The Problem of Harry Potter

Seeing how Pandora and Xenophilius Lovegood were.

Seeing how Mr and Mrs Granger were (apparently, their names were Victor and Jane).

Seeing something he suspected Hermione didn't see, namely how Ms Malabul and Ms DuCharme were.

Seeing in Sirius Black's eyes that he was seeing what Harry saw (Harry was a careful watcher of people). Seeing him look at the couples and glance sideways at Madame Bones.

Harry began - it was just a small thing, stirring inside - to realise a little bit of what Hermione had been getting at.

These couples worked together. They were stronger together. They respected each other, they belonged to each other. They stood together against a world Harry had long ago realised was mostly hostile and unforgiving.

He didn't think the kissing stuff, which he would avoid for several years, he had already determined, would be all that Hermione, being a girl, thought it was cracked up to be. For one thing, he doubted there'd be music in the background like there was on the telly when Petunia was the only one (that counted) in the house and she could watch what she wanted. In real life, you did all that kissy mussing hair stuff and no music and well, there you were. Probably no phantom wind came up to make the girl's hair blow around hypnotically, either.

But he could see how - his first thought was a boy and a girl, but then explain Hermione's teachers - well, anyway, people who liked other people partly because they were boys or were girls, more than as friends - could give a different feeling to a friendship. He and Hermione were at the very beginning of some sort of partnership. And if it ended up like what he'd observed, that was a good thing. Probably.

His attention had wandered, but he snapped to attention when he heard Mr Lovegood say they were "addressing the Problem of Harry Potter."

I'm a problem, now? he thought, resentfully. Unfortunately, that made his mind wander back to Hermione, and he tuned out what the wizard was saying again.

Hermione had been acting somewhat like a mom, or a real aunt. The tea party had made her feel like a fellow sufferer. Harry remembered looking up the word "comrade," and a tearful Hermione admitting she had no friends made her something of a comrade, he thought. A fellow-sufferer kind of friend. Vulnerable is the word my English teacher used. A vulnerable, more ordinary human kind of friend there.

She was also like the White Rabbit (Don't think of rabbits) because she had dragged Harry through the looking glass or down the rabbit hole or something and now he was experiencing six impossible things before breakfast every day.

However, she was also something else, sort of. As they sat, with her hip pressed against his, facing the rest of the crowd, there was a feeling of us two against the world. He found her presence comforting, and she clearly felt the same about him. It was going to be tricky getting from here to there, though.

Anyway, he doubted that Hermione, unlike the Dursleys, would ever consider him a problem. A chore, maybe. An obligation. But never a problem.

Then again, before he got mad, he needed to start tuning in to the discussion. Hermione said working for the Lovegoods was more than fair, and in reality, mostly them doing her favours, and training her. She was more like an apprentice than a flunky, though the two weren't entirely something you could separate.

Mr Dumbledore had promised to train him for free and kind of selectively fog his memory so he could safely help him without his brother - the guy who had dumped Harry on the Dursley's doorstep in November like a bottle of milk - finding out and exerting control over Harry. He got the strong impression that if that happened, it would be all but impossible to help him.

As he gradually tuned in, he could see that Mr Lovegood meant more like an obligation than a problem, and it was the Problem of freeing and protecting Harry, and he'd been unkind. But he had learned not to blame himself for being cautious and untrusting. Now that he knew that magic was real, it was possible all or most of the adults that let him down had been whammied, but he would address that on a case-by-case basis, with evidence.

"I have a few presents for Mr Potter," he suddenly heard Mr Lovegood say. "Someone helping us took a great risk, and a group of us took another, and these are the fruits of our labour."

"Albus Dumbledore relies on my wife's relative to inform him of all the goings-on in his wand shop. For that reason, we had him make a facsimile of this wand elsewhere, at a makeshift wand crafting workshop we set up near where the materials were freshly gathered. Our Dumbledore once injured Gellert Grindlewald badly, and he bled. Mr Dumbledore put a stasis charm on the blood he gathered from the floor of their house in Godric's hollow, and it has been kept in a vial ever since. It was sacrificed to dip freshly plucked thestral hair in. Arcane runes were carved into the wand in a ritual - not a very powerful one, given we couldn't wait for an auspicious day, but a ritual nonetheless. When Albus Dumbledore next holds "his" wand, he will feel Grindelwald's influence, just as he has with the wand I have here. That was because Grindlewald was the last owner of the wand before the Headmaster. The freshly cut Elder wood, the freshly plucked thestral tail hair, the runes, the blood of a powerful wizard, will all combine to make a very powerful wand indeed, for purposes of fighting and attacking, and to a degree defending oneself in combat. However, he will immediately realise it's changed - we weathered our wand exactly like his wand was, so we believe he will think someone has somehow made themselves the master of his wand, which should be impossible. He is still the master of this wand, young Harry," he continued, because the wand had reached Hermione, who handed it gently over to Harry.

"That said, you are the last descendent of the family that made this wand, the Peverell family. As such, you are its owner to a degree. To a precise degree, inasmuch as we wouldn't want you to be its complete owner, or master. That would lead to far more than you can deal with at your tender age, Mr Potter."

By that point, a very mysterious ring had reached Hermione. Before she could hand it to Harry, Mrs Lovegood spoke up. "Don't put it on yet, Harry. And when you do, don't fidget with it, don't play with it, don't, whatever you do, turn it. The family that made this ring isn't yours, Harry, but the heir to it lost his right to it when you and your parents destroyed him, because the dead do not inherit. And he'd already lost his rights, more likely than not, when he exterminated everyone else in the family, his uncles and grandfather included. That sort of betrayal of an old, blueblood, or as they say, a pureblood family has repercussions, and the Gaunts were famously unforgiving. But the stone in that ring was made by your family, the Peverells, so it is yours by right."

Harry jerked his head towards Hermione, which she, correctly, assumed meant she should hold on to it.

Next he noticed a sort of pantomime going on where people were pretending to pass something.

"Can you not focus your eyes, for a little while, Harry?" Mrs Lovegood asked. "For instance, try looking past where people are passing the cloak, and above all relax, don't concentrate on seeing anything. Let it be like in the morning before you find your spectacles."

When Harry took her advice, he noticed a shimmering above the hands passing the invisible object.

By the time it got to Mrs Granger, he could see her hands and lap disappear. Instead of handing it to him, Hermione threw the bit of fabric over him. "Does anyone have a mirror?" she asked, in a firm voice.

Everyone shook their heads, even practical Aberforth Dumbledore didn't have one.

Sirius Black had shook his head, but then he straightened up in his chair. That brought him into contact with Madame Bones, who took no notice of it. He reached into one of his vest pockets, and pulled out a small compact mirror. For some reason, he just stared at it, instead of handing it around or even saying anything.

If Harry weren't such a keen observer, he wouldn't have been able to make out Sirius Black saying in a low voice, "Oh damn it, Prongs, I wish I could just call you and talk - I'd give anything just to hear your voice one more time." Sirius Black was several people over for Harry to be able to overhear what he muttered, but most of those present could see tears welling in his eyes.

"Hold that thought, Pads. It's not time, yet." The room went silent in a very serious, foreboding way. A voice Harry'd never ... wait, was it really never? It sounded somehow familiar - heard before had come out of the ring.

At that, Sirius Black dropped the compact, and Madame Bones deftly snatched it out of the air and passed it around. When Hermione received it, she held it up to Harry, and he saw - the wall behind him!

"It had been altered by sewing inferior demiguise thread with charms to make it no better than Disillusionment and to track the wearer, but that's been removed," Mrs Lovegood said. "I actually had Luna do that, she enjoys close work."

"Mr Black, you should heed your friend's advice, and hold your counsel until it is, in fact, time," Aberforth Dumbledore added. But the expression on his face was very sympathetic, especially for a normally gruff and Stoic old wizard like him.

He didn't even notice, Harry noted, with some sympathy and amusement, but Madame Bones put her hand on Sirius Black's hand as he mouthed the same name he'd mumbled, "Prongs," whoever that was. So there was some good coming Sirius Black's way, whether he realised it or not.

"Harry, you wearing that cloak is fine. My studies tell me that even you wearing the ring will be fine," Mr Lovegood said. "None of us have mastered that wand, and that, for our purposes, is quite a good thing. In all honesty, without you ritually claiming the inheritance of these gifts, you're probably safe, but it's best not to play with fire."

"Some people thought Xeno was after the Hallows for the arcane power, but that was never him, not a bit. He developed strong magic to defend himself on trips, the strong magic wasn't the point, the trips were," Mrs Lovegood added. For some reason, her expression reminded Harry of someone who'd heard a clever joke.

"I have held the Deathly Hallows, and so has my wife. Come to think of it, so has our naughty daughter. We even had to discipline her over that, which we hate to do, and I have studied them. As a Quester, therefore, I am the greatest ever to fill our ranks, sleeping with one eye open to keep the Elder Wand safe and loyal is thin beer in comparison."

"I'm sorry, Mommy and Daddy," little Luna said.

"We are just worried you won't avoid the next dangerous thing we tell you to leave alone, darling," Mrs Lovegood said. Luna nodded her head vigorously, the gesture promising she would, in fact, obey them the next time.

"Somewhat connected to these gifts, Harry," said Aberforth Dumbledore, "when I've muddled the trail in your thoughts sufficiently so that we shan't be discovered, I will take you on a small excursion to the Ministry. I'll be disguised as, and acting in the manner of, my august brother. Where we're going, spells to fool the eyes, and even potions that make your body take on another person's shape, won't work. But I will have a friend tend my bar all day using just such a potion, as an alibi. So, look forward to that. We can acquire something in that fashion that no other means will suffice for."

"I'll explain what I can of this stuff," Hermione whispered to him. Now, that was interesting. All these mysteries, apparently, weren't - to Hermione. Boyfriend talk or not, he decided to push Hermione to tell him more than she wanted to would have the opposite effect to what he would want. She already gave away more than she thought she did, in his estimation.

"Beyond the obvious families - the Malfoys, the Notts, and so on, Miss Granger has given us a list of families whom it would be unsafe to draw attention from that rests on young Mr Potter," Aberforth went on. "To a degree, hiding him out in a magic-hating, Muggle house does keep him out of sight, we should give the devil his due. And in that light, we should not be over-eager to move Harry out from his current accommodations until we have something equally safe, if with a better environment, to offer in their stead."

Harry felt a poke in his side, and realised he should speak. He raised his hand, and Ms DuCharme laughed and said, "Go a'ead, petit 'Arry!"

"I'm trying to think of it as 'home,' and trying not to mind the Dursleys so much. I don't know if it works. I'd still rather be out of it than in it, and Hermione's house is more what I've always thought a home was, what I used to dream about."

"Can we, can someone I mean, somehow measure how good this enchantment is? How strong it is? Whether it's changed?" Hermione spoke up and asked.

"To refresh your memories, Harry and Hermione, what we, by which I mean the Lovegoods and I, and we'd welcome input from Mlles DuCharme and Malabul, and Sirius' perspective as the scion of a family famous for its understanding of rituals, believe is that Lily Evans Potter led the way for herself and her husband to conduct a saving ritual which ended up being powered by their sacrifices. That saving ritual put protections on Harry, meant for him alone. They were so strong that they turned a killing curse into something that destroyed Voldemort. Then, what Albus Dumbledore did was weaken the protection to a small fraction of what it had been, in order to protect a house, yard, and three other people. That one of them had Lily Evans's blood probably had a nearly negligible effect, despite Albus' claims to the contrary, making Harry's suffering there almost entirely pointless Alas, that cannot be undone, but one of our goals should be to work out a new scheme to let Harry grow up protected and have him and the Dursleys part ways, with the Dursleys moving house from Britain altogether. The 'charging' of the enchantment that my brother mentioned does, indeed, go faster when you aren't trying to protect three entirely unrelated people, but it's being charged by and from Mr Potter, not from some sort of ethereal pool of 'blood-relation magic' drawn from thin air. There are no ley lines there, Harry has scarcely ever thought of it as his home, and there has been absolutely no love of any sort between Harry and his relatives or his relative by marriage, which would not count for a blood ritual in any event."

"You're right, as far as I can recall," Sirius Black said. "Pity Grandfather Arcturus, Aunt Cassie, Cousin Alphard, hell, even my brother Regulus aren't around. They were much more involved in that stuff. Thanks to Walburga, I pretty much dismissed all ritual magic, especially as the Blacks would invoke it, as just bad, mad, and I'd be glad never to see it again."

"You are correct," Ms DuCharme said. She'd conferenced with her partner in rapid French, and said woman was nodding in agreement.

"Can I say something that might not be all that helpful?" Hermione asked. Harry stared at her.

Mr Lovegood laughed, and said, "By all means, this shouldn't degenerate into grim, determined looks and stentorious pronouncements."

"I feel really vindicated, right now. When I heard, well, I'd been informed of it, but when I heard it, in particular, all of this Dursley, blood-enchantment, Harry has to stay there to be safe stuff, it wasn't just, oh my goodness, what a dilemma, what bad luck. My feeling was that the whole thing was fishy. I've been keeping track, and practically nothing Headmaster Dumbledore said about Harry being there was true. Only the 'charging' business, and even that was meant to mislead, not inform."

It made Harry feel a lot better that people were taking his situation so seriously. Having to have Mr Aberforth confuse his memories, repeatedly, all the studying Hermione wanted him to do, it was all well worth it. The extent to which this Albus Dumbledore had controlled his fate so far, and the awful way he'd chosen to do so, made avoiding him pressing business.

"Did this come from your sources, or was it more of a feeling you had hearing about this," Aberforth asked.

"Well, maybe mainly my sources," she began. The dolls, thought Harry. I guess she's only going to tell me about that. "But then it's more of a sensethat the magic isn't working like I'm being told it is."

"That," said Mr Dumbledore, "is one of the signs of true magical prodigies. It may be that you weren't blessed by Nature with prodigious magical strength and talent, we have no way of yet knowing. But it is indisputable that you have a very powerful will, and aren't afraid of extraordinary effort, and that is starting to shape your magic, I believe. Hold on to that sense, and cherish it, if you would. It will be the key to your future development."

After more discussion, in which everyone there participated, even Luna Lovegood, it was decided that, while Harry would remain at the Dursleys for the time being, it would be explained to them that he would have too much magical studying to do to be able to do many chores. On Harry's suggestion, he offered to cook some meals for the times he happened to be there. That was the most use the Dursleys got out of him on a day-to-day basis. It would be reiterated to the Dursleys that Harry's presence was mainly for them, not him, and the alternative was to move house from Britain before the truly dangerous 'freaks' came calling, with fatal intent. It wouldn't make them love him, but if they could put the fear of Death Eaters into them enough, they'd either set up a plan to divorce Harry from the Dursleys and have them vacate the United Kingdom, or they'd acknowledge the benefits they'd already gotten out of the boy.

Harry and Hermione would periodically be spirited away late at night to a safe house under a Fidelius Charm, where they would be trained in magic the next day by people let in on the secrets. That was basically restricted to the people actually there right at the moment.

"That concludes the first part of what is but our first pass, or overview, of solving the problems of Harry Potter's safety and privacy and general welfare," Aberforth Dumbledore pronounced. "But now, we will be joined by two more people with a stake in these issues."

With that, he waved his wand, and two chairs grew up from the floor, quietly and gently pushing Mr Granger's and Hermione's chairs aside. It was so slow and gentle, Hermione didn't even look annoyed. Nor did her father.

"Harry, please put on your ring, if you would," Mr Lovegood said.

After Harry did so, he exclaimed "It feels very strange. Are you sure it's safe?"

"Yes, it is, unless you really want to stretch your concept of 'unsafe,' Harry," Mr Lovegood responded. "Now, I want you to put your finger on the face of the ring as it faces you and push it to the right. If your finger was pointing up and someone was looking down on it, it would be going counter-clockwise, or the opposite of how a clock's hands move. We call that moving widdershins in the magical world."

"As you do that, Harry, think of your mother and father," Mrs Lovegood added. "Think of James and Lily. Anything you can remember, anything you can feel. Anything you wished. James was a lot like you, and your mother had long auburn hair and the same eyes as you. James liked flying - I think Hermione has shown you herself flying and has simulated it with you in her back garden? Think of that, a little. Your mother had to do a lot of magical learning with very little of previous knowledge, like yourself and the rabbits - yes, it's going to haunt you for a long time, but don't worry, it will end up just making you more human, as well as frighteningly powerful, of course."

Harry, with an effort of will, took his mind off all the rabbits and followed Mrs Lovegood's suggestion. Actually, Hermione had worked extremely hard to find any pictures, paintings, etc. of James and/or Lily she could, and give them to Harry, so he had a decent notion of how they looked, luckily. He definitely had a bad feeling about all of this, but contradicting that, he also felt as if he was about to learn things he'd yearned for, for many years now. And this room filled with powerful magicians was probably the safest environment to take risks in that he could come up with.

As he turned, and thought, the chair between him and Hermione was gradually occupied by a young woman who faded into sight. Startled, he whipped his head over to stare at the other chair, where a man who looked like a grown-up version of Harry was sitting and smiling.

"We can't hold you, Harry," the woman said. "However much we might wish to. Perhaps at Halloween, but not any other times."

"Well," said the man, "CAN'T is a pretty imprecise word, here. Shake hands with your old man, Harry James Potter, and you'll understand better."

Harry reached over tentatively and shook the man's hand. His hand felt like he'd left it in a freezer for a couple of minutes.

"Brrrrr, right?" said what Harry realised was his father, James. "And as for us, everything's too bright, too loud, touching things is painful, we haven't had a sense of smell or taste so long that they're just repellant."

"It's true, Harry," his mother said, nodding. "This world is too bold, loud, and colourful for our pastel senses. I don't know that you've experienced many crowds, but it's like being in the loudest, pushiest, smelliest, scariest, most hostile crowd ever, pushing against you on all sides. The same way that becomes more grating the longer you're in it, until you just can't stand any more."

"That's why they had you summon us for the transition. Finish off the business with temporarily settling your issues, then moving on to other issues," James said, somewhat mysteriously. "Because we really can't stay long. It'd end up being excruciating, nor would we be able to concentrate enough to be very useful."

"Just so you know, Harry, we haven't been able to watch you every moment," Lily said. "Things are foggy there, worse, we are allowed to tell you very little, though I hope you're used to that with your Hermione already. Time passes in a funny way, you look up and Harry's a week older, a month older, maybe a year older."

"We had unfinished business, mainly your treatment and the disposition of where you'd live, but we couldn't haunt Privet Drive. That was part of the price we paid to get rid of Tom Voldemort Marvolo Riddle, even if just for a while. We had to sacrifice hanging about entirely," James said.

"If you want to ask us things in the future, make a list, express your questions quickly and simply, and expect short answers. If you keep it under five minutes, we'll all genuinely enjoy visiting," Lily volunteered.

"A day," James specified.

"But the good news," Lily added, "is that portraits of us exist and we can help you find them."

"And they're not us, but they're the next best thing. In terms of time, they're better than the originals," James said.

"And," Lily continued, "we'll help you find all sorts of legacies from us, from our school trunks to the family grimoire to our wands, to property you own that no one will tell you about that knows about it in the living world."

"As I said, Harry," James warned, "as long as you don't get addicted to using your ring, well, really the stone set in it, we can make this an unblemished good thing. While being here is bad, the good part is how it focuses us. Time passes at the same rate without all the fogginess. Even ten minutes a day would be worth it, but it wouldn't be as pleasant. Today, you're going to see what is probably the outer limits of useful visiting time. Don't count on it happening again."

"We're very proud," Lily began, "of what a nice boy you've turned out to be. We know you're suspicious, and cautious, and easily hurt, but you should be, given the circumstances. You're also sweet and kind and tolerant and understanding. We're happy you and Hermione have gotten so close, but even if, no, especially if, she gets her wish and you two are someday a couple, you will need to branch out beyond just having her as a friend. You've made inroads with Neville, our godson, and you should stay friendly, but at a distance, with the Weasleys. Buying Ron's rat and 'giving it a good home at Luna's house' put you in his good books, and that is as far as that should go. Don't be afraid to make friends outside of school, and even in school, don't be afraid to make friends in other years or Houses."

Houses? Harry mouthed.

"They're a thing Hogwarts does," Hermione explained, "though there may be a version of it in some countries not in Europe, a version that's taken less seriously. Basically, when you start school, you get put in one of four Houses, and they're all big rivals. The House you go into is supposed to reflect your personality, roughly."

It sounded stupid to Harry. Then again, it did have a classy, old-fashioned feel to it. Maybe he'd seen too many period dramas about boarding schools through the slat in the cupboard door. Thinking about his old bedroom drew a yawn from Harry, and poor Hermione caught it, too.

Not missing a beat, Aberforth Dumbledore handed them a vial with a reddish-orange potion in it. "Half each," was all he said.

Maybe it's coffee for kids, Harry thought. It turned out to be neither. Then again, seeing steam come out of their partner's ears made both children laugh.

"Lily will help you really wrap up this part. Pads over there and I need to go to the corner for a little chat," James told them all.

To Harry's shocked surprise, when they did so, Sirius Black hugged his father anyway, even though the cold must be physically painful. Even the comforting pats on the shoulder must have inflicted freezer burn.

Lily moved over to the other side of Harry. Mrs Lovegood dismissed one of the chairs Mr Dumbledore had conjured, and Hermione moved closer to Harry again. Lily pointed to James and Sirius, still having a very sombre discussion. "Your godfather isn't going to like it, but we're keeping Remus Lupin, you called him 'Unca Mooey,' mostly in the dark. It's going to remind Sirius too much of the atmosphere before we were killed. Suspecting everyone. Sirius is a Black, Remus is a werewolf, Peter acted fishy, and so on, and so on. But the difference is, we're not suspecting him of anything. We simply know that right now, he'll take anything he finds to Albus Dumbledore, and we've established not doing that as Rule One. Or maybe at the very least Goal One."

"He'll go along," she clarified, "because he knows that as your godfather, your welfare comes first, and Albus Dumbledore doesn't give a tinker's damn for your welfare. He'll just complain about it."

"How much," she suddenly asked Harry, "has Hermione told you about us?"

"When I add it up," Harry replied, really thinking about it, "it is quite a bit. Obviously, you weren't drunks on the dole, killed in a car smash. She said I should ask Flitwick about you, and Horace Slughorn if I can run into him. McGonagall knew both of you quite well, though she knew James a lot better since before even coming to school at Hogwarts. Close friends with Snape, he told you about magic, he also dropped a big tree branch on Petunia, which turned out to be indicative, he got more and more addicted to using dark spells on people as he grew up. That's why Hermione says even though he could tell Harry things about you as a child, he should avoid him if at all possible."

"He's right," Lily said. Then she sighed. "I believe it's still a rule that you can pay for private lessons and if there's an issue - and there will be - you can substitute them for a regular Hogwarts course. I rather wronged your father. I thought he was jealous of Severus, and so I not only disavowed everything he claimed or suggested, I went so far to the opposite pole that I ignored or ridiculed or evaded what all my friends said about him. Which was, more or less, what the Marauders said about him. It finally got so bad that once when he used Severus' own Levicorpus spell, which he used dozens of times a day, mostly on first-years, against him, and I demanded to know how he could justify his bullying, he was so exasperated at me for not listening to years of reasons, he simply said it was because Severus 'existed.' Which was both true and sarcastic. I mean, he'd become such a dark wizard in training that his mere existence was probably angering people like James, but mainly it was 'you won't listen to me anyway, so I'll just express myself sarcastically.' "

Lily tended to jump around on topics, Harry noticed. "Thank you," she suddenly said, looking at Hermione. "We've got magic lessons arranged for the both of you, a truce with my sister's family, security in place for Harry generally, and he's taking charge of his own life instead of being blown around like a dandelion puff. And we owe most of that to you."

The old Hermione, before she'd decided to reinvent herself (or die trying), would have blushed and stammered and denied any goodness. Instead, she simply said, "You're welcome. And for the most part, it was my pleasure."

"James and I have talked it over," Lily said, "and as long as you don't get Harry involved in anything too advanced for his age, we approve of you."

Hermione laughed, and said, "This isn't like a normal meeting the parents affair, like the ones I read about, we're seeing each other in action at a serious meeting."

"The pleasantries," Lily observed, "are grossly overrated."

At that, James returned, the old chair arrangement was re-established, and the more general discussion re-commenced.

"Let's list," suggested Mr Lovegood, "our immediate and our mid-term goals."

"Immediately:

* Magical training

* Memory obfuscation

* Arrange for food and finances not involving Dursleys

* Find parents' portraits and wake them.

* Help Harry re-integrate into school, now that his cousin can't drive friends away.

* The Mlles Malabul and DuCharme give Hermione a program to keep her magic up while still pushing her self-improvement program forward at school.

Mid-term:

* Sirius Black slowly takes over custody of Harry

* Continuing education in Wizarding Britain's politics and corruption

* As Hermione parcels out her near-term visions, make concrete plans around them."

At that, Luna Lovegood interrupted and said, "The more people you tell about the future, the more details you give, the more you change everything and it ends up all being rubbish. She's not doing anything wrong."

Harry noticed the grateful smile and glance Hermione gave the little girl.

With a cough, Mr Lovegood continued:

"* Neutralise, as far as Harry is concerned, the Minister, Cornelius Fudge, who is a Death Eater hireling, and his assistant, an unmarked Death Eater named Delores Umbridge. They're both as bad as anyone on the list Miss Granger will supply.

* Get Harry into perfect health. It will have to be done stealthily, but Mrs Lovegood does have training as a Healer. The effects of years of neglect and abuse need to be reversed.

* Continue increasing security on the Granger home and their business location."

"We could go on all night, but that's at least a sample of things we need to do. And now, it is time for my beloved wife to go ahead to the Granger residence."

As if he'd signalled a break, everyone stood up and then moved around until they were standing in a group and discussing what had gone on before and during the meeting. Harry was thankful the ear-steaming potion hadn't worn off yet.