A/N: Hello, people!
I don't own Harry Potter or Twilight.
I have no beta.
ENJOY!
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I'M NOT HOMELESS ANYMORE!
After almost 2 years of this suffering, moving all around Delaware from motel to motel, or being stuck in our van which is breaking down, we have finally moved into a small home!
Most of our possessions got destroyed in the storage unit we were renting because there was a hole somewhere which allowed it to flood and allowed rats inside. We managed to get mom and my little sister beds to sleep on, and a pull-out couch for my step-dad. I am still sleeping on the floor though because beds are too expensive, and we just can't handle the extra expenses right now. There just isn't enough space left tbh.
There are only 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom. I am sleeping on the floor at the foot of my mom's bed. We have a kitchen again, and a shower, and I got a new blanket! My clothes are all gone though, so I only have what I was bringing around with me since January of 2022.
Still, it's great to be able to say that my extra panic can be laid to rest, and things can kind of go back to normal. We get to eat full meals again and that's the best part honestly.
Now, y'all don't have to keep hearing my whining about this.
"So... that is a ghoul?"
Bella stared at the vaguely green figure holding up a considerable handful of chains in the far corner of the Weasley family's attic. It was shaking them back and forth, and refusing to make eye contact despite how intensely she was staring it down.
"I don't know why but I had expected ghouls to look more like ghosts and less like… that."
"Is it possible that you're confusing ghouls for ghosts based on American pop culture references?" Harry asked. "Though to be honest, I don't think I've ever actually seen a ghoul be brought up in any way on the non-magical side. And, in fact, that might be the only magical thing I've come across that has never been mentioned in my life outside of its ties to magic. We all hear about vampires and werewolves and mermaids and things like that, but nowhere have I ever encountered the word ghoul."
"The funniest thing about this is that I don't think I've actually encountered it much either when it comes to American pop culture. Like, I don't even know where I heard the word for the first time, but I just expected them to look more ghostly and not greenish. Nor covered in weird bumps and dripping with fluids."
Harry couldn't even begin to explain any of it himself.
"Why is it holding chains?" Bella went on to ask.
"You know, I never really thought to ask about that. Maybe it found them and just likes them or maybe all ghouls have chains."
It was moments like this where Harry wished they actually touched upon things like this in Care of Magical Creatures, but in a way, ghouls technically weren't considered magical creatures because they weren't really alive in a way that meant going without sustenance would eventually kill them, so why would they have to learn about them? He had no doubt in mind that Hermione would know the details about it though. And Luna would probably know as well.
As if summoned by magic or by the sheer force of knowing that Harry did not have an answer to a question, Hermione appeared at the doorway to the Weasley's attic. "For your information, ghouls are actually a type of magical beast according to British classification. They possess a certain level of intelligence - enough to know that they have to eat and then to seek food out - but they mostly only eat small insects and don't care enough to consider it further. They tend to be very humanoid in shape but are also incredibly malformed with varying skin tones that aren't found in homo sapiens. They have often been described as slimy, warty, or even pockmarked."
And yet not one thing in that description mentioned anything about them having chains, so where did the chains come from?
"Most likely he just found the chains in the attic and decided to keep them because he liked them," she explained simply.
Well, at least that made some sense.
Bella sent him a questioning look. "Are there things like this in Grimmauld Place? Meaning, will something randomly start rattling chains at night on the second Tuesday of every month?"
At once, both Harry and Hermione snorted.
"Formerly there were creatures living in Grimmauld Place," Harry clarified. "We all put in extensive work to cleanse the place from top to bottom to make it safe. Nothing living there can harm you or would even want to. Believe me."
That sounded ominous as all hell when put so plainly. But now it was obvious that she was even more curious.
As for Edward, he merely stared at the being, that watched him with equally wide eyes. Harry couldn't begin to understand what was going on between them, and he wondered if ghouls were sentient enough to have a thought process that Edward could actually read.
He'd ask about it later.
"So, this is what Diagon Alley looks like."
Bella looked around at the various shops lining the street, all of them just slightly tipping over into the center to help block out the light of the sun from above. In the distance, she could see the most twisted looking building of all. Harry had called it Gringotts, which was the magical bank with hundreds of locations all around the world. Further along the street were pet shops with animals resting in the windows or on perches outside. Shops specifically for quidditch supplies and other magical sports paraphernalia. And not too far away, she could see the magical sign for the bookstore Harry had mentioned many times before.
"Is that Flourish and Blotts? Can we please go in there first?" She had so many things that she wanted to research about magic, and a bookstore was definitely the best place to go.
Harry smiled and looked over to Edward to see if he was okay with this line of thought as he was standing very still and staring very widely out at the people in front of him.
It had to be especially hard for him to be in a new place, surrounded by a bunch of people from a community that he still wasn't very familiar with. He could probably hear most of the thoughts of the people around them, and Bella could only imagine what was going on in the minds of all these people. So many things he probably didn't even have the context for, hitting him from every possible angle all at once.
Harry had said that not everyone could guard their minds, nor could everyone afford to pay for the enchantments on the jewelry needed to protect their minds. It was probably hell to deal with after the relaxation he had experienced at The Burrow.
Edward turned and gave Bella a calming smile and said, "I'm all for doing whatever you want to do first. I think I need a minute to acquaint myself with this new place, so don't mind me if I'm a bit quiet for a time."
Of course, that made total sense. Every day she was given a good reason to be glad that she wasn't a mind reader. Or someone who could See the future.
Before they could even actually go to any of the stores though, they had to stop at the bank first because Bella wanted to figure out what the conversions were like between different types of money, and she actually had some money of her own and she wanted to be able to convert it appropriately.
The bank was everything she thought it would be, and then also nothing at all like what she thought it would be. The grand marble work and the absolute detail was astonishing and made her think of old museums. Inside, there were goblins lining the long, abnormally polished wooden tables on the floor, measuring gems of all kinds of sizes and writing things down with quills and parchment.
And the fact that they were doing it so blatantly and out in the open meant that they had to be incredibly sure of themselves and their ability to keep the bank safe. There was even a warning on the double doors as they were going in, and Bella had to wonder just how seriously they took that warning.
Enter stranger, but take heed,
Of what awaits the sin of greed.
For those who take but do not earn,
Must pay most dearly in their turn.
So, if you seek beneath our floors,
A treasure that was never yours.
Thief, you have been warned, beware,
Of finding more than treasure there.
She had to wonder what was lying beneath the floors of Gringotts Bank, and what exactly it was that made them so sure that their defenses were impregnable.
Also, she just felt that it was a bit suspicious to put a race of beings that human magicals had degraded for so long, in charge of their money. She didn't understand why the goblins would agree to be working with the money for the people that tried to enslave them and also remove them from existence later on. Maybe this was some kind of way of getting back at wizards for their terrible behavior centuries ago and she just couldn't see the filling of the plan.
Harry led her and Edward all the way down the long hall, toward the left side, where a surly looking goblin sat behind his side of a very long desk he shared with many others. There were several golden and brass scales weighing all sorts of precious gems and even bars of gold. A pair of half-moon spectacles graced the bridge of his sharply pointed nose, and he looked over them with such severity, that Bella could practically feel his distaste for Harry.
"We're looking to convert some muggle money into magical money if that's alright with you?" Harry said instead of a greeting.
"Mr. Potter," the goblin said rather unkindly, "it has been a while since you have stepped foot inside the Britain Branch of Gringotts. You come with a vampire and a muggle in tow. Quite the interesting kind of company you keep these days."
He just knew upon first glance what Bella and Edward were.
Awesome.
The goblin reached below his portion of the long desk and withdrew a long sheet of parchment and then slid it across the table alongside an inkwell and a quill, and said, "Fill this out. The expected amount that you intend to have exchanged. Choose the type of money you're using, and the type of money you intend to receive in return, and then you will give your signature as a witness. This will be added to your official account records."
Bella chose to step forward then, because technically, she was the one who wanted to see how the conversion worked and wanted to convert her own money. It didn't sit right with her for her to have Harry just spending all of his money on them when he had already gone to the trouble of getting them plane tickets to get them all the way over here to begin with.
"Is there a way for me to do it myself, sir? I'm the one that technically wanted to convert my own money into whatever magical people use in transactions. Or is it not possible because I don't have magic myself?" That would suck if it was indeed the case.
The goblin stared her down for a solid minute, and she could feel Edward twitching and wondered what exactly was going through the goblin's head, and wondered if he realized that Edward was perfectly capable of hearing what he was thinking.
Also, she wished he had a name plate or something. Referring to him as just a goblin made her feel bad.
"As you are a muggle, and you are not blood related to a magical individual, as far as the wards are aware, it would mean that you technically do not fall under any present laws about this type of means, and that you would still require a magical person's signature and testimony as a witness to this conversion happening, so that it cannot be claimed that you were coerced into this."
Bella frowned, because in a way that didn't really make sense. "Are you saying that I would still need Harry's signature anyway? Why aren't you a good enough witness to this happening? You're the one overseeing everything already."
And then the goblin sneered a sneer that had to be one of the worst she had ever seen on anybody. "That would be because according to the British Ministry of Magic, Goblins are not considered People and are not allowed to act as sole witnesses to business arrangements."
Immediately, Bella's head snapped around to look at Harry, because she had not been expecting him to just say something like that and she was mortified. What kind of racist behavior on behalf of the actual government was this that there were the people who were handling all of their money and would still be treated in such a way? It just sounded incredibly foolish to keep ostracizing an entire community of people within your already small community of people, just because they happened to not be human.
Harry did not look like he was any happier about this than she, and Edward looked to be severely uncomfortable by it. His eyes trailed around the room, stormy and lost in thought.
"Unfortunately, this is something that has persisted for an incredibly long time, and it is something that Hermione does intend to fix. We're still a little too young to be allowed important positions in the government as of right now, but within a decade or two, we will have a lot more power and a lot more political reach to be able to change things. And I have a lot of money to help out with that."
It did relieve her to an extent to know that there was at least a plan of some sort to make sure that something like this did not continue on in the future. Still, the fact that it was the twenty-first century, and this was still something that was happening to this day, did not sit right with her.
Bella huffed and folded her arms. "That's bullshit. This shouldn't even be a thing in the first place."
The goblin in question, cracked a sort-of smile and nodded. "This is simply the way things are as of right now. Regardless of who is the one applying for the conversions, Mr. Potter would still have to be the one to sign off and be the witness for both the muggle and the vampire, because of how Magical Britain's laws presently are."
Once that emotionally harrowing situation had finally passed them, Bella got to convert two hundred American dollars into what was considered magical galleons. Because magical currency was split into knuts, sickles, and galleons. Knuts were made of bronze, the sickles were made of silver, and the galleons were made of gold. And the numbers were crazy.
There were so many knuts to a sickle and so many sickles to a galleon, and then so very many knuts to a galleon, that she had to wonder how these people managed to do math quickly when they went out. How was any of this handled?
493 knuts to a galleon.
17 sickles to a galleon.
29 knuts to a sickle.
1 galleon = $6.60 as of today's current conversion rates.
Who was sitting there counting out all of those knuts?! Paying for anything with anything but galleons sounded like a bitch to deal with.
Thankfully, her confusion seemed to make the goblin take pity on her, because he decided to reveal, "Those who have vaults at Gringotts are gifted with the ability to sync their wand to their account. What happens is, when those with accounts here go to pay somewhere, they have the opportunity to place their wand tip against wherever the Gringotts symbol is located, and money will instantly be transferred between accounts A detailed receipt will be sent back with the amount lost in the transaction and will then be recorded in the account's files."
Harry nodded. "I used to have to do that in school, because I didn't have permission to travel out to Hogsmeade Village with everybody else on the weekends, so I would just hoard magical magazines, and then I would just press my wand against all of the things that I wanted so that they would eventually be mailed to me. Also, it made me feel less lame because I was the only student who never had anything coming in the mail for me."
And once again, Bello was back to absolutely hating Harry's non-magical family because of the way they treated him. It seemed like at least once a week she was destined to feel this way.
But back to the convenience of being able to just pay for things instantly, that was almost like credit cards but also, did this mean that the standard magical citizen did not bother to learn what their money was worth? Did they not sit there bothering to learn how much math they would have to do for basic things? It sounded annoying but it was still important.
Did magical people not have things like dollar stores? Or like, a convenience store? Things where everything was supposed to be like a dollar or under, or maybe like under five dollars. Much like a Five Below in fact. Was there actually anything that would be worth less than a sickle in the long run? Who would want to count out a hundred knuts or something?
It was like being in a penny candy store with only a pocketful of only pennies. No thanks.
Once Bella successfully managed to get her own money properly exchanged, Edward decided that he wanted to convert his own. He had an entire bag that Harry had magically extended the insides of, just filled with rolls upon rolls of cash. It was very obvious that the Cullen family was incredibly rich based on all of the fancy cars they had, and all of the nice clothes they wore, and the fact that none of them looked in any way like they knew what poverty would be like, but it was another thing to have it so blatantly obvious.
Edward flawlessly wrote down the number that he had and what he wanted it converted from and then too, and he signed his name and then Harry signed his own name, and then the goblin behind the long desk proceeded to magically count out all of that money right then and there just to be absolutely sure that it was the amount that Edward claimed it was.
It came out to ten thousand dollars. Edward Cullin just randomly dropped $10,000 in cash, to be converted into magical money, so that he could go around buying whatever the hell he wanted in Diagon Alley.
And the funny thing about it was that Harry was not in any way shocked at that. Despite the way he grew up and how he was treated his whole life, Harry actually was very rich now, he was used to having money, so such numbers did not faze him anymore.
Bella wondered at exactly what level of wealth did one have to be at for the numbers to no longer matter. Harry had admitted that his combined wealth made him one of the richest people in the Magical World. Not just because of his father's family or his godfather's family, but also because of so many people who had no heirs of their own, leaving him everything they had as gratitude for defeating the evil dark lord. People were actually leaving a one-year-old everything in their wills, all because they were grateful that he had supposedly saved the world.
So, there was a lot in Harry's name that was technically just given to him out of gratitude. He was actually using a majority of the money for good purposes such as a magical orphanage that was being set up in hopes that magical children would not have to be shipped off to their non-magical family members that they'd never met before should something happen to their parents. And even non-human children potentially suffering something because their non-human parent(s) got screwed over by the law.
It just seemed like Harry and his entire generation of friends and fellows ended up being the group of people that wanted to enact justice. And it just so happened that Harry had the money and the fame necessary to be able to back a lot of those plans up. It would be a lot harder for all of them if Harry was not so famous or not that rich, but because Harry had essentially saved the Magical World from the same tyrant multiple times, people felt indebted to him. They also ended up putting so much of their faith in him when he wasn't even old enough to have the experience necessary to honor that faith in the proper way, that there was no real point in doubting him now.
Like, he was right about not being able to get positions in the government that were, you know, really important off the bat. No matter how famous and how much of a hero he was, it was common sense for grown people to not put literal children in the government. Nor would it be smart to put them in high positions of power in said government when they hadn't proved themselves capable of handling the judicial side of magic. They hadn't even graduated yet!
Just because everyone dealt with the Magical World and their particular community, and all of their experiences within said community, did not mean that every single member of the Magical World had experienced fighting evil people and dueling them down and having to save the world.
Harry could probably be what the magical people called an Auror. Harry had enough experience with defensive magic and offensive magic, and magic that was neither defensive or offensive but because he was creative enough, he was able to make them dangerous. In a way, he could totally be the magical equivalent of a cop or an investigator because he had a lot of experience with things like that.
But Harry did not do well in his history class, so he was already behind on the knowledge required to be able to enter such a profession. And unfortunately, there were many other classes that were required before one could even have an entry level job at the British Ministry of Magic, and Harry did not take those classes at Hogwarts because he did not think that they would be interesting. This was why Hermione, who did take every single class offered, was the best option for this kind of thing.
Each and every person knew their part and knew how to play it well.
It was impressive, but she just wished time could go by a little faster so things could be fixed sooner rather than later.
When they finally left the bank, Bella could already feel that her head, which was filled with so much new information, was going to need an entire day of rest just to be able to process everything that had happened today. And they hadn't even gotten started. They still had a bookstore to go to, and then she had the ice cream place with all of the hundreds of different ice cream flavors she wanted to sample, and then she even wanted to go and check out the clothes. Yes, Bella Swan wanted to look at magical clothes and she wanted to ask questions about how they were made and what was done to them to preserve them.
She was very excited, but she could also feel a headache coming on.
She'd probably end up napping the moment they got bakc to Grimmauld Place.
It was obvious that Bella was trying very hard not to let her excitement be too much but neither Harry nor Edward minded all that much. It was nice to see her excited about something, especially if it was something she had only recently become aware of. Harry had recently learned of things called reaction channels on the YouTube, and how famous they were, and how people liked to watch other people react to the things that they liked.
And Harry could say that he understood very well why all of those people would do that and dedicate so much of their time watching complete strangers reacting to things of all sorts. He wanted to show Bella and Edward around his first ever home and teach them about magic as he had experienced it and as he knew it, and it made things feel all the more surreal.
So yes, they immediately headed to Flourish and Blotts first because Bella probably wanted to buy the entire shop and who was Harry to deny her?
The moment they stepped in, she gasped very audibly and proceeded to head directly to the left toward where all the books about the government of Magical Britain were. He wouldn't say that he wasn't surprised but considering that the next aisle over had to do with Potions and she had been just as interested in them as she was in magical law, it was a close enough thing.
Bella started flicking through the first book she grabbed, which had to do with the founding of the Ministry of Magic way back in the seventeenth or eighteenth century. Actually... it had been a while since he'd attended Hogwarts, and he might not have committed that particular bit of information to memory during History of Magic. Or Professor Binns might not have ever actually gotten to teach them anything about that because he was so obsessed with the goblin wars. There were a lot of thing students didn't know about history because it was always limited to European history, and always boiled down to goblin conflicts.
In fact, anybody but Hermione knowing anything about the history of their community wasn't really surprising. He would like to think that in general it just wasn't his fault that his schoolteacher was not good at his job. So, if Harry got basic history facts wrong, it was Binns who deserved the blame.
In fact, he was going to raise his concerns to McGonagall once again about kicking Binns out and exorcising him at the very least because he was being very annoying. Or Harry could just take the initiative and force Binns to move on himself. It wasn't as if he didn't have the power to do it and, no offense intended, but he honestly did not care about Professor Binns. Not one bit of emotional attachment to him. He had no fucks to give as the Americans would say.
When he looked around, Harry could see that Edward had managed to gravitate toward the section about household magic. The kind of spells Mrs. Weasley may have been using when they had visited for example. There were so many household spells to make life easier that he was certain she probably had a dozen or so going at the same time.
As Bella was going around grabbing books, Harry was following behind her, grabbing copies to add to the magically floating basket at his side. He probably wouldn't have to do the same for Edward since Edward had perfect recall and could read much faster than they could. In fact, Edward was already halfway through a book that he just grabbed. The chances of him asking for the book would be incredibly low, though Harry had no problem with buying it for him if he really wanted it.
The thing was, Harry didn't really have to offer to buy Edward anything because Edward had decided to bring like ten thousand US dollars with him to use on his own desires. He was pretty sure that Edward had been given a mission to acquire certain bits of information for Carlisle's personal library. If he ever got anything, it probably wouldn't be for himself personally unless it was something like music.
While Edward and Bella were busy, Harry took a moment to go over to the Potions section and acquire a few new books for himself to practice with. He'd recently taken up improving his potions skills, and he knew that Bella really liked watching him brew potions, so he decided that it wouldn't hurt to learn a few more things in regard to Potions.
If only Snape was around to see him now. The man would probably have a fit if he knew the Harry Potter was actually taking Potions seriously for once, and that he was actually doing really well in it. If he ignored the whole year where he was using Snape's personal notebook and potentially crushing on the Half-Blood Prince - he couldn't even confirm nor deny that bit, and he didn't really want to either(there may have been emotions of a sort back in his Sixth Year) - then him improving through his own efforts would have the man spitting like a kettle no doubt.
It was still funny to think about in a way. Hermione never let him live the facts down though.
Eventually, after an hour of standing around, Bella had gotten hungry and decided that she absolutely had to eat and then have ice cream right afterward. Edward had managed to clear out several shelves of books and filled the bag that Harry had charmed for him. As much as he could with a low-powered Undetectable Extension Charm though. It was not an infinite one like the kind that Hermione often tended to use. It was more of a simple kind of enchantment, because Harry wasn't that good at such charms and did not want to risk ruining the bag by accidentally overpowering the spell.
Being the Master of Death was still a bit new to him and the access to so much power was still a bit overwhelming.
So, they paid for all of their books, and Harry decided to let Bella choose the place they would go to for lunch. He was not surprised that she had wanted to choose The Leaky Cauldron. Something about the atmosphere being the most magical when they'd passed through earlier.
Besides, there would be other days to try out other places in Diagon Alley.
There was a wizard in the one corner of The Leaky Cauldron, who, according to Edward, was reading a book by Stephen King who was a muggle writer. The next thing that tickled Bella was how the dining floor of the inn was basically cleaning itself. Seeing witches and Wizards magically stirring their coffee, seeing tables and chairs moving aside on their own and doing different things without prompting, and even seeing the entire bar area just filled with different glasses and bottles of alcohol all moving by themselves to pour drinks for people.
There was just something incredibly magical and sort of homey about The Leaky Cauldron.
Once they were done there, in which Bella had eaten Dragon Bites - which had not been made of dragons at all, they were just pieces of chicken shaped like Dragons - they decided to head to Florean Fortescue's for his millions of ice cream flavours. Harry had requested what was considered a sample platter for taste-testing. Bella was given a very large silver platter full of small cups, each filled with a mini scoop of a different kind of ice cream.
It cost ten galleons.
Now, prior to leaving for his Third Year at Hogwarts, Harry had spent the remainder of his summer holiday in Diagon Alley. That had been the perfect opportunity for him to test out all of the ice cream flavours without anybody breathing down his neck about how much money he was wasting. And he may have spent a day or two eating only ice cream and nothing else, and nobody could tell him not to. It had been a wonderful time, and he got to learn very quickly which kinds of ice cream he liked and which kinds he did not.
Like, Harry wouldn't exactly say that lychee-flavored ice cream was bad, but it wasn't exactly something that he would gravitate toward ever again. He, in fact, preferred the jujube ice cream way more.
Also, there were actual ice creams that were made with hot peppers, and despite being freezing cold, they burned the tongue. The burn could not be alleviated by the cold of the ice cream or the fat level of the milk it was made with. The hottest ice cream on Fortescue's menu had to do with something called Dragon's Breath hot peppers, and the only way to quell the burning of the Dragon's Breath hot pepper ice cream, was to actually eat Blood Pops made of Dragon's Blood. And the Blood Pops were provided with each purchase of said ice cream just to make sure that nobody was unnecessarily harming themselves.
Florean Fortescue had done many things, but he could probably say that he and his business had never sent anybody to Saint Mungo's before.
Also, much like with Ogden's Finest Firewhiskey, Dragon's Breath ice cream actually made you spit out a little ball of fire with each bite. It made it a little bit more interesting that way.
Thankfully, for today, none of the ice creams on the platter that Bella had been served were Dragon's Breath. That could be another surprise waiting for her on another day that they decided to come out to Diagon Alley, and boy, was he very excited for that.
To make things more interesting, there was also a challenge posted up on the board behind the ice cream bar.
Basically, someone would have to eat thirty-nine servings of Dragon's Breath ice cream and in turn they would win a hundred galleons. A single serving of ice cream was two scoops, and it cost one sickle. To take part in the challenge, you would not be charged for any of the ice cream you ate until you managed to win. You would only have to pay for the ice cream if you lost, and the person who set the record presently was actually Ron.
Ron had gone in and eaten thirty-eight servings of Dragon's Breath ice cream without having a single Blood Pop. As such, in order to beat him the next person would have to eat thirty-nine servings without a Blood Pop. They all had to be consecutively eaten and no breaks could be taken in between. Sometimes, Harry wanted to take up the challenge just to see if he could do it, but then he would remember that his stomach was not that big, and he knew that he probably wouldn't make it through five servings.
His flesh was weak.
When Bella was finally incapable of eating any more ice cream, Harry finished off all the ones that he liked personally and then they set off again to explore. It was only just past lunchtime, and they had an entire day ahead of them, so there was no reason to drag their feet. Bella was so stuffed though, that Edward was actually giving her a piggyback ride.
And she had been so full that she didn't even argue with him when he made the offer. She was simply too adorable for words.
So, after Gringotts, Flourish and Blotts, The Leaky Cauldron, and Florean Fortescue's, they finally came to a place known as Twilfitt and Tattings. Harry would have gladly taken them to Madame Malkin's but she was closed for the day so they unfortunately couldn't go in there.
Now, he had been in this particular shop before, but he never had been particularly interested in what they considered to be top of the line fashion for magical humanoids.
However, maybe it was just better for Bella to get this kind of experience under her belt since the people who worked at such a high-end place, would have better answers for her than Harry could ever manage to.
Edward Cullen looked around, and wondered what exactly his life had come to, in just the past few weeks alone, that he found himself seated in the first drawing room of a London townhouse alongside his girlfriend and his boyfriend. So much had changed in so little time, and he found himself marveling over the fact that his world had expanded so much so quickly.
In his hands, was a book about the convenience of household charms, and how they could double as deadly weapons. Spells that summoned bubbles and soap to clean with could be used to choke somebody to death or poison them. Spells that were meant to help trim hair or things like fabric, could be used to behead a person if powered enough. All of these things were listed in a sort of matter-of-fact tone. And there was a mildly unnerving reality behind the knowledge that at some point in time, someone had thought to use these simple and helpful spells for nefarious purposes.
He was sitting in a magical house filled with giant portraits of people who all moved around and had things to say whether you invited their opinion or not. There was a little creature called a House Elf, who looked after the maintenance of the entire house all by himself. And Kreacher the House Elf did not like it when Bella or Edward offered to help clean or put things away. He wanted to do that all by himself, and he did not want people getting in the way of that.
Harry had long since explained what the deal was behind that, and how Kreacher had been in this house his entire life and it was all he had despite how he had formed relationships with other creatures like him at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Kreacher didn't feel comfortable anywhere but in the House of his former Masters. In particular, the last two he genuinely looked up to were actually nice to him. As he and Harry were all that were left of that family, in a sense, he just didn't feel like it was right to abandon the house, and therefore he chose to stay.
It all sounded incredibly depressing, and Edward didn't like to dwell on it too much.
The townhouse had two libraries, and the second one was much more difficult to reach than the first one. Only those of a relation to the family in question, could actually enter that particular room, but it did not mean that Harry could not take any of the books out of there and bring them to Edward. Harry could only give Edward some of the books because a majority of them were cursed to not be handled by people who weren't a member of the House of Black. Not even by marriage would it be allowed.
There was a very specific reason why Harry had not given any of those books to Bella, because prior to coming into Harry's ownership, the House had been built specifically to be against non-magical people.
Just as short as five years ago, this house probably would have tried to kill Bella had she stepped foot inside. Harry had employed the efforts of his friend Bill Weasley, to thoroughly dismantle all of the curses and hexes and jinxes that covered every scale inch of the building, to make it less of a house and more of a home. Edward could not believe that a family had chosen to raise their children in such a house for generations. It had been incredibly unsafe to reside in for humans.
Bella was sleeping on one of the many sofas in the room. Harry was seated in an armchair off to the side in front of the fireplace which had been lit for hours. Edward was going back and forth between three different books and combating his desire to play the grand piano over not wanting to wake Bella up.
He wondered if Alice was getting Visions of their experiences. He wondered what his family would think if they were in his shoes and were experiencing all of the things that he had. It had only been four days and already he had seen and learned and heard of so many things. Even about his own past that he'd long since forgotten.
Being able to read the mind of another non-human being, who wasn't a shapeshifter or fellow vampire was a novel experience.
The goblins at Gringotts Bank had very specific ways of thinking. He had been rather offended on Harry's behalf, by how frank they had been, but after hearing the thoughts of the goblin - his name and title was Uhgrohk the Usurious - doing their exchanges, he had to come to understand what life was like for them and how they had come to be so brusque and opinionated.
The goblin in question had been absolutely shocked because Bella had considered him a person and had referred to him as Sir, and expressed a very obvious level of disgust over how the goblins were treated. The way she had comported herself in that moment had earned her a decent amount of respect from the goblin in question, and the surrounding goblins who all had an ear out because there was a non-magical person in the building, and they were curious enough to eavesdrop. They had all been influenced as well.
Not enough to where they would ever probably speak up on her behalf or personally do much to help her if there was no benefit to them, but it was just nice for them to know that there was another human who wasn't a total piece of garbage.
The goblins did not have a very favorable opinion of Harry, and Edward couldn't really fault them because apparently Harry had robbed the bank. It was all to save the world from an evil overlord who wanted to control everything and possibly get rid of the entire goblin race as a whole considering his beliefs about races other than humans in general, but it would have been possible for them to have come to a different kind of agreement. Edward couldn't really say that he didn't understand why they were very angry that Harry had broken in and stolen something.
And yes, while they were still angry, they did do business with him because he was incredibly wealthy, and he had paid back the debt for breaking into the bank. So, he settled his debts, and he maintained a level of respect for the Goblin Nation and his usual level of kindness toward non-humans, so it was mostly just ego and wounded pride that kept them bitter about what he did.
Unfortunately, Harry Potter and all the people he chose to keep in his life, ended up being of the decent stock of humans, so to an extent, there was really no point in being extra bitter and angry all the time against people who held no personal vendetta against them. There were actual people, currently in positions of power in their government, that wanted to do away with the Goblin Nation as a whole. They could remain annoyed by the presence of Harry Potter and his cohorts, but there were actual people out there that were problems that needed to be faced down.
It was such a novel experience. Edward had been capable of reading minds ever since he woke up in this new existence, and he had been at the forefront of a lot of things going on in the US. He'd been exposed to every kind of mind possible in the past century, and he knew a lot of things about a lot of things he wished he didn't have to.
It was impossible to exist as a mind reader during the Civil Rights Movement, and not come away with an in depth understanding of how messed up injustice and intolerance was.
There was just something particularly disheartening about how living, breathing beings who had perfect sentience and full consciousness, were still treated as if they weren't considered people because they weren't human. And Edward had to agree with Bella that it was utter shit.
It seemed that even in a fantastical universe such as the worldwide magical community, people were still people and intolerance was still intolerance.
Sometimes, Edward wondered if it was just impossible for people to not be horrible. Was it ever going to be possible that a day in the future would come where people would not be judgmental or intolerant of those different from them? Sometimes, when he looked around, and he truly considered all of the thoughts and opinions of the people that he was forced to be exposed to, Edward found himself falling into a hole of doom, consistently expecting for things to be bad and to never improve.
And he would love to say that he could give humanity the benefit of the doubt, but the fact of the matter was it now wasn't just humans that could think and act for themselves. A living being was not considered a person if they weren't human, but Edward was considered a person despite not being alive. He simply looked human, so did he pass the test or not?
Edward still considered himself to be a person even though he was no longer human. And the people on the reservation down at La Push were still people even though they could turn into superpowered animals occasionally.
Every single race out there had those specific groups that were just terrible. And it seemed like it was going to be impossible to ever be able to coexist peacefully.
With a quiet sigh, so that he didn't wake Bella up or announce to Harry the fact that he was deeply unhappy at the moment, he decided to focus his attention on his books. This was supposed to be a summer vacation of sorts. To learn new things and have new experiences and get to know Harry and where he came from and all of the things that he had learned that helped make him who he was. Spending the entire vacation being depressed about the sad reality of the world, would do him no favors.
After another hour of sitting in silence, Harry finally closed the book he was reading and stood, stretching one way and then the other, making his back pop several times in the process. "I'm going to go start on dinner before Kreacher has the chance to do it first. I remembered that Bella mentioned something about wanting to eat ravioli so I'm going to take the time now to begin preparations. I should be able to have things mostly finished by the time she wakes up."
There was something so inherently romantic about Harry. The fact was he just listened to people. What they said and what they did and what they didn't even say too. He committed everything that he took into his memory because he considered all of it to be something important. Bella had made the comment about ravioli a week before they had even left America. Yet not only had Harry remembered, but he had actually made certain that he had everything he would need on hand so that he could make them by hand. It was little things like that that proved the sincerity of Harry's actions.
It reminded Edward a lot of how Carlisle and Esme didn't necessarily need to say a lot of things out loud to simply understand each other. After being together this long, Carlisle still found ways to surprise his wife and Esme always knew what she had to say or do in order to make him smile.
Edward had used to watch his parents and the way they behaved with a sort of envy. Because he got a front row seat to their thoughts and their feelings about each other, he could understand in theory what it was like to be in love. The problem was that he had never been in love in practice, and he didn't really know what it was like to be in love with somebody, nor was he familiar with the desire to make them happy whether that resulted in a benefit for you or not.
And while he couldn't directly say it was romantic love that he was feeling right now, thanks to his lack of any experience in the area, there was something about being with Bella and Harry at the same time that made him feel lighter. When they were happy, so was Edward. It made him feel less selfish in a way, to want to put their needs and happiness above his own.
And it was especially touching because despite all of his efforts to keep them happy and thriving, it wasn't as if they let him do it alone. This was very much the kind of relationship where all three of them were definitely involved and it wasn't just one person making sacrifices for the other. Harry or Bella would ever allow something like that to happen, and it was very clear that they were a lot better at this kind of thing than Edward was.
The proof was literally in how despite his best efforts, at the beginning of this whole interaction between them, Harry had felt left out. It was proof that Edward was not the best at this kind of thing, and that he had much to learn and to improve upon. Neither of them decided to hold it against him, which was very nice of them, otherwise embarrassment would dog his steps for decades as a result.
Edward looked over and watched as the shadows of the flames in the fireplace made little shapes on the paleness of Bella's turned cheek. Based upon the sound of her heart and the steadiness of her breath, this had to be one of the most peaceful sleeps that he had heard her have since meeting her. It was nice to know that she felt so relaxed in their company that she could just be herself and allow herself to wind down, and trusted that they would keep her safe and that everything would be okay.
There was just something incredibly touching about it. Maybe Edward was just being overly emotional since this was his first time ever experiencing these kinds of things, but it felt important. It felt like something worth taking note of and worth remembering.
Edward had been someone that people relied on for almost a century. Upon understanding that he was exposed to the thoughts of everyone around him, he became something like a sentinel for his family, warning them of what was to come if Alice somehow didn't have a Vision about it first.
His family trusted him to keep watch and to help keep their unit safe, but it was very different between familial connections and romantic ones. In romance it was more or a two-way street, and it was a very sacred and delicate thing. Edward was sort of like a bodyguard for his family, but when it came to Harry and Bella, there was a lot more to the trust between them than that.
It meant that this was something that he shouldn't take for granted and, because of his status, he couldn't afford to make any mistakes. At home, there were half a dozen other vampires there to make up for his failures, but in a romantic partnership, things were more fragile. And, as he was technically the top of the food chain among their little triumvirate, he needed to be even more careful compared to the other two.
If Alice had told him mere months ago that his life would be taking such a drastic turn for the better, he would have struggled to believe her even with her ability to See the future. Now though, he was incredibly grateful for how things seemed to be turning out. He hoped that things could continue on as they were and that things could stay this nice for as long as possible.
Perhaps, after so long, Edward was finally meant to be happy.
A/N: Another is done!
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