A/N: another chapter, quite a bit longer than the last. Also, since I haven't gotten a review, I must think that people do not like this fic and I will be taking it down on Sunday, because then I will replace this story with one that is hopefully better and people will like more.
Chapter 3
After a long day, Harry went to his room intending to sleep when Seamus came into the room, singing some obscure country song. Harry climbed into bed and fell asleep almost instantly. The next morning, while they were eating breakfast, Draco got a copy of the Daily Prophet. He put a Knut in the owl's pouch and unrolled it, only to look at the headline and hand it to Severus. The potions master let out an angry growl and handed it to Blaise, who looked and threw it at Seamus, who looked and handed it to Harry. He read the headline and then the article on the front page.
Boy-who-lived strikes rich
By Rita Skeeter
Yesterday while walking through Gringotts at 9:00 am yesterday morning, I overheard a conversation concerning our resident hero. Apparently, he inherited a lot of money, property and other valuable items. Now our hero is famous and rich! For the full story, turn to pages 2, 6, and 12.
Harry gave the offending newspaper to Draco and continued eating his cereal. No more than five minutes later, he went to his room.
Harry refused to come out all day. The next morning, however, he came out for breakfast. As he started eating porridge, two owls swooped in through the open window. As he pulled off the letters, four more swooped down. As he started to pull those off, even more came in. soon, you could not see the table, and everyone at the table was delettering (Is that a word?) owls.
After every owl was shooed out, Harry looked at the mail in heaps on the floor. He sighed and handed all the people in the room a large stack of letters. Then he decided that Severus would search for love spells or potions on them and pass them out to people to open. The ones that had potions or spells on them went straight into the fire. Oddly enough, there were only seven or eight that had something magical on them. The rest were handed off to the teenagers, who opened them and read what they said out loud.
"This one is from someone named Helen Peters. She wants to marry you."
"Paris Hilton? (A/N: I have nothing against her, it was my sister's idea) Who's she?"
"This one has a box of chocolates in it." Draco said as he put the chocolates on the table.
"This one has a picture in it."
Half an hour and a ton of letters later, they sat at the table eating the chocolates that had no love potion in them. Severus had some antidote for love potions but would rather they did not need it. They had a lot of fun, and Harry, Seamus, and Draco persuaded Severus and Blaise to come shopping with them.
Less than two hours later, and less than 4 stores later, Severus and Blaise were carrying all the bags and were apparently 'bored out of their minds' as Blaise so eloquently put it. Yet the other three ignored their protests, and kept shopping.
Soon, they stopped in front of the tattoo parlor where Harry got his first tattoo. Before they entered, Harry told them that they could all get a tattoo, or in Draco's case, another one.
They all went inside and picked out a tattoo. Blaise picked a small snake, and Seamus picked a tiger. They went in and got their tattoos while Draco and Harry were still choosing. Severus was looking at some on the far wall, and Draco and Harry were looking at some magical creatures.
Severus picked and Harry and Draco were left alone in the main room. Harry picked a jade eyed grim, and Draco picked, oddly enough, a hippogriff. Harry also picked a dagger that had a rune that stood for protection on it. He went in and told Arra what he wanted and where, and everyone went back to the room to show off their tattoos.
Harry had the grim tattooed on his arm, and the dagger on his shoulder blade the rune went on over his hip, where he held a dagger and one of his seventeen wands.
Draco had his put on his shoulder blade, Seamus on his lower back, and Severus had gotten a smoking cauldron on his hip, about where Harry's rune tattoo went, and Blaise had his coiled around his left upper arm. Harry paid for all six tattoos, and they left and went back to Hogwarts.
Harry, Draco, and Seamus were sitting in the sitting room, sorting out their purchases. They had all their school stuff, plus some, all their robes, and harry got some dragon hide pants in all colors but red. He also got some battle robes, and none of the other shoppers in the store could take their eyes off him when he modeled to his shopping companions.
They had also went to an apothecary so Severus and Draco and Harry could get stuff for the potions class for their last year. Besides, it kept Severus from insisting that they go back home for a while.
Harry wore his battle robes whenever they went out. Not only did it keep the Death Eaters from stunning him, it kept the girls and boys that wanted no more than to stun him, and proceed to shag him, from doing just that.
He was constantly photographed and even the muggles fawned over him, because he was kind and sweet and polite.
He wasn't safe from 'adoring' fans anywhere. It did not help that he wasn't the ugliest hero ever either.
Today they were going to look in vaults in Gringotts. They were going to many days ago, but had too much stuff to deal with already. But today, they would visit some of the vaults.
They made their way to the head Goblin's office. When they got there, Harry asked if they could go to the Potter vaults, and how many vaults there were for the Potter family.
"Griphook will take you to the vaults, and there are two hundred and thirty-six Potter vaults. Just ring this bell when you are finished in the vaults."
He handed Harry a small silver bell, that looked like one of the 'ring for service' muggle bells in department stores. Harry thanked the goblin and left. They were put into a large cart and rode down to the Potter vaults. When it finally stopped, Blaise and Draco got out of the cart, looking like they were about to lose their breakfast.
They entered the first vault again, because a pureblood wizard who might have a clue what the stuff was should look over the stuff they left, and make sure that there was nothing else of importance there. Severus put in a few jars of stuff, and they deemed it cleaned out of anything useful at the moment.
They moved on to the next vault, and found nothing else in it that they needed now. But as they made their way to the next vault, Severus and Blaise handed over long scrolls of parchment.
"Lists of things in those vaults, in case you need something from them and have no time to look." Blaise explained.
"I never even thought to do that!" exclaimed Harry. "Thank you!"
They went into the next vault, the last one that was looked through. They all took a trunk and dug through the contents. Severus was meticulously writing down all the items in his trunk, and moving on to the next one. Blaise was beside him, taking out items that Severus told him to.
Draco was doing the same thing, writing down stuff while Seamus took out whatever Draco told him to. One difference was that Draco was taking everything out and putting it on a clear space on the floor, writing down an item when he pulled it out, while Severus took out everything and put it back after writing it down.
Soon they had finished, and were moving on. Harry looked at the lists of stuff left. Draco's looked more messy, but was still readable. He quickly read it.
Blue Trunk with owl on lid:
One black battle robe: status, taken
One blue battle robe: status, taken
One red battle robe: status, taken
One pair silver dragon hide pants: status, taken
One pair metallic blue dragon hide pants: status, taken
One pair blue dragon hide pants: status, taken
Fourteen black silk shirts w/ protection: status, taken
One basilisk fang dagger: status, taken
Trunk status: empty
Black Trunk with Hogwarts Crest on lid:
One crystal orb: status, left
One large Jar of tea leaves: status, left
One copy of The Inner Eye: status, left
Forty-seven strings of beads: status, left
Trunk status: full
Blue Trunk with black snake on lid
One black dagger: status, taken
One Blue owl pendant: status, taken
One jade snake pendant: status, taken
One silver rune pendant on leather cord: status, taken
One platinum rune pendant on leather cord: status, taken
Trunk status: empty
Severus had a slightly different way of putting things, and the only trunks he found had weaponry and books in them. All of the trunks he had searched had something taken from it, and quite a few that had everything taken.
They moved on and made it to the fourth vault. They opened it to find all sorts of stuff piled on the floor. In the center of the room was a package wrapped in brown paper and tied in twine. There was an envelope tied to it and upon examination, saw his name in the familiar calligraphy of his late mother.
Severus took the package and put it in the front pocket of the enchanted bag. They quickly made an inventory of the stuff in the vault and moved on to the next one. Several vaults later, and many scrolls of parchment later, they found another vault that had a package in it for Harry.
Harry put the package in the bag with the other one, and went about taking the useful things from the vault. They found very few things they needed, and only took a few potion books when they stumbled across them. They moved on, and four vaults later, they came across a third package for Harry.
He put it with the others, and when they finished sorting through the vault, left for lunch. Severus rang the silver bell, and the goblin brought the cart down to take them back up.
After a nice lunch in the Leaky Cauldron, they went back to the wizarding bank. They went to the Vaults of Salazarr Slythrin and Harry opened the first one, but instead of only putting blood on the brick, he had to let it feel his intentions too.
Only one with pure intentions were allowed access to the vault. Harry was the only heir so far that could get in. Every other person who tried could not pull the door open. Therefore, every last knut that was in the vault when the founder had died was there.
Harry pulled the door open and gasped at the mountains of gold. In the center of the floor was a parchment envelope that had no writing on it. Even weirder, it was glowing. It had a seal that had two snakes shaped like the letter s and were intwined around a pole. Harry saw another magical tote on the floor and put the letter in it. He instructed the others to put all the stuff that might be useful in the tote with the letter, so the stuff from the different sets of vaults did not get mixed up.
Draco put in a large pile of what appeared to be journals in, Seamus adding books that had names like Potions for every occasion, Dark arts, a theory; and Light or dark? Uses for every curse or hex.
Severus added every potions ingredient he could reach in the bag, and soon the vault was close to empty, save for the mountain of gold and a few odd articles that they did not need.
They moved to the next vault, and when Harry opened the heavy stone door, Severus let out a girl-like squeal and went straight to the jars and small containers full of hard to find potions ingredients.
Severus loaded all the ones he did not have into the bag, while the Slythrin boys looked over page after page of long forgotten potion instructions and ingredient lists, putting all of them into the bag.
Seamus, having no love of potions, was looking at a small pile of jewelry in the corner. Harry got busy looking at a large pile of ritual daggers, and soon enough had sorted out the doubles and put one of each dagger into the bag. It already had a large quantity of potion ingredients and papers and books in it. They finished up and left for the next one.
As the door fell open on the third vault, Severus nearly had a heart attack. The room was literally one big pile of vials of clearly marked potions vials. As Severus looked over the labels, He started hyperventilating.
After breathing deeply into a paper bag that Draco just happened to have in his pocket, Severus started loading every potion he deemed worthy into the bag. As he did, he started giggling madly.
The four teenage boys just looked with amusement at the overexcited potions master as he loaded seemingly every potion within grabbing distance to the bag. Soon, almost every potion was in the tote, and they left the vault.
The next vault proved to be much like the one before it. Severus skipped into the vault and started to load all the potions inside it. After Severus added the last potion to the tote, Harry decided that they had looked in enough vaults for the day, partly because he thought if Severus got more exited than he already was, he would wet himself. And so they would start on the fifth in the morning.
After going back to Hogwarts, Severus took the tote back to the lab and pulled out what looked to be hundreds of little clear plates and rolls of parchment attached to them.
Humming softly, he set up the small plates on the long counters on the walls. After that, he pulled out the potions, setting them gently on the floor. After making sure they all were out, he took one off the top of the pile and, uncorking it, let a drop fall onto the plate.
He resealed it and put it in a large cabinet above the counter. Grabbing another, he repeated the process. After a few moments, he came back to where the teens were standing.
"Well, lets get something to eat!" With that, he led them into the sitting area. He called a house elf and got some food. Soon they were chatting quietly about what they had found.
After eating, Severus went back to the lab and looked at the first plate. He detached the parchment, which Harry noticed had some writing on it. Severus put the parchments next to the potion that went on the plates.
After every parchment was put away, he shooed the others into the sitting room. Draco broke the thoughtful silence.
"Hey, Harry! Why don't you open those brown packages and that letter from Slythrin? I want to see what is in them!"
Harry relented and dug the three packages and the letter out of the bags. He pulled the paper off the smallest of the three packages and pulled off the letter. He opened the letter and read it before passing it to Seamus. Seamus read it and gave it to Blaise, who gave it to Severus who offered it to Draco after he read what it said. Draco looked at the letter in his hands. It read:
My wonderful son:
I hope you like quidditch like your father, because he wanted you to have the snitch he caught at the first quidditch match he ever played. He hoped that he would get to give it to you, but I'm afraid that that was impossible. You have to understand that all we ever wanted was to see you grow up and teach you all the things that pureblood parents teach their kids. Hopefully Sirius is treating you okay. If not, just hit him on the head with a rolled up newspaper. Your father wants to write something.
Hey son! Its the quidditch star himself! Well, not as good as some, but decent all the less. Anyway, I have to write quick because you mother will have a cow if she reads what I tell you, as she does not want me to tell you, because she thinks you will get in trouble if you see what's on them. But anyway, there are these little things called videocassettes, and your mother and I made a lot of them.
You need a muggle thing called a VCR to watch them, but if you can get one, you should. Anyway, they're in the fifteenth vault in the Potter Hallway. There is also two diaries in there, that can let you talk to us in case we die. If you ever need to talk to us, just write down what you want to say and we will answer.
Your mother is trying to read what I wrote, so I will let you talk to her some more.
Oh, and before I forget, Padfoot and Moony also have diaries in that vault. Mine is red, your mother has blue, Padfoot has black, and Moony has a leather one.
This is your mother again and I want to tell you that I will always love you, in life and death.
Forever and Eternity,
Mum, Dad, Padfoot, And Moony.
Draco had tears in his eyes as he read. He handed it back to Harry, and everyone pulled on shoes without a word being spoken. They flooed to the Leaky Cauldron and made their way to the marble building for the second time that day.
They arrived at the vaults and Harry all but sprinted to the fifteenth dark brick. He put his cut finger on the brick and pulled the heavy door open. They spread out, all looking for the diaries. Seamus cried out "I found one!"
He held up the leather one. "Me too!" yelled Draco, holding up the blue one. They looked a little longer and soon had all four of the diaries. They left and went back to the dungeons at Hogwarts. Harry opened the blue one and wrote:
Mum? This is Harry, Your son.
He looked at the diary, where his ink had disappeared.