~oo00oo~

Chapter 7

Obscured

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4 January 1985

It was slow going getting up the next morning. I felt as though I had cried long after I had fallen asleep. The deep ache that had weighed down on my chest the night before had settled in my bones. A depressing state of existence that simply wouldn't do, I had so much going on. Too much that depended on me.

I went through my new morning routine as I tried to snap out of my fugue state. An enchanted brush worked on my hair as I used light weights to do small, repetitive exercises. The brush would help stop, and even to a certain extent fix, the damage that I had been doing to my hair. The exercises were to build up strength in my upper body before I began on anything else. The potions that I took before I came down to start breakfast were also helping with those things.

The metabolic adjustment potion and muscle growth potions helped my body work at it's maximum best to get me into shape like I wanted. The bone health and vitamin and mineral potions were far more advanced than muggle vitamins as they worked to encourage healing as well as supply the body with the missing materials to do even better. The hair health and skin vitality potions actually worked best together as they increased the amount and capabilities of the body's keratin, collagen, proteins, and elasticity. They also work with the metabolic potion to increase blood flow to the skin and follicles.

These were by no means fast fixes, but they were fixes. It would take a year or two of taking the potions daily in conjunction with all the changes to my diet, my exercise, and my hygiene practices before I got to where I actually should be. Things like this would not work for everyone because not everyone actually had the deficiencies that I had. My body had legitimate issues that needed extra help getting through. If, say, a body builder that was at the top of their game and practically heaving with muscles tried this potion regiment, nothing would happen. They wouldn't have anything that needed fixing. So often people are disappointed that something is supposed to make them better and they didn't actually have that problem in the first place. I never really understood that mindset, but I had seen it in my younger future days.

After breakfast I was feeling much better and started working on my character for the day. I would need to go out as a batty old lady and then become a posh lady in search of a solicitor. I had one last interview and it was set for later this morning, but if it didn't work out I had to go through my list all over again to try for another one.

It was a cold, nasty day out. Great fat drops of rain fell and created slush with what was left of our Christmas snow. In several layers of old lady clothes, a heavy coat, a head scarf and a rain bonnet, I trudged out to a spot for the Knight Bus with my shopping cart filled with my nice suit. The bus was full as ever for a day with awful weather. I had never questioned it before, but why did the bus have more occupants on foul weather days? Many people apparated if they didn't take the bus, didn't they? Or a floo perhaps? But here they were, the lot of them spread out in comfy chairs with the enchantments straining to keep them still. Danny had given me a drying off with a quick flick of his wand, but others hadn't gotten such treatment and little droplets splattered themselves against the inside of the windows in a wet mosaic after having been flung from hair and shoes and tightly clutched umbrellas.

Arriving at the Leaky was a relief and I gladly made my way into the warm pub with a backwards wave to the boys on the Knight Bus. As I passed Tom at the bar I thought to look over and mention, "That bus is always full on nasty days like this Tom. I can't understand it. Surely those people apparate?" I was shaking my head in irritation, but Tom was nodding.

"It's the ground though, in't? They may know where they're goin' but what if it's a bit of mud in the rain?"

I took a thoughtful moment to ponder that and eventually nodded my agreement. "You must have it there. Have a good day," I called as I breezed towards the back. He waved me on and out.

Once in Diagon proper I made my way to Carkitt Market and back out into the muggle world and the rain. I changed my outfit in a small pub after arranging for my cart to be stowed in the backroom by a barkeep I had made friends with for just such a thing. At ten on the dot my hired car pulled to the front of the pub and I was off to meet the next solicitor.

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The waiting room was well appointed and I was offered tea on a nice, if not fine, china with a floral pattern. The office was just for two partners, both fairly young, but in addition to family matters they were known for being able to establish thoroughly documented timelines of misbehavior. It was that recommendation that had really drawn me to put them in my top three list. I wanted to make sure that there was as accurate a history as possible so that later on, when we could, the evidence could be presented. I also wanted to cover my own actions. I was directly disobeying Albus Dumbledore and I was certain that disobedience would have far reaching consequences.

"Miss Warren?" said a man in a well fitted suit as he came towards me with a professional smile. "Thank you for waiting. If you would like to follow me to my office we can discuss your needs with a little more comfort and privacy."

He was in his mid to late thirties, had stylishly coiffed sandy hair, a square face, and a watch that probably cost more than most paid for their mortgage. It was quite a first impression. I was led into an office that was indeed larger than their waiting area with comfortable chairs fitted around a small table. It was obvious that he used this table to meet clients instead of sitting behind his desk and it made me like him more. Such a small thing to change the balance during a conversation by putting everyone on more of an equal standing. It was bright and intuitive.

I looked around the sparsely decorated office and saw a variety of awards, certificates, and diplomas. There were very few pictures and even fewer personal touches. It gave a more cold, professional feeling than the offices I had visited previously which were warm with personality. When we had both settled and a steaming cup was set before each of us he took out a pad and pen before asking, "Why don't we get right to the heart of the matter, Miss Warren? What is it specifically that you want to accomplish?"

"There's a young boy for whom I have taken on a grandmotherly role. He is an orphan and has legally been placed into the home of his maternal aunt. Unfortunately, the woman is incredibly abusive. I would like to find some way in which to remove him from her without having to force the issue at court."

We went back and forth like that for an hour or so, carefully dancing around details I didn't feel would be safe to give to a stranger. In the end he was intelligent and capable, and more than able to help me do what I wanted. He hadn't tried to steer me towards the court as the other solicitors had done. Instead he spoke of using various types of custody agreements to arrange what would amount to special guardianship.

Hours later I sat as a batty old lady with fly away hair in a friendly pub and enjoyed a hearty lunch. I was going to have to make the decision to trust someone. Was that someone the solicitor I had met today? Or should I keep searching.

If only I could obliviate them. I could get the proper paperwork, have the Dursleys sign it, have it lodged with the local council, and then wipe it out of everyone's minds. But such magics were far outside my capabilities. I needed to find someone to trust or Harry was not going to make it out of his childhood intact. Not to mention the war that Albus would lose on purpose so that Harry would throw himself at a crazed monster.

It wasn't any good, I thought with a bit of disgust at myself. They had all been reasonable, but this last one was perfect. He had the right look, he did the right things, he said the right things, but still I hesitated. It wasn't about the solicitor then, I supposed. It was about trust. It was about power.

Revealing myself to anyone in any way required me to trust that person in a way that I simply couldn't anymore. Before, when I was just a cat lady, the only one I really trusted was Albus. I trusted him to be the right leader. A good leader, who did the right thing. With the knowledge I now had of how he was knowingly raising at least one child to die as a sacrifice I could no longer trust him about anything. With the exception of sticking his crooked beak into everyone's business and thinking he knew better about everything.

Having no actively available magic myself left me vulnerable. The acting, the character sheets, even the clothes I wore, disguised and protected me. Giving up any part of that would be making me more vulnerable. And poor Harry didn't have any disguises to hide behind. Just little tricks I could teach him to get around his relatives until I could save him. He was so smart and so fast.

Too smart and too fast, I recalled. I settled my bill and wandered towards the bookshops to find something on child development. After that I would go to the bookshops in the alleys to see about differences in muggle and magical children. During my walk, instead of focusing on the worry of getting proper legal assistance, I focused on what I could recall about Harry's intelligence from my younger future days.

The Harry that I remembered best was from the tv series. They had done a great job fleshing out the characters from the books, both for the Harry Potter series and the Marauders series. The actors were great for everyone, though I remembered the one for Ron Weasley being a particular favorite. The actor anyway, even if the character was a second favorite next to Hermione Granger for me.

This wasn't to say that I couldn't remember the book version of Harry Potter. It was just much more difficult for me to remember what I had read in the canonical books versus the massive amount of fanfiction I had inhaled for most of my young life. I did recall, however, that the majority opinion was that serial Harry was very close to book Harry.

He was smart, but better at practical work. He was friendly, but not overly outgoing. He was brave, but only when it came to helping others. He was a sassy, sarcastic little shit sometimes.

"There's no need to call me 'sir,' professor."

What Harry wasn't, though, was smarter at age eleven than he appeared to be at under five. Even accounting for being told to pretend he didn't exist so much that he developed learning issues, most children would still grow at a steady rate. The more neglect the slower the rate, surely, but there should be some change in six years.

In the muggle world it seemed that there were really only two types of books one could find that dealt with children. The first was light in its prose and in its facts. A sort of, "everything is wonderful" type of approach that didn't actually give the reader any assistance when it came to rearing or understanding children. The other type was so clinical and dense that it seemed only someone writing a dissertation might look into those works. Neither being especially helpful I continued on in my procrastination by going through the books on the magical side of the divide. It was a kindness that the rain had stopped, but the alleys were spelled to mute nasty weather anyway. It would still snow and rain, but it would never be anything like the downpour of this morning.

In the bookshops of the alleys the books on young wixen were dotted with helpful hints on how to manage accidental magic without being discouraging, how to spell out spills, and how to tell if your child was old enough to use a toy broom. Books specifically for muggles about their muggle born children were interesting, but felt a bit racist in their "your children are better than you" rhetoric. Most of the literature seemed to tend towards that slimy feeling when trying to compare muggle and magical children.

To avoid it, I went searching in the areas of the shops that were devoted to raising magical mischief makers. It was odd when my brain finally clicked and realized that the magical world had a better understanding of child behavior and development, at least for magical children, than the muggle world right now. In the 1980s there were probably a lot of things going on in the field of psychology, but it wasn't necessarily accessible to everyone. The magical world, on the other hand, had a hundred different titles that read more like the knowledge I was accustomed to in my younger future days.

I wondered about it for a moment before deciding to see if the thing that I believed to have set this off even existed. It was debated over the many decades of Potterlore as to whether or not it was canon. After asking a clerk for assistance, I did find several books on them in the history sections of the shops.

Though the clinical muggle books I had skimmed through hadn't been as bad as "lobotomize the brains of children to make them behave," it did have a lot of "let's blame children for the responses they have to the awful things adults do to them" and was considerably less advanced than what I was seeing in the magic books. This might be because the muggles and muggleborns seemed to be blamed for a large amount of awful things instead of the pureblood children. In the same sort of way people used to rationalize it being a black child's fault for being shot in the back because they were wearing a hoodie and running away from scary men with guns. It was racism, plain and simple.

But the main reason that the magical world probably had a better handle on child and infant development was because obscurials were real. With such a dangerous sickness being real it is no wonder that even such a slow moving society would make moves to research, understand, and develop this field. Which all begged the question of whether Harry was turning into an obscurial and if that had something to do with his high level of development. I bought books on obscurials, histories, infants and children, health and growth, potions, and a few fictional books as well. I was hoping to cover up my reading habits a bit.

After that I decided to take care of another Harry related shopping necessity. I had been eyeing the shop for quite some time and was fairly certain that they would have exactly what I needed. I hadn't wanted to go before with the Christmas rush however, and now I had something in mind for more than just myself.

The bright pinks and purples of the storefront were accented with glittery whirls of movement, it looked as though a sparks spell was being randomly cast about the window display. It certainly worked to draw attention. I allowed myself a brief moment to wonder if the Weasley twins would someday have their tophat wearing shop near here, or if they would never have it at all. I was going to change so much after all, who knew how that would effect them specifically.

A small tinkling chime sounded as I made my way through the door with the most confused and bewildered face I could manage. I nervously gripped my extendable bag tight and shuffled through the doorway, moving my head this way and that while flicking my eyes shrewdly over the few people scattered in the large shop. The shop was as pink and soft as a cloud of candy floss, large round tables displaying the shop's wares were artfully arranged. The cathedral like ceiling had some kind of enchantment on it allowing it to look as though a pink and purple nebula was lazily drifting about the store, sharp pinpoints of sunken stars breaking through luminous haze. They were crystal hewn lamps shining through the misty magics.

A young woman of perhaps twenty with hair so vibrantly purple I had to make sure to stare, came up to me with a warm smile and extended hands, "Welcome to Fabulousa! Is this your first time shopping with us?"

The question was just to get a conversation started and the warm, calm tone of her voice had not an ounce of patronizing irritation. I knew that it would be easy to work with her on this project just from that. The way she looked also helped to reassure me and the character I was acting that she would know what I needed. I smiled at her as I fidgeted and looked around, still a little lost, before nodding nervously.

"I've a good bit of spending money from the holidays and I wanted to use it to buy the various children in my life fun little things. My little god niece would love to be able to change her hair like yours," I muttered shyly as I looked pointedly at the impressive stellar purple afro she was sporting, a silver star shooting past her ear as I spoke. "But her mother would want it to go back the way it was if it wasn't play time. My friend suggested this shop had charms that could do that."

"That's wonderful. We can do that and more. My name is Amara Fabling, this is my store," She held out her arms wide as though she could encompass the whole of the place. "My business partner is more of a numbers person, but I have quite the head for enchantments. Let me show you the charm that I have on right now, it's a favorite of mine."

We moved further into the store and off to the right of the door towards a wall of jewelry and trinkets. It sparkled and moved, the magic of them waiting in anticipation. Fabling threw her arms up at the wall as though worshiping the mass of sparkling gold and silver. "This is my favorite part of the whole store. I absolutely love making these. They change hair color for a wide variety of hair types, in solid or patterned colors. Or even like the one I'm wearing," she pointed to her neck where a delicate gold necklace with a small aquamarine crystal lay in stark contrast to her rich dark skin. "With an animation in the color. The Shining Star animation is one of the most popular charms right now."

"Oh, I think that she would like that. Does it just come in purple?"

"No! We have a variety of colors as well as one that swings between colors. We also have different animations for each of the four houses, an animated snitch that will zoom and hide, and even a quaffle that will race around their hair."

"Well, I think she would like one in a very bright blue, if you have it. Now you must understand," I quavered lowly, "I'm a squib and so are many of the children I know. And the children that will go to Hogwarts won't be permitted to use magic while out of school. So I'm looking for things that they can all use."

Fabling's hazel eyes had gotten a bit wide, and she may have forgotten to breathe for a moment, while I explained this, but she nodded in understanding. "That's nothing to worry about with almost all of our products." She was nearly as quiet as I had been, but instead of a wavering whisper it was a soothing murmur. I nodded and that was that.

She took me through everything personally, even encouraging me to try on a few things myself. In the end I had made a new contact and had a veritable horde of products that I could use to help Harry. As I approached the counter to pay she looked a little worried at the mountain of treasures we had set aside. I could feel her mind analyzing my old, but good quality clothes and my worn shoes. Her wondering if I would be able to pay was written all over her face so, in a moment of pity for my new acquaintance, I began bringing the galleons out of my bag before she could think about taking a loss by giving me too much of a discount. The surprise at the gold was too funny not to laugh about, but she quickly went back to marking up the purchases.

"Don't worry dear," I huffed with a laugh. "I put my money where it's best used."

Fabling's shoulders hunched up as she looked at the purchases with a great deal more concentration than was actually needed for the task. "Oh, it's alright. You're young yet. But you have such a lovely business. You and your partner must be doing very well, did you ever put more into the business and forgo a new pair of shoes? Or a nicer night out?" The shoulders started to fall and the young woman nodded, her vibrant galaxy of hair bouncing slightly in the motion.

All told it was quite a bit of money. There were always £5 to every galleon. Instead of being on the gold standard the worth of the galleon was tied to the worth of the pound and a single galleon would always equal a £5 note. It was perhaps not the wisest of money systems, but considering money only had meaning if society gave it meaning in the first place, the system in use didn't really matter. Not to me anyway. The amount of the £5 was further broken down into sickles and knuts based on the galleon conversion. There were 17 sickles in a galleon and 29 knuts in a sickle. Then, of course, was my future knowledge of inflation multiplying that £5 by four. With both memories, however, I was able to easily work through all the conversions to make sure I stayed in my budget.

"That total comes to 843G 10s 6k," she whistled appreciatively. "I think you just became my favorite customer and I know all the kids in your life are going to be very happy."

As it turned out, I could probably have bought the fancy watch off that solicitor earlier and still have had room in my budget. That's what happens when you start a successful business as a teenager and just never stop. There was a never ending supply of people who wanted feline familiars every year and I was the breeder everyone wanted to buy them from, even if they bought them from one of the stores I sold through. I had two or three litters going every month since I was around twenty, that was nearly twenty five years ago. I had lived on the family estate until I had gotten married and then was set up in the Order house in Little Whinging after. A little frugality and a lot of shrewd investments, both muggle and magical, allowed me a comfortable amount of gold. There was always the patents as well, but I didn't touch those. No that gold belonged in the many pillared halls of stone and caverns old, it was not touched or thought on.

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7 January 1985

It had been three days since I had met with the perfect solicitor and I still could not bring myself to trust him with Harry even if I was going to cloud everything over with a bit of magic and slight of hand. I had read all of the books that I had gotten from the alleys that day and made plenty of notes on useful or worrisome things. I had hoped that by now I would have things going at the Dursleys so that Harry would not have to live in a constant state of terror and starvation. I had made progress in several areas, just not the ones where I wanted to see immediate action.

The disguises that I had gotten at Fabulousa would work wonderfully with the new clothes I had gotten for both myself and Harry. This way for both the magical and muggle world we would be able to blend in and not be noticed. It was absolutely incredible what they had come up with at Fabulousa. The hair charms would change not only color, but also the length of the wearer's hair. There were also charms to give one freckles and to change one's eye color. They truly were amazing charms as they worked off of passive magic and could be used by both myself and Harry without the need of a wand. A few acting classes, a few new outfits, and these charms would make us whole new people.

The extended purse I had gotten for him was the size of a small change pouch and had preservation charms. It could hold additional food, potion ingredients, or potions without it spoiling as well as any other item up to a truly absurd weight. Extension charms were a tricky bit of magic, especially if you wanted anything like food to go into it. That's why, legally speaking, there were restrictions on who was permitted to do such things. Most people bought their bags, trunks, and tents with those and other charms on them from specialty shops so it didn't matter much. All of those shops had people with proper permits. Doing such a thing to your own bag or trunk, as long as no food or people were to go in them, would only get you a warning if the Ministry felt so inclined to even take notice. Anything that involved people going into it was more serious as when extension charms collapse the person was very likely to die.

I had already carefully packed the extended purse for Harry, but was stymied by the fact that we should have no reason to interact. Even worse, a drop off was impossible due to his relations wanting to constantly lock him in a cupboard if he wasn't working on "chores" for them. I couldn't be seen giving it to him and I couldn't set up a drop point with him if he was never alone. I was working on it, but again it was taking time. I felt like everything was taking too much time.

In reading through the books I became more knowledgeable about obscurials and magical children. Magical children did have a tendency to outpace muggle children as far as information absorption went, but unfortunately I did not believe it to be the cause here. Thankfully, however, Harry was not an obscurial. The magic he used was not angry or turned in on himself in a rage. Harry knew he was not as normal as the Dursleys, as if the Dursleys were what would pass for normal, but he didn't try and force his magic inward. If I had to guess, it was probably because Harry was blamed for everything. He was hurt and punished for everything that the Dursleys didn't like, even if he knew it wasn't his fault. This might have been what saved him from becoming an obscurial. He didn't once believe he was being punished for being magical, just for being Harry.

The way that Harry behaved was still an issue though, as it was not in line with what a muggle or a magical child should be at his age. Even gifted children would not act like this at his age. For all of her academic intelligence and acting like an adult, Hermione Granger was still a child and acted like a child. It was the same for many gifted children. Their intelligence might earn them praise and they would then take on more adult aspects, but still emotionally be children with some odd adult characteristics. Harry behaved neither as a four year old should, nor as an adult, and not even some odd mix inbetween like a gifted child. Instead he was simply aged up by five or so years in intelligence and emotional maturity. While perhaps with a loving and attentive family he might be a little advanced, five years was far too much. With the family he had to safekeep himself from, however, he would be lucky to know his own name. And yet, here was Harry a four year old acting as though he had the emotional and intellectual experiences of an eight year old.

Oh, shit

What if Harry did have the experiences of an eight year old? An eight year old orphan living in a London that was hobbling its way through the Great Depression.

But, no, that couldn't be right… could it? If he was at the level of about eight now, then why wouldn't that increase by the time he went to school? Did he have actual memories? Did he have access to a greater amount of power? Did he remember more than just Wool's Orphanage if he remembered anything at all? Why hadn't he said anything? Did he just think it was normal like fictional Harry thought loads of people talked to snakes? Did he worry that he was crazy? Did he just not trust adults? Maybe it wasn't actually happening at all.

Oh.

Harry can talk to snakes. I don't think that I ever picked up on that in the whole of my other life. At the end of the first series, Harry isn't supposed to be able to talk to snakes anymore

All was well.

I even remember Dumbledore theorizing that Voldemort's magic is what gave Harry the power to speak to snakes. But in that past future life I had never made the connection that if Voldemort's magic was effecting Harry so much that it gave him additional magical abilities it might be doing other things to him as well. How much of an effect might that have on his cognitive abilities?

That horrible thing needed to be out of his head now. I simply didn't have the power or the contacts to do it, especially without Albus catching on to what was happening. I still couldn't bring myself to trust the solicitor so completely, but perhaps it wasn't strictly necessary. Perhaps there was another way around things. After all, I was not really interested in the local council knowing that Harry had different guardianship. I just wanted the Dursleys to leave him alone. Or, perhaps more importantly, to leave him to me. All without the protections breaking or Albus' other spies knowing anything about it.

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