AN: When I initially posted this I made the mistake of chopping the Gringotts visit up with the misguided idea I should try to keep the chapters roughly even in length. I've since learned that's a horrible idea. It made it feel like Harry was there forever. I've kept Ch 4 – 6 as they were to keep all the reviews but you should really think of them as parts of the same chapter. It might allay this frustrated feeling.
There's a lot in these chapters, and I apologize for the legal talk, but that's what comes from creating two characters with legal backgrounds, even if they are entertaining. All of this serves to establish Harry and the world he finds himself in so it's rather important it's done right – but more on this at the end.
We pick up with the Gringotts group already in progress.
.o0O0o.
"You mean away from the Dursleys?" Harry asked, looking from one to the other, hopes rising for the first time. "You mean never going back?"
"We mean never ever going back," Lichfield agreed.
"WOOHOO!" Harry's great cry went up as out of his robes came his bulging hand-me-downs and they too followed his cheer up to the ceiling before coming back down onto two very disturbed Gringotts employees.
"He's certainly taking this well," Barchoke said as he scooted Harry's trousers off his precious files.
"It's always so difficult giving bad news," Lichfield lamented with a dramatic shake of his head, a hand pressed to his heart.
"Hang on," Harry said, coming back to the ground again. "My trunk, all my stuff for school, it's still there. Won't I have to go back?"
Barchoke's eyes went wide, but not for the reason he thought.
"Our security!" the goblin cried with a shocked stare at his empty snow globe. "Everyone quiet, quiet!" In a blur, files were flipped and drawers drawn as the distressed goblin searched for something. "Now where did I put that thing? I just had it."
Harry turned to ask the old wizard beside him for answers but Lichfield already had one gnarled finger to his lips and another ready for poking.
"Aha!" the goblin cried, holding up a shiny slender tuning fork. "Here's the little doxie."
With two fingers daintily holding the shiny silver instrument, the Overseer tapped his desk and touched the other end to the clear globe. Expecting the dancing couple to appear again Harry was kind of disappointed when purple dinosaur and a small group of children showed up and started silently singing and dancing around.
"I usually have it set on salsa dancing," the goblin said.
"–Very disconcerting for anyone trying to listen in," Lichfield interrupted. "Way too active and energetic for most people's tastes – a bit like him once you get to know him," the old warlock said with a thumb pointed towards the Overseer.
"You're one to talk," the goblin groused. "The only one who can stand you is me, and Gotts knows how I put up with you. Must have the patience of a smith of old," he ended stuffily.
"And for a flighty little doxie that's saying something."
Barchoke shot him a look.
"So what is that?" Harry asked, hoping to corral the adults into acting their age.
"It's called a Concealer," Lichfield explained. "Anyone trying to listen in will only hear whatever's going on inside that orb."
"And if they heard any of that last bit this will really annoy them," the goblin said as he studied the globe. "You think someone broke through?"
"I think his trousers turned it off."
"No throwing trousers!" the goblin ordered Harry.
"Oh yes, just shirts will be fine," Lichfield said sarcastically as he handed Harry's hand-me-downs back to him.
Harry expected some sort of comeback from the Overseer but Barchoke had a finger to his lips, brow furrowed in serious thought. "His things, his things," the goblin muttered. "What do we do about his things?" Suddenly his eyes popped and out from a drawer came a very big book that he threw on the desk with a bang. The goblin muttered to himself as he flipped through section after section of tiny text.
Lichfield sat back in his chair.
"He'll find it," Lester said. "He always finds it when he gets like this. It may not be exactly what you think – but he'll find it," the old stump said confidently as Harry wondered what 'it' could be.
"Aha!" the goblin cried pointing to a specific line of very tiny text. "You, Mr. Potter, are a wizard, are you not?"
"Er– Yes," Harry said curiously.
"And, although you cannot be said to own the domicile in question, it remains, technically speaking, your residence – until further notice. Is that not the case?" Barchoke said with a smile, lights dancing in his eyes.
Harry looked over at the old wizard next to him. Lichfield was already nodding his head.
"Yes."
"And the objects in question may be said to belong to you?"
"I guess so."
"Well then," the goblin said happily. "All that needs to be done is to fill out this form here," out of one drawer came the form in question, "as to the address and location of the residence, as well as a general description of what is to be retrieved–." And another drawer was opened and similar-looking form soon joined the first. "And then on this form we place the same information as to the objects to be withdrawn–"
Harry wondered about the difference as an almost cackling Barchoke scooted the available quill and ink set closer to Harry.
"And then, under Banking Order 659, Section Q, Subsection B, Gringotts can retrieve your property from your residence to deposit into your vault and then withdraw your property from your vault and deliver it to the new location that is considered your residence at that time. And take that Unauthorized Transit Stricture!" Barchoke shouted in triumph.
Harry looked over at the old stump.
"Yep. Didn't see that one coming," Lichfield said.
Harry shook his head and went about filling out the forms in front of him.
"Go ahead and list anything the Dursleys let you use on a regular basis," Lichfield advised. "As long as you can reasonably say you believe they gave them to you, you should be covered. If they don't like it, let them go complain their authorities that goblins stole their furniture and see what good that'll do them."
Harry shrugged and went ahead and listed the desk, bed, wardrobe, and clothes he used along with detailed instructions to find what he had hidden under the invisibility cloak. He may never plan on wearing the clothes again, but throwing them sure felt nice. It was only when he got to the end of the second form, where it asked for the location of the residence where everything would be delivered that Harry ran into a stumbling block.
"Where should I say my residence is?" Harry asked.
"Huh," Lichfield grunted. "The Leaky Cauldron is out. Unless you stayed there a month it couldn't legally be considered a residence, and by then you'd be on your way back to school. We haven't had a chance yet to go through your file and see if you have any vacant properties suitable for living in."
Barchoke's triumphant face fell.
"What about the place in Godric's Hollow?" the Overseer asked.
"The Ministry turned it into a damn monument," the Litigator said tersely. Harry instantly wanted to ask about it, but certainly didn't want to ask him right then when it brought out that kind of mood.
"Is there nowhere in the wizarding world you can stay at in the mean time?" Barchoke asked. "Staying with Lester or I would seem rather biased and the muggle world just won't do for us at all."
"Both would work against you," Lester nodded to Harry.
"Well my friend, Ron Weasley, did invite me over to stay–," Harry said, wondering what the Weasleys would say when he showed up with a bedroom set in tow. "But he never said where they live."
"Weasleys?" Barchoke looked to the Litigator. "Er– Um. The name sounds familiar but I don't recall any Account Manager with that folio."
"Probably because there isn't one," Lichfield replied. "I think I know the family he's talking about, they keep popping up on the minimum balance list."
"Oh, that one. Never dealt with them in person."
Harry felt rather embarrassed. He knew Ron's family were poor but hadn't meant to advertise the fact.
"Don't we have a Weasley somewhere," the goblin asked, "or was that a Wesley?"
"No, you're right. There is a Weasley stationed overseas somewhere," Lichfield confirmed. "I heard some of the secretaries talk about him today when he came in for his yearly performance review. Apparently, he's dreamy," he said wryly. "I slipped out of the office before anyone could ask me to run him through Legals. Want me to have him recalled if he's not here?"
"No, no," Barchoke said with a wave. "That'd raise far too much fuss. Just grab him if you see him."
"It's not going to get him into any trouble, is it?" Harry asked, remembering the last time goblins grabbed anyone around him.
"We're not going to drag him down the hall, if that's what you mean," Lichfield said with a smirk.
"You know, this may work in our favor," the goblin continued, his finger back to his lip in thought. "If we can manage to change this informal invite into a formal rental agreement–"
"First things first," Lester said.
"Oh yes," the goblin said. "You just sign the bottom. Lester can fill out the rest when he goes to find these Weasels."
"Weasleys," Harry corrected.
"Right," the goblin said as Harry signed the form. "Now what we need for you going forward–," the goblin told him, "–is some sort of rental agreement, at least until your next birthday–"
"That can wait," Lichfield said forcefully.
"But it sets up the legal groundwork to counter the youth issue!" cried the exasperated goblin.
"–And it can wait," the Litigator repeated. "The Account Seal comes first since it's the most important. It should have been done the moment I stepped inside this office but some pestilential pixie started pelting me with questions."
Harry looked at him, remembering all the questions he had asked him.
"Not you," Lichfield said, noticing his concern. "Him," he gestured with his thumb. "And if the legal beagle hadn't run off without me I would've had you sign it before signing those other forms."
"Shouldn't that be eagle?" Harry corrected.
"No," Lichfield said with a look to Barchoke. "Because he's small, like a beagle."
The beagle was not amused.
"Then a great stump like you should keep an eye on him," Harry said with a grin. "You know what dogs are like when it comes to trees."
"Ha!" Lichfield cried as Barchoke let off a short round of machine gun like bursts of laughter.
"Stumpy's right," the goblin said. "The Seal should come first."
"So that's a thing now?" Lichfield asked.
"It's better than beagle," Barchoke scorned.
"Would you prefer doxie?"
"I'd prefer to get you all out of my office so I can wonder how this all went so horribly wrong," Barchoke huffed quickly.
"So what does a Seal do?" Harry asked before his brain caught up and he regretted the question.
"ItlockstheAccount," Barchoke blurted out quickly, before Lichfield could have a field day.
Lichfield eyed them both with a smirk.
"A Seal locks things down so nothing can be done without a bit of blood and magic from you."
"My blood?"
"It's the safest way to do things," Lichfield said offhandedly. "Polyjuice Potion can give a person someone else's appearance, but that just alters their body, it can't alter their blood. The same is true for magic. Someone could cast charms on themselves to make everyone think they're you, but everyone's magic registers differently."
"So it's like a fingerprint?" Harry said, catching on to what he meant.
"Huh," Lichfield grunted, staring down at his thumb. "I never thought they might be different."
"So if a person's blood and magic doesn't match mine then–"
"Then nothing happens," Lichfield continued. "The tellers can't honor cheques, distribute funds, no contracts can be entered into – nothing. We use both because getting one might be possible, getting both would be brobdingnagian."
Harry looked at Barchoke.
"A really really really really really really really big thing to do," the goblin explained.
"And since this guardian signs everything magically–," Harry said, catching on to where he was going.
"Then none of his orders will be any good," Lichfield finished for him. "There'll be silence from our end so they'll have to come here to figure out why it's not being followed."
"Any currently ongoing contracts should already be put on hold while our Audit is underway," Barchoke explained. "Only those made before Gropegold will be honored, but even those will be scrutinized. Anyone with a genuine lease with you should be covered though."
"What about the people he forced off–," Harry eyed Lichfield warily, "–the land? Can they come back?" he asked, the lack of a poke saying he had picked an appropriate article.
"Nothing formal can be set up with them," the Litigator explained, putting his poking finger away. "Not until we resolve the guardianship issue and you can stand on your own. But once the Account's been Sealed whoever it is won't be able to force them off again. Even if they get the Ministry involved we can object and mire the whole thing down until the whole issue is resolved. We won't be able to collect rents or anything like that, but what's a few Canutes compared to the good it'll do us?"
"Canutes? I thought it was called a knut," Harry said, wondering if he'd been saying it wrong.
"It is called a knut," the goblin said. "This nut's the only nut I know to call a knut Canute."
"Good one," Lichfield nodded appreciatively.
"He's not wrong," Barchoke explained. "He only seems wrong because everyone else stopped pronouncing it that way around the turn of the last millennium."
"It rhymes better," the old wizard said with a shrug. "Few Canutes, few Canutes, few Canutes."
"He's a few Can-idiot," Barchoke said to Harry.
"Better," Lichfield pointed at his little friend. "I like that."
He turned to Harry.
"Putting the people back on the land is a good move, it shows that you have your own ideas about what to do with it, and it shows the people are willing to accept you, no matter how old you are. It's what Charlus would've done," Lichfield said thoughtfully. "And it should help get the Wizengamot to see you as something other than a little kid. If we could follow that up with a rental agreement–"
Suddenly Lichfield shot Barchoke a look.
"You've gotten me distracted," he said gruffly. "Don't you go blaming me if this conversation keeps bouncing around. We were talking about the Seal."
"Yes, yes," the goblin said, rooting through his desk again before taking out a rather thick type of paper Harry had never seen before.
Harry felt the texture of it. It certainly felt different. He didn't know if it was because of the magic it must contain or because–
"It's vellum," Lichfield said. "It holds the blood better, and it makes the magical signature easier to differentiate."
Barchoke slid the ink and quill set away from Harry.
"Won't I need that?" he asked.
"First you'll need this," the goblin said as he handed over a rather sharp looking black quill.
"What is it?" Harry asked cautiously.
"It's a Blood Quill," the old warlock said. "And it's just what it sounds like. It writes with your own blood rather than any ink. Watch out though, it's painful."
"It should be painful," the Overseer pronounced. "It makes people think. And you shouldn't be complaining, in the old days we used to make you write the whole thing in blood."
"So how much do I have to write?" Harry asked.
"Some people use an X, though most people use a small slash," the Litigator explained. "That fool Lockhart signed his full name, complete with curlicues, with it for his last book deal," he told the Overseer.
"Did he cry for his mommy afterwards?" Barchoke smirked.
"Pretty much."
Harry steeled himself before making a small diagonal slash that looked more like a check mark. An instant after he was done the back of his right hand stung. Looking at it he saw the quill had somehow cut into his skin like a scalpel – yet even as he stared at the shining cut, the skin healed over again, leaving the place where it had been slightly redder than before but quite smooth.
"Now you see why people should think before signing anything," the Overseer grinned.
"I'll take that," Lichfield said, plucking the Blood Quill out of his hands before it could touch anything else. He then conjured a glass of water and stuck the quill inside it. "It makes sure there are no traces," he said, noting the look on Harry's face. "Never hurts to be vigilant."
"Now," the goblin said, scooting the ink and quill set back to him. "You can use this. All you have to do is write, 'I, Harold James Potter–,' or you can use 'Harry' if that's how you'd like to think of yourself, it doesn't make a difference.'–Do hereby Seal my Account with blood and magic.'"
'Seems simple enough,' Harry thought to himself as he took up the quill and started to write. 'I,–' Simple or not, that one letter was as far as he got before he had to stop. 'Am I a Harry or a Harold?' he wondered.
He had always been a Harry. Everyone called him Harry. He liked being Harry, Harry thought to himself; making a list of for both sides. His mother had named him Harold though, had insisted on it. 'But it didn't matter to her,' he reminded himself. 'Her dad was a Harry too.' They had used both, he was forced to conclude, so how was he to decide?
'Harry sounds too young,' a part of him thought.
'But Harold sounds so old,' the other side said.
'If age is an issue,' he told them both, 'then it's better for them to think that I'm older.'
That part of him had a very good point.
'Your friends won't want to hang out with stuffy old Harold,' the Harry part of him said.
'Your friends will like you either way,' the Harold part countered. 'Hermione might actually think Harold is more mature.'
No other part of him had thought of that at all. The Harry side of him actually seemed to blush.
'Harold gets his work done. Harold thinks for the future. Harold handles his own Account and wins against the guardian,' the Harold side pushed.
'Harry likes Quidditch. Harry likes chess with Ron. Harry likes sneaking out at night and running around the castle,' the Harry side reminded him.
How does he decide? 'I like them both!'
"What's wrong?" the Overseer asked, noting he hadn't moved in a while. "Did you make a spot?" Barchoke peered over his desk at the vellum.
Lichfield seemed to catch on to the dilemma.
"You might want to consider the goblin approach," he said.
The Overseer looked at him wondering if he should be offended.
"In public, goblins have the utmost professionalism,–" Lichfield explained as an approving smile started on the Overseer's lips. "–But once you're in private,–" he said as the goblin scrutinized him again, "–and once a suitable rapport develops," he clarified, "then the professional wall can come down and you can relate to them like normal human beings."
Barchoke seemed to ponder that last bit.
"So you're saying I can be Harry to my friends and Harold to everyone else."
"It's about the same as saying Harry Potter or Mr. Potter," Lichfield said. "It all depends on mood and context, and how you want them to think of you."
"I gathered that part," he said.
"We do do that, don't we?" Barchoke remarked. "I never realized that before."
"It's the benefits of an outsider's perspective," Lichfield remarked.
"No wonder I was like that when we first came in here," Barchoke remarked to himself.
"What were you like before I got here?" Lester asked.
"I don't want you to make fun of me," the goblin said.
"I always make fun of you–."
Harry tuned them out and continued to write.
'I, Harold James Potter, do hereby Seal my Account with blood and magic.'
Harry sat back and looked at the vellum. Nothing happened. Part of him had been expecting fireworks, or trumpets, or for it to be whisked away in a puff of smoke – instead all he heard was–
"I'm lucky you don't carry me down the hall wearing a bonnet!"
"What?" Harry asked.
For the first time today both adults blushed. They had obviously forgotten he was there.
"Nothing, nothing," Barchoke said with a wave as he tried to put that particular outburst behind him. "Now you seal it with magic."
"But I can't do that," Harry said. "I thought you did. I can't do magic outside of Hogwarts."
The Overseer looked at Lichfield like Harry had just said he wanted to grow up to be the dancing purple dinosaur.
"There was an anti-muggle panic back in the late 40's. Everyone went mad thinking they'd drop Atopic Bombs on us."
"You mean atomic bombs?" Harry corrected.
"Why, what do they do?" Lichfield asked evenly.
"They blow up a city the size of London in about half a second."
Barchoke and the Litigator shared a look, as if wondering why anyone would be mad enough to make such a thing in the first place.
"And here was me wondering what the big deal was about a little bit of skin rash," Lichfield deadpanned. "Now I'm glad they passed those laws. Not that you could really enforce them."
Barchoke still looked lost, anything not banking related obviously not his forte.
"They set up a Trace program and a magical detection web," the warlock said. "The I.C.W. had been pushing hard for it for years. Then they tagged every underage witch and wizard up and down the country. Now they tag kids when they're born in our world or when they first use magic in theirs."
"I don't remember that happening," Harry said.
"Maybe because you were born in our world," Lichfield reminded him. "If you were born in on the muggle side they may have done it while you were at school, or they could have just Obliviated you, I suppose. They would've approached your family around then, to let them know about the wizarding world and what to expect in the future. The idea was to give the parents several years to get used to the idea of their kids being magical before telling the kids themselves."
"So this Trace actively stops him from doing magic?" Barchoke asked.
"No, it's just a convoluted baby minder," Lichfield continued. "Any magic goes off around him while he's underage and the Ministry will be made aware of it. If he's a Hogwarts student and not in a recognized wizarding area they'll assume he did it and send him a warning."
"So what's the hold up?" Barchoke asked. "He's in Gringotts Bank, in the middle of Diagon Alley, with a goblin and a wizard with one foot in the grave. Even if they thought it iffy there's more than enough reasonable doubt to get him out of any official sanction. You've done magic around him so if they were going to come after him they'd be beating the door down already!"
"Exactly," Lichfield agreed. "You're fine, Harry. Don't worry. There should be an exception for cases like this for it to square with the older banking laws, but even if there's not, this would just serve as a case to establish it anyway. As long as there are other wizarding people around you, especially if one's of age, or if you're in a wizarding home for example, then you're in the clear. They tell you you can't do it but what they mean is they don't want you to."
"Did you just tell him it's fine to do something illegal?" the Overseer asked, eyes momentarily hardening.
"I merely mentioned to my client an interesting tidbit of legal trivia about the topic at hand," Lichfield replied formally. Barchoke seemed to accept that.
"Just don't go spreading it around," Lichfield continued. "Once it gets out, everyone will use it and the Ministry will have to come up with something that's an even bigger infringement on your personal liberties. Something which might actually work. As it is, it's really only useful for keeping muggleborns from practicing and getting a leg up on everyone else."
Thoughts of Hermione had Harry thinking this was completely unfair.
"And why do they pick on muggleborns?"
"Because they have this idea that they're the ones most likely to use muggle technology to destroy them all if they get miffed about all the persecution they have to deal with," the Litigator said evenly. "It only takes one."
"You know a lot about the Ministry," he said to the Litigator.
"And you don't miss much," the Litigator replied.
And with that Harry realized just how reserved the warlock had been during the exchange. Besides the bit about skin rash, which he supposed could've been genuine, he hadn't cracked a joke the entire time. Lichfield had obviously lowered his 'professional wall' around Harry but with Harold it's a completely different situation. He wondered how this dynamic could've gotten so complicated and why anyone would want to work for Gringotts if this was what you had to go through on a daily basis.
"So," Barchoke said, filling the uncomfortable silence. "Sealing with magic... Let's go," he finished in a falsely chipper tone.
"You take out your wand and press it to the vellum," the Litigator said, still in his somber mood. "Preferably in line with what you wrote before and the blood. Then you… push a bit of your magic out. That's the only way I know how to describe it. Don't try to cast a spell, just push while thinking about what you wrote there. You'll get it."
Harry did as Lichfield said but didn't really know how to push. When he was finally ready to give up and just wanted the whole Sealing thing over with he felt this… pulse. The only thing he had to compare it to was when he first held his wand in Ollivander's a year ago.
He assumed he'd done it correctly since Lichfield quickly plucked the Blood Quill out of the water, made his scratch, signed his name normally, and did the same next to it before sliding it to Barchoke. The goblin repeated the process, but since he didn't have a wand he used a licked thumb instead. After he was done the goblin took out some sort of stamp and cried, "Sealed!" before slamming it down on the vellum and it disappeared in a puff of smoke.
"You realize that was supposed to be filed after those other two forms, right?" Lichfield reminded the goblin.
"Damn," Barchoke said. "That'll be another form."
"I'll do it later when I file these others and contact the Weasleys," Lichfield said with a wave. "It's on the list. What's next?"
"If this Trace can detect magic around me, why didn't it pick up what a house-elf did last night?" Harry asked, figuring no more damage could be done to Lichfield's mood and this would probably be the only way to bring up why he had wanted to be here in the first place.
"A house-elf? Last night?" the Overseer asked. "I don't think I want to hear this," the goblin said quickly before covering his ears and beginning to hum.
Harry looked to Lichfield to fill him in.
"Overseers are required by law to report any illegal activity; Account Managers aren't. He might be acting as your Account Manager right now but if he hears about a breach by someone else he'll have to report it, and a house-elf in a muggle residence doing magic is certainly that. We're only skirting by the whole bank fraud issue by him saying it's a potential civil matter, but that won't hold for long."
"And what about Litigators?" Harry asked.
"We don't care. It's our job to get you out of trouble you get yourself into and get done what you want to get done, and I'm your litigator."
Harry briefly told Lichfield how Dobby had appeared and why he wanted to buy him.
"If it was just about acquiring a house-elf," Lichfield said. "I've got one I'd bloody give you. She's way too young and energetic for me; makes me feel old. Buying a specific elf though–"
"Is it possible to find this family?"
"Should be possible," Lichfield nodded. "I know someone in Dodgy Deals, he owes me a favor. Anyone who treats a house-elf like that will be up to their neck in them. I'll imply it's for me, that I'm buying Mipsy a mate and she just really liked this Dobby of yours."
Harry wished Lichfield would go back to being the joking guy he was when he came in but couldn't think of what he could do to make it happen.
"He didn't mention anything specific about what this threat is supposed to be?" Lichfield asked.
"No, just that terrible things will happen," Harry explained. "I'm hoping once I buy him he'll be able to tell me more."
"It might work," Lichfield nodded. "Then again if his family is involved he might not be able to tell you even then. Even if he hated his family and they hated him, it's just the way house-elves work. That family needs their secrets kept and house-elves need Need. I guess it's just a difference between who needs that information more: you, or them. House-elves are just different that way. I take it you're not wanting to be pulled out of school, just to be safe?"
He didn't wait for Harry to respond.
"I didn't think so. I guess we can only hope he misunderstood the severity of the threat and hope we get this guardian thing taken care of before you get yourself killed or it'll make everything we've done here today irrelevant."
"What do you mean?" Harry asked.
"Well, with you dead, your line gone," Lichfield explained, "and you being too young to name an inheritor, the guardian becomes only one with a viable claim. It won't matter then they had abandoned you, or stole from you, the Ministry will just give everything over to them."
"Harry Potter must stay where he is safe!" Dobby's voice cried again in his mind.
"So you're saying that this guardian has reason to kill me?"
"I'm saying it's a theory. But yes, this guardian has plenty of golden reasons to kill you, especially now you know what they've been up to."
"And all I wanted to do was be nice to a house-elf," Harry said stupefied.
"Yeah, they'll make you want to. It's hard not to like them, even the old crusty ones. It sounds condescending but they're really a lot like small children – only with a lot of power behind them and an eagerness to please."
Harry wanted to say something in Dobby's defense, but really couldn't since he had been treating him the same way without even realizing it. Even Cadogan did it. 'Maybe it's their tiny bodies that makes us treat them like children,' Harry thought. 'That way we'd look after them.' It'd certainly explain why the word 'family' was repeated so often when dealing with them.
"I'd ask how much you wanted to spend," Lichfield continued, "but since you've got no real idea about the size of your own funds–"
"I'll leave that up to you," Harry said. "You just find him and get them to sell. He's the whole reason I'm here in the first place so no matter what it costs he's worth twice that much."
Lichfield looked over at the Overseer.
"You want me to poke him or do you want to wait until he finishes?" Lichfield said with a slight smirk.
By this time Barchoke had switched to some kind of harsh-sounding music for his humming Harry was sure must be goblin in origin.
"Poke him," Harry said with a smile.
A quick prick by a gnarled poking finger soon got the goblin's attention.
"Ow! Sorry about that, Mr. Potter," the goblin said, rubbing his side. "Overseers are required by law–"
"I told him," Lichfield interrupted. "Final details?"
"Right, right. Now the Seal's in place all that's left is the Key," the Overseer said.
"You have your Key," Lichfield asked, "or is it in your stuff back at the muggles?"
"Er– neither," Harry said. "I don't have a key."
Lichfield looked at the Overseer, the Overseer looked at his files.
"It says here your Key was presented to a Teller on July 31st of last year to be inspected before withdrawal, and that's corroborated by the report filed by the cart operator who led you to your vault and opened the door," the Overseer reported. "Are you saying these reports are in error?"
"Er– No, it was there. It's just–," suddenly a really uncomfortable thought occurred to him. Hagrid was the one who had given his Key to the Teller. But how did he get it? Suddenly Harry heard Hagrid's voice echo in his mind. "An I've also got a letter here from Professor Dumbledore," Hagrid said importantly, throwing out his chest. "It's about the You-Know-What in vault seven hundred and thirteen..."
Hagrid coming to see him had been "Hogwarts business," or so he'd told the bartender at the Leaky Cauldron. So had retrieving the Sorcerer's Stone from vault seven hundred and thirteen. To get his money out of his vault Hagrid would've had to have his Key, but no one besides the guardian could have had it to give him. 'And wasn't Hagrid always going on about how great Dumbledore was?' Harry asked himself. 'He'd do anything for the old man without asking why.'
And then Hermione's voice sprang to mind, "We were dashing up to the owlery to contact Dumbledore when we met him in the entrance hall – he already knew – he just said 'Harry's gone after him, hasn't he?' and hurtled off to the third floor."
And then she was replaced by Ron, "D'you think he meant for you to do it? Sending you your father's Cloak and everything?"
Harry's mind bounced back to that Christmas, "Your father left this in my possession before he died–"
"Well," Hermione exploded back into his mind again. "If he did – I mean to say – that's terrible – you could have been killed."
'But Dumbledore had rushed to help me. He saved me, didn't he?' Harry asked himself.
'We can't know that,' the Harold side of him said. 'Quirrell could have already been dead by the time he got there. We were unconscious, so how would we know the difference? He could have just taken credit for it.'
'Then why didn't he just kill us then?' the Harry side asked.
'Maybe he doesn't want to get his hands dirty. But if horrible things just happen around us...'
No part of him liked where this was going. Especially since he was now talking to himself in his own head.
"What will happen to them?" Harry asked the others. "The people around the guardian. The ones who knew about the Dursleys and didn't think anything of it. I can't think they'd betray me like that, no matter what his motives might be," Harry said scornfully, unable to bring himself to say the name.
"I can't see charges sticking against people who didn't know any better even if you wanted to make them," Barchoke said. "We all made the same mistake, so there's plenty of blame to go around. It's the money we're going after and this guardian is the one who took it. Him and the ones he gave money to, they're the ones Gringotts will be holding liable for the debt."
"You know who he is," Lichfield said. "You know who has the Key." He hadn't said it like a question.
"I want to see what happened to the last Account Manager," the Harry who was Harold said. "The one before Gropegold." He looked Lichfield in the eye and didn't say it like a request.
.o0O0o.
AN: The HP series has always been very Harry-centric, as if he were the center of the universe and the only person able to do anything to change it; it is this very failing of Rowling's world I'm striving to combat by treating it in this story as a multi-polar world. Every character – no matter how small – is going to be treated as a real, independent person with their own goals, drives, opinions, and backstory. Likewise they're going to react and do what they think they should do; not be enslaved to any preconceived 'plot' demanding they suddenly be stupid for no reason.
In Chapter 6 you'll get the first taste of this as the point of view starts splitting off to show parts of the world as a different character sees it. This has the effect though of slowing down the passage of time in the story as the roughly 20 POV characters have to react accordingly (though thankfully not all at once). The reason this individuality and shifting POV is such a core part of the story is that they allow me to show parts of the world Harry would never see or influence. They allow me to establish them, to make sense of them, to show how they function, and then to show how they – and the characters – start to shift in response to the changes in other areas and thereby get the world as a whole to change.
And while there's been times when I've felt frustrated reading a fanfic when the writer seemed to deviate and go off on tangents for too long when I simply wanted the story to get back to Harry, I feel like I have to solidly ground things in how things are in this world because my philosophy is that this is the world that Rowling built. On its surface it may be ahistorical, nonsensical, and fly in the face of everything we know about how a society would function, but that doesn't give me the right to unilaterally change things in a sentence that she spent books putting into place. If I'm going to get things to change (and no doubt I am), I first have to establish how things are and show the steps which lead to it changing. Only then can I take a more hands off and distant approach when furthering that change.
On a similar note, I'm glad of the reception I've gotten with my heavily restricted version of the "Harry goes to Gringotts" trope. Thanks for being open to something new and, as always–
Thanks for reading.