10. Pyromania

That evening, Harry insisted that HtB deliver a written complaint to Professor McGonagall about what Draco had said. Harry remembered quite well that Dumbledore had sat on his hands regarding name-calling the entire time Harry originally was at Hogwarts. It was time to see if that was senility, or deliberate manipulation.

Harry-the-Boy gave a concise and complete report of the incident, and offered to provide his memory of the event as proof, and that the other witnesses also had agreed to provide a memory, if needed. He demanded that Draco Malfoy's punishment be with Mr. Filch, and be hand-labour, no magic.

Expecting Malfoy's Head of House to handle the detention, the letter explained, would be a waste of time. Professor Snape would either ignore the request while saying he took care of it, or he would have the boy do one of his regular assignments and pretend that was the punishment. "This can be predicted not only because of his decade-long egregious abuse of the House point system, but because he ignores his Slytherin students' transgressions against other students in his classes, in front of witnesses, also going back for a decade. Based on past behaviour, why wouldn't he ignore properly enforcing the punishments assigned by other Professors, as well? For him, there is no down-side to ignoring the other Professors, the Headmaster always dismisses their objections as 'exaggerated,' tells everyone that 'I trust Professor Snape completely,' and refuses to do anything to verify any accusations — not even asking the portraits that spy for him what they saw."

HtB wrote that he expected Draco to be publicly reprimanded in the Great Hall — because the slur had been voiced quite publicly. Plus, sufficient points were to be deducted to enforce the stance that such slurs are not allowed in Hogwarts.

He also expected a public apology from Draco to Hermione. A proper apology, too, in which he said he was unreservedly sorry for calling her that vile name, and promised never to do so again.

If these actions did not happen, then "I will feel free to call Malfoy, or anyone else who insults me or my friends, an 'inbred illegitimate todger-cheese eating maggot,' without fear of punishment. After all, I am given to understand that calling someone a 'mud-blood' is worse than that. Which means that if Malfoy can bandy 'mud-blood' about without reprimand, detention, and/or points taken, then anything I say will be similarly ignored, correct?

"Or do the delicate, fragile, snowflake-like sensibilities of the Slytherins require special privileges denied to the rest of the school?

"If that is the case, then, in the future, should points be taken and a detention given to me for name-calling, I will refuse to comply. What is good for the goose, is good for the gander."

Hermione was appalled when he had her proof-read the letter. Ron was amazed at his audacity, and bravery. Neither could say he was wrong. Both predicted McGonagall would not take kindly to the missive.

Harry and HtB made a quick run to the Owlery just before curfew. Copies of the letter would arrive tomorrow to Madam Longbottom, Mr. Weasley, and the members of the Hogwarts Board of Governors —Malfoy's father wasn't an issue as he was still being held in Azkaban prior to his trial. Percy had been quite happy to give HtB their names and addresses.

That would put the heat on both Albus Dumbledore and Snivellous Snape, without a doubt.

The gauntlet had been thrown down.

If nothing happened, then it was time to take the gloves off and explain to the kiddies how the point system was designed to control their behaviour with peer-pressure. It wouldn't be difficult to describe how Professor Snape had turned the system into a mockery, to allow his House always to win the House Cup for the previous ten years — excluding last year, of course.

Things such as taking points from Harry for not stopping Neville from melting his cauldron one day, and then taking points from Harry for helping Neville not melt his cauldron another day. Such a contradiction meant the point system was arbitrary and useless. Taking points for asking questions? What was the point of school if you couldn't ask questions?

In the face of such bias from a Professor, any points any non-Slytherin earned did nothing. They were about as effective as giving a niffler a piece of wood and expecting him to put it with his stash of shinies. The point-system was hopelessly broken. They would never win the House Cup fairly, so, why try? They should turn the House Cup into a comedy, a race to the bottom!

Was it possible to get negative points? Why shouldn't they find out? Maybe they could set a goal for the greatest number of negative points! That, at least, was something they could accomplish without interference from an antagonistic Professor.

Let loose the dogs of war! Or, in this case it would be, let loose the puppies who no longer feared peer-pressure to be "good"!

-===(o|o)===-

Sunday morning was quiet. Harry didn't expect to hear anything from Dumbledore until later — after the different governors had had time to read the letters and contact him demanding answers.

HtB had delivered his letter to Professor McGonagall that morning at breakfast. He had just handed the letter to her, and said, "This is my official complaint about an incident that occurred yesterday." Her expressions as she read through it had been enlightening. Curiosity, surprise, shock, then anger. She glared at Professor Snape, knowing Wood had booked the Pitch and upset at his cavalier commandeering of it for the Slytherins. Her narrow-eyed glare at Draco did not portend well for the boy, either.

The Headmaster was absent — he usually only attended the dinners. If he had been there, Harry was sure their conversation would have had to have been behind a silencing spell.

As it was, she made a point of catching HtB's eyes once he had returned to his breakfast, and nodded to him. She finished her repast, and quickly left the table. Harry almost wanted to be a party to that discussion.

Almost.

Instead, he spent the day lazily flying around the castle grounds and over the forest. Thoughts of how to handle the Death Eaters filled his head. As did his fantasies of revenge for what they had done in his world.

While he had flown around the castle on his broom, doing it as bird was different. He spotted many things he had never noticed before, such as the acromantula colony. From a thousand yards up, it was a doodle to spot the blight their webbing had made of the forest. The treetops were covered in white with only a bit of green or brown occasionally showing through.

The Centaurs were more difficult to spot, their homes blending seamlessly into the forest. He spotted them more by the noise the foals made, laughing and playing, than by anything he actually saw.

He was unable to locate any deer, goats, or unicorns, although he knew the forest harboured those — they were just that good at hiding. Plus, they didn't group together so obviously.

The lake beside the castle also looked dramatically different. It was simple to separate the shallow portions from the deeper ones just by the colour of the water. One of the deeper ones, of course, was home to the merpeople. Spotting the giant squid was surprisingly easy and Harry spent some time watching as it swam around the lake. Or loch, as lakes were called in Scotland.

At lunch, Harry dropped into the Great Hall and took up his customary position on one of the ceiling rafters. It gave him a chance to check on HtB, and pick up on the latest gossip making the rounds at the school.

His letter to Parvati about Draco, his boyfriends, and their doomed romance, was paying off handsomely. Already, the Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs were elaborating the story into a complicated soap-opera that would do the East Enders proud.

The Slytherins had yet to pick up on it, but he could see a few with puzzled frowns at their table when they overheard a couple of Ravenclaws discussing the rumour.

The afternoon was as simple as the morning, and Harry took quiet pleasure in a simple day. It had been some time since he had just idled with nothing to do all day. No plots, no real planning, just watching the world go by. Daydreaming of a world where Tom Riddle wasn't a threat.

Dinner, however, did have a bit of drama. Surprising everyone, Dumbledore called a sullen Malfoy and a startled Hermione to the Head Table. Hermione had a pink face at the attention and couldn't help but fidget nervously.

To Harry's stunned disbelief, and everyone else's in the Great Hall, they saw something they had never seen before. He wasn't the only one left slack-jawed, although his was more of slack-beaked.

Draco, slowly, grudgingly, offered up an apology to Hermione about calling her a vile name the previous day. "What I said to you yesterday . . . on the Quidditch pitch . . . was something no gentleman should ever say . . . much less to a girl . . . and I deeply regret that I said it. I'm sorry . . . I said it to you," he said, with an expression that looked as if he a mouthful of lemon juice.

His expression clearly conveyed that his words were at odds with his true feelings, but the societal forms had to be observed.

Most of the younger students at the Slytherin table had similar expressions. The older students' faces, however, were carefully bland. Harry could see from above, however, that many a Slytherin hand was tightly clenched around their goblets or golden utensils. They understood what this meant in the greater scheme of things.

The Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs had amazed expressions. The Gryffindors all looked as if Christmas had come early, with big smiles and half-disbelieving stares.

Dumbledore had a soft smile, but his lips were tightly pressed together. He was not happy at this turn of events. Snape was so rigid he looked as if he were about to erupt into violence at any second. McGonagall kept a narrow-eyed glare directed at Draco.

Harry knew that even if Snivellous was too childish to understand, and Albus too wrapped up in his schemes to notice, the Depute Headmistress understood the kind of chaos that would descend upon the school if the students decided to ignore the discipline the point-system provided.

After a moment's pause, Hermione said, "I . . . accept your apology."

The Headmaster sighed sadly. He looked directly at Harry "To impress upon everyone that name-calling is forbidden," he said slowly, "Mr. Malfoy will lose twenty points and receive a detention with Mr. Filch," the Headmaster said as he glanced at the two students. "You may return to your tables." He sat back down.

It would be interesting to see if this new intolerant would last.

-===(o|o)===-

Monday brought an eagle-owl from Gringotts to HtB at breakfast. Harry was already guarding "his" plate beside HtB, and watched, smirking. Puzzled, HtB took the scroll and miniature trunk, and offered the owl a banger. When he read the address, his eyebrows shot up in surprise, and he turned his head to look at Harry. Hesitantly, he held the scroll up so Harry could grab it in his beak.

Swallowing the last of the current rasher of bacon, Harry took the scroll in his beak and grabbed the trunk with a foot. Hermione, and several others, stared at HtB, gobsmacked. The boy shrugged his shoulders as Harry took flight. The owl heard the boy say, "Well, it was addressed to him."

Hermione's shriek of, "Gringotts sent Hedwig a letter and shrunken trunk!?" followed him out the door. The Hall erupted into cries of disbelief.

Harry would have laughed at that, if he wouldn't have dropped the scroll. Once secure in his private rookery, he examined what he had. The trunk had, as expected, the galleons and quid he had requested.

The scroll was quite enlightening, once he stuck it to the wall to hang down for easy reading. The Lestranges seemed to have had quite a number of goblin-made items — and there was a reward for returning them to the goblins. If you had something in your family's possession that was goblin-made, he knew, they considered it stolen by your family. However, if you found a goblin-made item, then it was finders-keepers from anyone except the owner or a former owner — just as it was if you found a knife or sword by the roadside.

The goblins, as a former owner, offered an enticement to get wizards and witches to return items they "found". It wasn't much, ranging from a few sickles to a few dozen galleons, depending on the item's actual value.

But when you turn in a hundred or two items? Those sickles and galleons pile up right fast!

The list of goblin items he might want was rather long, even after eliminating the swords and knives. Later, he would visit Gringotts and see about getting a matched-set of three knives for the trio. Then he would make sure they were dipped in basilisk poison. It was probably overkill, but he thought it would be worth it.

Perusing the list, he found several items of interest. Heading that selection were necklaces and earrings that featured occlumency spells. Next came bracelets that harboured shield or area silencing charms of various strengths. Then there were the rings to detect potions, signalling with vibration, getting warm, or gems that glowed if the potions were harmful, or benign.

After making marks with his wand by the ones that seemed promising, he started the second, longer list, and made similar selections.

He would have to hire someone to compare the goblin-made versus wizard-made items to see which was the superior in performance. Perhaps Bill Weasley might be available? If he wasn't, maybe Lupin?

Remus wasn't Harry's first choice, now, given how he was ignoring HtB. The wizard apparently put too much faith in Dumbledore, and treated his "requests" as commanding decrees from his Emperor. Which, Harry had to admit, in Remus' case, they probably were.

Remus would never have attended Hogwarts without the Headmaster's sponsorship. Unfortunately, it was significant that no other werewolves had been afforded that privilege after he left.

Now that he had had a decade to consider the matter, it was a strike against Dumbledore that he had never allowed any other werewolves into Hogwarts. Apparently, based on how the Headmaster had handled Remus, it was beyond his capabilities as the most powerful wizard of the century, to secure a room in the dungeons so that a werewolf could neither escape nor be heard. It was as if the silencing and imperturbable charms didn't exist!

He shook his head and turned his attention back to the list.

He needed to see about getting a ring for one of his legs that could power a dove illusion when he needed it to. It would save him from wasting his magic.

The final numbers at the bottom of the scroll were . . . much lower than he expected, given how sparkly everything in the large Lestrange vault had appeared. It was still two zeros larger, with the lead digit doubled, than he remembered his trust vault having in his past life.

He doubted the other manors and vaults he intended to plunder would even reach a tenth of what the Lestranges' had yielded — except maybe the Malfoys. None of the rest had married a Black son or daughter since the seventeen-hundreds, at the latest. Plenty of time to squander any inheritance or dowry.

Plus, he didn't remember any of them being super-rich, just comfortably so. *

On that subject, the influx of galleons to his vault had allowed him to buy business-shares that some of the Death Eaters put up to pay their fines. Many of them he picked up for as low as ten-percent of their value! His account manager had done quite well for him.

His income from those businesses, including The Daily Prophet, Cleansweep Broom Company, Comet Trading Company, Nimbus Racing Broom Company, Flourish and Blotts, Globus Mundi Travel Agents, Mr Mulpepper's Apothecary, and Obscurus Books was easily double or triple the average salary a wizard could earn.

Hmm. Maybe he should check the Room of Lost Things for goblin items? Not to mention knives and books that might be useful for HtB — such as arithmancy and sigils.

Maybe the Room could show him a room in the castle to store his things with its own owl-window? It was only a matter of time before someone noticed an owl always flying around in a certain corridor on the seventh floor. What would be perfect would be a room with an owl-entrance to the Gryffindor common room.

Considering that the castle liked to move doors and rooms around, not to mention the stairs in the central stairwell, maybe it could arrange a convenient room for him? Neville had clearly shown how the Room could create passages to and from any location in the castle or outside (that is, the tunnel to Aberforth's pub), maybe it could do more?

He glanced at the five boxes on the floor. There was only one that was empty.

He was already in a version of the Room of Requirement.

He closed his eyes and thought. He wanted a secure room in the regular part of the castle with an owl-window only he could use. He wanted it to have a hidden door and owl access that was attached to the Room of Requirement so he could access that room either way any time he wanted to do that, just as they did in the corridor with the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy's Dancing Trolls. It had to have windows to the outside and a door to the castle, both hidden to outsiders. The door could be password protected. It had to be as large as a regular classroom, with a large bathroom containing a six-person hot tub and separate shower.

After concentrating on that for a while, he opened his eyes and looked around. To his delight, he saw a new owl-window. He flew up to it and handed on the edge, looking over the new room carefully.

It was as large as a classroom. Directly across from him was a set of windows, with an owl-entry above them and a lovely view of the lawns in front of the Forbidden Forest. On his left, in the far corner by the windows, was a door to the outside. On the right, in the middle of that wall, was another. Above the door on his right was an owl-entry, and through it he could see enough detail to determine that that door led to the bathroom. Taking up the wall on both sides of the bathroom door were floor-to-ceiling bookcases.

It was, of course, unfurnished. That didn't matter. They could bring desks and chairs from the Room of Lost Things to suit their needs. He flew into the room and landed on the windows' ledge, and took a look at where he had been. It was a blank wall. He took off and looped lazily in front of it, thinking on needing his room with the horcruxes. An owl-window shimmered into view. He changed his mind to ask for a room with only uncursed books.

One hovering charm later, they were all in his new room, in a pile in front of the bookshelves.

Next came goblin-made items, uncursed, first. With the Room doing all the work of separating the items from the rest of the junk, all Harry had to do was hover and drop them into his trunk for transport to Gringotts. He took his time and examined the knives he found, making a separate pile of them. He would have the trio pick the one they wanted and see if his account manager could get a good price. Perhaps, if he promised to return them treated with the venom of a basilisk when he died, he could get better prices?

He shrugged.

Then it was the turn for cursed goblin items. That was a larger pile! On reflection, he decided that made sense. Cursed items were more likely to be hidden than uncursed things, right?

Once he was finished, he used the Room to give him a direct exit, with his shrunken trunk of goblin items, into HtB's dorm room. The typewriter was, naturally, set up on HtB's work-desk.

Mr. Weasley had quite happily made a few changes for Harry, back when they had been at The Burrow. There was now a bar just below the spacebar for Harry to perch on when he used the machine. Being an "electric" it didn't take more than a gentle tap of a claw. His typing wasn't fast, but using his claws was much faster than trying to hunt and peck — literally — with his beak. It wouldn't take long for Harry to pound out another short letter to the goblins.

The lettering type-ball had been enlarged almost three times over the normal size of its original twelve-point. It more closely matched the size of the letters the children normally used for their essays. The erase feature was most appreciated by Harry and HtB.

"This trunk has goblin-made items I have found; I am returning them to you - - note that some are cursed. What you do about the curses is at your expense. Place the reward for returned goblin items in my vault. As before, give me a list of any of any goblin-crafted items with protective or detection spells; I might wish to rent them for my lifetime.

"Hedwig Potter"

Once it was finished, he pressed the cutting bar Arthur also had installed, and that section of parchment was cut from the roll mounted behind the typewriter. It immediately rolled up. Harry grabbed it and stuffed it in his backpack with his trunk and vault-key.

Then it was out of the room and to Hogsmeade to catch the Knight Bus.

That afternoon, an excited HtB dragged Hermione and Ron out of the common room. "You blokes have to see this!" he said as the other two hurried behind him down the seventh-floor corridor. Around a corner, not too far past an odd tapestry of a wizard with eight trolls in ballerina costumes, he stopped. "Hedwig showed this to me earlier!" he said breathlessly. He looked down a moment and hissed, §Open!§ Harry noticed, although HtB did not, that Ron recoiled in horror, while Hermione looked mystified.

Before Ron could say anything, however, an archway shimmied into view.

"Come on," he said, grinned at them, and rushed inside. After a brief look at each other, the other two followed.

It was a large room with tall windows on one wall and a door opposite them. Looking back at the archway, there was a very faint outline of the stone wall visible, and they could see into the corridor. The archway was in the corner of the room, beside it in the middle of the wall was a large fireplace. A very comfortable looking couch and armchairs were grouped in front of it.

"The archway disappears from the corridor once we go through it, so no one knows we're here," HtB said helpfully. "But we can see out to see if anyone is waiting there."

There was a large red and gold rug in the middle of the room, with several comfortable armchairs scattered about, as well as several writing tables.

"Pitts furnished it for me," he said proudly, waving his arms around.

Hermione, naturally, noticed the stacks of books by the shelves, and rushed over.

"Hedwig says that those were abandoned or lost books that he found and claimed for me," HtB said. "Sorry about the stacks, but he's not much for arranging a library. He also found this nifty spell that puts in a nameplate and taught it to me to use on those books," he concluded happily.

Hermione paused in her perusal of the books and glared at Harry.

"I'll be happy to show that to you," he added quickly.

She smiled and nodded, and went back to the disorganized book stacks.

He walked over to one of the tables, pulled out his mokeskin bag, pulled his typewriter from it, and carefully placed it on the table. Then he reinstalled the mounting-bar that held the source parchment scroll, and fed the end of the scroll around the platen and through the slot in the cutting-bar.

Hermione had already started sorting the books onto the shelves, murmuring about which years they belonged to for the O.W.L. textbooks, and the subjects for the N.E.W.T. and reference books.

Ron was still giving HtB the gimlet eye. "Did you hiss in the corridor?" he said accusingly.

"Hmm?" HtB said as finished with the typewriter. He looked over at Ron's pale face.

"Uh, yeah?" he said uncomprehendingly. "It's the language of snakes. Hedwig told me to use it so no one except us could get in."

"But that's Parseltongue!" Ron objected. "Only evil wizards can understand it!"

HtB rolled his eyes. "That's like someone on the continent saying anyone who speaks English must be evil because Voldemort speaks English!"

"But all the wizards who spoke it were Dark Wizards!" Ron stated firmly.

HtB looked at Ron quizzically. "All the Dark Wizards in England spoke English, therefore it is an evil language." He paused a bit as Ron stared at him, puzzled. "Hedwig can speak it, and he told me that Dumbledore speaks it, too. Are they evil wizards?"

Ron opened his mouth, then clicked it shit.

Hermione had not been as oblivious as they had thought. "Hedwig can speak to snakes?" she said incredulously from right beside them, causing all three to startle.

Harry couldn't roll his eyes, but he did turn his head almost the full one-hundred and eighty degrees his neck allowed to stare at her, then hissed. It was only the word hungry in Parseltongue, but the platter of owl treats that appeared proved his point — and that Pitts was listening.

He hadn't been too happy, but HtB had convinced him to learn a few words: come, hungry, finished, and help.

Harry had been practicing with HtB and a friendly garden snake over the summer. The snake had greatly appreciated the mice Harry had traded in exchange for the assistance.

HtB nodded. "Oh, yeah. And I'll need to teach you how to hiss 'Open' so you can get in without me.

He looked at Ron. "And if I teach you how to speak Parseltongue, does that mean you must be an evil wizard?"

Poor Ron. He was having his whole world-view turned upside-down.

"Besides, if all Parseltongues are evil, then they must also all be evil Slytherin gits, right? So, because I'm in Gryffindor, I can't be an evil git!"

Ron was shaking his head and blinking furiously.

One short serpentsortia later, the three were practicing away.

Having Harry — an owl! — able to do it drove Hermione to extraordinary effort. It also quite easily destroyed any arguments that it was "impossible to do," as Ron tried to insist, at first.

Harry was impressed, although he didn't show it. In less than an hour, the other two were proficient enough that either could access the room without difficulty. HtB still had to look at the tiny snake carved into the stone floor, but the other two just had to concentrate on hissing properly.

By dinner time, they had a rudimentary understanding of several words: open, close, help, stop, go, danger, and hungry.

If it came out that HtB was a parselmouth, Ron and Hermione chiming in that they also could speak and understand it would confuse everyone. After all, nobody believed for a second that either Ron or Hermione were inherently evil. A bit slow and lazy for pure-blood Ron, and an overbearing know-it-all for muggle-born Hermione, true, but evil? No.

That evening, while the others were studying in the library, Harry used their "clubroom" as HtB had deemed it, to access the Room of Requirement. Once there, he had the Room provide him with a map of where the Vanishing Cabinet was. With that knowledge, he wrote a note to Pitts asking him to fetch it for him. Because it wasn't in use, it wouldn't be inconveniencing anyone. The cabinet was, after all, empty, and not being used.

It wouldn't be broken for another month, when HtB was invited by Nearly Headless Nick to his Deathday Party.

Once it was safely ensconced in the clubroom, between the archway and the fireplace, he used several sticking charms, one on each foot to the floor, and another on the back to the wall, to keep it from being moved. He placed a small piece of wood in the door latch so that it couldn't be fully closed without the deliberate effort of removing the blockage. Then he stuck a note on the door; "Do Not Use — Spell-Trapped." The parchment was above the wardrobe's doorknob and spread across the opening left when the door was closed as far as it could be. Anyone opening it would tear the parchment, except the parchment had an impervius charm on it! There would be no "accidents." The alert charm was just an after-thought.

He would see about having the goblins buy the other one from Borgin and Burkes, and putting it in his vault until he could think of a better place for it. To prevent any misunderstandings, he would have them chain it open so that it couldn't be used on the sly.

-===(o|o)===-

Now came the problem of the Acromantulas, the giant spiders in the Forbidden Forest. They were an extreme danger to the students at the best of times. Once Aragog died, whatever restraints they had from going to the school for food would be gone. Not to mention their restraints at the moment were extremely tenuous, just look at how Aragog had wanted his offspring to eat Harry and Ron last year!

Plus, they had attacked with the Death Eaters at the final battle.

True, they were being driven before the Death Eaters, but the spiders could simply have scampered past the castle, and not attacked the defending students.

On the other hand, attacking them now would be problematic. It would be better to carry out the assault in the dead of winter, February, when it was coldest. The spiders would be extremely sluggish and unable to fight back or flee effectively.

He would see about using expansion, impervius, and feather-light charms on a bunch of plastic bags. He could fill them with a combination of flour and petrol, then drop them in a circle around the nest. He would hit each one with a finite as it fell, and then an incendio. The petrol would burn, and the gooey, petrol-soaked flour would make it stick to everything. An American Auror had taught him that trick. It was useful for flushing out hiding criminals without wasting a great deal of magic.

It would have maximum impact in the dead of night, when the spiders were least likely to be aware of what was happening. Once most of the spiders were driven into the centre of the nest, a couple of bags dropped there would see a precipitous decline in the spiders' numbers.

Could he possibly get the Centaurs to perform a mop-up operation?

Actually, perhaps he should warn them in case he set the entire forest on fire!

Or, maybe, he should make a bunch of bags with just water in them, to handle any hot spots outside the circle of fire he created? It would make for a very long night, but if he prepared things ahead of time, it would be doable.

Yeah. He needed to test this, somehow.

He could do a few practice runs around the mansions of incarcerated Death Eaters, assuming the buildings were empty.

Okay, that was his next chore: scouting the Death Eater mansions. He'd start with Dolohov. He had a score to settle with that wizard for what he did to Hermione in fifth-year, at the Ministry. Then on to Rookwood. He had been instrumental in getting to the Prophecy. Gibbon, Jugson, Mulciber, Rowle, and Travers were dependable Death Eaters, but not great thinkers or schemers. They were more followers.

Get rid of the more dangerous followers, first.

Except the ones in Azkaban. They were out of reach, at the moment.

-===(o|o)===-

Dolohov's home, like the Lestranges and Hogwarts, was unplottable. Just like the other two, however, he hadn't blocked owl-post.

The Head Mouse ignored the letter on the floor, which he should have. It contained as powerful a pest-be-gone spell from Lockhart's stolen book, "Guide to Household Pests", as HtB could manage the day before. Homenum Revelio yielded confirmation that no people were home. The same spell modified for house-elves showed none were at this residence.

Just like the Lestranges, unfortunately, while he could get to into the room that had it, their vault key was . . . out of his reach.

He didn't do exactly what he did before. He set a sealed bag on the desk with the inaccessible drawer. The bag was expanded inside, and it had taken every bit of his magic to make it bigger on the inside two days before. He finited the impervio spell he had cast yesterday on the bag, then cast a simple incendio on the cloth he had covering it. Once that was going well, he beat wings to get out of there. Seconds after that, the integrity of the plastic bag failed under the heat, the expansion charm then failed, and four hundred litres of petrol flooded the room, splashing into the hall and into the other rooms.

Apparently, four hundred litres of petrol burn a bit hotter and longer than most fires, and push the protective spells to failure, he discovered the next day. All that remained of the building were the brick walls, the exposed basement, and ashes. He put the coinage he recovered into his bag. It was a pitiful amount compared to what the Lestranges had had lying about but was still more than most wizards earned in a year. The other gold and silver items went into his trunk. As before, he cleaned the stink and residue from the fire off them, first.

Then he was off to Gringotts, and it wasn't even noon, yet.

For Rookwood's manor, he decided not to take chances. The wizard had been an Unspeakable. That meant he had to be a bit more paranoid, and inventive, than the others. As a result, Harry didn't want to try going inside.

Fortunately, the wizard hadn't been so paranoid as to put up owl-blocking spells. The property was, though, under unplottable and muggle- and wizard-repelling spells. Harry had carefully reconnoitred the property from a distance, while Dolohov's place was burning brightly.

The house was in an "L" shape, so he decided he'd need to drop his fire-bombs at each corner, with the inside corner being last. But, first, he needed to make his fire-bombs. Regrettably, he couldn't just grab any old bag from the Room of Requirement. He needed something small and light-weight. The later was to make it easier for it to burn when he removed the impervius spell.

He headed back to Hogwarts, intending another visit to Blackpool that evening.

-===(o|o)===-

The Goblins were more than happy to sign a lease-for-life for three occlumency blocking rings, one each for Ron, Hermione, and HtB. He also got all three of them rings that got warm when they detected poison within a hand's width.

Ron and Hermione were stunned to discover that both Snape — "Professor Snape, Harry!" — and "Professor" Dumbledore could see things they had done by "reading" their minds with occlumency.

They would not be looking any adults in the eyes anytime soon! Hermione, naturally, quickly borrowed HtB's copy of Occlumency: Organize Your Mind by Knot Al Thar.

Both were quick to add their bloody thumbprints to the order letter when asked. HtB did not, of course, tell them the true costs of both sets of rings.

-===(o|o)===-

Author's Note: * Briefly, the economy of a society is: salary times estimated working population. The wizarding population is based on J.K.R. saying the ratio between wizards and muggles is 1:1,000. The population of the UK in 1991 was ~57 million, thus 57,000 wizards and witches.

However, about 6,700 of those are children. Plus, many of the women are stay-at-home wives, perhaps as many as half of them, 10,000. Thus, the wizarding economy would be 30,000 * 4,000 galleons, 120 million galleons (4,000 galleons is the equivalent of £20,000, the average salary of an English white-collar worker in 1992, ~ 384 Pounds Sterling a week. If the average wizard made significantly more than that, all wizards would live like kings in muggle areas because rent, etc., would be cheaper).

Based on the size of the Wizarding economy and the fact that the richest people in any given economy rarely exceed 1% of that economy (Rockefeller is considered the richest person in American history, yet his total net worth was only 1.5% of the total US economy (GDP) at the time (1937-There is some dispute about this with others saying it was only 0.6%). Vanderbilt, in the late 1800's was the second richest of all time, but was only 1.1% of the total US economy (again there is dispute that it was only 0.4%), so, the very richest wizard would have a net worth of about 1.3 to 1.7 million galleons – which includes property. Property is usually almost fifty percent of a wealthy family's net worth. Modern billionaires are all involved with the WORLD economy, not just the country they live in.

When dealing with the ultra-rich, the numbers are very small. For example, in 1989, in Britain, there were only 7 billionaires out of 57 million people, about 0.000012%. Considering the wizard population of 57,000, there are no "billionaires"(over 200 million in galleons) in wizarding Britain. There were, however, 6,600 millionaires in Britain, which means there would be six or seven wizarding millionaires (that is, wizarding families with more than 200,000 galleons). The giant increase to today's 43,000+ millionaires is due to computers, technology, inflation, and involvement with a world economy, which would leave wizards still in the single digits.

In canon, the Black Family is the richest in England, with the Malfoy's coming in second as the richest family not in Azkaban, and therefore able to wield their wealth to browbeat their friends and enemies.