hot chocolate in the office."
Aberforth got up and went to what looked like a bar in the corner of the room, he came back breaking up a rather large bar of Honeydukes chocolate and passed it to Ginny, "Eat it all my dear," he said smiling, "it will make you feel better, please continue Nymphadora."
Tonks winced at the use of her given name but then she concluded the story.
"Well at least we appear to have the informant and the hit squad," said Hermione.
"It does look that way," said the Headmaster, "and all that anyone in the local office and the driver knew was that you were coming to Chudley Salterton for the day, not what you were coming here to do."
Harry had been getting more and more frustrated, "Would someone please explain what is going on here, I found the deeds to this apartment in Gringotts, they were in Sirius's old vault?"
"Well," said Albus, "this is not your flat Harry, this building belongs to the Order of the Phoenix, I placed that folder in the vault and I modified the inventory letter to include it. However you may all use the flat this summer, because you are or rather soon will be Members of the Order and I think that you should all become assistant Aurors. Also you will all need somewhere to train, this building is virtually unknown within the Wizarding World, even to most of the Order members. It is therefore a very safe place for you to be, the bonus is that not only can you all study and train here but you can relax as well."
"Headmaster," said Harry, receiving a stern look, "sorry, Albus, can you come over to the bar a minute, there is something I need to ask you about," the Headmaster nodded and stood, Harry got up and brought Hermione with him over to the bar.
Then he continued, "I haven't told anyone else yet but in the box that Sirius left with the solicitors was a magic ring, I wondered if you knew anything about it?"
"Did Sirius tell you what the ring is called?" asked Albus, looking like a small boy about to open a birthday present.
"Sirius believed that it is called the 'Ring of Merlin'," said Harry, he went back over and collected the black box from Tonks, came back and after opening it passing the Headmaster the ring, it lay in his palm for a couple of seconds, then it jumped back into the box.
The Headmasters eyes opened wide and then he smiled at them and said quietly, "We thought that, this Ring was lost hundreds of years ago, it is an extremely powerful magical object and it was supposed to be capable of all kinds of wonderful things. It sounds like a good project for our resident bookworm. I had better give you both passes to the Special Restricted Section of the library. If this ring has been in the hands of the Black family for a long time, I can see why it never came to light, supposedly it can only be used by those of good heart to all men and as you probably know, that could have been a bit dodgy for most of the Black's."
At the mention of the Special Restricted Section of the library, Hermione had started bobbing up and down, on her stool, with excitement. "What's the SPECIAL restricted section of the Library?" her eyes were glowing.
The headmaster smiled, "That is where we keep the most ancient books and texts and you must both be extremely careful with all of them."
As the three of them went back over to sit with the others Ron stood up and went to look out of the window, "Hey! Harry there's a bird sunbathing out here with no top on."
Immediately Parvati said, "Ronald Weasley you take your eyes off of her this instant."
"Why? Your not my girl!" was his immediate reply.
"That can soon be arranged," she said without thinking.
Ron turned and looked at her and said, "Please say you mean that Parvati?" It was the first time anyone had ever wanted to be Ron's girl.
She looked down shyly and said, "Well, we can try it, if you like."
He went over to her put his arms around her and kissed her gently on the forehead, "Ok. I'd very much like us to try," he said so they held hands and sat back on the sofa.
There was a whoosh and Arthur appeared from the Floo.
Molly went over to him and asked, "Why didn't you tell me?" in an admonishing tone.
"Because it would have been too easy for you to let something slip!" she thought about this for a moment and then kissed him on the cheek.
Albus said cheerfully, "Now why don't you all go and have a bit of a look around, while I make some Library passes?"
All of them began standing up from their comfortable seats, Harry and Hermione for the first time really looked around the room they had all been talking in for about an hour.
It was quite a large room, about fifty foot by twenty-five foot, it faced south and virtually the whole of the fifty foot southern wall was panoramic windows, as was the front third of each of the end walls and the view, over the bay was fabulous. There was a television, video, Hi-Fi and a telephone, in the far corner there was what looked very much like a bar with six bar stools, there were three four seat, sofas, eight large armchairs and various small tables with some other odd chairs.
The couple went and looked behind the bar, it had a double tall fridge unit on the back wall that was full of soft drinks including Butterbeer and Pumpkin Juice as well as many Muggle products also all kinds of chocolate. Inset there was a Microwave oven, the drawers of the bar were full of sweets, both Muggle and wizard, there were cupboards full of biscuits, crisps, popcorn, nuts etc.
Wandering on through a door they went into what was obviously the dining room and sat at the table to talk, there was a pop and Dobby appeared, "Dobby what are you doing here?"
"I am here to serve my new master, Mr. Harry Potter sir." Dobby said as Ginny, Parvati and Ron had appeared at the door then Tonks, Arthur and Molly came up behind them.
"Who is your new master Dobby?""Mr Harry Potter is my new master Miss Hermione, Professor Dumbledore is asking me if I would like to serve Mr Harry Potter, for the summer and I is telling him I would be proud to keep Mr Harry Potters secrets." Harry could see all the others smiling and listening to Hermione's conversation with Dobby.
Then Hermione asked, "And are you still being paid?"
"Oh yes Miss Hermione," Dobby was nodding his head so hard that his ears were flapping, "Professor Dumbledore is telling me to ask Mr Harry Potter to pay me and I is, I is, is going to ask Mr Harry Potter for one Galleon a month and one day off a month and Professor Dumbledore said, that if I wanted to on my day off, I am allowed to visit my friends at Hogwarts because I asked him. So I will, and then I can help them with their work."
Hermione opened her mouth to carry on with the conversation but Harry put his finger to her lips up and said, "Hermione I think that you would be just wasting your breath."
"Does Mr Harry Potter and Miss Hermione want something to eat, because you is sitting at the food table?" the others started coming in and sitting down, suddenly they all felt quite hungry.
So Harry said to the elf, "I think that we would please, what can you get us Dobby because there appears to be quite a lot of us all of a sudden?"
"I can get you all sorts of sandwiches and pumpkin juice and Butter beer and tea and cream cakes and Chocolate Éclairs for Mr Weezey, who is Mr Harry Potters friend."
"Alright dobby if you bring the food please and everyone will tell you what they would like to drink and I would like Pumpkin juice." Dobby took all the drink orders and disappeared.
When Aberforth and the Headmaster joined them and Albus said with a mischievous twinkle in his eye, "Dobby is only here temporarily but Molly would you like a House Elf because we have one at Hogwarts called Winky and she is most definitely not a happy Elf. She used to work for Barty Crouch but he gave her clothes at the last Quidditch World Cup, I believe you know the whole of that very sad tale. She refuses to be paid and she wants to work for a family, however she does wear clothes and I thought that you could give her a good home? So being as how you are now the Minister for Magic's wife you should really have a house elf and maybe, this way, we can kill two birds with the one stone?"
"I must admit that I have always wanted a house elf, but I don't know if I should?" said Molly glancing nervously at Hermione.
Quickly Hermione put her at ease, "Winky definitely needs a good home Mrs Weasley and she certainly is not happy at Hogwarts, why don't you give her a try? I'm sure she will be a lot happier with you than she is at the school."
Molly smiled her thanks to Hermione then turned to the Headmaster saying, "Thank you for thinking of me Albus, I will try to make Winky happier," the food appeared on the table and there was silence for a while as they ate.
"Do I understand that you mean us to stay here for the rest of the holiday Head'. Albus, and for me to be their guardian?" queried Tonks.
"Well that was my idea, I am fairly certain that the Dursleys wouldn't be too sad to lose their house guests, so if Molly and Arthur here agree and the others parents agree, well certainly, that is what I intended."
Molly's immediate response was, "What about propriety?"
"Well," said Albus, "if Tonks suspects anything untoward is going on, she can put alarm charms on the outside of the bedroom doors at night. The occupants won't need to come out as there are en-suit facilities in all the rooms and if they need anything else they can always call Dobby, although I cannot see Hermione being happy about that if they do it to often. You can Floo in and out and talk through the fire as could Parvati's parents. There is a telephone so Hermione's parents can talk to her and they can also use the Floo to visit."
"But our two can't come until Saturday though, because tomorrow is Ginny's birthday," Molly had obviously agreed to the two Weasley's coming.
Harry asked, "Albus, what is the red Floo Powder for sir?"
"It is to contact me only if you think I am at Hogwarts, but you should always try to find me at Headquarters first."
"I should really be going," said Aberforth rising, "I live on the second floor, in the flat below this one, you will usually find me there if you need me for anything. The Ground and First floor flats are empty at the moment," then he left.
Their Headmaster then said, "Right, I must give you all some information and then I must also be going.
The whole of this building is completely shielded from magical detection hence any magic preformed inside it cannot be detected from the outside. All the windows in the building are charmed, so no one can ever see who is inside, what's more they allow owl's to pass freely through them, without opening if you want to send or receive mail. Furthermore if you point at a window and say darken or clear they will, but this can only be done from the inside of the apartment.
The training room has a permanent sound proofing charm any noise made in there cannot be heard anywhere else.
The Floo address of this flat is CS14, you cannot give it to anybody without my permission and I give that now for Parvati's and Hermione's parents. The telephone number is on the phone, it is registered as a Free-phone Carlisle number so it won't give away your location, this also should only be given to Hermione's parents."
"Here are your Library passes," he handed each of them two pieces of card, that had their names on and were labelled L and RS, "I am sure that you will have great fun working out how to use them," then he gave Harry and Hermione another card each with SRS on it.
"Can you make Harry, Hermione, Ron, Parvati and Ginny into assistant Aurors, please Arthur. Knowing this lot I believe it will probably save us a lot of bother, in the future?"
Arthur thought for a minute, "I will make out the forms and back date them to Monday, as soon as I return to my office, don't worry I will sort it out," he said smiling.
Then Albus continued, "Obviously nothing that transpires here is to be communicated with anybody else. Dobby will provide you with what food you want and keep the bar stocked. You may go out if you wish but only all together and Tonks would you consider taking the Defence Against the Dark Arts teaching job at Hogwarts next year? Now I really must be going. Have a nice time," then he 'Disapparated'.
"He could of given me time to think about it," said Tonks, sounding slightly miffed.
"He is" said Arthur, "and I must go, I must make out these forms, what's more I left masses of work on my desk and nobody knows where to find me, I will see you all later," he gave Molly a kiss and he also 'Disapparated'.
x-x
Hermione and Harry were the first to get up from the dining table.
"Let's go and see what else we have to use," said Hermione taking Harry's hand and leading him out through the door as all the others started getting up as well.
The seven of them left the dining room and they turned right towards the only door in the room none of them had so far tried.
Harry opened it, as he did a plan appeared on it, down the left the rooms were labelled Harry, Hermione, Parvati, Ron and down the right Study/Library, Tonks and Ginny, the room at the end was labelled Training Room, after a few minutes the plan disappeared.
It was quickly determined that all of the bedrooms were virtually the same, they were about fifteen foot by twenty with a window in the far wall, only the colour of the room decorations were different. Immediately to the right on entry was a door leading to, what looked from the outside like, a very compact four by four bathroom but it contained a corner Jacuzzi bath, a large separate shower cubical, double washbasins, WC and Bidet, the room had obviously been magically expanded. The bedrooms were furnished with drawer units, Wardrobes, a writing desk with two chairs, two tall book cases, two comfortable chairs, a King size four poster bed and a pair of bedside cabinets.
Hermione was the first one to reach the Study/Library and when the others arrived, unusually she had a very puzzled expression on her face.
"What is the matter darling?" Harry asked her.
"No books!" she said.
They checked all the shelves, there were hundreds of Records, C.D's and Video Films there were six desks with computer's and chairs, a cupboard with ink quills parchment etc., one very large table and ten extra chairs, definitely no books.
Harry was looking at the wall between this room and the dining room. "Look at this," he called, embedded along the wall were six slots each with one of their names on it, Hermione took out her cards and put the one with L on it into the slot, immediately a shimmering portal appeared on the wall alongside her slot.
Harry tried to put his hand into the portal. "It just feels like the wall," he said.
Hermione tried, her hand disappeared so then she walked through, her card slot disappeared and was replaced with the Legend HERMIONE LIBRARY, where the slot had been, Hermione reappeared as did the slot with her card, she had three big books with her.
"I've just been to Hogwarts Library and I brought these just to see if I could, Mme. Prince couldn't see or hear me and I couldn't go out of the Library door either." She put the books on the table and went and retrieved her card, when she took her card from the slot the portal disappeared, as did the books.
Ron and Parvati had been whispering, they put their L cards into their slots and both stepped through their own portal, two minutes later they reappeared each with a book.
"You took your time just to find one book each?" said Ginny with a grin.
"Well we had to have our first kiss as well didn't we?" said Parvati blushing as they went and put their books on the table. Ron went and took out his card, his portal and his book disappeared and Parvati's book remained.
Hermione put her card with the R in her slot she stepped through the portal the logo this time was HERMIONE RESTRICTED and she reappeared with a book and said. "Right, I have just been to the restricted section of the library and I think we know how this works, lets go and look at the Training Room."
Parvati and Hermione removed their cards from their slots and all the remaining books disappeared.
Lastly they all went to the training room, it was the same size as the Lounge but it had no windows and was almost empty it had a pile of various sized stones in one corner and a rack with lots of miniature furniture and equipment on it, in another. They were looking puzzled until Molly smiled and took out her wand, she levitated some of the miniature desks, chairs and a potions bench from the rack to various parts of the room and enlarged them, obviously, now, that was the answer. You took out and enlarged whatever you needed for the lesson and then you shrank it and put it away on the rack when you no longer needed it.
How to enlarge and shrink things would definitely need to be one of their first lessons.
Harry went to the potions bench and turned on the water tap, why had he even doubted it, water came out of the tap and disappeared down the drain.
"Let's go back to the Lounge and have a chat, about what we are going to do," said Tonks.
Molly shrank and put away the things she had expanded then as they were walking through to the lounge she said, "I should be getting home, are you all coming for dinner tonight?"
"We should talk to my Mum and Dad sometime," said Hermione.
"And mine," Parvati added.
"Lets not come to dinner tonight then, it's Ginny's birthday tomorrow and everybody will be there then," said Tonks.
"All right then, but all the rest of you must come for breakfast in the morning and you two don't be to late home," said Molly then she kissed them all and Flooed to the Burrow.
x-x
When they were all settled in the lounge again Harry asked Tonks if they should move in today, she thought it was a good idea and Hermione said she would ask her parents and went to telephone them, when she had finished on the phone she and Tonks Flooed to her home to collect her parents.
Ron and Parvati Flooed to Parvati's house to ask her parents if she would be allowed to come and stay.
Tonks soon arrived back followed by Mrs, and Mr Granger then Hermione, Mrs. Granger went to the picture windows. "Isn't this lovely, I can see why you want to stay here," she enthused, so Hermione showed her Mum and Dad around the flat, followed by the others and they were all chatting.
When they had finished their tour Mrs Granger said, "well it is all very nice but what are you going to eat? The only cooking appliance I have seen is the Microwave Oven behind the bar and the only food I found is sweets, nuts, chocolate and such like, you can't live on that?"
They all laughed and Harry said, "But it's magic are you hungry?"
"Yes, I was going to make our dinner as soon as we get back home."
"Then come into the dining room Mum and have some dinner with us here," Hermione said pulling her mother up and they all went into the dining room and sat around the table.
Immediately gold plates and goblets appeared at all their places, followed by silver cutlery and cruets, then with a pop Dobby appeared, Mr and Mrs Granger jumped.
Hermione said, "Mum, Dad this is Dobby our House Elf. Dobby I would like you to meet my mother and father."
Dobby came around the table and bowed very low to them and said. "I is very privileged to meet the mother and father of such a great and honourable witch as miss Hermione, she is a good friend to all the House Elves. What is it you would all like to eat?"
"Hello Dobby," Mrs Granger said, still sounding rather stunned, "well I was going to make Steak and Ale Pie with chips and some vegetables and gravy," there was a pop, "I wasn't finished I was going to ask him what he had ready," and just as Mrs Granger finished speaking all their plates piled high with Steak and Ale Pie and the table filled with platters of chips, carrots, peas, mushrooms, beans and large boats of gravy. Also there were jugs of various juices with wine for the adults.
"You will notice," said Tonks smiling, "that there are no sprouts, it is no good putting sprouts on a table for children."
"Well I can see I don't have to worry about what you are going to eat," said Mrs. Granger smiling and then there was just the normal sound of eating.
When they had all finished, the plates cleaned themselves and the platters disappeared to be replaced with about ten different deserts.
"If I came to live here I would have to buy new clothes every fortnight, I wouldn't fit in the old ones," said Mr Granger, tucking into his second treacle tart with custard.
After they finished they all went back into the lounge, Mrs Granger noticed that the table had cleared itself. "Well I see no reason why you can not come and stay here for the rest of your holidays, we can contact and visit you easily enough." Then longingly added, "Do all wizard's dining rooms work like that, if they do, I think I would like one?"
"Thank you for letting me stay Mum and I don't think that all wizard dining rooms work like that it's just because this is set up a bit like school," Hermione told her, "it will be fun here, but we're also here to learn."
"In that case I think that we should go home and collect your things," said Mr Granger.
"Shall I come and help you?" asked Ginny.
"That's a good idea there are lots of things to carry, then Tonks and Harry can go and get their things and you won't be left here on your own." Hermione said as she set off to her home with Ginny and her parents, using the Floo.
Harry and Tonks went to Little Whinging using a Portkey, which Albus had given her specifically for this purpose.
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