Chapter Ten: Magical Maturity

"Good," Archblade began in a self-satisfied voice when Harry entered the conference room. "You finally resemble a wizard who looks like he'll reach his next birthday."

Harry smiled fondly at the surly goblin who had changed his life. "Merlin forbid I die and my fortune gets placed in the hands of some distant relative in Siberia and out your control."

"Actually," Archblade replied his thin lips pressed together tightly so he didn't smile, "it's Argentina, not Siberia."

Harry barked out a laugh. He couldn't help it. His mood had greatly improved since his visit with the healers. He'd just learned he gained an inch in height and weighed a stone more than he had before the ritual.

Archblade's face cleared as he looked over Harry's shoulder and growled. "Drop your charm."

The next moment, Sensei and a man Harry had never seen but whose magic he'd felt were standing behind him.

"Hello."

The man grinned and held out his hand. "Kris Wilde," he said with an American accent.

"Nice to see you," Harry said placing emphasis on the word see.

Kris chuckled and Sensei rolled his eyes before they went to stand guard at the doors as he and Archblade sat at the conference table.

"Before the others arrive, I wanted to go over your accounts," Archblade said as he passed Harry a portfolio that held his complete financial profile. "We've cancelled your trust vault and merged it with the Potter vaults since you have claimed your Lordship. Your parents set up your trust vault as a refilling vault that topped out at 20,000 galleons each year. After your parents were murdered, Dumbledore used his role as your 'guardian' to take money out of your vault. We've tracked down where the money he stole from you was utilized. Some went to pay for your parents' funeral and burial at Godric's Hollow." Harry scowled; Potters were buried at Castle Potter not Godric's Hollow. He was going to have to change that. "He also withdrew a sizable sum to pay bribes that helped your cottage at Godric's Hollow be declared a National Landmark." Harry gripped the armrests on his chair so tight that the knuckles were turning white. Archblade seeing Harry's response smiled evilly showing his teeth. "The Headmaster of Hogwarts also used your money to commission a statue erected outside your Godric's Hollow's cottage to commemorate your family's sacrifice." Harry wanted to scream with frustration. He'd bet anything that Dumbledore was behind the world thinking of him as their precious Boy-Who-Lived. "He further authorized 2,000 galleons a year transferred to the Dursleys account for your upkeep and care." At this, Harry did growl. "Last year, he gave the Weasleys 100 galleons from your vault. All these transactions were from your trust vault, which the traitor among our ranks gave him access too. Albus Dumbledore did attempt to enter the Potter Family vaults and the personal wing at Castle Potter numerous times but failed. He was unable to circumvent the family magic protecting both places. To enter the Potter vaults you have to be a Potter or escorted by a Potter, marriage does not count. This access restriction includes goblins. The goblins allowed access without a Potter are your account manager or the head of Gringotts and that is only to perform inventory, the magic surrounding your vault does not allow us to take or add items from the vault."

Harry whistled impressed. "And Dumbledore was unable to break the charms on the family vaults even with the old account manager on his side."

"No." Archblade smirked evilly, "it is safe to say you have the most secured vault inside Gringotts, Lord Potter. The damage could've been worse, from the transaction activity; it appears the Albus Dumbledore was more interested in acquiring Potter family artifacts rather than money, but was unable to do so. What would you like done to recover what has been stolen?"

Harry scowled. "I doubt the Dursleys spent 1,000 pounds on me in twelve years. I want that money back with interest. I'm already working on a way to reclaim Godric's Hollow, but I want the money back from him from that. You can ignore the Weasleys, the hundred galleons was probably used to pay the fine caused by my and Ron's idiocy with the flying car. As far as Dumbledore, I guess forward any proof you have to Madame Bones, if we build a strong enough case; he won't be able to wiggle out of it. Do you think she'll be the next minister?"

"She's the best choice, but who knows how the minds of wizards work."

Harry snorted. "As if you guys aren't working behind the scenes to ensure she wins."

Archblade ignored him and slid right into going through his accounts as if he hadn't spoken. He left his accounts and investments in Archblade's capable hands and gave him a 10% commission on whatever profit he managed to eke out, before taking the bankcards Archblade handed him to use in the muggle world.

Harry sighed. "I don't suppose there is something like this in the magical world?"

"Anywhere but England."

"Why am I not surprised."

Archblade grinned. "However you can use your Lord's ring here to pay for purchases, being the head of an Ancient and Noble House has its privileges."

There was a knock on the door and Madame Bones entered with the two Unspeakables in their special robes that obscured their features.

"I heard about your confrontation with Albus," the head Unspeakable said with unholy glee. "Well done, lad."

"I let my anger get the better of me and let it slip that I knew about the prophecy," he answered back wryly.

The head Unspeakable, Mr. D waved a hand. "Don't worry. Now he'll think twice about meddling but knowing him he'll just be craftier with his plans, be careful. He still thinks you're a horcrux. It never occurs to Albus that people can be as smart as he is or can have knowledge he does not. He was raising you so that you'd sacrifice yourself for his 'greater good'. The man has tunnel vision to go along with the belief that his way is the only way, he won't give up on that notion willingly."

Harry's hands fisted in his lap as the truth of Mr. D's words hit him. That only made him more determined to get this Voldemort mess over with so he could live his life.

"I know it's only been a week, but has there been any progress with the horcruxes?"

"Yes. We researched the life of Thomas Riddle. His life at the orphanage, his parents, family history. While doing that, we believe we stumbled upon a horcrux underneath the shack where his mother lived as a child," L began, "but we need your help to retrieve it."

"My help?" Harry asked surprised.

"There are several spells protecting the horcrux, we could break them but not without serious injury to our team."

"Parseltongue?" Harry guessed.

Mr. L nodded. "Most likely."

Harry looked over to Sensei who gave a short nod.

"Okay."

The spent the rest of the time discussing what they had found out about the life of Thomas Riddle. When the meeting wond down, he asked about Sirius. He was feeling better about him and to some extent, Remus after skimming through his father's journals again. Especially his Lord's journal, he saw how his father managed to win his mother's heart, and how Sirius and Remus lavished him with attention when he was baby, though he could've done without reading about his dad going on about how amazing sex was with his mother.

"He's well and relieved to be free. It will take several weeks for his body to recover from the years of malnourishment and dementor attacks. He'll be ready for visitors in a couple days."

Harry nodded. He'd go, he owed it to the man to at least make an effort. "Lord Potter, may I speak to you on a personal matter," L asked.

Curious, Harry nodded as everyone with the exception of his guards left. L glanced at Sensei and Kris.

"I am assuming you are occlumency masters and took confidentiality oaths?" Sensei nodded and L looked to Harry. "How about you? How are you progressing with your occlumency?"

"I can tell when someone's trying to break in but I can't always keep my trainer out. I haven't reached the point where I begin compartmentalizing my memories and emotions yet. Luckily, I'm wearing a necklace that blocks legilimency attempts."

"May I test you with and without the necklace on?"

Harry nodded and waited for several seconds, though he could tell L was trying to probe his thoughts, he was confident nothing could penetrate the protections inside the goblin made necklace. L nodded after a few moments and asked him to remove his necklace. Harry did and immediately felt the Unspeakable's presence in his mind. He broke eye contact and stared at the ceiling. L took out his wand and Harry felt a stronger attempt sweep through his body. Harry closed his eyes and reached out to capture L's wand. L chuckled.

"Excellent progress for a beginner, Lord Potter."

Harry opened his eyes as L removed his Unspeakable robes. L had long, straggly blond hair and an absentminded air that reminded Harry of the pictures of hippies he'd seen in muggle history books.

"Xenophilius Lovegood. In my cover, I am the owner of a magazine called The Quibbler. The Quibbler is full of conspiracy theories you have to read between the lines to understand. Since I'm known to be eccentric, everyone ignores the warnings and thinks I'm crazy. My wife was an Unspeakable as well, she passed away almost three years ago while spell crafting. My daughter heard the explosion and raced to her mother. She was in the room and watched her mother die." Harry gasped. "Unfortunately, the shock forced her magical maturity to arrive when she was only nine years old. My Luna is a seer." This time it was Sensei and Kris who gasped. "Getting your inheritance early can have a detrimental effect on the person. For Luna it means she gets visions she can't properly process or interpret. She has amazing insight but can sometimes appear out there with her interpretation of the vision she receives. This past year at Hogwarts was not a good one for my Luna. She was sorted into Ravenclaw and while she was at the top of her year, she's a more creative thinker than your typical Ravenclaw or your friend Hermione who are more literal, straight from the textbook type." Harry nodded understandingly, but still didn't see what that had to do with him. "I think it would be good for my Luna if she met people who wouldn't bully her. I understand you are having a get together at a muggle amusement park, a very eclectic gathering." Harry nodded. "Would you mind including Luna in the group, she's already somewhat friendly with Ginny Weasley as their home is a couple miles from ours?"

"Of course, May?" A second later May appeared. "May can you add Luna Lovegood to the invitation list to Blackpool and send it right away, also my vaults are unlocked, tell Sherry we can get in there and start searching whenever she's free."

"Yes Master," she popped away.

"Thank you."

Harry shrugged. "No big deal. I'll have a talk with Neville and ask him to keep an eye out of her at Hogwarts this term."

Mr. Lovegood smiled gratefully, put his robes back on, and left the room.

"Am I a doormat?" he asked Sensei.

"No. You're a young man who hates injustice and has a big heart, and if it makes you feel better, he underplayed Luna's condition. It's very dangerous to come into magical maturity early."

"What's magical maturity?" He didn't remember his father mentioning anything about it in his journals.

"It's when your family magic stabilizes with your magical core, usually around seventeen or eighteen. If this happens before puberty or seventeen, it can cause havoc with your system. With my family's gifts, early development can be lethal. To put it in perspective, think of Satoshi with quadruple the energy." Harry shuddered. "It actually happened to my cousin Mitsukuni, Takashi's best friend." Harry nodded, recognizing the name; Takashi talked about his cousin a lot. "It's why Takashi is so protective of his cousin. Mitsukuni is a contradiction. His growth has slowed. He's fifteen but looks eight and he's lethal. Mitsukuni is one of the most lethal martial artist practitioners in the world, part of that is the effects of his forced maturity, and he's only a squib. With Luna being a witch, a witch with an active magical core and her family's magic being precognition, I'm surprised she's sane. She must be powerful to function enough to even attend Hogwarts let alone be first of her year."

Harry wrapped his arms around himself. "How do you fix it?"

"There is no fix. Eventually, her core and magic will stabilize but at a slower rate. As I said, we normally reach maturity around seventeen; Luna's core won't stabilize until she's around twenty or thirty."

"I didn't read anything about magical maturity or family magic in my father's journals."

"Keep reading gifts can often be so subtle you don't have any idea what they are. I suspect, I know yours, but—"

"What are they?" he asked eagerly.

Sensei smirked. "You have to figure some thing's out for yourself."

"Killjoy," Harry pouted causing Kris to laugh.

May popped back in and bowed at them. "Master Harry, I spoke to Sherry and she is available all day and eager to get started."

"I'm free now. I have a couple hours before my appointment with the mind healer. If you can, pop her in here and we'll go down to the vaults."

Fifteen minutes later he and Sherry were standing outside his vault, they were both humming with excitement.

"Hundreds of years of history preserved. Antique scrolls, furnishings in their original state, with the original fabric . . . thank you giving me the privilege of seeing this with you. I would've given up my newborn for this opportunity."

"You just had a baby?" Harry asked interestedly.

"No, I'm single, but I'd still give them up."

Harry chuckled as the vault door opened to the Potter home storage vault. The vault went on for miles it seemed and filled with priceless furniture, paintings, glassworks, sculptures, and other household items. Breathing deeply in and out, Sherry managed to get ahold of herself. Harry mimicked her.

"Okay, we have to think logically. Theirs this large open area up front and we can create furniture groupings to see if they work, if you use your wand and float what we choose over here." She went to her bag and pulled out blueprints. "Let's start with finding items for the reception and living rooms."

Soon they had picked out furnishings and accessories that seemed to work with what they were going for at the Hall and were just wandering around exploring. Sherry had become fascinated with the racks of antique clothing she unearthed and Harry was looking at rows and rows of toy cars, motorbikes, bicycles, and scooters neatly labeled. It was only by looking closer did he feel the magic and realized they weren't toys just vehicles that had been shrunken down for storage. He was literally looking at a history of the automotive industry. Harry's jaw dropped. He supposed this was what it felt like when you won the lottery. It was too much, way too much, and too extensive to fit the new garage he was building at Potter Hall. But, he wanted them all. Maybe he could have Jouri set up an exhibit at the castle and maybe a clothing one for the women? Maybe raise admission prices to cover the costs of building new garages to hold the exhibits? But, what would be best to show and best for him to keep? Maybe display them all and just commandeer them occasionally whenever he wanted a ride. He'd need a mechanic and an automotive history buff too and maybe someone to run the exhibit. Could one person do both or would he need a full staff?

"I guess from the expression on your face those aren't just toys?"

"No." Harry couldn't tear his gaze away.

"There are hundreds of years of priceless history in this vault, it should be displayed."

Harry nodded. "I was thinking the same thing, it will probably increase day traffic to the castle with new permanent displays and I can increase the price of a full day or weekend day passes or cheaper alternative if . . ." He flushed. "Sorry, excuse me . . ." He pushed the record button on his watch and began rambling his ideas into it.

Sherry smiled. "It has truly been a pleasure getting to know you. I hope you are taking time to have fun and act your age. I remember reading you're a good flier, maybe you should go and fly a bit to relax."

Harry gawked at Sherry trying to remember the last time he flew on his broom. It hadn't been since his last Quidditch game at Hogwarts. He missed flying, it would be nice to fly without worrying about bludgers or jinxed brooms. He'd do it after his healer appointment. It would probably help him wind down from spending an hour being probed about his feelings.

Harry beamed. "You're a genius."

Harry entered his person wing at the castle relaxed, exhilarated, and with his stomach growling. Smelling food, he made his way to the kitchen still carrying his Nimbus 2000 to see Sensei dishing up dinner with an apron tied around his waist. Sensei seeing the look on his face grinned and handed him a plate and an ice-cold soda that Harry chugged down in two seconds before going to the refrigerator to grab another bottle. He sat across the table from Sensei and looked down at his plate curiously.

"It's called Hiyashi Chuka Soba. It's basically chilled noodles over vegetables, meat, and cut up thin omelets with a sauce poured over it."

Harry picked up his chopsticks and moaned he guessed this is what people talked about when they said you could make healthy food delicious.

"You're a great cook? How did you learn? Takashi talks about having personal chefs."

Sensei smiled. "Which are great but not actually useful when you're out in the real world, especially with some of the assignments I've been on. I had our chefs teach me the basics and picked up other things here and there."

"I've been thinking about what I want to do next summer. Hermione's family went to France this summer and Ron went to Egypt while I've never been anywhere except for the short trip we went on and going to get Pettigrew. I thought it'll be cool to visit my house in Tokyo for most of the summer, eat the food, learn the culture, and hang out with your nephews."

Sensei shrugged. "It's your choice, why do you look so apprehensive?"

"I want to learn the language so I don't look like a moron, but I don't think I'll have time for another tutor with everything going on."

"I'll just get you a self-study language program muggles use. You can learn at your own pace then practice with me. Next time I visit home, I'll stock up on kid's books and television shows. Maybe some anime and magna too, it'll help with the language and writing. The action will keep you interested and help you learn."

Harry beamed. "Thanks sensei. That's an awesome idea."

"You're a great kid Harry, but you often make things more complicated than they need to be."

Author's Note:

*Hey guys. Thanks for the support. I've come to a decision to do weekly updates and update on a specific day of the week. The reason for this is it seems like with real life and editing this has made the sequel I'm writing fall to the wayside and I'm way, way, behind on the sequel which is my current work in progress. I've stopped and gotten rid of what I've written several times and I think I'm finally back on track with the sequel though I'm only a couple pages into the story now. I figure if I only update once a week it'll give me time to write the sequel and hopefully have it ready by the time I'm finished posting this.

*Question. If I do go to posting once a week, what day do you prefer I update on? Please go check out my profile page and vote in my poll with your preferred day. Please don't post your favorite day in your review as they won't be counted.

*As always, all errors are mine as I am self-editing and I do not own Harry Potter or Ouran High School Host Cub.