I ended the previous chapter (Three) with Amelia leaving Harry at the Dursley house, then Harry going to sleep on the sofa. I had plotted Harry spending only one night alone without family, but I gave no hint of this at the very end of Chapter 3. Some reviewers (mostly male) made no objection to Harry ending his traumatic day being alone at the Dursley house; but most of Chapter 3's reviews ranged from "Amelia made a poor choice" to "Amelia should be arrested!"
I defend both Amelia's choice at the end of Chapter 3 and my plotting of the end of Chapter 3; but I rewrote the beginning of this chapter (Four) to answer the criticisms that reviewers made about Chapter 3.
Chapter 4
Harry's New Relative
The next day (Thursday, 19 April 1990)
Harry on the sofa woke up feeling not only well rested, but ridiculously energetic. He felt like he could run from Surrey County in southern England, north to northernmost Scotland, then swim the Pentland Firth to the Orkney Islands, all whilst pausing every mile of his run for press-ups (push-ups).
A block from Privet Drive, on the way to school, Harry was stopped by Piers Polkiss and the rest of Dudley's gang.
Polkiss tried to be threatening. "Potter, you'll tell us where Dudley is, or you will regret it."
Harry snapped, "Dudley's dead." Harry rushed up to rat-faced Piers and, two-handed, Harry shoved Polkiss away. The shove was much more forceful than it needed to be, in order to put Polkiss on the ground.
Piers did not merely fall down, Piers flew backwards five feet.
Harry snarled, "Go ahead, Rat Boy, start something. All of you blighters, come on, what are you waiting for? I want to punch someone."
Dudley's gang, minus Dudley, backed away from Harry.
Two hours later, at Saint Grogery's Primary School
Harry was called out of class to report to the headmaster's office. In the headmaster's office, along with the headmaster, were three women: Ms Bones; a woman in her forties who was dressed similarly to Ms Bones (minus the monocle), and who was wearing the woman-version of magical robes; and a woman in her thirties who was wearing new blue jeans, a top made out of an expensive fabric that Harry could not name, and a black-leather tailored jacket.
The Saint Grogory's headmaster disliked Harry; the feeling was mutual. Now the headmaster said, "I'm sorry for your losses, Potter. You're excused from classes for the rest of the day."
Ms Bones led the other two women and Harry out of the headmaster's office, then led the women plus Harry almost out of the school. Ms Bones stopped just before she used the exit doors; Harry and the women stopped too. Ms Bones looked about, drew her wand and cast a spell on the four people in the group.
Ms Bones explained to Harry, "I put a Notice-Me-Not Charm on us. People will see us and maybe will hear us, but they won't pay attention to us."
Ms Bones led the group outside and about sixty or seventy feet away from the school building. The classrooms of Saint Grogery's had lots of glass, but Harry did not think that anyone inside a classroom could see or hear what the foursome was doing and saying.
Even so, Ms Bones cast another spell ("Now nobody can hear a sound, even if they're standing a few feet away"), then Ms Bones told Harry what was going on.
Ms Bones made introductions. The witch-dressed woman in her forties was Helga Diggory, the Deputy Director of Wizard Child Services. WCS should have been making monthly inspections of the Dursley home since 1981, but no visits had been made in all these eight and a half years. The woman in her thirties who was dressed like a stylish nonmagical woman was Andromeda Tonks; she was a cousin of Harry's father. Harry the apparent celebrity needed no introduction for these two witches, who both expressed outrage at how thin, short, bruised and poorly dressed Harry was.
Then Ms Bones asked Harry, "Were you all right last night, after I left you at the Dursley house? Were you okay there this morning?"
"WHAT?" yelled Ms Diggory.
Ms Bones held her hand up, her palm facing Ms Diggory, in a Let Harry answer gesture.
Harry replied, "This morning was brilliant! I slept on the sofa, which was roomier than the boot cupboard under the stairs. This morning the sunrise woke me up. I took a shower, and it was nice to not be pulled out of the shower by Dudley after five minutes. For the second meal in a row, I cooked food, breakfast, and nobody stopped me eating it. Whilst walking to school, Dudley's gang tried to start trouble, but I let them know I wasn't their punch-bag anymore."
Silence. Ms Diggory and Ms Tonks were looking at Harry in shock; Ms Bones was looking at the other two women as though to say Didn't I tell you? You didn't believe me, did you?
Ms Tonks said, "But you're the Boy Who Lived!"
Harry shrugged.
Ms Diggory demanded to know, "Amelia, how could you leave him in that house, alone, after he watched his family get ki—"
"Relatives," Harry angrily corrected. "The Dursleys were my relatives, never my family."
Ms Bones replied to Ms Diggory, "How could I leave him there last night? Because I had no procedure that told me what else to do! He has Muggle neighbours; and we just walked out of a Muggle primary school, please note. It was pounded into our heads in the Auror Academy, 'When a situation comes up that might risk violating the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy, you follow procedure, you don't improvise! Improvising usually causes mistakes, and mistakes expose our world to the Muggles.' "
Then Ms Bones said to Harry, "I didn't think to tell you last night, but the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy now applies to you too. You may not say anything or do anything to let nonmagical people, except for immediate family members, know that magic is real."
Harry nodded. "Which explains why Uncle Vernon never told Aunt Marge about magic. Which is fine, believe me. If Aunt Marge had known that magical people lived in Britain, she would have brought back witch-burnings!"
Then Harry said, "Erm..."
Ms Bones said, "You have a problem?"
Harry studied his worn-out trainers. "I haven't told anyone that magic is real, but this morning, I shoved Piers Polkiss away like I was that muscleman from Austria, not like I was a starved nine-year-old kid."
Ms Bones sighed. "That's called 'accidental magic.' Please try not to lose your temper in the future when you're near nonmagical people."
Harry said, "Don't worry about me telling anyone at Saint Grogery's that magic is real. They never believed me about Dudley, and Dudley was there at school where they could watch him. No way would anyone believe me if I said, 'I saw a little magical creature with pointed ears heal an exploded door.' "
Ms Diggory said, "Let's get back to you, Amelia, leaving Mr Potter in that killing-house overnight. What if another Death Eater had shown up and attacked? What if a dozen Death Eaters had shown up and attacked?"
Ms Bones rolled her eyes. "What happened last night was a one-off, I would bet my vaults. Helga, Lucius Malfoy used a family-magic spell to find Mr. Potter. No other Death Eater has found Mr Potter in eight and an half years and, I believe, no other Death Eater can. Logic says that Lucius certainly was not about to reveal Mr Potter's address to another Death Eater, lest that other Death Eater steal the address, kill Lucius, then kill Mr Potter and grab the glory. Lucius hoarded the secret of where Mr Potter lived, just as Dumbledore hoarded the secret, and for the same reason: the power that knowing this secret gave him."
Then Ms Bones glared back at Ms Diggory and said, "Let me get back to a point that I was starting to make before I got sidetracked. Mr Potter is a magical child who is the only survivor of an attack by evil wizards in a nonmagical area. There was no procedure for this, before now, because the situation never had come up before."
Harry had an horrified suspicion why the situation of a magical child surviving a magical attack in a nonmagical neighbourhood never had come up before.
Ms Bones continued, "Last night after a long day, when it was late and I wanted to sleep, instead I sat down and thought up a new procedure. If what happened to Mr Potter happens again, the Aurors on site will be asked whether one of them would volunteer to take the magical child overnight; then in the morning, WCS and the child will seek out the child's magical relatives, which probably means a trip to Gringotts."
Ms Tonks said, "Amelia, you might want to tweak your new procedure to add a Plan B. My husband Ted is Muggle-born; before Hogwarts, and during summers during his Hogwarts years, he lived in a Muggle area. It turns out that Ted's closest magical relatives are the Selwyns. Ted wants nothing to do with them and they want nothing to do with him."
Harry said, "May I say something here?" Now it was Harry who was glaring at Ms Diggory. "I'm not a baby in nappies, I'm nine. I've been cooking at the cooker since I was four, and Aunt Petunia stopped watching me cook when I was six. What bad things do you think would happen if I spent another night in the Dursley house by myself? I'd burn down the house? No. I'd become so grief-stricken by three dead Dursleys that I'd kill myself? Ha. What I feel when I think of three Dursleys dead is not sad. Here's my point, ma'am: I've been taking care of the Whale, the Baby Whale and the Horse for years now, so I'm sure I can take care of myself!"
Ms Bones said, "But Harry, you don't need to take care of yourself. With the Dursleys dead and with your 'magical guardian' in an holding cell, I'm declaring as Director of the DMLE that Mrs Andromeda Tonks is your Acting Guardian till we find out what your parents' wills say."
So saying, Ms Bones gestured towards the woman wearing blue jeans.
The blue-jeans woman looked at Harry and said, "Please call me Andromeda."
Ms Bones continued, "Mrs Tonks has tried unceasingly, but unsuccessfully, for the last nine years to find you. I say 'unsuccessfully' because the Department of Records doesn't know your address, WCS didn't have your address till today, and Dumbledore refused to tell Mrs Tonks anything."
Andromeda snarled, "The bearded blighter actually told me that at wherever you live, you are 'safe and loved.' It's obvious to anyone with eyes that yesterday you were neither."
Harry looked at Ms Diggory. "So no address for me was why you lot never checked up on me in nine years?"
Ms Diggory sighed. "Your file was marked 'Special to the Director only.' Meaning, only Director Grenwick knew your address and only Director Grenwick would make visitations. But no visitations were on file. None in nine years!"
Ms Bones said, "This morning I asked Boudicca about that. Her eyes went glassy and her voice went flat, then she said, 'Now is not a good time to visit Mr Potter. I'll visit him soon.' When I heard this, I immediately took Boudicca to Saint Mungo's—"
"The magical hospital," Andromeda explained.
"—to get her brain cleaned out. Saint Mungo's confirmed that Boudicca had been hit with hostile mind-magics but, what a surprise, the healers couldn't say who had done this to the Director of WCS."
Andromeda snarked, "And I'm sure the DMLE has no guesses who Director Grenwick's mysterious mind-whammy-er might be." Andromeda mimed stroking a belt-length beard.
Ms Bones said, "On the Muggle side, Surrey Child Services has no record of you, Mr Potter. They should, but they don't."
Ms Diggory said, "Anyway, Mr Potter, your WCS folder no longer is marked 'Special to the Director only.' Once you're living with Mrs Tonks or with your guardian as specified by your parents' wills, I'll begin regular visitations."
Ms Bones said, "And I shall be dropping in at WCS from time to time, to make sure that neither Boudicca nor Helga 'forgets.' "
Harry asked the witches, "What happens now? I can't guess what you pulled me out of school for."
Ms Bones replied, "Mrs Tonks is taking you to Saint Mungo's for a medical checkup, then to Gringotts, the magical bank, to see if the bank has a copy of your parents' wills. I want you to be put with whomever your parents chose to be your guardian, not with whomever Albus Dumbledore wants you to live with. As for myself, I need to return to the DMLE, but before then, I want to run an experiment."
Ms Bones cast what she told Harry was "a Notice-Me-Not Charm for an area," then she called out, "Tibia!"
Pop. Ms Bones's female house-elf appeared in front of her.
Ms Bones said to Tibia, "Go to the House Potter house-elves and tell them that Harry Potter will be calling them soon. Then go to the House Malfoy house-elves and ask them to come when Harry Potter calls them soon, whether Mr Potter is their master or not."
After the house-elf disappeared, Ms Diggory asked Ms Bones, "Why do you think that Harry Potter might possibly be the master of Malfoy house-elves?"
It was Andromeda who answered: "Depending on how Magic interprets what happened yesterday, Harry Potter now might be Lord Malfoy by Right of Conquest."
Ms Bones corrected, "Heir Malfoy by Right of Conquest, since he's seven years too young to be Head of House."
Andromeda facepalmed. "This would make the Malfoy Regent until 1997 be Narcissa Malfoy."
Andromeda looked at Harry and explained: "Narcissa, besides being the widow of the man you killed and the mother of the boy who expected to become Heir Malfoy when he turns eleven, also is one of my two sisters. Narcissa and I were close till I was supposed to marry Lucius but refused to, so that it was Narcissa who married Lucius."
Harry said, "So you're telling me that for as long as you're my guardian, you and your sister might be bumping heads? Brilliant." Harry rolled his eyes.
Pop. Tibia returned.
Ms Bones coached Harry how to call House Potter house-elves: "I, Harry James Potter, call here all House Potter house-elves. Present yourselves for my inspection."
Pop-p-p-pop. The four house-elves who appeared were well dressed—Greyclay, the head Potter house-elf, was wearing an elf-sized grey tuxedo. But the four Potter house-elves' voices were tremulous, and their legs were shaking. Andromeda diagnosed the problem as the house-elves being magically depleted.
It took both Ms Bones and Andromeda to coach Harry what to do. Telling him Lay both your hands on an house-elf's head, then inject magic into the house-elf just like you inject magic into your wand was not useful advice for a boy who never had held a wand. But eventually Harry figured out the how-to. It helped that Harry was apparently much more magically powerful than was normal for nine-year-old wizards.
Harry maybe went overboard with injecting magic into his house-elves, or maybe the Potter house-elves were overjoyed to be near their master again. In any case, the Potter elves, once they were magically refreshed, acted as excited as small children on Christmas morning.
Then it was time to call the House Malfoy house-elves. Harry helped Ms Bones with her "experiment" because he wanted to know if he now owned his would-be murderer's house and money—apparently the blond man had been rich.
Following Ms Bones's coaching, Harry said aloud, "I, Harry James Potter, ask all House Malfoy house-elves to come here."
Pop-p-p-pop. These four house-elves were wearing the simplest of clothes—which were filthy. The Malfoy house-elves all were bruised and wounded, and at first they did not look Harry in the eyes when they spoke to him. Harry thought, If the Dursleys had house-elves, this is what they'd have looked like.
It turned out that Harry was now the Malfoy house-elves' master, besides being the Potter house-elves' master. (This discovery made all the House Malfoy house-elves happy, and made one Malfoy house-elf so overjoyed, he hugged Harry.)
In related news, Harry now owned both Potter Manor and Malfoy Manor. This was quite a shock for the boy who, seventeen hours earlier, had "owned" only a bloodstained boot cupboard.
Harry thanked the eight house-elves for coming, and told them that he would call them again when he needed them. Eight pops later, the house-elves all had vanished.
With the house-elf questions answered, Ms Bones and Ms Diggory said goodbye to Harry and to Andromeda, then Ms Bones and Ms Diggory disappeared with a bang apiece.
An half-hour later
At Saint Mungo's (the magical hospital)
Harry, with Andromeda watching, just had gotten a magical head-to-toe scan of his body. A "quill" (feather), with no hand moving it, wrote on a roll of parchment instead of on several sheets of paper. Harry's medical scan caused three feet of tiny writing on the parchment. Harry could tell that Andromeda clearly was bothered by the parchment listing so much that was medically wrong with Harry.
Harry knew nothing about magical medicine, and knew little about nonmagical medicine. Andromeda knew much about both. In fact, Andromeda worked here at Saint Mungo's as an healer (magical physician), but had taken today off.
The diagnosing healer then pulled Andromeda aside and spoke to her in a quiet voice. Harry did not understand most of what he was hearing; but somehow the discussion related to his lightning-bolt scar. Harry overheard the diagnosing healer say to Andromeda, "Saint Mungo's can't fix this; but I'm almost certain that goblin healers have a ritual for this."
After the diagnoses, and the mysterious and quiet discussion between the diagnosing healer and Andromeda, the diagnosing healer wrote out prescriptions for potions. The next stop for Harry and Andromeda was Saint Mungo's apothecary to buy the prescribed potions.
Once the potions all had been delivered, Andromeda promptly put five potion-vials on the table in front of Harry and commanded, "Drink them."
Every potion that Harry was ordered to drink, tasted like dog vomit that had been left out in the sun for too long.
On the other hand, potions, unlike nonmagical medicines, did not come with "side effects," so Andromeda informed Harry. After drinking the five potions, Andromeda assured Harry that he did not need to worry about his blood pressure spiking, or about blood clots forming in his brain.
Twenty minutes later, in Gringotts
Goblins, Harry had decided, were strange-looking people. Goblin men were only four feet tall, so goblins were bigger than house-elves, but not by much. Goblins had pointed ears. They had long hands and fingers, and long feet; skin that was black and wrinkled like an elephant's; and many long, slim, pointed teeth like a piranha fish's.
Goblins were also, for some reason that Harry could not guess, the only magical people (other than nonmagically-raised humans) who wore suits. Bronzedagger, who was the "Potter Account Manager" (an apparently important position for a Gringotts goblin) currently was wearing a black, goblin-sized, three-piece wool suit.
At the moment, Bronzedagger was being a berk. "No, Mr Potter, Mrs Tonks, I may not show you the wills of James Potter and Lily without the permission of your magical guardian. Albus Dumbledore has not notified me that he gives you permission to look at the wills, and I shall not bother him to ask. However, once you reach your majority at seventeen, you may look at the wills whenever you choose."
Andromeda sputtered, "But we need to see the wills now, to know who Harry Potter's guardian is supposed to be right now. We don't yet know who the guardian is, but we're sure that the guardian is not Albus Dumbledore!"
Bronzedagger replied, "Witch, whatever you might be sure about, I take instructions only from Albus Dumbledore till Mr Potter turns seventeen. Do either of you have any other business related to the Potter accounts? I remind you that Mr Potter can have no business with Gringotts till his eleventh birthday, when he may access his trust vault."
Andromeda snapped, "And when he may claim his Potter Heir Primary ring, you forgot to say."
"No. Albus Dumbledore has instructed me not to let Mr Potter have his Potter Heir ring till his sixteenth birthday."
"Listen to me," Andromeda said, "Dumbledore has been arrested. For neglect as guardian. The Director of the DMLE appointed me to be Harry Potter's acting guardian till his parents' wills can be read and the true guardian can be known." Andromeda pulled from her jeans pocket a folded parchment, which she unfolded and held out to Bronzedagger. "I watched Amelia Bones sign this. Now bring out the wills!"
Bronzedagger barely glanced at Andromeda's parchment. "Until and unless I receive notification that Albus Dumbledore has been tried by the Wizengamot and has been sentenced to Azkaban, he and only he is whom I shall take instructions from. This discussion is over. Leave before I summon the guards."
Seconds later, Harry and Andromeda were standing in the corridor outside Bronzedagger's office.
Andromeda sighed. "Sorry, Harry, but I can't think of a Plan B. I was disowned from House Black, so I can't ask Bladebloody, who's the Black Account Manager, to intercede. He'd throw us out of his office."
Harry got an idea then. "Ms Bones told me I'm famous in this world, right? I'm Robin Hood famous, I'm Lady Di famous, right? If the Boy Who Lived asked to speak to the local number-one goblin, do you think he'd hear us out?"
Four minutes later
In the office of Ragnok, Director of Gringotts London
Director Ragnok was wearing a goblin-sized, black three-piece suit with white pinstripes, made of wool. Ragnok also was wearing a white cape that had strange black writing on it.
Right now, Andromeda was speaking, as Harry watched and listened—
"...We suspect that Dumbledore is not whom the wills declare should be Mr Potter's magical guardian, but we can't prove this, because Account Manager Bronzedagger refuses to let Mr Potter see the wills! And the wills that the Ministry has, were sealed by, you guessed it, Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore."
Ragnok glanced at the Grant of Acting Guardianship declaration that Ms Bones had signed. Then Director Ragnok asked his visitors, "Perhaps Account Manager Bronzedagger thinks Mr Potter is an imposter? Even now, over eight years after Harry Potter became a rich and famous orphan, people walk into the bank claiming to be he."
Harry snarled, "If they don't look like they're about to starve to death, they aren't me."
Then Harry said, much more calmly, "If you're asking me to prove that I am who I claim to be, I don't know how to do this. I'm not sure I have a birth certificate back at the house."
Ragnok said, "It wouldn't matter. Muggle birth certificates are easy to forge magically."
Harry wound up slicing into the pad of his left thumb with the tip of a bejeweled-hilt dagger, then bleeding three drops of his blood onto a parchment. Andromeda acted like this was perfectly normal, so Harry made no fuss.
Ragnok waved an hand, and Harry's bleeding thumb instantly healed. At the same time, the blood disappeared from Harry's thumb and from the dagger-tip (but not from the parchment).
Ragnok waved his hand again. The three blood drops moved about on the parchment and stretched till they spelled out Harry James Potter in blood-red letters.
Ragnok waved an hand, and the parchment-and-name disappeared.
Ragnok said to Harry, "When you stabbed your thumb with the dagger, you didn't even flinch. You are a true warrior, Scion Potter."
Harry shook his head. "After all the stuff Vernon and Dudley did to me, besides the burns I got at the cooker? This was the mildest injury I've gotten all week."
Both Ragnok and Andromeda, Harry noticed, now looked angry.
Less than a minute later
Nobody bothered to knock on the door of Bronzedagger's office.
Two goblin guards, each wearing armour and with a sharp axe strapped to his back, shoved the door open and rushed into Bronzedagger's office without warning. Then Ragnok walked in, his white cape fluttering as he moved. The last people who went into Bronzedagger's now-crowded office were Harry and Andromeda.
Ragnok thundered, "Account Manager Bronzedagger, bring forth the wills of James Charlus Potter and of Lily Marie Evans Potter."
In less than a minute, two fan-folded parchments were laid on the desk of clearly nervous Bronzedagger. Ragnok picked up the two documents and handed them to Harry.
Harry immediately handed the two wills to Andromeda, on the theory that she would need to explain to Harry both what the wills meant and who the mentioned people were. Since Andromeda would need to read the wills anyway, why not let her read them first?
Several times as Andromeda was reading the wills, Harry heard her say "Merlin!" By now, Harry had figured out that this expression was what polite witches said instead of Bugger me!
Still in Bronzedagger's office, Ragnok's voice commanded Bronzedagger, "Now present the Potter account ledger!"
Bronzedagger, who clearly was frightened now, brought out an huge book, two feet tall by two feet wide, and about three inches thick. Bronzedagger laid this ledger book on his desk.
Ragnok's fingers waggled, and the ledger rotated to be readable by Ragnok and the humans, then the ledger opened to its first page. On the far left side of the page was a column of short descriptions, written in English. The first ledger-page had two other columns, both containing only numbers. In one column, all the numbers were black; in the other column, all the numbers were red.
Director Ragnok waggled his fingers again; but so far as Harry could tell, nothing was different.
Then Ragnok waggled his fingers a third time, and an unseen hand began to turn pages in the ledger.
When Harry saw the fifth page of the ledger, he choked—
Certain lines in the ledger were highlighted in red. More than this, those lines in the ledger were highlighted in flashing red.
Ragnok peered closely at the flashing-red lines. Then he went back to magically turning pages in the Potter ledger. More flashing-red lines appeared.
After a while, Ragnok looked at Harry and at Andromeda. "The good news for you is, whilst Headmaster Albus Dumbledore is definitely a fool, it seems he is not a thief. Account Manager Bronzedagger, on the other hand—"
Ragnok glared at Bronzedagger. "Tell me, Thief Bronzedagger, did you think I was not paying you enough? You're the account manager to a Noble and Most Ancient House, so your income is half my own, but was your vault not filling fast enough? Were the bonuses too small? Or did you think that Clan Glethmak enjoys such a solid-gold reputation that a bit of scandal won't hurt your Clan?"
Andromeda murmured to Harry, "Director Ragnok is speaking English for our benefit, so we'll know what is going on."
Meanwhile, Ragnok's voice had turned commanding: "Guards, take Thief Bronzedagger to the Chamber of the Wise Ones. Drag him there if need be. Then summon the Elders of Clan Glethmak to the Chamber of the Wise Ones. When all three Elders are present, one of you behead this disgusting klork, then display his head on the front steps. Meanwhile, the other of you is to find Senior Teller Axefrenzy and to bring him here. Treat Axefrenzy politely and respectfully."
After the goblin guards and Bronzedagger had left, Ragnok said to Harry, "Once I install your new account manager, I suggest you call for a full audit, at no charge. The last time this ledger was audited was 1980. Clearly Headmaster Dumbledore trusted Klork Bronzedagger to do his work without checking up on him."
Harry nodded. "Same thing happened with the Dursleys. Dumbledore left me with my mum's nonmagical relatives in 1981, and trusted that they would treat me right. They didn't."
Since Harry was now the future Lord Malfoy by Right of Conquest, he and Andromeda met briefly with Slicesword, the Malfoy account manager. Harry learnt in his brief visit that Lucius Malfoy has raised white peacocks as an hobby, and that Lucius had nearly two million galleons in his vault—which was worth, Harry computed, about ten million pounds. Wow.
Harry learnt one other thing from Slicesword: Two minions of Malfoy, whose names were Vincent Crabbe, Sr and Garston Goyle, owed House Malfoy about ten thousand galleons (£50 000) apiece. Lucius Malfoy, who easily could have forgiven these two loans, instead had written the minions each a letter saying that the indebted minion had until 1 September 1991 to pay off the entire loan, else the minion's son would become the bodyguard of Lucius Malfoy's son. If Garston Goyle still did not pay off his loan by 1 September 1996, so warned Lucius's letter to Garston, when Garston's daughter would enter Hogwarts, the girl would become the whore of both Lucius Malfoy and his son.
Reading these letters, Harry was horrified. Unfortunately, Andromeda told him, there was nothing he could do till he turned seventeen.
At 4pm, at Number 4, Privet Drive
Harry and Andromeda sat in the Dursley kitchen and composed a letter to Ms Bones about the shocking things that they had read in the Potter wills. According to Andromeda, it was vital that Ms Bones immediately be informed that—
• the Potter wills' first choice for Harry's guardian was someone named Sirius Black, "Harry's sworn godfather";
• the wills said of Petunia and Vernon Dursley, they "are not to be given guardianship of our son"; and
• Albus Dumbledore was mentioned nowhere in either will except at the end of the document, as a witness.
Meanwhile, Senior Auror Nigel Grenwick and four other Aurors in long red dresses returned to Number 4, Privet Drive, to search the house for evidence of Harry's abuse and/or for evidence of Dumbledore's neglect.
Two Aurors took turns casting spells inside the boot cupboard under the stairs. Another Auror, the woman named Jones, asked Harry follow-up questions about all the times he had been overworked, beaten or otherwise injured by any Dursley, deprived of food or locked in the boot cupboard.
Somewhere upstairs, another Auror found a letter addressed to Petunia Evans Dursley; the letter had been written by Albus Dumbledore and was dated 1 November 1981. Apparently the letter had "Compulsion Charms" on it; from the way the Auror scowled, Harry gathered that Dumbledore should not have cast those spells.
The upstairs Auror also found two "student trunks" in the attic that somehow the Dursleys never had noticed. One trunk had things from James Potter's days as a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry; the other student trunk held property of student Lily Evans. Included in the Lily Evans trunk were seven pink diaries that detailed Lily's life at Hogwarts.
Meanwhile, at 4pm in the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic
Amelia Bones had called a press conference—
"Good afternoon, witches and wizards. Yesterday evening between 6.30 and 6.35, Lucius Malfoy entered the Muggle house where nine-year-old Harry Potter lived with his Muggle relatives. Malfoy, by use of a Silencing Charm followed by Bombarda, entered the house dramatically, but without alerting anyone either outside the house or inside the house that he illegally had entered.
"Malfoy then moved to the kitchen of the house, where he found Mr Potter with his Muggle relatives: Petunia Dursley, P-E-T-U-N-I-A, space, D-U-R-S-L-E-Y, the Muggle sister of Mr Potter's mother Lily; Petunia Dursley's husband Vernon, V-E-R-N-O-N, and their nine-year-old son, name withheld. Malfoy used three Killing Curses to kill Vernon Dursley, then his son, then Petunia Dursley.
"Then Malfoy aimed his wand at Mr Potter.
"As Malfoy was casting the Killing Curse on Mr Potter, the boy rushed up to him and shoved Malfoy's wand-arm down. Lucius Malfoy died at the scene when his cast Killing Curse hit his own foot. Lucius Malfoy died with the Dark Mark on his left forearm."
The reporters gasped. Someone said, "With two Gryffindors for parents, what can you expect?"
Amelia said, "How did Malfoy find out where Mr Potter was at? By repeatedly using a spell in the Malfoy grimoire. I point out that whilst those Harry Potter children's books claim that Harry Potter lives in a blue palace in Wales with two distant Potter relatives and with an house-elf, Mr Potter in fact was living in a Muggle house with the Muggle Dursley family in England."
Amelia paused, as the reporters murmured. Tomorrow, many magical children in Wizarding Britain would be heartbroken when they learnt that the Harry Potter books that they so cherished were lies. Last night Susan, the first magical child to hear such news, had sobbed.
Amelia said, "Aurors detected the four Killing Curses, and apparated to the house to defend the house's residents from attack. By the time the Aurors arrived, spellcasting had ended. The highest-ranking Auror on site, Kingsley Shacklebolt, soon requested my presence. When I arrived at the Dursley house, I discovered Albus Dumbledore already there, though no Auror had messaged him.
"During my investigations, I discovered that the adult Dursleys had abused Mr Potter with beatings and other physical harm, with starvation and with in-house imprisonment. Mr Potter also had been overworked as a slave. If the three Dursleys were not already dead, I would have arrested the adult Dursleys yesterday, and they would have been facing years in Muggle prison for charges relating to child abuse.
"But those Muggles were not the only people who had harmed Harry Potter. Twice yesterday, I heard Mr Potter say about Albus Dumbledore that Mr Potter never had seen him before yesterday; Dumbledore, who had been awarded the magical guardianship of Mr Potter in 1981, was unable to refute Mr Potter's claim. I arrested Albus Dumbledore for neglect of his duties as guardian."
The reporters gasped and muttered, hearing this.
Amelia had two more interesting things to say: "Magic has made Mr Potter the future Lord Malfoy, by Right of Conquest. Yesterday the House Malfoy house-elves confirmed this."
The reporters were gobsmacked.
"Finally, Saint Mungo's discovered this morning that Mr Potter has an owl-post redirect on him, but Mr Potter did not remain at Saint Mungo's to undergo the ritual that would've removed the owl-post redirect. I mention this because my niece Susan has owled birthday cards to Mr Potter for several years and has never received a reply; I'm certain that Mr Potter has not replied because he hasn't received magical mail from Susan or from any other magical person.
"This concludes my prepared remarks."
Then came the questions.
Reporter 1: "What does this do to the claim by certain Purebloods that they were Imperiused to be Death Eaters?"
Amelia called such claims "bald-faced lies," pointing out that no such claimants had been questioned with Veritaserum or had given unambiguous magical oaths.
Reporter 2: "Where is Harry Potter now? Is he living in the Dursley house by himself?"
Amelia answered that until the wills of James and Lily Potter could be read by the Ministry—Chief Warlock Albus Dumbledore had ordered those wills to be sealed—Amelia had appointed "a magical adult" to be Mr Potter's acting guardian. Amelia refused to say what relationship, if any, the acting guardian already had with Mr Potter.
Amelia then said, "Mr Potter now is living with the magical adult I appointed."
Reporter 3: "What does your niece Susan think, now that parts of those Roy Locke books are proven to be wrong?"
Amelia replied that the public did not need to know any more about ten-year-old Susan Bones than was already known.
Reporter 4: "Can you tell us any more about Harry Potter's acting guardian? Is the magical [person] male or female?"
Amelia replied that she would reveal no further information about the acting guardian.
Then Amelia added, "Note that every year on 31 July, Albus Dumbledore issued a public statement that Mr Potter was 'with family' and that he was 'safe and loved.' These were lies. Mr Potter, when talking to me or to the Aurors about the Dursleys, always called them his relatives, never his family. Mr Potter received no affection from the Dursleys, only cruelty, the Dursley adults starved him, all three Dursleys injured Mr Potter at least once, and Mr Potter's uncle came close to killing him on several occasions. Mr Potter was locked in a tiny room many times a month. But Albus Dumbledore knew about none of these things, because Albus Dumbledore never visited the Dursley house till yesterday."
Reporter 5: "Did someone at the Ministry tip off Lucius Malfoy where Harry Potter was living?"
Amelia replied that this was impossible, because two places in the Ministry that should have known Mr Potter's home address (the Department of Records and Wizard Child Services), yesterday had had no information about where Mr Potter lived.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In other stories of mine, Dumbledore steals from Harry's vaults, eventually is caught and is sentenced to work in a goblin mine. I decided not to do that in this story. However, Dumbledore still is a disgusting waste of space in this story.
