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mickume
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alt_potterverse

Dataset card Data Studio Files
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"Do you know where a goblin’s name comes from?" Awlthrow asked.
"I’m afraid not," Harry said.
"Goblins are not given a name when they’re born," Awlthrow said. "When I was young, I was simply called "seventh child of Polepull and Stoneshield’. Each goblin earns a name the day they become a warrior, and they become a warrior by defeating another warrior in combat. And only warriors are taught to use weapons, so w...
"So you defeated a warrior by...throwing an awl?"
"Yes," the goblin said. "It was, oh, thirty years ago now. Blazearm—though she had not yet earned her name—and I were both apprentices in the same workshop, and I was courting her. She was interested, but we were both still children, so our marriage would have been forbidden. One day, a warrior came into the workshop a...
"Erm, I bet it was," Harry said.
"But enough nostalgia," Awlthrow said. "To business!"
The next half hour was spent discussing the particulars while Awlthrow scribbled down notes. "I will, of course, select some enchantments as I forge these," he said, "but one in particular that I could add is a guidance magic used on some goblin arrows. It would ensure that they always found the heart of your target."
"What if you don’t want to aim for the heart?" Harry asked.
"That’s why I’m asking."
"No thanks," Harry said.
Then they started haggling on price. After another half hour, they had reached a satisfactory conclusion.
"So, that will be two hundred Galleons for a sale under goblin law of three knives and associated sheaths and other hardware to a Mister Harry James Potter, for delivery before you return to Hogwarts on the Fifth of January."
"Actually, for legal reasons I need it to be sold to House Potter," Harry said.
"Oh," Awlthrow said. "In that case, it will need to be two thousand Galleons."
"What? Why?" Harry asked.
"Goblin-made objects are sold only for the lifetime of the buyer; at the end of that time, the object returns to the craftsgoblin or their heirs. When an object is sold to a line, that line is expected to live longer than a single person, and so the price is ten times higher."
"Okay," Harry said, "five times higher."
Awlthrow shook his head. "I’ve heard your name many times in the last six months, Harry Potter. Most wizards consider us either beneath their contempt, or too terrifying to risk disobeying. Many both at the same time. You do neither; you honor my people with your willingness to meet us in economic battle."
Harry tried very hard to look like he’d been meaning to do that all along.
"But the multiplier is set down in the Great Tables of Actuary, the book written by Gringott the Great himself. It is based on the expected longevity of a wizarding line, and it cannot be changed."
"I understand," Harry said gravely. "I did not mean to disrespect your culture." After a moment’s thought, he said, "On the other hand...is there a different rate when the house is at risk of extinction?"
Awlthrow laughed.
A little while later, Harry was walking through the entrance to Gringotts, stuffing his Invisibility Cloak back into his mokeskin pouch, when he heard the voice of the last person he wanted to run into.
"Honestly, Hermione, I don’t know how you manage to spend so much on books," Lance Granger said as he scooped Galleons off a teller’s counter into a moneybag.
Harry slipped into "don’t notice me" posture and tried to walk by them.
"Well," Hermione said from behind a stack of books that reached her nose, "it’s partly because you want your own copy of almost everything, so you can "at least get a feel for the theory’"—she spotted Harry at this moment, and her eyes widened—"eep!"
"What is it?" Lance said, and started to turn.
Hermione hesitated only a split second before dropping the entire stack. Books scattered across the floor. "I’m sorry! My hand slipped!"
Lance stooped to start picking up the books. "Not to worry," he said. "They all look fine. Sorry, Mister Forkthrough, this won’t take a moment—"
Harry gave Hermione a little wave, and Hermione nodded to him before joining her father on the floor. Then Harry hurried to the teller farthest from the Grangers and asked to see Inkeye again.
"I hope your business went well," Inkeye said, steering Harry through a maze of hallways.
"It did," Harry answered, trying not to imagine how Inkeye might have earned his name. "Oh, I have another request for you—if a person named R.J. Lupin sends me anything, I want to receive it immediately. And could you send me anything from him that’s currently in my postal vault?"
"For a price," Inkeye said.
"Naturally," Harry murmured.
They haggled as they walked, and had just settled on a figure when they entered the waiting room.
It was low and dim and windowless. In a corner, three goblins were arguing in a language Harry didn’t understand—Gobbledygook, presumably. Near the middle of the room, a witch and wizard in threadbare robes talked in low tones. Jane Granger sat beneath a flaming torch; she looked up at their entrance and snapped her bo...
"Harry!" she said. "Did it go alright?"
"Yeah," Harry said, "not a problem."
"You’re not hurt?"
Harry shook his head. "Not a scratch now. Magical healing is amazing."
"Alright. Let’s go run your errand, and then we can meet my new library for lunch."
"Wake up, Harry!" he heard as a person-shaped weight landed on top of him. "It’s—"
Harry’s eyes opened to find Hermione’s surprised face above him, his F-S Fighting Knife at her throat. They stared at each other for a moment.
"Erm, sorry," Harry said, lowering the knife. "You startled me."
"I understand," Hermione said, and Harry got the impression she understood more than he realized. "Now get up! It’s Christmas!"
A few minutes later, Harry was downstairs, and so were Lance and Jane. From their disheveled hair and clothes, he suspected they’d received much the same awakening he had.
Harry found the pile of Weasley gifts beneath the tree—and, to his surprise, a few others. Ron Weasley—or rather, his older brothers on Ron’s behalf—had given him a wizard’s chess set. Fred and George, apparently unable to avoid a joke, gave him an elaborately-wrapped, carefully-folded old sheet of blank parchment. Eve...
That left three packages. The first was from R.J. Lupin; Harry supposed the goblins must have started forwarding his post. Within was a box with two wands. One was a little shorter than his, made of a light wood—
"—ten and a quarter inches long, swishy, made of willow—"
—and the other was nearly the size of his own wand, made of a dark reddish wood—
"—a mahogany wand. Eleven inches. Pliable."
My parents’ wands, Harry realized, even as he unfolded the note tucked between them. It explained that, now that Harry was over eleven, Lupin was allowed to return these to him.
Harry carefully put away the box, resolving to write back to R.J. Lupin soon.
The second was from the Dursleys, and contained £100. Hermione’s parents were a little surprised at the amount.
"They often spend that sort of money on me at Christmas, but most of the usual amusements would be trouble at Hogwarts," he said.
"Of course," Lance Granger said. "Professor McGonagall warned us against giving Hermione a Walkman or games console to bring with her."
Harry left him to his misconception.
That left one last gift from Hermione. She watched him eagerly as he opened it, to find—
His parents’ picture.
It was the same one he’d had sitting on his nightstand at Hogwarts, the one that he now realized he hadn’t packed. Hermione had placed it in a silver frame. The left half—his mother’s half—was decorated with a motif of flowers and plants; the right half had tree trunks and, for some strange reason, stags. Both halves m...
"I’m sorry I borrowed your picture without asking," Hermione said. "When I wrote to Shutter Sorcery, they said they’d need it to properly link it to the frame."
"It’s alright," Harry said. "I love it. Thank you."
Hermione beamed.
At the bottom of the frame was a crest. He ran a finger over it—the shield was green and purple with a dragon—and read the motto at the bottom: Non melior amicus, non nequior inimicus. "Do you know what it means?" he asked her.
"No better friend, no worse enemy.’ It’s the Potter family motto. I looked it up in Nature’s Nobility."
"I’ll have to read that," Harry said.
"I wouldn’t bother; it’s mostly pureblood propaganda. You might be interested in your family tree, though. Did you know that Malfoy is your cousin?"
"I didn’t—and I think I liked it better that way," Harry said.
Hermione giggled as she tore into Harry’s package, finding a key. She looked at him curiously.
"Well, I noticed you seemed to like the library compartment in my trunk, so I asked them to give you one just like it—"
She launched herself at him, and a moment later, he was gasping for air.
"You don’t mind making three stops, do you, girl?"
Hedwig ruffled her feathers and clicked her beak in irritation.
"Of course not," Harry said, stroking her back. "You’re nothing if not professional about your deliveries."
He finished tying the letter to R.J. Lupin to one leg, then added another Hermione had asked him to post to the Ministry; finally, he picked up the shoebox he was sending to the Weasley twins, which he’d already wrapped and tied. Hedwig landed on the shoebox, grasping the twine in her claws.
"Stay safe and catch something tasty on the way back," Harry said.
Hedwig bumped her beak against his shoulder affectionately, then took off, swooping out the window and climbing as she turned towards the setting sun.
Harry watched her until she was a speck above the horizon; then he crossed the hall to Hermione’s room, where he’d left her reading on her bed. "Well, that’s sorted. What do you want to—" He stopped short as he caught a glimpse of her expression.
She was furious.
"Hermione? What’s wrong?"
"I think I figured out how Snape knew you had those knives," Hermione said. She picked up a book off her bed—it was Secrets and Lies, the book she’d borrowed from Harry—and shoved it at him. "Here, look at this."
Harry looked at the page, which seemed to be the beginning of the introduction, and as he read, his blood went cold in his veins:
When most wizards think of battle, they think of curses and jinxes, of shields and siege spells. Yet few have even heard of the magic that has won or lost many a war: The art of Legilimency. With nothing more than eye contact, a Legilimens can steal secrets from the minds of his enemies or twist their thoughts with lie...
This made a truly disturbing amount of sense. Snape didn’t have to see into the mokeskin pouch to know what was in it; he had seen it in Harry’s own mind. And he had made eye contact with Harry that night in the girls’ toilet, hadn’t he?
"Do we have any other evidence, though?"
"I think so," Hermione said, pointing to a passage in the book she was reading. "Remember what you told me about Snape—that your political book had said Dumbledore claimed he spied on Voldemort?"
"Well, I remembered something from The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts. Take a look."
Harry leaned over her shoulder to read a passage she was pointing at:
And yet You-Know-Who’s prodigious power was not his most threatening attribute. His vicious cruelty, his willingness to steep himself in the darkest of magics, his mastery of obscure arts from Arithmancy to Legilimency, and perhaps above all, his ability to attract and organize dangerous allies made him the deadliest w...
"Voldemort was a Legilimens. How would you spy on a man who could read your thoughts?" Hermione asked rhetorically. "You’d have to be trained in Occlumency, the art of shielding your mind from others. And a little later in that introduction, it says that they’re usually taught together."
Harry rubbed his forehead. Professor Snape, the man who seemingly loathed him even more than Uncle Vernon, the man who could torment him with impunity, could also pluck the thoughts right out of his head. This was unacceptable.
What could they do?
Harry’s eyes fell back on the introduction to Secrets and Lies.
With this book, you can not only learn about this secretive magic—you can also learn how to avoid it, how to block it, and even how to wield it yourself.
Harry looked up to Hermione. "We’ll have to learn this stuff."
"I know," Hermione said. "I’ll get started right away."
Legilimency, it turned out, had its limits.
A Legilimens could not simply stroll through your mind, taking whatever he pleased; he could only affect your train of thought, whatever was at the forefront of your mind. He could see what you were currently thinking about, and could even alter it, but everything else was inaccessible.
But most crucially, it turned out that most Legilimens needed eye contact to enter your mind at all.