Dragonborn Gothic 3 - GOT
Part 12
The Leaky Cauldron. The Wizarding World.
As I'd expected Arya, Meera, Aela and I were able to find the pub known as the Leaky Cauldron. We'd gotten to this place, and through the muggle repelling charms without any trouble, and then we'd entered the pub. It was early in the morning here and the gateway I'd made had appeared as hoped down an abandoned back ally near this pub. We had startled a milkman and a stray cat when we walked out of a dead-end, but with the milk guy, we'd only got his attention due to the way we were dressed.
It made sense to me that Arya, Meera, Aela and I, were able to come here and see this magical places as Muggle repelling charm didn't effect magical creatures, I knew that from the books, so Aela and I would have been unaffected. As for Arya and Meera, their brothers were wargs and I've given them both spells, so since none of us could be thought of as muggles the wards meant to keep normal humans away had no effect on us even though none of us would wave any wands around.
Dressed as we were, my girls and I were instantly the focus of attention for those within the pub at this early hour of the morning. The four of us had dressed as plainly as possible, but we still looked rather out of place as everyone else either looked be Victorian or wore rather colourful robes, sometimes mixing the two styles. Not that I really cared about blending in as long as we didn't attract government attention or the notice of those Death Eaters, assuming any of them were about.
I looked around for a moment, ignoring the stares we were getting, and then I went over to the bartender.
"Hello, sir, we're not from around here and need to enter Diagon Alley to visit Gringotts. Could you help us out with that?" I requested.
I knew how to get into the wizarding shopping centre but none of us had wands so we'd need some help.
"Call me Tom" invited the bartender "The bank won't be open for another hour and a half so you might as well stay for some breakfast".
That would be fine only we had no money, or at least we didn't have of what the natives would consider money.
"I've been out of Britan for a while," I said truthfully "I don't have any local currency on me. So unless you'll accept gold from elsewhere we can't buy anything until after we make it to the bank".
As it turned out Tom was willing to let us pay in foreign coinage since he knew that he'd be able to exchange it later or because he wanted to keep the coins as curiosities. While waiting for breakfast I got some old papers and began to read through them as the women with me discussed things and got distracted by the moving pictures in the paper. They could read them to as the common tongues of the Seven Kingdoms, which they could all read and write in, were more or less the same as English or the Imperial language in Tamriel. Stuff like this made me wonder if I'd never escaped Oblivion and this was all just some kind of illusion, but I figured that tentacle horror would be able to make a more convincing illusion.
From what I was able to put together from the newspapers the Dark Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters minions were very active, and while the Ministry was fighting them it didn't look they were having much luck, and Dumbledore was alive, that shouldn't be a surprise given the date. October 21st 1981. This should mean that Voldemort would soon go to destroy the Potters, and not be very successful in the attempt.
Once breakfast was done the girls and I needed to head into the ally so I asked for help getting in.
"Now you just go through that door and then..." Tom started to say.
Someone else spoke at this point.
"Sorry to interrupt, but I couldn't help hearing that you are on your way to Gringotts and need some help," a young man said to us "Perhaps I can lend a hand?".
If pressed I'd just make some excuse us about our wands having been lost during my group's travels.
"We do," I said.
The young man helped us in Diagon Ally and after that, we began to look around. Aela, Arya and Meera were all speechless, not that any of them ever spoke much at times such as these, they knew enough to hang back and watch when I was up to stuff. I felt sure that they were learning quite a lot.
When we got to the place I wanted to go we all looked at imposing building the goblins used as their bank. I wouldn't say it was to my taste in terms of appearance, the Iron Bank looked much better, but I was impressed by what it represented. The finical power of the magical world and I needed to make use of that power for my own plans.
As we moved nearer to the guards at the front of the bank I felt the girls with me all tense, none of them had seen such people before, and there was something about the creatures that made me want to lash out at them. They were after all evil, most likely these were kind of bankers who'd repossess a home and put a family on the streets all the while smiling. Although I'd read a lot of Harry Potter fanfics in my time so that might be fanon rather than canon.
"Easy, they're friendly enough until you attack them or try to steal from them," I said in a quiet tone "So no summoning weapons or casting spells unless we are attacked".
Finally, we entered the building and once inside I went to the nearest free teller I could see. When I reached the teller, I nodded to the Goblin in greeting. This race didn't care much for manners if my knowledge of this world was correct, but still, it was best not to be rude. Hopefully, they liked people to be direct with them as I planned to be that way and had it worked well enough with the Iron Bank.
"Good day. I would like to speak to the person responsible for setting up new accounts" I said, "and I have some questions about services the bank might be able to help me with".
At least I wasn't ignored.
"If you would wait here for a moment, I will be right back," the Goblin answered.
He quickly vanished into the backrooms of the bank. Then after only a few minutes, he returned and came over to talk to us.
"If you and your associates would follow me?" he said.
Which we did, and soon we entered a rather nice office belonging to the Account Manager who offered me a seat. I took as the women with me hung back. I took a moment to look around the office, and just by doing that I could tell that this Account Manager was a very important person.
The office was filled with bookcases that held much more than just books. There were small devices upon the shelves that I knew nothing about, an hourglass, a timepiece of some kind of dagger in a display case, a small chest and what looked to be a collection of scrolls.
Since goblins were a violent race it made sense that they had weapons on the walls. Ones that had been forged for their own kind judging by the size. There was also a few shields on display as well as a larger banner directly behind the desk. I rather liked this style. Perhaps I should inquire about hiring the Account Manager's interior designer.
As for the rest of the office, the stone floor was covered in a lush red carpet, and a fire was going in the fireplace, the Account Manager had a large desk that had been made from dark wood, and it was covered in quills, ink pots, more books, more scrolls, and even an abacus that sat next to a silver tea set that was in use. I really hoped that they didn't use an abacus when adding up the value of what would be in my vault.
"You wish to open an account," said the Goblin.
Despite this not having been a question I still answered it.
"Yes, Account Manager Sharpclaw" I answered.
His name had been on the door, and while he didn't enquire as to my name I was not offended.
"I recently came into a fortune and some property that I need to get fixed up" I informed the goblin "I was hoping that for a fee that Gringotts would help me make some arrangements to update my property".
Before the creature sitting at the desk made some comment about this being a bank, not a real estate developers, I reached into my pouch of holding and took out a small chest, more of a metal box, that was filled with the contents of one of my stashes in Skyrim. The goblin inspected the gems, the few bits of jewellery, ingots of rare metals as well as silver and gold coins from both Westeros and Essos. I'd not brought along any gold or gems I'd made by magic as the goblins might be able to detect the magic involved in their creation, but I could trade the gold ore I made for coins.
"I have more," I told the goblin "Much more, and the chance for you to profit from my good fortune".
The Accounts Manager closed the chest.
"What property needs work?" asked Sharpclaw
"A castle" I answered "A rather large one, it lacks modern comforts, and requires proper plumping".
Someone must have installed the showers and such at Hogwarts, and with enough pay, they would do the same for me.
"That is work for dwarves," said the goblin.
There'd been a sneer when the creature behind the desk used the word 'dwarves' could be some sort of racial thing. All I knew about the dwarves of this world was that Gilderoy Lockhart once had a whole squad of Dwarfs dressed up as cupids delivering singing valentines around the school, one of which was delivered to Harry Potter from Ginevra Weasley. If they were willing to carry out something as humiliating as that I could see why they'd be willing to install toilets in a castle. In most fantasy worlds dwarves were great craftsmen, perhaps that was the case here and if so I could have a lot of work for them in the future.
"As long as they work well that is all that matters to me" I stated.
I was basically a dragon in a human body so everyone was inferior to me I just wasn't a dick about it.
"We can open you an account, decide a value for your goods, and make some arrangments for you," Sharpclaw told me "and we can contact a dwarven clan that is rather desperate for work. They wouldn't work for us, but they don't mind humans so much".
What followed was a lot of paperwork and once it was done I was instructed to return tomorrow morning to met someone from a dwarven clan.
"We also need to do a little currency exchange" I mentioned.
My girls brought forth their chests and these were also full of silver and gold coins.
"Since we don't have an exchange rate for these we can put a value on the metals" the goblin let me know "we'll detract a small fee from the total".
I assumed that we'd be ripped off, but that was fine as I could have as much gold as I wanted as now that I knew that my magical doorways did, in fact, go where I wanted them to I had lots of options, and I had a lot more gold on me than just what was in these chests.
(Line Break)
The Leaky Cauldron. Diagon Ally.
While I'd intended to limit our time in the world of wand wavers, Diagon Alley had proved to be too interesting to so easily leave. There was so much to see, and a lot to buy, so one afternoon simply hadn't been enough. Already we'd had to buy means of carrying more things that we brought. Thankfully they had plenty of those bigger on the inside pouches here.
Tired from a long day of buying magical items I'd decided to rent rooms for us at the Leaky Cauldron for myself and my girls, with the intention of finishing our shopping in the morning before returning home before lunchtime. I wasn't sure what time that would be back home, but there was no rush, the Mother of Dragons wasn't going to be landing her army at Dragonstone for at least a few more weeks.
"Pumpkin juice is horrible" I complained as I sampled some of the local beverages "As is Butterbeer".
To me this butterbeer stuff tasted a little bit like less-sickly butterscotch, however, I hated the taste of butterscotch. True to its name, the Gigglewater caused the drinker to laugh out loud when consumed. A few of my girls were trying it. With the drinking age being 18 rather than 21 in the UK, and 17 within the magical parts of it, we all had no trouble ordering proper drinks even Arya.
The drinks were cheap but rather bad. Thankfully the fire whiskey was more drinkable, and was only on fire for a short amount of time, though it did leave a burning sensation in my mouth when drunk. Right now I was sipping a glass of some sort of spirit called Daisyroot Draught, it was not very good either, but at least it covered up the taste of the Butterbear and pumpkin juice, both of which I'd just tried and they were horrid. The magic users of this world were all insane.
"Bleh" was the noise that came out of my mouth.
The magic users of this world were indeed all mad, and not just when it came to drinks, but also in terms of dress, there was just something wrong about men not wearing proper trousers or at least breeches. I mean kilts were on things, but there were men here in robes that were so colourful and frilly that they could be dresses.
After some time spent sampling everything on the menu that couldn't be found elsewhere I found a drink called Dragon Scale, a wizarding brand of ale that, well it started out as ale, and somehow ended up as a larger. I didn't understand how that worked, so I put it down to magic, and just enjoyed it. As I did I looked over to see Arya who was currently poking her Shepard's Pie with a fork.
"Do you think they're real Shepards in this?" she asked me.
I assured her that the meal was people free. What I didn't say was that I could only be sure that muggle version of the dish was people free, who knew if these wizards and witches put in Shepard's pie, but it did smell like lamb so I wasn't concerned. My sense of smell was superior to humans so I was sure that I'd be able to detect human meat, something I'd encountered the smell of before thanks to spending so much time fighting dragons.
"Don't you have that in the North?" I asked "Its just minced lamb with mashed potatoes".
Arya shook her head and I realised that they did not have mashed potatoes in Westeros so maybe she didn't know what she was eating. That or High Born ladies such as herself were not served such things.
"Pies should have crusts," she said.
Well, it was hard to argue with that.
"You know I once heard that a culture should be judged not by its music, its art or science, or even by how it treats the vulnerable people within it, but by its wine, women and food," I said to Arya, "I think this culture could do with some improvements".
I'd been raised on British cooking so I didn't find the food so bad, but the drinks needed work, as for the women, there were hags here, real warty child-eating hags, at least Westeros had some attractive women within its borders and good wine. Maybe I should export some of the wine here and make some more gold?
"Shouldn't you be more supportive of your homeland?" Arya remarked as I complained to her about the local drinks "You told me you were from here".
I had to wash out the taste of Paulopabita's Fishy Green Ale before I could reply. The name alone should have stopped me from sampling the drink, the foul taste in my mouth was my own fault.
"This is close to my homeland, but not the right place," I said.
I drank some more.
"Are you drunk?" the little Stark woman asked.
I wasn't even sure I could get drunk I'd been able to drink Nord warriors under the table before I'd consumed the soul of the First Dragonborn, but these were magical drinks so maybe I could get intoxicated.
"Well I'm not dragging us off to a takeaway for chicken and chips" I replied, "So no, I'm drunk yet".
I wondered if in the muggle world they put pineapple on pizza. I use to bloody loved that stuff if I'd been drinking.
(Line Break)
The Leaky Cauldron. The Wizarding World.
I jerked awake in the middle of the night as a dream woke me up. I wasn't sure what was happening as prophetic visions in dreams, that I'd not known I could receive unless a Seer of some sort sent them to me, never came with helpful footnotes, I only knew that something dark was coming for us and that I had no time to waste.
My finely-tuned somewhat supernatural senses soon told me that I did indeed have reason to worry, and what really clued me in was that as I started to get dressed some agonised screaming filled the air. The dream had only brought me a matter of seconds, but that was enough to get me out of bed and to put a weapon in my hand. I even had time to put my boots on. On the way out of the room, I took out the dwarven dagger that I'd been keeping hidden in my new jacket that I was able to grab before I headed out into the corridor.
When I got out of my room I saw a large group of mostly women, including my harem if they could be called that, fleeing down the corridor. It was odd that were running from danger, but to be fair they were hardly ready for a fight. It was hard to battle evil when you are barefoot, getting pushed around as part of a panicking crowd, and don't know even know what the danger is. If they didn't get killed in the next few minutes they'd wake up properly and take action, after getting other people to safety, because unlike me they actually cared if the people here died or not.
It seemed as if panic had started due to a robed and masked figure who was currently blasting a red coloured spell at the fleeing women and somehow missing, perhaps he just wanted to scare them. The red light was a stunner if I remembered correctly. This Death Eater, the figure had to be one of them, was not here to kill but to capture someone. But I had no time to think more about that as I had to deal with this dark arts user.
"Who are you?" asked the dark wizard when he saw that I wasn't running away "Are you the one our Lord sent us to find?".
News of strangers must have reached Voldemort's ears and no doubt he had spies at the bank. I should have suspected that, but I'd not been concerned because I'd thought that the wand wavers would be too busy with their own affairs to concern themselves with a few visitors. My successes had made me overconfident. I would need to be more careful in the future.
"I'm the Dragonborn" I answered.
Before the man in the black robes could do anything I threw the dagger in my hand at him and it ended up inside the skull of the Death Eater who'd been firing stunning magic just a moment ago. Had he been the only dark arts user around that would have been the end of the matter, but he'd not come alone.
"AVADA KEDAVRA!" cried a shorter figure,
This wizard had just appeared behind the one I'd just killed. Knowing that the green spells would spell my doom (pun not intended) I dropped, rolled and then sent my own spell at the wizards, magical flames. Alas, they were stopped by some sort of shield.
"You would be well-advised not to attack the servants of the Dark Lord," warned this tall Death Eater.
I couldn't resist taunting the henchmen.
"And how is old Mouldyshorts?" I asked, "Does he have that snake face yet?".
My words proved to be the distraction I desired.
"How dare you mock the Dark Lord," screeched the shorter Death Eater "CRU...!"
"FUS!" I Shouted.
That wizard went flying into the wall, and he'd not been knocked out as my Shout had been short and not very powerful.
"You'll have to do better than that," I taunted.
As I blasted the Death Eater with magical lightning there was another curse from yet another Death Eater, something purple, but I dodged that easily enough as the dark wizard had yelled out the spell rather than just attack, so my speed and reflexes, that were vastly superior to others, kept me safe.
"I've seen old grannies move faster than that! Your Lord will be most disappointed" I said, making sure to fill the word 'Lord' with as much disrespect as I could manage "Care to try again?".
The newest Death Eater seemed to vibrate in rage for just a moment and then with a soft pop he disappeared into thin air. Leaving his comrades behind, but not before long. The Death Eater had teleported back into the corridor I was standing in, but behind me, as I'd suspected he would and for his trouble, I blasted him with lightning. Then I turned to one who'd tried to use one of those Unforgiveable Curses on me.
His mask had come off and because of this I saw that this man was a young Severus Snape, he had to be, and he out of action for a while, but still alive, and that gave me an idea.
"Gahrot Mindoraan Vahrukt" (Steal Comprehend Memory)
Very quickly I learned much about Snape, more than anyone would want to, and not just his magical knowledge, which was what I'd wanted, but also a lot of what he'd done when trying out new curses. He'd killed men, woman and even children since becoming a Death Eater, and in very nasty ways, feeling sickened by this man I reached took his head in my hands and broke his neck even as yet another one of his peers appeared in the corridor. I didn't even give this magical terrorist the chance to let off a spell as I raced towards him with a Bound Weapon appearing in my hand just a second before I killed the Death Eater.
"STUPEFY!" someone yelled.
As I got down into the bar area there was another flash of light but it was not aimed at me. I spared a moment to look around to see what was going on and saw a young man in glasses and a red-headed woman who were now charging into the fray, as they launched their own spells. The man in glasses was particularly furious in his spell-casting and soon had the few remaining Death Eater here the lower part of the Leaky Cauldron pinned down in a battering of spells.
Soon more of Mort Munchers were joining the battle but with two actual spell-casters backing me up, they stood no chance against and soon retreated, all disappearing into thin air at the same time with a loud crack of displaced air. It was over so fast that I didn't even have the chance to kill any more of them.
"Who are you!" the young man in the glasses demanded to know.
I ignored him and headed into the man room to find my harem.
"Calm down, James," said the girl as the two locals followed me into the pub's main room "We need to get moving before the Aurors arrive".
My whole harem was by the bar, and by the looks of things they'd had a fight here too. No one was dead, but the tables and chairs were all over the place. No doubt Arya, Meera and Aela had done their best to fight despite their lack of proper weapons and knowledge of the enemy. Had they been any less skilled they would have died. My own fault. I should have briefed them better, or taken us back to Dragonstone.
"They'll arrest anyone these days," the man with the glasses was saying. "Anything to have something to point at and say 'we're doing a good job really'".
Guess the Ministry for Magic was just as useless here as it was in the books.
"Time for us to go," said Aela "Let's grab our stuff and you can Shout us a door far away from here".
Normally my werewolf lover would up for more fighting, but she knew that it would be very foolish to fight people that had powers she didn't understand in a place she knew so little about.
"Come with us," he said. "We have a few portkeys, we can have all of you out of here in a couple of seconds".
That might be a good idea since I still needed to visit the bank in the morning and if I was going to do business here perhaps I should make this world safer.
"We have to get our stuff," said Meera.
Fighting evil in a nightgown and bare feet wasn't much fun, and we could come under attack again if we stayed here.
"Okay. Meet us back here and make it fast," said the local man with a hint of urgency in his voice "We'll have to leave without you if you take too long".
(Line Break)
Unknown. Magical Britain.
While we didn't know exactly where they'd brought us I could guess, and I was tipped off by the baby, who didn't yet have a lightning scar on his forehead, and the babysitter worried me as he had to be Peter Pettigrew, or Wormtail as he was also known. I had to handle this carefully as the rat-man needed to be captured and not be allowed to escape.
"What a nice home you have," one of my girls said.
The comment was ignored as Lily Potter spoke to someone via a fireplace, and it was a rather cosy home.
"They were attacked by Death Eaters," she was saying to the fire.
"Wait for just a second," asked the woman who was on the other end of the line "You ran into Death Eaters? This was supposed to be a quick look around and then return home. You know HE is looking for you".
I wondered what could have drawn both the heroes and villains of this world to the Leaky Cauldron. It must have something to do with my group and I being there. Perhaps a Death Eater spy had been at the inn and had reported that a group of unknown people with a lot of money were at the alley. They might even have found out about us via the bank. Doubtful the goblins would have mentioned anything given that they cared not for human affairs, but perhaps some human employee had tipped the dark wizards off. A spy as I'd thought earlier and somehow the Order of the Phoneix had gotten news that something would happen at the pub.
"Does anything work out that easily when Jame is involved?" asked Lily Potter.
Like father like son it seemed.
"Suppose not," replied the older woman "I'll find Dumbledore and send him to you".
A private word with the Headmaster of Hogwarts could solve a lot of problems for the Wizarding World in the future, and while I didn't care much for their conflicts, I was already rather busy, if handled right my information would save a lot of lives, and perhaps there would be some sort of reward. At the very least I'd be able to do my business here without getting attacked by more dark mages.
"So who are you people?" James Potter asked.
I spoke for the group.
"My name is Gothic," I told the locals "And the lovely ladies with me are Aela, Meera Reed and Arya Stark. We were staying in London for one night before moving on. Which didn't go so well".
I knew why I'd been there, but I didn't know exactly what was going on here. I wanted to know more.
"Why were you at the pub?" I asked Potter.
He confirmed that he'd heard about Voldemort ordering a few of his minions to check out some people at the inn.
At this point, I began coaxing the whole story out of the wizard and witch. All about the Dark Lord and his followers who were looking for the Potters. With that in mind, it would seem very foolish for them to bring us here, but they'd not had many options and the heroic types were always too trusting.
"So what's your story then?" asked James" "You're obviously not a wizard but you still managed to stand up to those Death Eaters. How did you beat them?".
This was when Dumbledore appeared, and he looked much as I'd expected. His dress sense was worse than those who'd been at the pub.
"I'd like to speak alone with your leader," I said.
Before long the room was cleared and I began to talk to the hopefully not evil headmaster. If he did turn out to be an evil Dumbledore I'd have to disarm with a Shout very quickly and stab him with a bound weapon before anyone other than me could react.
"In my world, your life is a series of books, good ones, and some movies" I informed Dumbledore "And to prove it, you were lovers with Grindlewald. Before he was a dark lord".
Now that got a reaction.
"How!?" he asked, "You can't know that".
I let him process that for a moment or two.
"The multi-verse is a vast place," I told the old teacher "There are many dimensions out there, in some you are real people, in others you're fictional. Deal with it".
He dealt with it better than most would have, and I wouldn't normally be this blunt, but given the date, we didn't have much time before Voldemort came knocking at the door of this house. If they knew he would be here soon it would be possible to lure him into a trap and kill him. After quickly dealing with the Horcruxes.
"And how do I know you're telling the truth?" asked the Headmaster "You claim that I am a fictional character in your world, so you must know how Voldemort is defeated, assuming he is".
I mused over what to tell him.
"Well if the Horcruxeses, or whatever they are called, match up to the ones in the books then I know exactly where they all are and how to destroy them," I told the guy with the big beard "If we plan it out right I bet we could have all destroyed by this time tomorrow".
I thought some more.
"Oh, I can tell you who the traitor is," I said to Dumbledore "and I know that he has already or very soon will tell Voldemort where to find the Potters. If I'm right about him then I'll be right about much more".
Some truth potion should help things along with that Wormtail guy, and in a day or two Voldemort should be history.
(Line Break)
Diagon Alley. Wizarding World.
It didn't take two days, more like a day and a half, once Dumbledore had organised everyone in his Order of the Phoneix it had been a simple task to hunt down all of Voldemort's soul jars. The hard part should have been breaking into the bank, but Dumbledore had the authority to take the cup out of the vault. Destroying the containers with fiendfyre proved to be much safer than you'd think thanks to skills of the witches and wizards who made up the Order of the Phoneix.
The actual hard part was killing Voldemort for the first and what would hopefully be the only time, and it might have taken a long time if not for the fact that he'd come for the Potters. Having somehow not learned about the parts of his soul getting snuffed out he been vulnerable when he'd entered the house to get himself blown up by something Sirus Black, Remus Lupin and James Potter had set up.
Overall it had been all too easy, in fact sorting out all the dwarves I needed for the fixing up of Dragonstone proved to be work than defeating the Dark Lord as they were unwilling to meet at the bank so I ended up with hundreds of dwarves who all had carts full of supplies, tools and their own food in the middle of Diagon Ally. To make matters even worse my girls had decided to go for one last look around the shops since I didn't intend to return for some time.
I spent that time thinking that it might be fun to come back in ten years, assuming that I didn't get myself killed before then, and see what the life of Harry Potter was like with having his fate intertwined with Voldemort. Would a new dark lord rise up? Perhaps I'd come back find out.
"Come on we're leaving," I said to the group as we left the last of the stores that I would allow them to visit "Time to go home".
There was just a little whining from the women as I lead everyone to the front of the convoy the dwarves had created. This gate was going to stay open for a while so I would need to stay on this side of the magical doorway so that no one who shouldn't be coming through decided to follow the convoy.
"No debate," I told the girls "Home, now. We can come back and visit this place again once the heat has died down".
The Ministry of Magic would learn about what happened soon, and I didn't want to be around for that. So I opened a sort of portal and then made sure all my girls went through. Before I directed the dwarves though, and it had cost me a lot to get them to agree to this, but they were supplying all the parts as well the materials, and I did need them, no price was too high to get proper plumping.