What Your Parents Didn't Tell You
Disclaimer: I own nothing Harry Potter.
A/N: Sorry for the delay, fall semester started for me. As graduate school is going to eat most of my time, updates will happen whenever I can spare the time. Thanks!
It had been an hour since Kingsley had left Grimmauld Place, having been unable to give any more information about the Hogwarts break-in, but Harry wasn't thinking about that. In fact, he was still feeling slightly anxious that someone, this clearly suspicious person, had had access to something of James and Lily's. He, Ron, and Hermione had moved down to the kitchen, where Harry just sat at the table, staring blankly at the picture he now held in his hands. It unnerved him to see his parents like this, he had never seen the likes of it before, and he did not like it at all. Why? Why were they like this? They had always been so happy before, so why now…?
"Harry?" Harry jerked, almost knocking over a cup of tea that Hermione must have placed before him some time ago. He looked up and saw Hermione and Ron sitting across from him, eyeing him warily. "Listen, mate," Ron started carefully. "I know this looks bad, but this bloke couldn't have gotten that picture from anyone we know. We would have heard about it."
"That's not the point, Ron," Harry bit out. "The point is that they can get to me, or the people I care about, actually. If they can get this picture of my parents, then they can get to…" He broke off violently, trying not to think of seeing Ginny, his children, Ron, or Hermione lying dead in his mind's eye. Ron looked at Hermione pleadingly, as though hoping she could say something without getting lashed out at. She squeezed her husband's hand briefly before taking a deep breath.
"Harry, please listen. I think we can rule out that whoever this person is, they could not have been to your house," she reasoned. "After all, you have protective charms put up all around the grounds and you would know if any of them went off. The same goes with your Gringotts' vault." Harry jerked and this time really did hit his teacup, sloshing some tea out on to the table.
"Gringotts! They could have gotten this picture from my vault!" He shot up out of his chair, ignoring the protesting cries from his friends, whipping his jacket around him and shoving the photograph into the inside pocket. If he didn't see his parents' somber faces, then he could believe that he had never seen them at all.
"Harry, there's no way your vault was broken into!" Ron exclaimed, grabbing the green-eyed man by the arm firmly but not so that it hurt. "Security there is as tight as it always has been!"
"Has it?" Harry asked rhetorically in a sarcastic tone. "Remember Quirrell breaking in to get the Philosopher's Stone in our first year? Remember us when we were hunting the Horcruxes? Because if security's still like that, then I'm not taking any chances!" Ron opened his mouth to say something, but Harry didn't wait to hear it. Hermione watched helplessly as he ran out the front door, looking at Ron in bewilderment.
"He does have a point, Ron," she sighed. "If we were able to get in to Bellatrix's vault all those years ago, who's to say that someone else could have gotten into Harry's vault?"
"But what would Harry's parents have to do with the Deathly Hallows? The only one that's connected to them is the Invisibility Cloak!"
"I don't know, Ron, but if there is a connection, someone just may start up the war again with Harry." Her brown eyes shone with the threat of tears that had not quite fallen. "And I don't think I can go through that again."
Ron frowned, clearly frustrated at his best friend's behavior, but he pulled Hermione into a hug and kissed the top of her head.
"We're going to figure this out," he muttered, feeling her arms squeeze around him gratefully. "Come on, we got to catch up with Harry."
By the time Ron and Hermione had caught up with Harry, they were striding down the street to the Leaky Cauldron in strained silence. Happily, no one in the pub approached Harry to pester him about the Second War or his celebrity; he had only one goal in mind and that was to get to Gringotts as quickly as possible. The trio pushed their way out to the small courtyard at the back of the pub and walked straight up to the brick wall. Harry pulled out his wand, tapped the bricks three up and two across, and stood back as the wall tore open to create an archway into Diagon Alley.
The shopping district was not too busy today, but still, shopkeepers were having luck with little groups of customers here and there. Not bothering to look around, Harry strode straight toward the back of the alley, towards the white, glistening building that was Gringotts Bank. Harry, Ron, and Hermione went through the bronze doors, past the lines of goblins working at the long stretch of counter, and right up to the main one at the back of the hall. A goblin with a rather large nose, wiry hair, and black eyes looked up from his accounting book as they stopped before him.
"Mr. Potter," the goblin said, his eyes narrowing slightly. Harry didn't flinch, but stared back at the goblin just as hard.
"I'd like to go to my vault, please." The goblin turned his gaze to Ron and Hermione.
"They may not come. They are not holders of the account."
"They're with me," Harry said shortly, eager to get down to his vault. Besides, he wanted Ron and Hermione with him; they had been with him for almost his whole life, he would not leave them behind now. The goblin's brow furrowed in displeasure, but he did not protest any further.
"Your key?" Harry reached into this jacket pocket, trying not to think of the photograph there, and pulled out the little golden key. He handed it to the goblin, who examined it, and nodded. "This way."
The ride down into the caverns was uneventful, but Harry's heart beat faster as the cart zoomed up and around its track. He was almost afraid as to what he'd find or wouldn't find in his vault. True, the goblins were very good at keeping wizarding vaults safe, but as even he had proven, they could be broken into with a bit of help. The cart slowed to a stop, and the goblin jumped out. He turned Harry's key in the lock and swung the door in, standing back. Casting a look at Ron and Hermione, Harry slowly climbed out of the cart and into the dark vault.
"Incendio." Instantly, the wall torches lit up, casting a warm glow over the vault's interior. Nothing seemed to be out of place; piles of Galleons, Sickles, and Knuts lay all over the floor. "Look for anything peculiar," he said over his shoulder. Harry could hear Ron and Hermione move toward the walls of the vault, checking every corner. He inched his way around his money, looking for anything that might seem out of the ordinary; but then again, what had he ever seen in here other than cold hard coins? Thinking back to the first time he had been here, Harry couldn't remember seeing anything else that Lily and James had put in here. Blocking out the clinking noises that came from Ron's rummaging, Harry tried to step over a particular wide pile of Knuts, but slipped over a few stray ones. Falling, he threw out a hand to stop himself from hitting the floor, which slid into a pile of Sickles. His face registered surprise as he felt something buried under that pile, something hard and wooden.
"Harry! Harry, are you alright?" He ignored Hermione's voice as he wrapped his fingers around the buried object and pulled it out. The Sickles slid to the stone floor with a clang, revealing an ancient wooden box, mostly plain but decorated with engravings here and there. The box seemed to be roughly the shape and depth of Muggle boxes for letter sized papers. It had to have been buried under that pile of money for so long that it had accumulated a large amount of dust and spider web fragments. So interested was Harry in examining the box that he barely registered Ron and Hermione hurrying toward him.
"Did you find something?" Ron asked, almost slipping over the same Knuts Harry had tried to step over earlier.
"I've never seen this before," Harry muttered, running a finger over the top of the box, feeling the engravings. He could not understand what they said, as they looked to be of an old forgotten language. There was a keyhole at the front of the box, copper and rusted from time. "May I please see my vault key?" Harry asked the goblin. The goblin silently handed the key over; Harry handed the box to Ron to hold as he tried to slip the key in to the lock. The key did not fit at all.
"Hagrid never gave you another key when you first came here, did he?" Hermione asked, studying the keyhole curiously.
"No, just the vault key."
"I don't suppose Dumbledore ever said anything about this box?"
"Nothing." Harry sighed in disappointment. No one had told him about this box ever; if Dumbledore had known, this was another secret he had taken to the grave. His parents had never left anything that mentioned it either. And this seemed to be the only clue that would provide an answer to the gloomy picture of Lily and James on the Cornish coast and maybe, just maybe, the disappearance of the Elder Wand from Dumbledore's tomb. Harry idly ran a finger down the front of the box and slid it into the keyhole, wishing there was a key for it. Suddenly, the lock clicked, causing all three to jump. Harry yanked his finger away and to his amazement, the box lid sprung open, making Ron almost drop the thing entirely. Peering inside, a treasure trove of old parchment lay cluttered in the box, with even more photographs inside.
"Oh, my!" Hermione exclaimed, her eyes shining. "These parchment leaves have to go back to the Tudor period, maybe even earlier!"
"But how could I open it?" Harry asked, staring at the contents in wonder. "There was no key!"
"Sometimes, wizards and witches can create protection charms that work only for certain people," Ron explained, shifting the box so that he could get a better grip on it. "I've seen it out in the field when we've had to get into some personal items in our investigations. Usually the charm is designed to recognize immediate family members, like the caster's kids or their siblings. Sometimes they make it so that only their husband or wife can break the charm. Looks like your parents made it so that only you can open this box, Harry."
"You knew that?" Hermione asked, her eyebrows raising and a slight smile on her lips. Ron chuckled.
"Always the tone of surprise." He strained to look over the lid and asked, "What about those photos?" Harry snatched the topmost one and examined it; his throat constricted at what he saw.
Again, Lily and James were in this one, but at a distance. They were climbing a slightly steep hill, heading to a single tower on top. Surrounding the tower were grassy knolls, and a little further out was a town in the middle of green fields and hedgerows as far as the eye could see. Hermione and Ron studied the picture as well.
"Harry," Hermione said slowly. "This is Glastonbury. Your parents are heading up to the Tor in this one. What does this picture have to do with the one of them in Cornwall?" Harry blinked once, twice, and finally looked up at her, a confused and distraught expression on his face.
"I don't know."
Thanks for R&R!