Chapter 17
Trust is a Double Edged Sword
They flooed to a busy Gringotts, at least for an early Tuesday morning when most everyone was supposed to be at school or work. Harry scanned the crowds for anyone he knew… Artemis Ingraham and her sister were with a stately looking woman at a teller's station. And Emma and William were by the door, both looking into the middle of the bank where, ah yes, there was Mary and a girl who looked exactly like Mary, but in miniature. Mary saw him at about the same time and waved, changing her course and pulling along the girl who had to be her younger sister.
"Hi Harry!" Mary said, "Professor, Paradise!"
"Hey Mary," Harry said, "enjoying the break?" Paradise slid a little closer to Aurora, who placed a comforting hand on the girl's shoulder. To her credit, Paradise didn't really flinched when faced with people she didn't know very well.
"Are you kidding me? No school; it's awesome. Not to mention Mum basically told us that any time we want, we can go to the Alley if Emma's around, and since William isn't allowed to come to the house, it's just great!"
"Maaaa-ry," drawled the little girl, rolling her eyes. By this point, Emma and William had noticed the odd trio and were within hearing range.
"Fine," Mary grinned. "Tali, this is Harry. Harry, this is my little sister, Natalie. We just call her Tali."
Natalie grinned, identical to Mary. "You're the Gryffindor seeker! I like Chaser better, but I'd probably be too small to make the chaser position when Angelina and Alicia leave in three years. By that time, you'll be a sixth year and big and a small little second year could beat you for the seeker spot! Then I could play seeker for a while before moving to chaser when—"
They stared at her, mostly amused.
Mary grimaced. "She knows more facts about the Gryffindor team than Wood. But she's never seen a game, so she doesn't know how good you are."
"I'm good!" Natalie persisted.
"Hi Harry, Professor Sinistra, Paradise." Emma said, standing next to them.
Natalie leaned around Harry and introduced herself to Paradise. Mary managed to pull Harry aside from the conversation a bit. "So are you just here to spend the day, or with a specific purpose?"
"Purpose," Harry said, feeling rather content. The MacDonald's good mood was slightly infectious. "We're going to try and inventory some of the family vaults I inherited."
Mary's eyes lit up with curiosity and eagerness and overall bounciness. "Fun!"
Harry could sense that she really, really wanted to come. "Wanna come?"
"Can I? You'd trust me with that?" At Harry's nod, Mary literally started bouncing. "Emma, can I go with them for the day? I know Mum said to stay with you, but it's Professor Sinistra…"
Emma nodded. Natalie looked interested, but the eldest MacDonald didn't seem inclined to let the youngest leave her watch. "Should we meet up for lunch then, around one?" Emma suggested. "I've heard good things about a new café."
"We'd need to meet earlier, around twelve, but it sounds good," Sinistra said, confirming.
Emma and William said goodbye, dragging Natalie with them. Harry, Paradise and Mary followed Aurora to the nearest open teller. The goblin greeted them, his words clipped. He sounded bored. Accompaniment was called and the four companions were soon sent spinning down to the Moorland vault. On Remus's recommendations, they'd leave the Potter vault for last, as they could probably spend days in that place and never get out.
The Moorland vault was about the size of a Hogwarts classroom. There was some expensively looking, ornately carved furniture pushed against the back wall. Paradise curled into one of the armchairs and lamented that the arms of those chairs wouldn't be good for sitting on. Harry smirked. Mary found a bunch of letters folded into two boxes near the furniture. She started reading one of them aloud and stopped, mid-word, glanced at Paradise and then her professor before dropping the steamy love letter like it burnt her. Several books lined shelves pushed up against one of the walls. Harry had brought along a self-inking pen and a notebook and started copying down the titles. Aurora took over that job and told him to go explore. There were two sets of fancy dishes, one something-silver-ish and one delicate china.
In a wardrobe, which sat perched by the furniture, Paradise found a delicate wedding dress, several fur cloaks, and one cloak that she couldn't really see, well, not well. She pulled that cloak out of the wardrobe and put it on, just when Mary happened to look over at her. "An invisibility cloak! That's incredible!"
Harry looked down. Having a spare invisibility cloak would be spectacular! But, he glanced at Sinistra's face, there was no way she'd let him have it at Hogwarts. It caused too much trouble. Paradise squeaked and put the cloak back. Both Harry and Aurora had been clear that they were only there to look. Harry found an extraneous book on Quidditch that he moved back to the shelves. There were three random dog statues propped up in a corner. Harry touched one on its head and the stone corgi bounded into life and started racing around the room. It got a good laugh; Harry made a mental note not to let the three animated statues sit in storage for the rest of their existence.
The vault was in no way packed, but it still took a good hour for Aurora to list all the books and then briefly note the other contents of the vault. While she finished, Harry activated all three stone dogs and he, Mary and Paradise romped around the room with their new pets. Mary absolutely fell in love with the little poodle; she named it Snickerdoodle. They were careful – at Mary's stern instructions – not to do any damage to the furniture. An heirloom set like that could be the most expensive thing in the vault.
When Aurora finished documenting everything they'd found, they turned the dogs off and left the Moorland vault. A bored looking goblin greeted then tersely, and with a sigh, drove the cart to the closest vault, from the Noble House of Arthure. The only thing Harry knew about his various vaults were their respective size - Potter the largest and Moorland the smallest – and that the Fallus vault was nothing other than a library. They'd decided to leave the library for another day.
Arthure was one of the larger vaults; it was only smaller than the Potter vault and one of the Enon vaults, but the first thing all four people noticed was the overwhelming size of the vault. It would be easy to get lost in the room.
"Merlin's bloody trousers!" Mary squealed.
"Miss McDonald!"
Mary blinked, sheepishly. "Sorry professor."
For the next three hours, the MacDonald, the Sinistra, the Aster, and the one and only Potter-Moorland-Aragan-Fallus-Arthure-Enon-Spinnet-Nanth-Bartholomew-Carine browsed the huge vault, often feeling utterly overwhelmed in the mix of everything.
Paradise, who still wasn't as energetic as normal, plopped down in front of the bookshelves to list out the various books. There were textbooks from Hogwarts and what looked like advanced apprenticeship programs. There were muggle textbooks, mostly devoted to various sciences. There were novels, both muggle and magical. There were personal journals, research notes, and several books on obscure branches of magic. And those were just the third of the books she managed to get through in the three hours that she spent, copying down titles into Harry's notebook.
Right near the entrance to the vault, Mary perused racks and wardrobes filled with fabric finery. The gowns were exquisite and the men's suits were simply delectable. She spent enough time among the clothes to know that everything could be magically adjusted to fit someone else; each piece was tagged with a blue ribbon of tailoring magic that Mary only recognized because she'd spent too much time in Madame Malkins'. There were rows of shoes and sashes and scarves and belts and more shoes and three suits of dragonhide armor. Mary stopped short by the dragonhide armor. That was story book wealth. No one could afford dragonhide armor nowadays! Dragon armor hadn't even been made in something like seventy years.
That brought Mary to what she instantly knew was mounds of jewelry. The Arthures had, by no measure, been a poor family. She'd estimate they were on the Malfoy level, and as the Malfoy's were the fourth richest family in magical Britain, that was saying something. Mary stared at the mass of sparkling jewels and diamonds and precious metals and wow… Power and prestige were two completely different things. The MacDonalds had prestige. The Malfoys had power. When Harry decided he wanted to change the world… the world would change. He had the prestige and the power.
Sinistra spent the three hours wrapping around the edge of the vault; ignoring the neatly organized wealth arranged in the middle. The vault edges were mostly pictures; some collected from famous magical or muggle artists, some of the Arthure family or other figures. There was a good thirty foot mural of Hogwarts on the back wall which was truly spectacular. It had been a big deal some seven years ago, when Cornelius Arthure had taken ill and died. All liquid assets had been donated to St. Mungos. His house and family vault had been left to The-Boy-Who-Lived, and everyone knew it. It just…
It was a lot to take in. Her ward, her Harry, was the single richest person in the world. And he was only thirteen. It wasn't worrisome; she knew there was no way he could hope to spend it all, even if he bought Firebolts for the entire populace of Hogwarts, and she knew he didn't plan on using any of this wealth purely for his own pleasure. She knew enough to know he wasn't comfortable. She was grateful though, that Harry probably didn't know the value behind these pictures or those clothes that she'd seen Mary disappear to, or all his houses, or the loads and loads of books. So many pictures…
For Harry, the three hours seemed to take forever to pass. Even as his friends and family had moved into the vault, he'd stayed on the threshold, not capable of movement or even truly tangible thought. It wasn't fair, that he'd been left all this when his mum had been the one who'd really deserved the credit. Why? Why? Tears traced down Harry's cheeks as he struggled to adapt.
When he finally gained control of his emotions, he moved just a few feet into the vault. To the left side of the threshold, there was an odd pile of things: things he'd always pictured would be owned by a little girl. An album rested on a writing desk in the middle of the collection of pink fairy themed items. Harry cracked open the album, flipping through to the end and settling on a rather interesting looking note.
Mum's given up on this old thing, it's just me now. I'm sorry, beloved sister, that we can't find a cure for you. I promise we won't throw your things away, even this album. Mum can barely stand the sight of all this stuff now. She's just so lost, loosing you. Oh sister, I miss you. I want to hope for a miracle, but just today, you told me to prepare for when the miracle did not come. I love you, Opal Arthure.
Harry flipped to the beginning of the album. There were pictures and sayings, all focused on a baby girl. She giggled and laughed in the photos, for all appearances, just the picture of joy. The pictures continued, following the girl as she grew older. At around seven, or so Harry could decipher from the album, she'd taken ill and the joy faded from her life, and her pictures. The last picture was off the girl and the slightly older boy who'd Harry'd learned was 'nelius Arthure, last descendent of the Arthure line. The only picture following that was a flower covered graveyard that was annotated in Cornelius's strict handwriting: We buried Opal today. This book is her life story. I can only weep when I think of how much longer it should have been. To my children or heirs, I hope you learn that life can only last for so long; I ask you to make the most of your own life.
Harry stared at that last page, not really seeing it. This overwhelming wealth came from people. People exactly like those he'd ignored or shunted or even despised, in previous times and especially in those alternate realities. These were people that loved and suffered and lived and died and they'd be so thankful for his vanquishing of Voldemort, they'd seen him as a worthy heir. To Harry, it was starting to make a little more sense why they'd do so. They'd cared. Had they known of his situation with the Dursleys, they would have jumped to help him.
But they didn't know.
This was their way of helping him. Harry looked down at a fluffy orange teddy bear that lay beside the album. He picked it up. He'd seen it in some of the pictures, especially as Opal got sicker and sicker. Cornelius had written that this was her favorite stuffed animal. He couldn't imagine how hard it had been on Cornelius, losing his sister like that. If he lost Paradise now, before they'd even really gotten to know each other, that would be awful.
Harry thought of David Summerby and his younger brother. He hoped that David wouldn't have to feel the same way Cornelius had. It was in that moment that Harry was grateful for his wealth. He could help people. He would help people.
o.o.o.o.o.o
Harry arrived at Ursa-upon-Heavens to find Remus Lupin, Minerva McGonagall, Filius Flitwick, Poppy Pomfrey (seriously, Harry's exhausted mind wondered, what is up with the alliterated names?) and an exasperated Aurora Sinistra in the living room. Out the window, he could see Paradise playing with Ciara and Tyler in the fading light. A brown-black owl was flying around with them. He dropped his back by the table and stared at the professors. Hedwig perched on a conjured cage in one of the corners of the room, her intelligent amber eyes studying the professors. Harry would ask her later what she'd seen and heard. "Should I head outside?"
Pomfrey looked reluctant, but when the professors shook their heads, she made no comment. Harry joined Aurora on the loveseat. "What's wrong?"
"Ehm," Lupin started, coughing into his hand a little. "We are discussing the perpetrator of the mass memory charm."
The healers at St. Mungo's had said it wasn't one person, Harry thought, but the professors had likely already conferred with his other teachers. One person would have needed to have been fueled by some massive amount of power. He felt Hedwig pressing an affirmative into his mind, though how she'd know, he couldn't understand. She was trying to tell him something, but their communication wasn't yet to the point that— "The healers at St. Mungos were talking about that too."
"How is that class going?" McGonagall asked, curious.
Flitwick mumbled something. Harry assumed it was about how only one Ravenclaw was attending an extra opportunity for learning. "Awesome! We learned about Mind Arts today and what Occlumens are and what Legilimens are and what Empaths are and some other branches of Mental Arts. Katie's got to become a Occlumens, 'cause otherwise she'd overload, so they tested us towards the end of the day to see if we had any natural talent for it."
"And?" McGonagall prompted.
Harry shrugged. "We'll get the results of the test tomorrow. Who do you think is behind the memories? Who could craft such a complete, interlocking worlds for a whole month?"
Pomfrey coughed a little. "I have been in discussion with Healer Mena, trying to discover the nature of the fabrications. There seem to be four or five major groups in the fabrication that interacted with each other almost entirely within their single group. So, all the students that you frequently interacted with were in your group, and what happened within your group was independent, perhaps, from what happened within other groups. Of course, there was plenty of overlap, but so far, that is our best interpretation."
"We will not be punishing anyone for acts committed within the fabrication," McGonagall said, softly. At that, Poppy, Aurora and Filius all scowled or tensed. Remus just shook his head, quiet. "It was, in essence, false."
"Albus will need to employ a counselor," Poppy insisted.
Harry suppressed a sigh; they hadn't answered his question and he supposed he really didn't have the right to ask again. He liked all these professors, he really did. Well, Poppy wasn't a professor, but as far as school nurses went, she was pretty amazing. Add Professor Babbling and all of the best Hogwarts professors were in the living room!
"Harry," Remus said, "in answer to your question, logic leads us to assume that whoever conducted this crime was Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore, or someone outside of Hogwarts. Some people would instantly try and blame Sirius Black; but he couldn't have – the man couldn't cast a memory charm to save his life."
Harry blinked.
"Now," Remus continued, "the castle wards register no abnormal entrances or exits in recent weeks, but as we can only infer as to the exact time the spell was cast, we do not know for sure. We do not believe that it was a student, as only a few would know the necessary charm and no one would have the power to cast it on such a large scale."
Again, Harry felt his owl press an affirmative thought into his mind. How on earth? He turned to look at Hedwig and their eyes locked. "What is it?" Harry snapped.
His professors looked at least a little startled.
Hedwig hooted, obviously annoyed.
"Do you know who cast the memory charm?"
Affirmative. Another hoot.
"Who was it?"
Derisive glare. The professors just watched with raised eyebrows.
"Right, of course. Was it Professor Snape?"
Negative. No hoot.
"Was it Professor Dumbledore?"
Affirmative. Another hoot.
"How do you know that?"
Hedwig flapped her wings, making judgmental sounding glares. They really couldn't communicate very well.
"Could you tell Kleio or Caradoc?"
Hedwig stopped flapping and glared. She launched from her perch and dive-bombed Harry, coming to an abrupt stop on his shoulder. The owl really didn't like the various patroni. Their unsteady connections of communications snapped. Harry sat back, thirsty and even more exhausted than he'd been before. The professors were all staring at them, except for Minerva.
The older woman and stood and moved to the window. She stood with her back to the gathered group. Harry bit his lip. His Head of House looked fragile, even from the back. He looked for someone to explain. His other teachers were either watching Hedwig or, in Filius's case, watching Minerva. The charms professor was sitting next to the loveseat in a conjured chair. "Poor Minerva." That was all he said.
Harry bolted upright. Hedwig squeaked in protest, but found some other place to perch. Before anyone could stop him, Harry had run up to his Head of House and given her a hug. She reacted stiffly at first, as if unsure of herself, but when Harry didn't let go, she hugged him back, shaking slightly with sobs.
Harry had struggled with a lot of revelations that Tuesday. He'd learned quite a few good lessons.
Adults were humans too. He still didn't trust really any adult outside this room, but to see his unbreakable professor look so broken… Harry just poured more energy into his hug.
Minerva pulled back after a while. "Thank you, Harry." She whispered, wiping tears away from her cheeks. The two of them returned to the main cluster of professors and McGonagall sat down. Harry sat down at her feet, as if sensing that she could use the support.
There was a long pause.
"That is an owl," Aurora said, staring at the snowy owl. Her words sounded a little choked. "I doubt that that counts as damning evidence."
"Are we trying for a conviction?" Filius asked. "I won't trust the man. I don't trust him, but it would take a lot to bring charges against someone so powerful."
"The one who did this has to be caught," Poppy snarled. "He manufactured a world in which an eleven year old student was raped and no punishment was given! That is unacceptable!"
Aurora winced.
Harry didn't have all the details to follow the conversation, but part of him really didn't want to know. A big part of him wished they would send him out to play with the staff kids. He didn't want all this information hanging over his shoulders. He'd never, ever trust Dumbledore or Snape, but that didn't mean he wanted to blame them for something as illegal as mass memory tampering! Harry tensed as McGonagall started to weave her fingers through his hair, but when he figured out what was happening, he relaxed.
"How… how would people react to knowing it was, if it was, Dumbledore?" Aurora asked.
No one, for a long time, answered. Harry figured he had permission to break the silence. "They'd be shocked. Really, really shocked. It would terrify Hermione. Parents probably wouldn't want their kids to remain at Hogwarts. The scandal would be immense. It would—" Hedwig, Harry asked again, how do you know? His bird closed her eyes and concentrated really, really, really hard. Nothing happened. None of the professors even noticed their continued mental conversation.
"Tear us apart," Remus said, purposely looking in every direction except at Minerva and Harry.
Hedwig fluffed her feathers in frustration and took wing, barreling straight at the still closed window. She grabbed the latch in her claws, unlocked the window, and took in to the sky. "That is an odd bird," Filius said, frowning.
"What are we going to do?" Minerva asked.
"Nothing," Poppy said. "The healers from Mungo's told law enforcement everything they told me, and possibly more. They will arrive to the same conclusion."
"They're going to add another suspect," Remus said, as if he were pointing out an age old fact.
Poppy looked confused.
Remus gave her a half-hearted smile.
Poppy seemed to realize what he meant. Harry had no idea. Poppy screeched, in anger, rage, and frustration. The mediwitch didn't even stay seated, but rather paced around room. She ranted for a good ten minutes, but a minute into it, Filius cast a silencing charm on her. She didn't seem to care much. When Poppy calmed down, Filius ended the charm. "You know what," Poppy said, her voice low and dangerous. "They saw your mind. If they even think about blaming you for this, I will tear the Ministry of Magic a part piece by bigoted piece." By then she was standing in front of Remus. She leaned down, kissed him, pulled away and stomped to the door, obviously still mad. "Tyler! Ciara! Time to go."
Harry stared at his defense professor. He hadn't moved and his eyes were wide like saucers. The two Pomfrey kids hurried inside, and all three Pomfreys flooed away before anyone even reacted to her rant. Paradise was barely in the door when Harry burst into giggles. Minerva and Filius both started laughing with him. Remus still hadn't moved.
o.o.o.o.o.o
Flitwick stayed for dinner only when Harry begged. While Harry couldn't do magic outside of school, Flitwick talked about emotion based charms and what some of the more common ones were. He promised to find Harry a book to study from when he extracted a promise from Harry that the boy wouldn't actually attempt any of the charms without proper supervision. Harry eagerly agreed, hoping he'd have the time to add yet another study item to his list of things to do. Paradise introduced Harry (and Flitwick, but mostly Harry) to her new eagle owl, Taygete.
When Flitwick left and Paradise retired to bed, completely exhausted from having so full a day, Harry and Sinistra went out to the garden and watched the stars come out. Harry loved it. The fields around Ursa-upon-Heavens really did have a great view of the sky. The boy managed to convince his guardian to talk about Poppy, and why she'd kiss Remus like that. Aurora was slightly reluctant, but gave in without too much prompting.
"Madame Pomfrey hasn't had the best of lives, Harry," she said. "She was a Hufflepuff, some two years older than me. And I was two years older than Professor Lupin and your parents. Her mother, another Poppy Pomfrey, was the Hogwarts nurse at the time. But that was just school. About six years ago, she had problems with her husband and divorced him, barely managing to keep Tyler and Ciara under her custody. And I trust that you understand that while these are just general things, they should not be discussed. I can't say what she thinks of Remus; we haven't actually talked about it."
That was all he got on that subject. "But why would law enforcement add Professor Lupin to a list of suspects?" Harry asked.
Aurora closed her eyes, as if fighting with unimaginable levels of tension. "Harry, as much as I love the stars and the moon and the night, keep in mind that a lot of Lunar Magic is truly hurtful." And she didn't deny or confirm anything; she really only hinted at it, but Harry knew. He'd read enough storybooks and fairytales by now that it wouldn't be so impossible to believe that the best defense teacher he'd ever had was a werewolf.
Huh. A real werewolf. That explained the white balloon boggart.
He'd never have guessed that without Aurora's clue, even if she hadn't told him directly.
"Go to bed now, Harry. I trust your discretion."
In Harry's dream that night, Albus Dumbledore played the villain, aided by the constant presence of Ronald Weasley. The moon wove in and out, both helpful and hurting at the same time. It didn't wake him up, but he remembered it as one of the worst dreams yet.