Chapter 11
Hermione's P.O.V.
14th June 1998
After sitting for a couple of minutes with Draco in front of the fire I was starting to get stiff and bored. Just as I was thinking about moving to get up and take a walk, an owl flew in holding a note. It then proceeded to land in front of Draco, at which point I moved away from his shoulder and into a proper sitting position as he untied the note from the owl's leg and read it. As he got further down the note his eyes widened and he got a panicked look on his face, when he finished the letter he jumped up and proceeded to throw the note into the fire and just stood there for a few minutes trying to plan what his next actions would be and it appeared that not long after he had made his mind up on his course of actions to follow. He then turned to me and proceeded to start kneeling and open his mouth as if to explain, but I interrupted him before he could start talking.
"Go do whatever it is you have to do and we can talk about it later when u are finished with whatever it is you have to do and before you say anything more about being sorry for having to leave me here alone or whatever else, it is alright I am a big girl and I can handle myself and anyway I want to go visit our little friend downstairs anyway."
He had a look of appreciation but also of wonder and curiosity, which I can tell, was pointed to what it could possibly be that I wanted to do with the man down in his secret basement. But he chose to ignore it and accept that when he gets back we will discuss everything and with that he then proceeded to dash off out of his office and I can only assume to either apparate away or floo away but for the time being I had other thoughts on my mind. So I put my shoes back on and grabbed my coat off the chair where I had discarded it earlier when we arrived and proceeded to exit the mansion and go round the side to where I know the secret door was hidden. I proceeded to open it the way Draco had shown me and walked down the stairs slowly, as I walked in made a mental note to get some torches down here because it was rather difficult with only my wand an s source of light but for the time being I will manage. As I neared the bottom of the steps I stopped to think what exactly would I be doing down there, to which I shook my head at myself and continued down to the bottom, when I was finally off the steps I looked at the young man before me and saw that for the briefest of seconds he had lifted his head up but it very promptly fell back down again suggesting to me that he must be very weak, and with that thought I conjured a chair and sat down to observe the man before me.
I noticed this time around his skin was looking a sickly pale suggesting he would have to be fed soon or I don't know what will happen to this man. Moving on my eyes shifted to his arm which was covered in markings, from what I remember from reading or should I say barely reading as there is not much published on the lycan specie which from what I could gather is due to them being very private creatures, again from what little I could gather, but back to his arm and markings from what I could tell the marks I given to the full blooded lycan males as and when they pass certain parts of their life almost like a sign of their passage of right and as the males get older once they have all the general markings given to almost all males the markings start to differ in now they state the males hierarchy. His markings start just on his chest more his collarbone obviously leaving the space below it for where one day his full blood bonded mark will be placed, the mark then extends up to his shoulder and onto his arm, his mark only went as far as to his bicep and part of his triceps. There is very little known as to how the marks are placed on their bodies hopefully once I have changed my name and accepted my true heritage I will finally be able to gain access to my families property and from there maybe I will be able to find some more books on the matter and learn more about my people.
I know that my real parents left some stuff for me at Gringotts in a vault that is in my mother's name, which is one of the many reasons one I wish to change my name as soon as possible so that I can find out what exactly is in there, but moving on I wonder what other information Draco has on the young man before, I will ask him later when we met. I look at said young man again and study his figure now it appears since I last saw him he has lost some weight and he looks even more sick, his body is covered in dirt and I don't want to know what else. There must be some sort of spell of ruin that has been placed on this room which is preventing me from smelling the obvious stench that must be coming from that man based on that fact that he has obviously been chained up like that for a long time and there is no obvious bathroom or toilet for him to use and since even then if there was one he would not have been able to use it.
With all that in mind I think that from here I must see if there is any more information I can get from Draco about this man and if there is see what it is. But for one we need to get him some form of sustenance and clean him and then from there decide based on how he reacts what we do with him if we release him from any form of chains and provide him with better living quarters down here or if we can move him into a room at my new house or if Morgana forbid it I have to kill the man, which would be such a shame as he would be very useful in the coming future and with my plans for everything. Well there is not much more I can learn from all this so I might as well leave now and not much else I can do down here, so I stand up and vanish the chair I was using as I turn to leave back up the stairs something tells me to turn around. So I do as I turn around I see him with his eyes barely open trying to look at me but for lack of energy he can't so I move back to him and crouch down and lift his head up by his chin using just my thumb and finger and look into his eyes which upon looking at look dead as though he has nothing to live for anymore almost like he is begging me to kill him right here or save him. Well we will have to see which one it will be in the coming future. So I stand back up and head back up the stairs and exit the stairway and close the doorway behind me and as I come back around the front of the house I see it is not as late as I thought it was so I decide to go back to Draco's study and grab my scarf and head home in the mean time then.
I enter his study and pick up my scarf from where it had fallen on the floor by the chair my jacket had been resting on and as I stand up I fell bump from behind and am sent flying forward but as I think I am about to hit the floor hard and brace for the impact it never comes and instead I feel a arm around my waist and realise I am standing up with my back against a man's chest. As my sense start to come back to me I quickly step out of the man's grasp and turn on him and point my wand at him, which I unholstered from the hidden pocket in my coat, but I soon realise that the man who has bumped and subsequently caught me was Draco. I should have know that the only way a man could have caught me that fast was if he was a seeker and had the lighting fast reflexes of one, but moving on I lower my wand and observe the man before me, he was out of breath and his hair and clothes looked dishevelled and had a shocked but scared look on his face, if I didn't know any better this is the look of a man who has come back from a quick rendezvous with a lady friend and gotten caught by his other half afterwards, but I decide to give him the benefited of the doubt as he opens his mouth to start explaining.
"My lady I did not expect you to still be here, I apologise for knocking you over just now or should I say almost. I also apologise for my dishevelled look as I have been running around trying to fix things and as I did not expect you to still be here I did not think to tidy myself up a bit."
I continued to just look at him as he began to tidy himself up and look a bit more presentable.
"Very well it is all right and what was it you were fixing that could make you Draco Malfoy look so unkempt, Hamm"
With that comment I walked over to his desk and sat in his chair and looked at the man before me who was now starting to sweat and looking very nervous with life.
"Well... you see my lady there was an incident at the ministry and well I was called in to help fix it."
"is that so Mr. Malfoy now may I ask why is it that the ministry of magic which I heavily filled with members of the order would call you, an ex death eater who they despise to come and fix something at the ministry, hmmm"
At that statement he looked pale and started to stutter and look worried at the fact that I had addressed him by his surname now and not his first name.
"well you see it was with the man who is helping you by the house and you see when he went in to the ministry to get the permits to renovate it well he had to put down the name of the new owner and well when people saw your name, word spread and soon Weasley and Potter where in there asking many questions about you and such and the man panicked and he owled me and I had to go and get him out and well when Weasley and Potter saw me they came at me after they saw the newspaper article about us and well we started to battle it out and then soon it was broken up and I left and so did the estate agent who had in all the confusion managed to obtain your permits for you."
I just sat there and looked at him for a few minutes and I could not get the strange feeling out that he was still keeping something from me and so I stood up and moved towards him around the desk till I was directly in front of him I grabbed has chin in my hand and forced him to look at me.
"Did you know Draco that I learnt a very useful skill during my hunt for my parents?"
He looked at me with confusion instead of elaborating and telling him I just decided to show him and that when I dove into his mind and started to look through his memories and that's when I saw the incident he had told me about but then I saw that he hadn't told me the whole truth and saw what he had been trying to hide from me and well now I see why he had tried to hide it from me because not only had Harry and Ron asked about me but Ron had started throwing insults about me, asking if Draco liked having his seconds and then he brought up the night I lost my virginity to him and that's when I couldn't see anymore so I left his mind and took a step back breathing heavily trying to resist the urge to walk out of there and go find Ron and murder him but I carried on taking deep breaths and then proceeded to leave the study and head out the mansion, Draco obviously stunned about the past few minutes was obviously not keeping up with current events and was to slow to stop me from aspirating back home where I put up wards to keep everybody out including Draco and grabbed my bottle of fire whisky and proceeded to my bedroom where I proceeded to drink the whole bottle and then pass out on my bed not bothering to take off my clothes only my shoes.
When I woke up the next day I lay still for a few moments processing the events of yesterday. After lying there for a few minutes I decided it was time I got my ass out of bed as there where to many things I needed to do today in order to further my cause and I couldn't put them off any longer. So I decided to first open my eyes so I can judge what time it is as I don't remember closing the curtains when I got home yesterday. The first thing I see when I open my eyes is excruciating pain from the blinding sun shining through my windows, I very quickly shut them and let them return to normal and this time when I opened them I proceeded to open them slowly and cautiously and this proved to have been the better option as instead of excruciating pain it was more like a annoying itch on my eyes but it was better than nothing as now I could actually see the room and my surroundings. I slowly sat up after learning my lesson with just doing something fast especially when you are hangover, once I was sat up I looked around my room trying to locate my wand and some sort of device that would be able to tell me the time. I finally located my wand which had been on the floor by my shoes and as I reached for it I saw a glint of mental on my wrist and that's when I remembered I had a watch on, I glanced at it once I had finished reaching for my wand and saw that it was actually earlier than I thought as it was only seven in the morning.
So I got up and walked to the bathroom where I ran myself a nice hot bath with bubbles, after relaxing in the water for a good twenty minutes my body didn't feel as stiff or tired anymore and I was starting to feel more human except for the dull headache and rolling stomach I would get if I moved to fast or bent down for too long, which was probably due to the fact that I finished a whole bottle of fire whiskey on an empty stomach which in hind sight was a very stupid choice but no use worrying about it now cause it's over and I need to get on with the day. After dressing in a smart black pencil skirt and a dark, almost midnight blue fitted blouse, I walked to the kitchen to get myself some tea and food, all the while drying my hair with a towel. As I passed the lounge I dumped the towel over the couch and walked into the kitchen thinking which tea I would make, but I stopped short when I saw a owl waiting at the window sill but it was one I did not recognize it so I approached it cautiously and opened the window allowing it to fly in and land on the kitchen table. I approached the owl with caution not sure who had sent it but still curiosity got my better side and I untied the envelope and the owl flew back out the window which I shut behind it, I picked the letter back up and against my better judgment to scan the envelope for any curses I looked at the front but it only had just my full name nothing else but then I noticed in the bottom corner the initials of my birth name which really confused me and intrigued me even more.
So I took out the letter placed it on the dining room table walked over to the counter and proceeded to make myself some tea, once the kettle had boiled and the boiling water poured into the cup and the sugar and milk added did I finally sit down and pick up the letter to read. It read as follows
Dear Mrs Hermione Jean Granger (Neomea Ulrica)
My name is GrookFang, I am a Goblin at Gringotts who is in charge of your account left by your mother and father, though I am only one accountant involved in your families estate, I am only in charge of your account.
There have been whispers that you might be soon changing your name and claiming your inheritance that is due to you. You may be wondering why this does not look like an official Gringotts letter and that is because technically speaking it is not, I will only be able to contact you formally on behalf of the bank once you have claimed your true status and until then I only right as someone who knew your parents very well and your mother's side of the family as well. I write partly to congratulate you on claiming your true status but I also write to give you my greatest condolences on the passing of both sets of your parents.
Finally I wish to say I look forward to finally meeting you soon and I wish you best of luck on your journey into life
Many regards
GrookFang
When I finally finished re-reading the letter I was shocked, by the sounds of it my mother's side of things had left me more than I could possibly guess and that alone was shocking let alone the fact that I have an accountant for just my account which means there should be more accounts based on what he had been hinting at. Which means I better hurry up and get my first order of business for the day over and done with as I can see I will be spending a large amount of my time today in meetings at Gringotts.
With that in mind I drained my now lukewarm tea walked into my bedroom and promptly tied my hair up into a bun ad walked into the bathroom where I brushed my teeth and did a few other things to make myself smell nice I then proceeded to walk to my closet where I grabbed a pair of black stiletto like high heels and grabbed the matching blazer to my skirt I also grabbed my black trench coat from where I had thrown it on the floor when I arrived back yesterday evening. I made sure I had everything I needed, my wand my birth papers both muggle and wizard and my family heirlooms from both parents, my mother's heirloom was a locket with her family sigils on one side of it and my fathers sigils on the other side and then on the inside was a picture of the two of them, then my father's heirloom was a signet ring with his families official sigils. I had attached the ring to the chain which the locket was connected and placed it around my neck feeling the cold bite of the metal touching my skin, warming up from the heat of my body.
I then walked outside and locked the door and then proceeded to apparate away to the ministry, when I arrived inside the ministry I preceded to the check in where they now mark and monitor your wand so that is you use it in any way or something happens they can check the magical register and then compare to all the wands that have been in that day and who the wand belonged to. After I was cleared and documented I then proceeded to the elevator where I then picked the floor for Birth & Death Registration and Inheritance.
When I arrived at my destination I walked straight to the receptionist where I filled out the forms I was given and he then walked back to the head of departments office he then returned sat down and after 10 min of waiting the head of department walked outside and called mine and promptly walked back into his office. I followed him and stood there waiting for him to actually properly acknowledge me, after a few minutes of standing there waiting he finally looked up and seemed to acknowledge my presence properly.
"Please take a seat Mrs. Granger"
I think it was at that point that now he was looking at me and saying my name that he actually recognized who I was. At which point he very quickly jumped up to shake my hand and usher me into my chair and offer me beverages and so on after letting him indulge in this for a few moments I interrupted him and told him to kindly and slightly different words just sit the hell down and get started. After that we very quickly started I could tell by his mannerisms that he was not yet aware that I was no longer best pals with the golden boys as I had come to calling them and he obviously thought that if he helped me out with this then I would put in a good word for him to them, if only he knew but I thought I would keep that fact to myself.
After nearly forty five minutes of tedious paperwork and getting my finger pricked nearly ten times cause the stupid idiot was so busy blabbering that he kept mixing up the spells and certain and when it was all finally said and done and I had proven all the necessary requirements it was official I was now officially named Hermione Neomea Ulrica. With all the official paperwork now in hand I will head to Gringotts so that I can get that over and done with, I reached the apparition point and apparate to the bank and walked up the stairs and into the banking hall and walked up to the front desk and waited for the goblin to finish what he was doing. After all the time I spent on the run with a goblin I had learnt a couple of things like if you want them to respect you, you better respect them first. So after ten min of standing there I finally had enough and cleared my throat, it seemed he finally acknowledged my presence and put down the quill and looked up at me,
"What can I do for you?"
"I am here to met with GrookFang, I am Miss Ulrica"
He looked at me for a few moments before he asked for some form of identification so I produced my locket and signet ring for him hoping it would be enough for now. By the look on his face it was obvious he was content with those for now, he got up and walked off to a door off to the side and returned back in a few minute another goblin following him. When they arrived the first goblin went back to whatever it was he had been doing when I arrived and the new goblin walked forward and proceeded to bow before me and he then announced who he was,
"good day Miss Ulrica, my name is GrookFang, I am going to assume you being here that you have finalised all your other paperwork and you are ready to begin going over your inheritance and estate am I right?"
I bowed and instead of speaking due to being so shocked over what he has said, I replied by just nodding my head, he then turned away and started walking towards the doorway he had come through just a few moments earlier, I started following him still trying to process what he had said to me, I had guessed based on what the Grangers used to hint at that I had nearly 3 000 000 Galleons left to me but the way he was talking suggested it was a hell of a lot more than that. I followed him for nearly a good minute, going down a corridor and making lots of twists and turns before finally we stopped in front a doorway, GrookFang turned towards me and gestured for me to take a seat on the benches he indicated behind me, he then knocked on the door and waited a few seconds before entering the room and closing the door behind him, he was in there for a good 10 or so minutes before exciting again, still alone.
He then started off again down the hallway, not looking back once at this point I was starting to lose my patience with them I had been here over half an hour and I had still yet to find out anything from any of them. Finally after walking for nearly a good five minutes or so we finally arrived at another set of doors this time he open both of them and gestured for me to enter them, inside the room was a long table with about ten chairs surrounding the table, there where various pieces of armour around the room which I could only assume from the size was meant for goblins, some looked brand new others had dents and scratches and even the odd whole, off to the right was another door. It was that door which I was once again lead through. This room was slightly different there was a mahogany desk, which had a large number of papers stacked all over it, off to the one side was a small fireplace and some arm chairs, but it was not there that I was indicated to go sit at, but instead in front of the desk.
After we had both settled down in our chairs, he began sorting some of the files and folders on his desk for a few seconds before he finally cleared his throut and started talking,
"Well Miss Ulrica lets begin shall we now let's start with your bank account first, after tallying the interest and the money received from a trust fund set up by your fathers dealings in the wizarding world the sum total of that account is approximately 6 500 000 Galleons (32 500 000 Pounds). Your father had invested some money many years ago, before you were even born if I am correct, when he was younger into much business, that has become very successful and such.
Right well that concludes your father's estate and such and your inheritance from him now let's move onto your parents combined estate now shall we. Now your mother and fathers combined account is not very large in its self it is roughly valued at around 3 500 000 Galleons. Now that includes some property in here in England, France and a property that had been left to your father in Scotland. Now the French estate is valued at around 250 000 Pounds which when converted equals to roughly 50 000 Galleons, now that was at its last valuation which was performed when the property was given to your parents by your mother's family when they got married, but we recently had it re evaluated and it now sits at around 100 000 Galleons thanks to your parents slowly renovating it over the years. Next is the small house they owned here in England, which is actually where you grew up under the care of the Grangers, now sadly after the war and raids that occurred to the property it has greatly lost most of its value and is only roughly worth about 5 000 Galleons now, if you would like we can organise for the house to be demolished and then the land be sold at about 20 000 Pounds which is 4 000 Galleons of course after taxes and the cost of removing and fixing up the estate it will be less than that when it finally arrives in your bank account. Now if that is ok with you then just sign the document here and here. Very well onto the next matter the property that was left to your father by his uncle in Scotland, now sadly this property is in Hogsmead, I am not sure if you may know it, it is listed here as being called the Shrieking Shack, now it appears this property has become somewhat of a historical monument to the students at Hogwarts and if you would like we can leave it be for now but if you change your mind then let me know and I can organise whatever it is you would like to be done to it. Now the rest of the amount is 3 396 000, now that is an accumulation of interest from the vault sitting unused in the last eighteen years or so, there is also some old family jewels that were given to your mother that are now worth quit a some and if I am correct the full amount is totalled to be valued at roughly 750 000 Galleons, next there are some paintings in there if I am correct they are rather rare ones that after our experts reviewed them they are valued at about 1 000 000 Galleons. Now there is not much in their vault which is from your father other than some old tombs which appear to have something to do with your father's side of the family and all that.
Now finally we must look at the last few pieces which after this war is a lot, now your mother was the youngest of three and it appears none of your uncles had any living heirs so there estates have been passed down to you as the last living blood relative as your grandmother was the last living relative before she passed of natural causes later on, now that also means her and her husband's estates are passed onto you as well, but sadly they are not worth as much as they once where after the order ransacked many of them of their homes and also they claimed many as apparently at the time there were no apparent living blood relatives, but now that you have claimed your birth right you can fight to get those properties back, now moving on the sum total of all the properties combines is roughly around 7 000 000 Galleons. That includes the contents of the vaults and interest of inactive accounts and also it appears your mother's side of the family tended to invest a lot of money in business so there is also that income. Now it appears there is a vault set up in your grandmothers name, it appears that some of your families money was put into there, where it then goes out to support many different causes now some of those said causes have shut down leaving a large amount of money being unused, now I can move that money to your account every month or you can invest it somewhere else, now whenever you are ready to decide on those just send me a letter and we can set up a date to sit down and organise those now if you would like I have taken the curtsy of setting up these papers which will allow me to move your parents vault contents into your vault and the contents of your uncles and grandmothers vaults all into your family vault if you would like and i will also change the name of said family vault to your current surname if you wish or would you like me to change it to something else. All i need you to do is sign here and here and i will get this done for you right away.
Very good now final few things and i now we have been here a long time, first i wish to give you these cheque books which will allow you to pay for certain things without having to come here to the bank for authorisation, but please understand that you have a limit and that is 1 000 000 Galleons otherwise it has to come through the bank for authorisation, now there is one for your vault and the second one is for your family vault, second would you like to go and visit your vault for today and then we you can go home and sort out the other things i have given you to do."
With that i signed the papers where i was told to and i picked my current surname for the family vault. After that he collected all the papers he put some back into folders and then put the other papers in a small wooden box on his desk adn they disappeard off to there destinations i could only think, with that all done he got up and exited his office followed him again adn we went back into the main banking hallway and then we went to the entrance to the vaults and climbed into a cart which was already waiting for us there. I always hated this part it was like going on a rollercoaster which i always hated, we soon arrived at a vault and got out the cart, he then proceeded to open the vault for me, once the door was open i entered the vault and what i saw shocked me.
A/N Hi guys so sorry for the late update but here is a really long one for you guys. Hope you enjoy.