Warning for language and shite.

August 2012

Harry spent the next few weeks at the leaky cauldron, it was now August, and his friends, Hermione and Ron were coming to stay at the Inn as well. Ron was returning from a holiday in Egypt, and Hermione from France, all three members of the trio were anxious to reunite.

Harry spent most of his days wandering, the minister for magic was obviously withholding information from him, so in a spiteful move, Harry was ignoring his '"advice" and going wherever the wind took him.

The wind took Harry Potter to a side street next to Diagon Alley, named Belle End. After laughing profusely at the street sign, and resolving to show his friends, Harry decided to explore the road, and the shops that were placed on it. Harry knew that it had not been too long since the Muggle world was in some kind of economic downturn, regardless of this, the magical world was booming. This random side street of a side street was filled with shoppers, leisurely moving down the street. Almost every shop window was full of seemingly full of priceless artifacts, from permanently levitating China plates, to great brass vases with seemingly no purpose. Harry was barely paying attention to the objects inside the shop windows, until something caught his eye.

The sign above the shop had, what Harry recognised as a musical note, he approached the shop, and was extremely happy with what he found. It was an all around music shop, selling everything from albums to instruments. There was a wide selection of magical and Muggle music, of varying genres. There was also a lot of equipment, there was drum kits, microphones, trombones, violins and guitars to name but a few. Harry entered the shop, and was greeted by a man with a rough Scottish accent "y'all right kid? feel free to 'ave a look around."

There were a few shoppers, but not many, all were looking at the albums, and not any of the instruments or equipment. Harry walked slowly and cautiously, after about five minutes of browsing albums, all on vinyl, he picked out a few that he recognised the name of from Hermione's gifted radio, as well as a Weird Sisters album.

At the counter he initiated conversation with the owner of the shop, "Hey, err, I've been wondering recently, about guitars and stuff, and I don't really know too much about it all-" he was cut off by the man.

"Right well if you're wantin' to get into guitars and that, you'll be wantin' to actually get a guitar, but keep your options open, like, if you end up wantin'to play another instrument." he began to lead Harry over to the guitar section of the shop "It's funny though, cos not many witches or wizards are usually wantin'to play anythin' other than a violin, course you have the weird sisters, as well as Daryl Shan and the Vampires, but other than that you've not got much options, excepting of course Muggle bands."

Before Harry was a 5 foot stretch of wall that was covered in guitars, from pristine acoustics, to dead red guitars meant for rock 'n roll. "Right so, depending on the type of music you'll be playin', you'll want a guitar that fits it, not only visually, but audibly as well," he took two guitars down, and plugged one into and amp. The sound that came out was clearly electronic, but rather clean sounding, however the next guitar sounded more rough and dirty, Harry could clearly see the difference.

"Well, I'm thinking an acoustic as I'll be at Hogwarts, and there's no electricity for an amp..."

"Nah, kid, you'll be fine with the amp situation, cos all I've got is magicamps, don't need no electricity, though they do need it if there's muggles around, and I'll shrink em for you so you can actually get em to Hogwarts. And with regards to price, I sell em at about half what the cost for muggles... "

In the end Harry decided to come back another day, with Ron and Hermione, that way, they could also get instruments.

Three days after his visit to the music shop, Ron and his family arrived. "Ah yeah, Egypt was brilliant, we went to the pyramids, there was mummies, tombs, ancient curses..." Ron said, enthusiastically.

"Hermione will be delighted that you leant something," Harry chuckled.

After a few minutes of conversation, Harry remembered the music shop "yeah, there's guitars, drums, pianos, there's all sorts." Harry exclaimed, excitedly.

"We should check it out tomorrow," it was near the end of the day, and Ron's family had been traveling for most of it. Their conversation drifted to what kind of music they actually wanted to play, as Ron had been interested in playing music for some time. It became clear that their musical interests were aligned similarly, to something inbetween hard rock, and indie rock.

When the next day came around, the two went down to Belle End, Ron balled over at the sign crying with laughter, a slight overreaction Harry thought. Fred and George, who had of course been following the duo, decided that this was the time to make themselves known, they joined Ron on the floor. After about a minute, they queried Harry and Ron about where they were going, and decided to join them on this merry adventure.

Upon entering the shop, Ron was amazed, his mouth agape, "holy sh-"

He was cut off by the owner, "ahh lad, I'm the only one allowed to swear in here, what might you fine customers be looking for?"

Harry, again moved over to the guitar section of the shop, however Ron, felt himself drawn to the bass guitars, he had deduced that the four, thicker strings were evidence of a deeper, more powerful sound than a regular guitar, and that suited his personality more.

Fred and George were deep in conversation with eachother next to some keyboards and synth machines, the two seemed suspicious, as always, however moreso now. One of them, though it would be impossible to know which one, was giddy with excitement, Harry had to wonder what they were up to.

In the end, Harry decided to buy himself an amp, and a black Fender Stratocaster, Ron, on the other hand, decided to buy a black Ibanez GSR180 GIO Bass guitar, as well as a small, and fairly cheap bass amp. Ron was perturbed, however, it was clear that he wasn't comfortable with Harry buying it for him, "Mate, I can't let you pay for all of this, for me! It's got to be almost a hundred galleons in total!"

But Harry was more than willing to "Listen Ron, consider it an early Christmas present, or pay me back later, it's not charity but either way we're buying them now!"

Ron smiled, considering the lengths that his friend was willing to go for him. Harry smiled in return, it was a good feeling for both of them.

After returning to the inn, the two tried to jam together, they quickly learned that they had no idea what they were doing, "Fucking hell, my fingers hurt already," Harry said, Ron murmured in agreement, "and bloody hell, I thought this would be easier, but we're just plucking random bloody strings..."

But after several days, they began to understand the instruments, how they worked together, how they were meant to be played, it actually started to come together rather quickly. Harry was able to create a riff, and Ron was able to back it up with some serious punch. After hours of jamming for several days the two felt rather good about themselves, that was until Hermione arrived, and played a perfect concerto on a piano that was in the Inn

"Thanks Hermione, way to show us up," Ron said in jest.

Harry joined in "Yeah Hermione, we were just feeling good about ourselves." Hermione blushed, "well, I do want to see what you've been doing." but that was not possible, as some more serious conversation came up with the Weasleys that surrounded them.

"I don't think it's a matter of if, but a matter of when they capture him," said Percy "He was caught once before, and they had him in Askaban for 12 years, he'll make a mistake and they'll get him."

Ron's father, Arthur Weasley chimed in "I don't think it's that simple Percy, Black was able to elude dementors, a feat that has never been accomplished before, ever, though I do think he will make some very grave mistakes for himself." He glanced at Harry while he said the last portion of his point.

As the hour drew late, all of the children were sent to bed, there was only one full day left before they were going back to Hogwarts, and all were anxious to get back. About five minutes of Harry being alone in his room, he realised that he must have left his his wand down in the main bar area of the Inn, his heart jumped, it was an extremely silly mistake to make. He stepped outside to find Percy accusing Ron of a most heinous crime, stealing his head boy badge, if Ron had done it then Harry didn't blame him, it was all Percy had talked about for the days that he had received it. He walked down the hall to find the twin Weasleys with the badge, modifying it to say big head boy, a most humorous joke, but it did not stop him from proceeding with his task of retrieving his wand.

His wand, it transpired, was on the floor at the bottom of the stairs from the main inn area. As he retrieved it, he heard his name, making him stop and pause, it was Mr Weasley.

"Harry needs to know, as long as he doesn't he's in danger," He said, however the Weasley matriarch countered him. "He's just a child, you don't want him paranoid, looking over his shoulder at every turn for murderers and death eaters! you'll traumatise him!"

"But Black is after him specifically, he needs to be at least prepared for the possibility that Black might find him," He lowered his voice, "fuck the minister, I'm telling him, he's in even more danger not knowing!"

Harry was startled by this information, questions raced through his head, Black was after him, why? How could he defend himself? It mattered how Harry reacted to this, he realised, Black was coming for him, and he knew this, which gave Harry the advantage, he could be prepared.

However this was not the time Harry realised, he needed to sleep on it, he was far too tired for his brain to properly process this, in a few days he'd be at Hogwarts, then he'd be safe. Harry chucked to himself as he entered his room, Hogwarts safe? That seemed like a bit of an oxymoron...