Severus didn't know what to think. He'd gone to the Potters' residence expecting to see two spoiled brats acting just like their father, but...
The child who opened the door looked so much like Lily, he could only stare. And then Petunia came down the hall. And then he was sitting in a spotlessly clean living room, watching as the Potter twins — James' children — placated Petunia's husband with honeyed words and wide, innocent eyes.
He almost thought they'd make good Slytherins.
He reached the end of the street and turn to see the twins right behind him. The boy held up his list.
"Sir, can we buy all of this in London?" he asked. "We don't have any money to buy supplies, either, is there some sort of scholarship?"
"Do you think your parents didn't leave you anything, Mr. Potter?" Severus asked. The children frowned. He sighed. "Your parents left you both quite a large inheritance. That is why we shall visit the bank first." He drew his wand and held it out in front of him. "We're going to Diagon Alley, which is part of magical London. I can't safely side-along apparate both of you at once, so we'll be taking the Knight Bus. Stand away from the curb."
The twins backed away from the curb as there was a loud bang and a bright purple bus hurtled to a stop in front of them. Severus sighed in distaste. He hated taking the Knight Bus.
Stan Shunpike stuck his head out the door. "Welcome to the Knight Bus, transport for the stranded witch or wizard," he rattled off. "My name is Stan Shunpike, I will be your conductor for today."
"Three to the Leaky Cauldron," Severus said, trying to keep his distaste out of his voice.
"'at's eleven sickles per person," Stan said. Severus handed over two Galleons and pushed past Stan, the kids following behind him.
The Knight Bus was full of old, mismatched leather seats and several lopsided tea tables. Severus led the twins past a wizard wearing a shabby black cloak, another muttering to themselves about dragon eggs and back to three chairs surrounding a table. As soon as they were seated, the Bus took off with a bang. The three of them were pushed back into their seats as the Knight Bus rattled and jumped along at nauseating speeds and finally screeched to a stop outside the Leaky Cauldron. Severus led the twins off, ignoring anything Shunpike tried to say. Another loud bang and the bus was gone, and the three of them stood in front of a rundown looking pub.
Elowen looked pale and her brother no better. "Is all magical travel like that?"
Severus' lip curled. "No, the Knight Bus is... unique."
Harry shook his head. "I don't think I like it very much."
"A sign of good taste, I assure you." Severus held open the door for the twins to enter. "Stay with me and don't talk to anyone."
The Leaky Cauldron was packed full of wixen. Severus sighed internally, it was going to be that much harder to get the twins through unnoticed. He ushered them through the pub, past the counter and towards the alleyway. They almost made it through.
"'Ello there, Professor!" Tom said cheerily. "Escorting a couple muggleborns, are ya?" Harry lifted his head before Severus could answer, his fringe shifting back. Tom's eyes widened. "Great Merlin. Is that—?" His eyes shifted to Elowen. "Bless my soul. The Potter Twins."
Tom moved to come around the counter and Severus glared. Some people had no sense. "If it's all the same to you, Tom, I'd rather not call attention to who I have with me?"
Tom stopped and nodded, looking a bit embarrassed. "Of course, of course. Sorry 'bout that, Professor. Go on through."
Severus pushed the twins through the back door and drew his wand. He noted the twins looking wide eyed as he opened the alleyway and smirked to himself. "Welcome to Diagon Alley."
~~~
The brick wall in front of them folded into itself to form an archway and Elowen's jaw dropped. Bright, colorful and seemingly thrumming with energy. Diagon Alley was crowded with other people wearing clothes like Professor Snape's, in all sorts of colors. Elowen could see people in jeans and T-shirts wandering around too.
She didn't know where to look first. There was a group of kids around her and Harry's age crowding around a shop window displaying a broom unlike any she'd seen before. "...Nimbus Two Thousand, the fastest broom ever..." she heard as they passed. A glint of metal caught her eye and she looked to see a stack of cauldrons outside another store. The sign above them said Cauldrons – All Sizes – Copper, Brass, Pewter, Silver – Self-Stirring – Collapsible. Elowen could see her wonder reflected on her twin's face as they both tried to look at everything at once: the shops, the things outside them, the people doing their shopping. A woman outside an apothecary's was shaking her head as they passed, saying, "Dragon liver, sixteen Sickles an ounce, they're mad..."
There were shops selling robes, shops selling telescopes and strange silver instruments Elowen had never seen before, windows stacked with barrels of bat spleens and eels' eyes, tottering piles of spell books, quills and rolls of parchment, potion bottles, globes of the moon...
"Keep up," Snape called to them as they trailed several steps behind him. They were approaching a bright white building, trimmed with gold. The lettering on the front declared it to be Gringotts.
"Is that the bank, sir?" Elowen asked. Snape nodded. Harry nudged her arm and nodded to the short creature guarding the doors. The creature was almost two feet shorter than the twins, with a sharp face and pointed beard. His very long fingers wrapped around the door handle and pulled open the door. Elowen looked up at Snape. "And who's that guarding the door?"
"That would be a goblin," Snape said as they passed. "They run the bank."
The goblin bowed as they passed him to go inside. On the next set of doors, there were words engraved:
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.
"Stealing from the goblins is a fool's errand," Snape lectured them. The twins nodded as a pair of goblin guards waved them through into the bank proper. Almost a hundred more goblins, bank tellers this time, were sitting behind a long counter, writing in ledgers, weighing coins, examining gems. Several doors led out of the hall, and people were being escorted in and out of them. Snape walked up to a teller.
"Greetings, master goblin, may your gold ever flow," Snape greeted.
The goblin didn't look up. "State your business."
"We need to make a withdrawal from the Potter accounts." At that, the goblin did look up. Snape continued speaking, looking a bit irritated at what he was saying. "And they don't know who has their keys, so we'll need a blood identification and new keys issued for all vaults."
"A fee of two Galleons per key will be taken from the main vault for the cost of reissuing keys and deactivating the current keys." The goblin held out a silver knife and a parchment. "Three drops of blood on the parchment from each of you."
Elowen looked up at Snape and at his nod, sliced the tip of her finger open just a bit. Harry did the same. As the blood hit the paper, it spiderwebbed across the page and formed words in blood red ink. Elowen leaned over to read them. Elowen Euphemia Potter, Heiress Black and Henry James Potter, Heir Potter was written elegantly across the top, followed by several numbers. Elowen looked up at Harry, seeing her confusion matched, and then at Professor Snape.
"Sir, why does it call Harry Henry?" she asked as the goblin took the parchment back and shuffled away.
"That is his name," Snape replied, eyebrow raised. "Don't tell me you forgot your own twin's name."
"No, sir," Harry said haltingly. "We didn't know that was my name. And we didn't know we had middle names either."
Snape's eyes widened just a bit, then he scowled. "Your aunt didn't tell you."
"Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon didn't even tell us we were magic, sir," Harry scowled. "Why would they bother telling us our names?"
Elowen stopped him. "Actually, Harry, they might not have even known." At her twin's narrow-eyed look, she sighed. "Aunt Petunia never wasted an opportunity to complain about how our mum gave you such a common name. You think she'd have told us you were Harry if she knew you were actually Henry?"
"You're right," Harry sighed. He looked up at Snape, who was looking more and more annoyed. "Do you know why they don't know, sir?"
"I have my theories," Snape replied. He shook his head. "Your parents named you Henry after someone in your father's family. All the birth announcements and records listed you as Henry. Harry was meant to be for close friends and family only. Unfortunately, someone," he sneered the word, "has let the entire wixen world think your name is Harry. It will be something of a fight to get people to refer to you as Henry if that's what you want."
Harry nodded firmly. "Then I'll just have to correct everyone."
The goblin came back and dropped four keys onto the counter. Two were fairly large and silver, with different crests pressed into the top. One said Black and the other Potter. The other two were small and gold with one of each crest.
"These are your new keys." He pointed to each key as he spoke. "As both the Black and Potter family heads are unavailable, you have the responsibility of keeping the main vault keys safe. You cannot take anything from these vaults except the Heir ring until you take the Lordship." He handed the Potter key to Harry and the Black key to Elowen, and waved at the gold keys. "These are your trust vaults. One for each Heir. They each have a set amount that gets refilled on your birthday every year." He looked between them. "Would you like to take your Heir rings today?"
A silent conversation of looks between the twins and then they both nodded. The goblin nodded and pushed two small black boxes forward. "I thought as much."
The boxes opened to reveal two silver signet rings. Harry picked his up, examining it. A raven sat atop a shield with an H in the center. A stag reared up on either side of the shield. This was the Potter family crest. Harry slipped the ring over his pinky finger, and with a rush of warmth, the ring resized to fit perfectly.
Harry looked over to Elowen. Her ring bore the Black family crest: a shield with three stars under a hand gripping a wand. A dog on its hind legs was bracing on both sides of the shield, and a knight's helmet sat atop it. An H sat between the stars and wand. She placed the ring on her right hand pinky and Harry watched as it glowed and resized.
The goblin teller nodded. "These rings have bonddd to you now. You'll be able to summon them to your hand, and while worn, they will protect you from most mind magics and warn you of poisons." He waved another goblin forward. "If you'll follow Griphook here, he'll take you down to your vaults."
"Thank you, master goblin," Elowen said. She looked back at Snape, who had not moved. "Are you coming, sir?"
"No. I will wait here for you to return."
Shrugging, Elowen followed her twin after the goblin.
~~~
Griphook held a wooden door open for the twins to pass through. Harry, who had expected more marble, was surprised. They were in a narrow stone passageway lit with flaming torches. It sloped steeply downwards and there were little railway tracks on the floor. Griphook whistled and a small cart came hurtling up the tracks towards them. They climbed in, Griphook pushed a lever down, and they shot off.
At first they just hurtled through a maze of twisting passages. Harry tried to remember — left, right, right, left, middle fork, right, left, but it was impossible. The rattling cart seemed to know its own way, because Griphook wasn't steering.
Harry's eyes stung as the cold air rushed past them, but he kept them wide open. Once, he thought he saw a burst of fire at the end of a passage and twisted around to see if it was a dragon, but too late – they plunged even deeper, passing an underground lake where huge stalactites and stalagmites grew from the ceiling and floor. He turned to Elowen.
"I can never remember," he said loudly over the wind. "What's the difference between stalactite and stalagmite?"
Elowen shrugged. "One grows from the ground and the other from the ceiling?"
"But which is which?"
"I don't know, Harry, we can ask Professor Snape when we get back."
"Vault 687, Potter Heir Vault," Griphook announced, and the cart screeched to a halt in front of a large round door. He held out a hand. "Key, please."
Harry handed over the gold key he'd been given and Griphook unlocked the door. It swung open to reveal heaping piles of gold and silver coins, towers of little bronze coins, piles of books.
"Uncle Vernon can never know about this," Elowen breathed next to him. Harry nodded dumbly. His sister frowned and turned to the goblin. "Is there anything for us to put the coins in? How much are the coins worth?"
Griphook snapped and two leather pouches appeared in his hand. "Weightless and expansion charms on them, for your convenience. You can have these linked to your accounts and automatically refill, for an added fee, of course."
The twins exchanged looks and Harry shook his head. "Maybe later, sir."
"The gold coins are Galleons. There are seventeen silver Sickles to a Galleon, twenty nine bronze Knuts to a Sickle," Griphook added.
Harry looked around, deciding to come back to look at the books later. He took a pouch from Griphook, crouched down, and swept several piles of golden galleons into it. After a moment of hesitation, he did the same with the sickles and knuts, before tying the pouch closed and standing.
"Let's go see your vault, El," he said. They went back out to the cart and hurtled along deeper underground.
"Vault 567, Black Heir Vault," Griphook announced. The twins hopped out. "Key, please."
The Black Heir vault was much the same as the Potter one, piles of coins and books lining the walls. The same process commenced, then Elowen reached up and took several books off the wall and shoved them in the pouch as well.
"I'm ready to go back now," she said as she turned around and walked back to the cart.
"What are the books for?" Harry asked as they sped back up to the bank.
"Culture and etiquette books," Elowen shouted back. "We can't go off to school not knowing."
"Smart." Harry hadn't even thought of that, but now that El had said it, he was glad for his sister's idea. How embarrassing it would be to offend anyone because he hadn't bothered to learn about the world he was now part of.
Snape led them back out into the sunlit Alley and down the street.
"Where to first, sir?" El asked excitedly. "Can we get wands?"
Snape thought for a moment, nodded. "That is acceptable, yes. We'll get your wands, and then your trunks."
The twins followed him down the street to a narrow and shabby shop. Peeling gold letters over the door read Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 BC. A single wand lay on a faded purple cushion in the dusty window.
A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as they stepped inside. It was a tiny place, empty except for a single spindly chair which Snape sat down on to wait. Harry felt strangely as though he had entered a very strict library; he swallowed a lot of new questions which had just occurred to him and looked instead at the thousands of narrow boxes piled neatly right up to the ceiling. For some reason, the back of his neck prickled, and he stepped closer to his sister. The very dust and silence in here seemed to tingle with some secret magic.
"Good afternoon," said a soft voice. Harry jumped and grabbed El's hand. An old man was standing before them, his wide, pale eyes shining like moons through the gloom of the shop.
"Hello," Harry said awkwardly. Elowen mumbled a hi.
"Ah yes," said the man. "Yes, yes. I thought I'd be seeing the two of you soon. Harry and Elowen Potter." It wasn't a question. "You both have your mother's eyes. It seems only yesterday she was in here herself, buying her first wand. Ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow. Nice wand for charm work."Mr Ollivander moved closer to the twins. Harry wished he would blink. Those silvery eyes were a bit creepy. "Your father, on the other hand, favoured a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable. A little more power and excellent for transfiguration. Well, I say your father favoured it – it's really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course." Ollivander moved even closer and Harry resisted the urge to step away. "And that's where..."
Ollivander raised a hand and pressed one pale finger first to Harry's scar, then to Elowen's. "I'm sorry to say I sold the wand that did this," he said softly. "Thirteen and a half inches. Yew. Powerful wand, very powerful, and in the wrong hands... Well, if I'd known what that wand was going out into the world to do..."
He shook his head and then, to Harry's relief, spotted Professor Snape.
"Ah, Professor Snape!" he exclaimed happily. "Wonderful to see you! Walnut, 11 inches, fairly flexible, yes?"
"That is correct," Snape drawled.
"And it continues to serve you well?"
Snape nodded sharply.
"Very good," Ollivander said. He turned to Harry. "Let's start with you, then, Mr. Potter." He pulled a long tape measure with silver markings out of his pocket. "Which is your wand arm?"
"Er, well, I'm right-handed," said Harry as Elowen stepped back to stand next to Snape.
"Hold out your arm. That's it."He measured Harry from shoulder to finger, then wrist to elbow, shoulder to floor, knee to armpit and round his head. As he measured, he said, "Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Mr. Potter. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons or phoenixes are quite the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another wizard's wand."
Harry suddenly realised that the tape measure, which was measuring between his nostrils, was doing this on its own. Mr Ollivander was flitting around the shelves, taking down boxes.
"That will do," he said, and the tape measure crumpled into a heap on the floor. "Right then, Mr Potter. Try this one. Beechwood and dragon heartstring. Nine inches. Nice and flexible. Just take it and give it a wave."
Harry took the wand and (feeling foolish) waved it around a bit, but Mr Ollivander snatched it out of his hand almost at once.
"Maple and phoenix feather. Seven inches. Quite whippy. Try —"
Harry tried – but he had hardly raised the wand when it, too, was snatched back by Mr Ollivander.
"No, no – here, ebony and unicorn hair, eight and a half inches, springy. Go on, go on, try it out."
Harry tried. And tried. He had no idea what Mr Ollivander was waiting for. The pile of tried wands was mounting higher and higher on the spindly chair, but the more wands Mr Ollivander pulled from the shelves, the happier he seemed to become.
"Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we'll find the perfect match here somewhere – I wonder, now – yes, why not – unusual combination – holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."
Harry took the wand. He felt a sudden warmth in his fingers. He raised the wand above his head, brought it swishing down through the dusty air and a stream of red and gold sparks shot from the end like a firework, throwing dancing spots of light on to the walls.
"Oh, bravo! Yes, indeed, oh, very good," Mr. Ollivander cried. He waved Elowen forward. "Now for Ms. Potter."
Harry and Elowen swapped places and El held out her right arm.
"I'm right-handed too, sir," she announced. Mr. Ollivander's tape measure began measuring her as he moved back off into his shelves. He came back quickly.
"Try this one," he handed her a deep brown wand, "chestnut and unicorn hair, ten inches, quite brittle."
Elowen took the wand and waved it in a circle. A cloud of green smoke smelling like rotten eggs burst from the end. Ollivander snatched the wand back and Snape, nose wrinkled, waved his own wand, sending a rush of sweet smelling air through the shop.
"Thank you, Professor," Ollivander said as he pulled another wand. "Cherry and phoenix feather, 11 inches, very bendy."
The wand was a pretty deep red, and was taken from Elowen's hand almost as soon as she touched it.
"No, no," Ollivander shook his head, grinning. He grabbed a white wand and handed it over. "Yew and dragon heartstring, 12 inches, moderately flexible."
There was a crash as Elowen waved the wand, and she turned to see the window broken. She winced. "Sorry."
Ollivander waved it away. He pulled several more wands, none of them a match, before he went into the back of the store and brought out a silvery white wand. "Aspen and phoenix feather, 11 and a half inches, moderately flexible."
Elowen took the wand, a cool rush of power running over her like water. She waved the wand, and much like her twin, red and gold sparks flew from the end.
"Very good!" Ollivander clapped. "Well, well, well... how curious... how very curious..."
He put Elowen's wand back into its box and wrapped it in brown paper along with Harry's, still muttering, "Curious... curious..."
"Sorry," said Harry, "but what's curious?"
Mr Ollivander fixed Harry with his pale stare.
"I remember every wand I've ever sold, Mr. Potter. Every single wand. It so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather is in your wand, gave another feather – two others. One is in your twin's wand. It is very curious indeed that you two should be destined for these wands when their brother – why, their brother gave you those scars."
Harry swallowed as Ollivander handed the wand boxes to them.
"Yes, thirteen and a half inches. Yew. Curious indeed how these things happen. The wand chooses the wizard, remember... I think we must expect great things from you, young Potters. After all, He Who Must Not Be Named did great things – terrible, yes, but great."
"That's quite enough," Snape cut in. He was standing behind the twins now, glaring at Ollivander. "I don't think it's very wise to compare these two to the man who killed their parents, do you?"
Ollivander paused, then shook his head. "No, no, of course you're right, Professor Snape." He smiled at the twins. "Just eleven galleons each then."
"Just a moment," Snape stopped them from paying and walked over to a shelf of wand accessories and kits. He grabbed two wand care kits and two leather arm straps and handed them over. "You should never keep your wand in your pocket, that's how accidents happen. These holsters strap to your forearm and are much safer."
Altogether, the twins paid 26 galleons each, and left the shop. Harry didn't think he liked it in there very much at all, and he was glad to be back out in the sun.
They stopped in a shop full of various trunks and suitcases, where they purchased black trunks of a high quality — Snape said the higher quality trunks would last them longer and hold more. Elowen, when paying for her trunk, saw a list of available charms and got the clerk to make their trunks weightless and able to shrink with a tap of their wands.
The next stop was very quick in a shop of magical devices to pick up telescopes, and then on to Flourish & Blotts, where Snape only allowed them to buy their school books and a few introductory books he said Muggleborn students were assigned. The books were put away in their trunk and they moved on to the apothecary.
The apothecary was dimly lit, every shelf packed with various ingredients. Elowen looked around wide eyed.
"Will we learn to use all of these?" she asked, reaching for a kit labeled first-year.
"Perhaps, if you advance far enough in your potioneering."Snape pushed her hand away from the kit. "Those kits have substandard ingredients. We will pick out your own ingredients." At the twins' skeptical look, he glowered and shoved a shopping basket at Elowen. "I am the Potions Master at Hogwarts. You will be learning from me, and I daresay you will be less dreadful if you have quality ingredients."
"Potions does sound like a fun class," Harry ventured. He had glanced through the book as they shopped for their school list and had been fascinated. "El and I are pretty good cooks, and I, for one, am looking forward to Potions."
Snape stared at him for a moment before whirling around and leading them through the store, bundling various items up in cloth and putting them in the basket. When the basket was full, Snape pulled two sets of potions utensils and two leather boxes from the shelf and placed everything on the counter.
"They will require the dragonhide kit with the stasis charms," he told the clerk, who had gone a bit pale at the sight of him. The clerk nodded quickly and pulled two scaly leathery boxes from the back. Snape quickly and expertly arranged all of the ingredients and utensils in the boxes and hand them to the twins to put in their trunks.
"Forty galleons," the clerk mumbled. Harry counted out the correct amount and pushed it across the counter. Snape swept out of the shop.
"Thank you," he said politely, then followed.
Professor Snape next took them to the cauldron shop. Harry reached for a gold cauldron and was stopped.
"There is no potion that you will be brewing in the next seven years that requires a solid gold cauldron, Potter," Snape sneered. "Your supply list specifically listed pewter for a reason."
Elowen lit up. "Sir, do potions react to the metal they're made in, then?"
Snape nodded. "That is correct, Ms. Potter. Pewter does not hold to magic, therefore it is ideal for most potions, and is safest for schooling."
"That's so cool," Elowen breathed and nudged Harry. "Potions is gonna be the best class, Harry." Harry rather agreed. Two pewter cauldrons, two brass scales, and two sets of crystal vials joined their trunks.
Their final stop of the day was Madam Malkin's, where they were fitted with several black school robes and uniform packages (containing everything a student needs, or so the label proclaimed). The sun hung low in the sky as they left Diagon Alley. The twins, at Snape's look, had placed their wands in their new holsters, trunks shrunken and shoved in their pockets.
Snape summoned the Knight Bus again. One harrowing journey later, he walked them back down Privet Drive and left them at their doorstep. He handed them two train tickets.
"These are your tickets for the school train," he instructed. "It leaves from Kings Cross at 11am on September first, so don't be late. Platform 9 3/4 is through the wall between 9 and 10, you just walk right through. Have you got that?"
"Yes, sir," Harry said. El nodded.
Snape nodded. "Then I will see you at Hogwarts."
He turned sharply and was gone.