Saturday, June 26, 1993
The addition of bicycles and brooms made the explorations of the “estate” within the trunk far easier. Over the previous time compressions, they had been limited by how far they could walk in a couple of hours and had limited their explorations to the Flower Garden and what they now knew was a small portion of the Fruit Gardens. They knew there were roads of a sort on the Estate. These were paved for wheeled vehicles of some sort but, until the bicycles, there had not been any such things. Their walked had been across the grass and such that covered the earth in the Fruit Gardens where there were no vines or berry bushes. Now, they had taken to the roads It was on their first day with the bicycles that they had first used the paved roads and it was along just such a road that they discovered Lake Hannah.
In the evenings, Hermione had taken to drawing a map of sorts now that they were able to move about much more easily. She conceded it was not to scale, although she tried to approximate such things. The first thing she drew was a rectangle that represented the House itself. The House did have an exterior, although they all knew it was not a true representation of the floors on the inside. The Main Floor and Training Floor and possible the Ground Floor were the largest, and it was the largest of these that defined the exterior footprint. But the House’s exterior was uniform in size from Ground level (of which only the side facing the Flower Garden was visible) to the upper most level which currently did not exist at all in the interior. They knew that some of the windows corresponded to the ones on the inside, but not all yet all the interior windows were on the exterior as well.
There were several roads throughout the Estate, some ran north to south (as they called it) and others east to west. “South” was the direction looking from the House out across the Flower Garden and the other directions were based off of that line. None of the roads were strait lines as they all curved around land features and landscaping. On Hermione’s map, they were unnamed for now. The North-South Roads were given odd numbers with Road 1 being the one furthest to the west and Road 11 being the furthest to the east. The East-West roads had even numbers with Road 2 being the furthest to the north and Road 12 the furthest to the South.
Road 1 ran from the northern wall of the trunk to the southern one and was generally within a half a mile or so of the western most wall. It passed through the full length of the Fruit Gardens and entered the western most portion of the Vegetable Gardens. Road two ran east from the westernmost wall and was between a half mile and mile of the northern wall. It passed through the width of the Fruit Garden and ended when it intersected the north-south Road 7 in the Magical Herb Garden. (As long as they stuck to the roads, they did not need and escort.) Road 7 began at the northern wall of the Magical Herb Garden and ran to the southern wall in the Vegetable Garden passing through the Herb and Spice Gardens and the tea plantation. Road 4 ran east from Road 1, it passed the very front of the House itself where there was a large door opening into the Entry Hall and continued east, across Road 7 and ended on the banks of the Great Lake which was where all the water in the trunk drained. Road three began at an intersection with Road 2 and ended when it intersected Road 12 in the far south. This road passed Hermione’s Lake and the eastern part of Lake Hannah and it was on this road that the lake had been found. Roads 4, 5 and 6 were the shortest roads. Both Roads 4 and 6 were entirely within the Herb and Spice Gardens beginning in the West from Road 7 and ending in the East at Road 11. Road 5 ran south from just beyond the flower Garden and all the way to the southern wall entirely within the Vegetable Garden. Road 10 went from West to East from Road 3 in the Fruit Garden just east of Lake Hannah to Road 11. Roads 8 and 12 ran West to east from one side of the trunk to the other. Road 8 passed between Hermione’s Lake and Lake Hannah and crossed through the Fruit, Vegetable and Herb gardens at some point. Road 12 was entirely within the Vegetable Gardens. Finally, there was road 11 in the far west of the trunk. This ran north from the southern wall in the Vegetable Gardens and ended on the south shore of the Great Lake at the northern edge of the Herb and Spice Garden.
Aside from Harry and Hermione, in the afternoons after their swim, the other girls went off on their brooms to explore. Harry and Hermione spent those afternoons in the broad lawns of the Formal Garden north of the main House where Harry was teaching Hermione to fly her broom. Harry explained that brooms were not unlike bicycles or horses for that matter. Muggles were known to do crazy things on both, but that did not mean one had to. By the end of the week, Hermione was becoming far more comfortable on her touring broom.
The other girls continued their explorations from the air. While the roads helped them get around on the ground, most of the estate was off the roads altogether. There were walking trails, but thus far Hermione had not included many of them on her map. From the air, the girls discovered additional features of the land that were now on Hermione’s map and had names. There were two rivers that drained the estate into the Great Lake. The largest and longest, fed by streams and the other two lakes flowed out of the Fruit Garden, through the Vegetable Gardens and then turned North through the Herb Gardens and plantations draining most of the estate. They named this river the River Potter. The second large river was named Hermione’s River. It was in the north starting in the northwest portion of the Fruit Gardens and flowing into the Magical Herb Garden draining it as well before ending in the Great Lake. It got its name from the first to see it for it passed through the formal gardens. There was a third river which was a tributary of the River Potter and drained the Herb and Spice gardens in the west. It was named the River Daphne not because she was the first to see it, but because she discovered its most unique feature: a forty meter high waterfall plunging into a green gorge with a clear, warm pool at the bottom - a beautiful place for an outdoor swim and picnic. They were now known as Daphne’s Falls and Daphne’s Grotto. Luna discovered a tall hill in the West that bordered both the Vegetable Gardens and the Coffee Plantation in the Herb Gardens. Atop the hill was an oak tree and the hill - the highest point in the trunk - had a spectacular view of the estate. This was Luna’s Hill. Finally, Ginny discovered a mile and a half stretch of white water rapids where the River Potter plunged into a valley in the Herb Gardens. This was now called Ginny’s Drop.
The evenings after dinner had been spent in the Library. The “family” goal was to complete their summer assignments before the trip to France. None of them wanted that worry although Harry was certain that Hermione and maybe some of the others might revisit their work after the trip was over. Hannah finished her assignments the first evening. Ginny had not even begun hers before her trip to Gringotts and it was soon apparent that while she was very smart, her First Year had been a disaster. Everyone pitched in to help her through her assignments and now, they planned to use the summer to get her caught up to where she should have been had that Diary never consumed her life. Ginny finished her assignments on the final night in time compression.
Saturday morning found the new family dressed at breakfast as they were expecting guests for the day. As had been the case every such morning since the first of the girl’s arrived, this was also when they read their mail and perused that day’s copy of the Daily Prophet. For Harry, all his mail had been from Gringotts. Hermione had received two letters from her parents, the later arriving in this morning’s post. Luna received a letter from her father earlier and a letter from her Great-Grandparents this morning telling her that they would be visiting today and assuring her this would not be the last time. Hannah had also received a letter from her mother and Daphne had letters from her parents and all of her sisters, even little Michelle who was just beginning to learn to write.
Harry had another letter from Gringotts that he read without expression or comment.
“It isn’t about yesterday’s meeting, is it Harry?” Daphne asked.
“No, it’s not. I would’ve been surprised if it was,” Harry began.
“Yesterday’s meeting?” Ginny interrupted. “You mean when you…?”
“I had two meetings yesterday, Ginny. The one Daphne meant was before the one with you and your parents and, while I won’t lie and say I was upset with that Contract and to some extent your parents, I was a lot angrier when we met than I planned to be after the earlier meeting. It seems everyone’s trying to steal from my family,” Harry finished without elaboration.
“What’s that mean?” Ginny asked.
“We’ll tell you later,” Hermione replied. “You still intend to go through with it today? I mean you don’t have to, Harry.”
“I know. But I’d rather not leave this to later. Daphne says its good to have leverage and I really do want to see them squirm.”
“You’re not going alone, are you?”
“Well, none of you are coming,” Harry said. “But Dobby will be there. I’m not about to go in there without some kind of protection.”
“What did Dobby do, anyway?” Hannah asked having heard the tale.
“No idea and don’t really care,” Harry replied. “But he can do it again if need be and I won’t get in any trouble for it. In fact, when I spoke with him about this last night he seemed eager to do it again given the chance.”
“So what is the letter about?” Luna asked.
“Apparently, my parents left certain items of property with Gringotts before they went into hiding that were to be given to me upon my marriage if they weren’t around to do so themselves.”
“Wedding presents?” Hannah asked.
“Looks like it.”
“What items?” Hermione asked.
“Doesn’t say.”
“Not surprising,” Daphne said. “They’re probably valuable or something and passed outside of any Will, missing or not. Gringotts seldom says anything about what’s in their vaults in letters in case the letter should go astray. So when do they want you to get them?”
“I or my elf can pick them up anytime at my convenience,” Harry replied.
“You must’ve made an impression, Harry. The Goblins usually are not so accommodating. This impression could be useful down the road. So, are you going to wait?”
“Once I’m done with this morning’s business, I’ll probably send Dobby over to find out what this stuff is and bring it back if he can.”
“When are you going to deal with this?” Hermione asked.
“One thing ‘bout my relatives,” Harry said looking at his watch, “you can set a watch by them. It’s Saturday, so they’re probably having their usual later than weekday breakfast which they should be sitting down to in about twenty-five minutes.”
“We do have guests coming,” Hannah said.
“They’re due to start arriving ‘round ten,” Hannah added.
“And they are coming primarily to see you lot, not me,” Harry replied. “I’m sure they’d like to see me too, but if this business runs a little longer than expected, they should not be too offended. Still, if I’m not back when your guests arrive, please offer my apologies.”
Twenty minutes later Harry stood in his old room for only the third time this summer. He was last here the evening before for the rest of the world when Dobby brought Ginny and him back from Diagon Alley. Before that, it was the day he returned from Hogwarts, a week ago for the rest of the world.
“Nasty muggleses thinkings theys be smarts,” Dobby said. “Theys be lockings the lockings on other side of Great Harry Potter Sir’s door. They’s not be thinkings,” he added as he snapped his fingers. “Locks now bes brokens.”
“I thought you said you had wards up.”
“To keeps Muggleses outside. Locks bes outside and easy to breaks if theys needs breakings. But we’s nots be needing nasty locking door so Dobby nots be dealings with its before.”
Harry nodded. “They up here?” he asked.
“No, Harry Potter Sirs. They’s bes in theys tiny eating room.”
“Let’s go then,” Harry replied reaching for the door.
They had no sooner stepped out into the corridor when Harry heard his Uncle yelling. As it was not directed at him and no one seemed to be responding to it, Harry assumed he was yelling at someone on the phone. Sure enough, after a rude ending to the call, Harry heard the phone slam as his Uncle hung up and then another loud noise he did not recognize.
“BUGGER IT ALL!” his Uncle yelled. “Look what the damned Freaks made me do Petunia! I swear I take the cost of the wall and a new phone out of that Boy’s hide! I swear it! I will not have such unnaturalness in MY house! BOY! BOY? YOU GET DOWN HERE RIGHT NOW OR SO HELP ME I’LL GIVE YOU THE HIDING I’VE BEEN PROMISING ALL THESE YEARS!”
“Showtime, Dobby,” Harry whispered with a bit of a smirk, but he was afraid as well. Years of Uncle Vernon would do that to you.
Harry stepped into the kitchen, saw movement out of the corner of his eye and instinctively ducked as what he soon realized was a broken telephone flew by. Uncle Vernon must really be mad, Harry thought. When he was really mad at Harry, he threw things. To the best of Harry’s recollection, he had never once hit Harry that way. Harry always wondered whether it was because the man couldn’t throw straight, deliberately missed or whether it was because Harry always ducked. Harry was not about to not duck to determine whether the man was trying to hit him or not. He looked at his Uncle whose red face was turning more towards purple.
“DO YOU SEE WHAT YOU’VE DONE, BOY?” the man raged for a second and then seemed to go pale in the blink of an eye. Harry saw that Dobby was now standing between them. “I will not have this unnaturalness,” Vernon Dursley began in a much softer voice filled with fear and uncertainty. Harry’s Aunt Petunia looked like she was in the presence of Death himself.
“Dobby, please invite our hosts to have a seat,” Harry said as calmly as he could. Uncle Vernon was still intimidating from Harry’s point of view.
Aunt Petunia, who was standing before her chair sat immediately. Uncle Vernon was not so lucky has he was away from his usual seat, probably to answer the phone. Dobby’s invitation was swift and violent as the huge man was thrown far more accurately than was the telephone right into his chair and, it was immediately clear to Harry, he had been immobilized.
“YOU CAN’T DO THIS!” Vernon protested. “YOUR FREAKY WORLD WILL DO YOU FOR THAT! WE HEARD THE NOTE LAST YEAR!”
“Do you see a wand in my hand?” Harry began gaining a little confidence. “I didn’t do it. Dobby did. My Freaky world may be able to detect my… you know what. But Dobby’s a House Elf or did he not explain that last time? They can’t detect him unless he wants them to. That means he can do whatever he wants and nothing and no one will complain or come to help you or question me. Understand?”
Aunt Petunia nodded vigorously. Uncle Vernon merely glared at him.
“Now,” Harry continued, “why is it you wish to see me?”
“I will not have this unnaturalness, Boy! You hear me?”
“That explains nothing… ,” Harry began.
“And I WILL NOT have your cheek! I swear I’m going to hide you but good when I get the chance!”
“I think not,” Harry said. “Now, do you mind explaining why you’re yelling and why you threw the phone at me?”
“I DON’T HAVE TO EXPLAIN ANYTHING, FREAK!”
Harry shrugged. “Still… ,” he began.
“ONE OF YOUR FREAKY LITTLE FRIENDS RANG US UP, THAT’S WHAT’S HAPPENED! I WILL NOT STAND FOR THAT!”
Harry was tempted to remind his Uncle that he was not standing. He knew it was not Hermione who called. There was no telephone in the trunk and besides, she was there with him this whole time.
“I see,” Harry said as calmly as he could manage. “And how do you know this?”
“Because the idiot clearly didn’t know how to use the thing! He was yelling all the time as if he had to or I was deaf! Add to it he didn’t know what it was called. Called it a Felly something…”
“Did he leave a message?”
“Don’t give me your cheek, Boy! And I’m not your bloody message taker!”
“A name, perhaps?”
“Ron something. It was something Freaky. I won’t have this.”
So Ron had tried to call him. Harry wondered why. But that was for later. “I’ll deal with this later, Uncle Vernon.”
“You’ll deal with this unnaturalness now, Boy!”
“I see,” Harry said in as Snape-ish a manner as he could muster under the circumstances. “You assume I came down here because you called? Interesting. And you are mistaken in that. I have other business with you and Aunt Petunia at this time and this telephone nonsense is not part of it. I will deal with that later,” he added somewhat forcefully.
“What business?” his relatives asked in unison.
Harry sat at the table placing a thick file folder in front of him. He would not have done so had Dobby not taken care of his Uncle and Aunt.
“We didn’t invite you to sit, Boy! And if you think you’re going to get any of this, you’re mistaken!”
“I just had a very nice and filling breakfast with some truly pleasant company, thank you very much. I’m really not hungry - certainly not for what you call ‘breakfast’,” Harry added looking at the food. “As for sitting, I didn’t ask for an invitation, did I?”
“Pleasant company?” Vernon began. “If I find out there’s freaks in MY House… ! That and your cheek will be the end of you!”
“I think not,” Harry said. “What you think and what you want are none of my concern, Uncle, and I use that term loosely seeing as you’re barely human much less polite…”
“Why you little…”
“SILENCE!” Harry said and with that and a snap of Dobby’s fingers, Vernon Dursley could not speak. He could barely even open his mouth. “For as long as I can remember you and your wife were all about being proper. All an act, isn’t it? Grew up in the gutter, didn’t you? Sounds like you did. Before I begin, let me tell you something Dursley! My name and my title is not Freak or Boy and never have been! That stops now! You may not call me Harry, certainly not in that tone and if you choose ‘Potter,’ I expect a proper title before it. In my case, it’s Lord Potter and Milord or Your Grace otherwise. Am I clear?”
He didn’t expect a reaction beyond the glare he got from his Uncle. His Aunt, however, was not silenced. “What are you on about?” she asked.
“As the last Potter and sole heir to the Potter Estates, I am an Earl,” Harry said. “Actually, I have four Earldoms and a Baronetcy, but only two of those are recognized as part of the modern Peerage: Hereford and Finchley. I’ve been told that the College of Heralds at Windsor Castle can confirm this and maybe I’ll look into it later this summer. I’ve had an interesting week, if you must know. Spent a fair amount of time with my family estates' Accounts Manager, Solicitors and Accountants going over a variety of things including this bit; none of which I was aware of before this past Monday. I can see by your beady eyes, Uncle Vernon, you’re now thinking there’s money out there and are trying to figure a way to get your hands on it. Well, you can stop right now. Yes, there is a fair bit out there. You can’t touch it. There’s a Treaty between your government and the Freaks which says neither they nor their citizens can lay claim to Freak money or estates.
“I can see by that smug look upon your face, Uncle, you don’t think I know what I’m talking about. Guess again. What you think you know is an exception that proves the rule; but it is also an exception you ‘normal’ people are well advised not to mess with.”
“What do you mean?” Petunia asked nervously. Vernon just glared, then again he could not speak.
Harry opened the thick file folder before him and handed a three page document to his Aunt.
“This is a letter dated 6 November 1981 to you and your husband from the Firm of Golblatt, Creswell & Dirk, Solicitors. I’m told if you are familiar with that profession then you would know it is one of the highest regarded firms in Britain and - Uncle - while many of them may be what you consider ‘Freaks,’ they work on your side of the fence as it were, not on the Freak side. They have a very exclusive clientele including the National Trust, members of the Royal Family and many of their charities. In other words, they are very well connected on this side of things.
“The letter states that they’ve been advised that you’re now my - um…” Harry looked at a sheet of paper. He called it his ‘big word’ sheet as it had many words he needed to know for this and other things but that he never had to use before. “… custodial guardians and that the Potter Estate has set aside some money for my care. It says a lot more than that, although you either forgot the rest or figured nothing would come of it.”
Harry handed his Aunt another document. “These are the Guardianship papers which detail the… ,” he looked at his Big Word sheet again, “… amount and nature of your stipend and its conditions. Again, it seems you lot ignored the latter bit.”
He passed over the third document. “This is a legal paper the two of you signed. By signing it, you get the stipend but you also promised to abide by the conditions in those other papers and the laws about such things.”
He passed over a fourth document. “This is a statement of… ,” he looked at his sheet again, “… disbursements made to you beginning 15 November 1981 through this past 15 June. The first column are the dates of the disbursements, the second the check numbers and the third the amounts. I know what you’re thinking, Uncle - or at least I suspect it. You’re thinking that those were bank checks and not personal account checks and they came from a reputable ‘normal’ bank and not some Freak bank, right?”
Vernon nodded this time but continued to glare.
“That was to cover the source. No need to let others even suspect there’s people like me out there, it there? Each of those checks came from my families Estate Accounts which can be proven quite easily.
“From 15 November ‘81 to 15 August '91 you lot received a monthly check in the amount of fifteen hundred quid. I’ll admit I don’t know much about money, but the accountants I’ve been dealing with do and they say it’s far more than was probably necessary for my care. When I started Hog… my Secondary School, your monthly check was reduced to 750 Quid. Considering my tuition was prepaid long ago and there was a separate fund to pay for my uniforms, books, supplies and the rest and considering since then I’ve only been back for about six weeks, that’s a lot of money. Nine thousand a year, to be exact. I doubt it costs anywhere near that to see to my needs now. To date, you’ve received 193,500 quid. Even I know that’s a lot.”
Aunt Petunia looked shocked. Uncle Vernon just glared.
“Now, if you bothered to read those papers, you’d know this money was not without conditions. It was to be used for my care! A certain amount - well less than half - could be used for my share of the common family expenses such as this house, food, vacations - assuming I went along and with the exception of last summer when you were trying to keep me away from my school letters - that was never the case. I always stayed with Mrs. Figg when you lot went on holiday. It could also be used for my fair share of the cost of a car provided that buying the car was necessary and reasonable. I’m told that buying a car just so you have a better one than any of the neighbors does not count. The rest of that money was to be used for me and only me directly. That meant for clothes, education, toys I suppose, health expenses that were necessary and not covered by… ,” Harry looked at his sheet for a moment, “… National Health Insurance. You could’ve sent me to an Independent Primary School rather than the local. Anything that was not spent on me directly was to be placed in an interest bearing account under my name which you could not draw from - except by Court Order and then only for me - and which would be mine upon my eighteenth birthday. Did you do as you were supposed to, Uncle?”
Vernon’s glare was less intense.
“The law required you to. Did you? The answer is no, you did not. This remaining big stack of papers is from my family’s estate accountants. Thought no one was paying attention, didn’t you Uncle? Wrong again. They’ve been keeping an eye on you - or more accurately your money - practically from the beginning. You were getting £18,000 a year to put up with me from ‘81 to '91 and £9,000 since then for less than two months inconvenience. Until a few years ago, you weren’t making £18,000 a year from your real job, were you? £18,000 is more than a lot of people make, isn’t it? Certainly was back in '81 or so, wasn’t it?
“So, for a long time over half the money you stuck in the bank came from my family’s estate, didn’t it? And what did you do with it? According to this stack of papers, my accounts estimate that my fair share of your family’s monthly expenses has averaged £250 a month or £3000 a year and that is giving you lot the benefit of the doubt and ignores the last couple of years altogether. That’s a total of £34,750 since I was placed on your doorstep. Again, giving you the benefit of a great doubt, they estimate that over that same time you’ve spent £1,300 on me directly. That’s for three pairs of eyeglasses, including the ones I’m wearing and my primary school uniforms which, like the glasses, it not something you could pass down from Dudley. That assumes you bought decent glasses and new uniforms. I know you spent as little as you could for glasses and aside from my school shoes, the uniforms were second hand anyway. Still, giving you lot the benefit of the doubt - which I’m told is not what you can truly expect to get - that means £35,950 was spent the way it was supposed to be spent. So, if you were doing what those papers and the law says you were supposed to do, that means £157,550 plus its interest should be sitting in an account somewhere under my name, shouldn’t it? Except you know there is no such account! Your total accounts combined come to a little over £6,000 after the last deposit and there is no account in your world in my name, is there? So what happened to the other £151,000 or more?
“And don’t act like you have no idea, Uncle! Since you started getting those checks you’ve been living well beyond your means. Not beyond the money you stick in your bank, but well beyond what you could do without the money from my family’s estate. You paid off the mortgage on this house a few years ago and years early. Now if that had been your only mistake, it might be overlooked. But it was hardly the only one, was it? Every two to three years since that first check you buy a new car. Yes, a car is necessary. But a new car every two to three years is not! It seems every time a neighbor buys a new car, you have to buy one as well to maintain appearances or whatever. Well, my family’s money was not sent to you for that reason, was it? Then there’s all the stuff you’ve bought Dudley over the years, most of which he tires of in days or breaks or something and altogether the lot was beyond your means if I hadn’t shown up with all that money. Then there’re the holidays you’ve taken - without me I might add - and with your deadbeat sister. Yes, I said deadbeat! You’ve always told me my parents were lay about drunks. Guess what, Uncle? That description fits your sister! She’s a lay about, useless drunk who’s been on a dole that you so hate since early 1982. Since then, you’ve been paying her Mortgage and expenses and providing her an allowance for her which, no doubt, she drinks most of. It may not be the government dole, but it’s a dole nonetheless, isn’t it? Had I never showed up here, you could never afford that, or the cars, or the yearly vacations or all the stuff Dudley demanded. Tightening your belt, you might’ve been able to prepay his Smeltings tuition and probably could pay year-by-year on what you make, but the rest of your spending could not have happened, could it?
“My family’s estate solicitors are urging me to let them drag you into your court and demand an accounting. You know what that is?”
Vernon’s glare had disappeared. He was pale and sweating. He slowly shook his head.
“You will have to prove - convincingly, I’m told - that you did nothing wrong. Good luck on that since you will need piles of papers showing clearly every penny that’s come into this house and your accounts since that first check and every one that’s gone out. Now, I suppose you could find some crooked, low life lawyer and accountant to make something up for a price, but it won’t work. That stack of papers is a summary of your finances since that first check. My solicitors have copies of all of your bank statements, credit card statements, every check you’ve written, every withdrawal you’ve made since then. And, if you wonder how they got it, take a good look at the paper you signed back then. It authorized them to receive copies of all of that and more from that day to today.
“My solicitors won’t say their case against you is a sure thing. They’ve told me they never make a promise like that even if it is. But they do say that it’s as good as and, more importantly, that the Crown probably won’t give you any benefit of the doubt. You know what that means?”
Vernon slowly shook his head again.
“It means you’ll be… ,” Harry looked at his big word sheet again, “… personally liable not for £151,000 or so, but the full £193,500 plus interest. They estimate that could be as much as… ,” Harry again looked at his notes, “… £369,445 and change in interest alone in addition to the rest as of two weeks ago.”
“We don’t have that!” Petunia protested.
Harry ignored the outburst. “And that interest is growing at over £62,000 per year right now.”
“We don’t have that!” Petunia insisted again.
“I know,” Harry said. “The accountants think that if they… ,” Harry checked his sheet again, “… liquidate everything you own - the house, everything in it of any value, your car, bank accounts, your pension, your sisters house and stuff, the unused portion of Dudley’s tuition, even your life insurance policies - and yes they have copies of those as well - you might be able to scrape together £150,000.”
“That’s almost what you say we owe you!”
“If the courts are not involved at all,” Harry nodded. “But the courts do not look kindly on this sort of thing. If the courts get involved you could be on the hook for over £560,000 all told; £410,000 after you lose everything including, most likely, your job.”
“Why would Vernon lose his job?” Petunia asked.
“He stole or, more accurately… ,” Harry checked his sheet again, “… embezzled over £150,000 giving him the benefit of a very big doubt. That means he had legal access to handle that money but took it for himself illegally. You think Grunnings would keep him once word gets out and, if this goes to court it will? You think their customers would trust their money to a company with someone like that having access to any of the money? Uncle Vernon might think it’s altogether different stealing from a kid and stealing from his company. My solicitors say the company probably won’t see a difference at all and even if they find that he’s done nothing of the sort with their money, they’re not about to take the risk. Bad for business, you know. And all of this assumes the Crown doesn’t get involved.”
“The Crown? What’s the Queen got to do with this?”
“I mean the criminal courts. If this was £50 or so, they probably wouldn’t waste their time with it. But it’s not, is it? With that amount of money, they’d probably bring him up on charges and with our evidence he’d probably get convicted. That means you and his sister living in Public Housing on the dole he so hates, your son in the local Comprehensive and not Smeltings, while he spends a few years or more in prison. And this assumes my types don’t get involved and they could.
“Your husband stole from a freak family. That gives my types and our courts the right to go after him as well. True, that treaty I mentioned prevents them from getting at your money and such, but not from trying him as a thief. The evidence that will probably ruin your family in your world will certainly convict him in ours. They don’t look to kindly at people like you who harm people like me. He would be convicted and chucked into our prison, which makes the worst of yours look like a luxurious health spa. Few people survive that place. Most become incurably insane - catatonic - or die within a couple of years. Then there’s that bank to consider.”
“What can a bank do that your solicitors cannot?”
“Remember I said it was owned and managed by my world?”
Petunia nodded.
“Have you ever heard of Gringotts?”
“I’ve been there when Lily was in school. That’s the place run by those nasty creatures, right? That’s where we had to go to exchange our money for those coins, right?”
Harry nodded. “Those creatures are goblins and nasty barely begins to describe what they can be when angry. They own the bank that issues your checks and manage the accounts from which those checks are drawn. They don’t look kindly on thieves and stealing from them, from any account they manage or from their customers makes you a thief in their eyes. Gringotts is a global business. They got branches all over the world and trackers and bounty hunters on call to hunt down thieves and we have a treaty with them that allows them to do that. If I set my solicitors on you, there’s a chance they will want a piece of your husband, specifically his head.”
“What do you mean?” Petunia said as she paled.
“If the Goblins get involved, your husband can expect a short, sharp shock, as someone put it. The punishment for stealing from them, their accounts or customers is decapitation. They don’t know the meaning of words like appeal,” Harry looked at his sheet again, “clemency, extenuating circumstances, mercy, excuse, ignorance or anything like that.”
“Why are you telling us this?” Petunia asked after a pause. “You could’ve just set those solicitors on us and be done with it! This is about the way we treated you, isn’t it?”
“As I understand it, if I set my solicitors on you as you say and if that came out, it’d probably go worse for you all. The reason I’m telling you this is not so petty. Yes, I am angry you’ve robbed me blind. But this isn’t about the money. That £560,000 my solicitors think they can get really doesn’t mean all that much to me.”
“Not all that much?” Petunia almost shrieked.
“I don’t know how much the Potter Estate is worth and under my kinds law, I won’t find out ‘til I’m seventeen. But I do have a trust fund that was set up when I was born. This fund is in addition to the money you’ve received over the years and in addition to my pre-paid tuition to my school. This fund is for my use only. You can’t touch it or demand anything from it, nor can anyone else! It is a tiny fraction of the total. That I do know. My fiscal year runs from August 1st to my following birthday. At the current exchange rate from pounds to my kind’s 'freaky’ money, £67,500 is added to the Principal of the trust each birthday. Now, I can’t touch any of that for any reason ‘til I’m seventeen and can’t touch the full Estate until I’m twenty-one. But that account’s been earning interest at nine percent a year since I was born.” Harry noticed Vernon’s jaw drop. “I can spend the interest the account’s earned. The fiscal year ending this summer, I’ve estimated I would have earned about £156,000 in interest since my last birthday give or take £2000 or so or less.”
“That’s almost as much as you say we stole from you!”
“Giving you a generous benefit of the doubt,” Harry agreed. “I estimate the total amount of interest - the money I can spend right now - will be about £671,000 give or take a couple thousand, which is more than my solicitors could possible get from you assuming you had what they say they can get, which you don’t. Add to it the Principal I can’t touch and that account will have close to £1.9 Million come my birthday. Financially, the money you took really doesn’t matter. That you took it is another matter and is why my solicitors want me to set them loose. However, you should know there’s far more at stake here than that money, Aunt Petunia, and what is truly at stake is worth the £157,000 or so that can’t be accounted for.”
“The wards!” Petunia whispered. Vernon looked confused.
“Yes, the wards. No idea what she’s talking about?” Harry added looking at his Uncle. The man shook his head.
“That’s one of those ’M' word things, Uncle. Some of that unnaturalness you’re on about.”
Vernon frowned.
“Wards are like a "M” word wall or fence or force field - which is probably a better example. I don’t know much about them except what they are in general. We aren’t taught that yet and not for a few more years really assuming I’m taking the right courses (which I am, by the way). They are designed to keep people you don’t want to deal with away from your property and, in some cases, from you. Most freaks like me have wards on their homes when they grow up. The most common keeps normal people like you from stopping by unless we let them. But there’re loads of others and some can be quite nasty if you try to force your way through them - there’re some that can even kill you were you to try, although I think those type are illegal.
“Do you know how my parents died?”
“They were killed by your kind,” Petunia said.
“Do you know why?”
Petunia shook her head.
“Your husband here has stated for years they were no good layabouts. I’ve told you today they were quite comfortable, enough so that they did not need to be employed. But they were. They were law enforcement officers in our world. They were part of what you could call a Counter-terrorism Force, our equivalent of your MI-5, I’m told. And they and their team were very good at their job. At the time, there was a large group of terrorists in our world trying to take over. These were the absolute worst of our lot and probably make the ‘normal’ terrorists in your world look tame. Over a ten year or longer war they killed thousands in our world; THOUSANDS! Given there’re about 65,000 of us in Britain now, that’s our equivalent of suffering through one of the World Wars, I’m told. Would’ve been bad enough, but these freaks crossed over into your world and raped, tortured and murdered your types for kicks. It was often blamed on your own terrorists. A friend of mine wonders whether there really would be the problems there are in Northern Ireland had those freak terrorists stayed on our side of the fence as it were.
“My parents were very good at stopping the bad guys, even their leader who was the most powerful, dangerous and psychotic of the lot and since you’d have to be a nutter to be one of them, well he makes the worst of your sort look nice. What my parents did during the War made them targets of those terrorists. I learned this summer from stuff I got that they had a bounty on their heads.
“But, while they were at risk, that’s not why they were attacked that night. They were attacked by the psycho terrorist leader himself. Somehow, he got it into his twisted head that I was the biggest threat to him that ever existed.”
“That’s just crazy!”
“He’s crazy. He believed it was his destiny to rule the entire world. Not just my world, the entire world. He probably thought he either was some kind of god or if not should have been. From what I’ve learned he may well have been a genius, one of the most powerful of my kind alive and totally mental - a very, very bad combination. So he gets this notion that there’s a baby out there that can kill him when no adult has managed to do so. He killed my parents ‘cause they tried to stop him. We don’t really know what happened next, only that somehow he blew himself up. I doubt it was on purpose.
“So the big, bad wolf was gone. Unfortunately, he led a pack of bad wolves and they were not. Some of them went on a rampage when word got out that their invincible leader proved not to be so invincible. They killed a lot of people trying to find out what happened before they were rounded up and chucked into prison. Had I not been placed here, had the wards on this house never been set up; you, your husband and son might well have been among those final victims.”
“Why us? We wouldn’t’ve known anything!”
“They wouldn’t’ve cared. Most of them are dumber than rocks, but not all. Most of them know nothing about your world but some know quite a bit. They would’ve figured out you were my Mum’s sister and they would’ve found you. They would’ve tortured the lot of you to find out what you knew and would’ve killed the lot of you regardless of what you knew or didn’t know. That’s what they did. They killed people like you for sport, remember? They wouldn’t think twice about it.
“The wards on this House protect my Mum’s surviving family from them - and there are still some who managed to avoid capture - and from the rest of my world as well. So long as you and I live here, those wards remain. The only contact you’ll have with my world is the contact the wizard who set the wards allows or the contact I allow.”
“So we’re in danger?”
“Not really. Not now. You were for a time. There might be a few out there who’d try something. Then again, maybe not. But the danger aside, this place would be crawling with my freaky kind if those wards fail. There’d be a queue outside the door, in all probability. You wouldn’t be able to get the paper or put out the rubbish without freaky cameras flashing in your face or photographers following you about…”
“Paparazzi?”
Harry nodded. “The vast majority of the ‘freaks’ in my world believe that baby Harry Potter killed the psycho that night. I was famous within days. I bloody well now know what the Royal Family must feel like! Can’t walk down a bloody street in my world without almost everyone staring at me and pointing and loads of them coming up to shake my hand, ask for an autograph or a picture or a picture of me with them. It’s annoying to say the least. I know how Uncle Vernon hates our owls. Well, without the wards what happened two summers ago when my school tried to send me a letter would probably be an everyday sort of thing.”
“But if we’re in no danger, why do these wards matter more than your money, what we did to you or any of that?”
“You’re in no danger right now. Didn’t say I wasn’t, did I? Nor will I say you will never be in danger from evil, psycho freaks again. That psycho killer who killed my parents while trying to kill me may have blown his body to bits that night, but he didn’t truly die.”
“WHAT? What are you talking about? How can he be blown to pieces and not die? That’s impossible!”
“For people like you, you’re correct. I’d say for me as well. But for someone who is truly evil and will delve into the most evil of unnaturalness, it is possible. There are very, very dark ’M' word stuff out there. There are ways to avoid crossing over when your body dies, but it requires absolute evil mind and intent to do. He did something like that. I don’t know what. But I do know I’ve dealt with two versions of him in the last two years both trying to regain physical form to kill me and resume his quest for world rule. My first year, whatever he is now took possession of a professor at my school. I had to kill him at the end of the year. This past year, something else of him tried to come back as well and I had to destroy it as well. I wouldn’t have believed it either had I not faced it myself. He’s not dead. He’s trying to come back. I don’t know how he’ll do it or even if he can, but he is trying and if he succeeds, then the war that ended soon after that night will resume. I said many of his followers evaded justice and are still out there. There are people who were too young back then who might well follow him as well. If he comes back, without these wards we’re in mortal peril! That’s why I need them ‘cause I’m his top target and the top target of his followers and they will kill you if they think there’s any chance it might possibly lead them to me. They’d probably kill you just because I lived here for a time. So we need those wards until the lot of them are well and truly locked away for life or six feet under.”
“How long until he comes back?”
“No idea. Could be tomorrow, although I doubt that. Might not be for years and years.”
“What do you want from us?”
“You will need to live in this house until I tell you it’s safe, Aunt Petunia. The wards protect your son, but will fail if you move away. That bedroom upstairs is mine. So long as you live here, I will use it for a month or so every year to recharge the wards and keep them up. You will continue to receive £750 per month until I turn eighteen. After that - and this is non-negotiable - it will be £250 which for one month’s use of that tiny room per year and no requirement for food, water or anything is still far more than you could expect from a boarder. You, your son and especially this fat lump thieving bastard you call a husband will not try to bother me when I’m here. If I need to contact you, I will. Finally, his lay-about drunk of a sister is not allowed in this house for any reason when I am in residence. That’s not negotiable. I would suggest that he cuts the bitch off without a penny. But that’s his choice. If you move out, if you do anything that causes the wards to fail, I’ll set my solicitors and the goblins after you. True, there may come a time when too much time has passed for my solicitors to haul you into court, but the only way to avoid Goblin justice is to die before they cut off heads.”
“What if we need to talk to you about something?”
“Don’t see why that’ll be necessary, but fine. If you need to speak to me about something while I’m in residence, slide a note through that cat flap. It might be a day or two before I respond and don’t ask why ‘cause I won’t say. If your husband or son do the same, they will be ignored and if I have reason to believe they put you up to it, you will be ignored, understand?”
Petunia nodded.
Harry then looked at Uncle Vernon. “And yes, I will try to keep freakiness and unnaturalness out of the rest of the house. But don’t expect me to bend over backwards for it Uncle Vernon. Oh, and if you threaten me, hit me, yell at me again or even think of trying to get more money out of me, I will ruin you! Understand?”
Vernon nodded.
“Good! Well, I think that covers it all. You won’t see me again until the wards are set and I leave for the year. And Uncle Vernon?”
He looked at Harry.
“Don’t think you can sneak a visit in with your sister just ‘cause I won’t be sociable. If she sets one foot in this house, I will know and what Dobby does to her and her so called dog may make what he did to you look like child’s play. Good day.”
And with that, Harry got up and headed back up the stairs.
A/N: In 2010, the per capita income in the U.K. was between $35,000 and $36,000 depending upon which source you consult. This is approximately £23,600. I couldn’t find these numbers for either 1981 or 1993, but it’s fair to say the income was less (inflation, increases in cost of living and such come into play over time) and the Pound may have been worth more compared to the dollar back then.