There were two things Harry Potter never left the house (not home, Privet Drive was never 'home') without: a working ball-point pen, and a small note-pad. Ever since he'd first been sent to buy groceries with a list, Harry had carried paper and pen with him everywhere. The pad allowed for lists of important things to be kept, and the pen meant he could add to these lists or mark things as completed, collected, or similar. Having pen and paper handy also meant that he could keep up his favourite hobby wherever and whenever he was.
Oh yes, Harry had hobbies. He cooked, he gardened, and he calculated. The cooking and the gardening had initially been chores given to him by the Dursleys, but he'd come to enjoy them well enough, as long as he was allowed to ignore them in favour of his task.
Calculating was something he'd come to love from school though. Numbers, he'd found, could be applied to anything and everything. If it existed, then it could be measured. Even air could be measured, though it required a different sort of units than most things. Ever since his very first numbers lesson in kindergarten, Harry had loved numbers.
Harry's absolute favourite thing to calculate (apart from food intake to energy output requirements so that he didn't end up the same shape as Dudley) was money.
He calculated the worth of everything that the Dursleys 'bestowed' upon him, so that he knew exactly how much of a 'financial burden' he was to them. The answer: including school fees, Harry cost negative sixty pounds a month. After all, he saved them a great deal of money by being their unpaid chef, their unpaid maid, their unpaid butler (yes, the two tasks were different) their unpaid gardener, their unpaid fix-it man, their unpaid plumber, and their unpaid cleaning lady (which, yes, was different again from being their maid or butler). The prices for having such services in a private residence was really quite high, especially considering the daily amount of work lumped onto him.
That's right, the Dursleys owed him money. Not that he'd ever see a penny of it.
One day while Petunia had been having lunch with Mrs Number 6 and Dudley was visiting with Piers Polkiss, Harry had let himself into Vernon's home office, where he kept his ledgers. There, Harry was at least pleased to note that they at least had some reason to complain about his 'being a burden'. They received no child support for him from anyone. Still, that didn't change that he saved them more money than he cost them.
~oOo~
"Mr Hagrid," Harry said cautiously, looking up at the very big man. "You don't look too good. How about you go have a sit down? There are some questions that I want to ask these esteemed bankers anyway."
Griphook, the goblin who had taken Harry and Hagrid down to the vaults, quietly raised an eyebrow behind the boy. That was quite expertly manoeuvred.
Hagrid nodded carefully. "Alright Harry," he answered. "I'll come back for yeh?" he suggested. "Wouldn't want yeh to be wanderin' around Diagon Alley all by yerself after all."
"Thank you Mr Hagrid," Harry agreed. "About an hour?"
Hagrid agreed and left the boy in the bank with Griphook.
"You have questions, Mr Potter?" Griphook asked, gesturing to an office. "Perhaps in privacy?"
"Thank you Mr Griphook," Harry answered politely, following him into the room and taking the seat between the desk and the door when the goblin had taken the chair behind the desk. "I was wondering about a few things. First of all, a history of the transactions made to the vault I was taken to today, and if my late parents had any other holdings. I would also like to know the going rate of the pound to the galleon, and if all currency used in this society is using only the pure metal."
Griphook smirked. "Very astute questions Mr Potter," he said as he withdrew a few large books from a drawer in his desk. "Not normal questions for a child of your age."
"I like numbers, Mr Griphook," Harry countered with a carefully bland but keen expression as he accepted the first book that was pushed towards him. "Something about this is wrong," he said a moment later.
"Wrong, Mr Potter?" Griphook asked, his smirk quickly turned into a frown.
"There are withdrawals by people I do not know," Harry started, pointing to the names 'Dumbledore' and 'Fudge'. "And I am not getting this money back at all. Nor do I appear to be receiving royalties from the various companies which are selling things with my name on them," he added, taking out his own note pad and pen to make note of these things. "But I think this will need to be returned to. The other matters?"
Griphook's frown had not budged, but still he answered. "All coin in Gringotts does follow the 'gold standard', yes, at sixteen carats if you were wondering that as well. We exchange at two pounds to the galleon. Also, this other ledger lists all holdings, investments, and properties owned by your parents and therefore you."
Harry accepted the second ledger from Griphook while he made more notes on his pad. "Finally Griphook, I would like to see my parents wills. What little I have seen of this society implies that they died in some kind of war effort, which suggests to me that they should have made a will."
Griphook nodded at this, but his frown didn't budge. "Their will was sealed by the Supreme Mugwamp of the Wizengamot. You would have to make an appeal to the Ministry to have their wills released."
Harry made another note on his pad. "Thank you Griphook. May I take these, or copies of them perhaps? I would like to study both of these in greater detail, but I'm sure you are very busy."
Griphook narrowed his eyes, and Harry could see the goblin calculating in the back of his own beady eyes. "If you will grant Gringotts five minutes with the ledgers, we can create copies for you to keep which will receive any updates that these ledgers receive and which will share any updates you make in the copies with these originals."
"Thank you very much Griphook," Harry said. "How much will this service cost?"
Griphook's smirk finally returned. "Twenty galleons," he answered.
Harry nodded in acceptance of this fee, making mental calculations of how much that was going to cost him ultimately. "Also, my current guardians would refuse to help me set up a bank account in the muggle world," he said, recalling the word that Hagrid had used. "Can Gringotts help me with that?"
"You doubt our establishment's ability to hold your wealth, Mr Potter?" Griphook asked, and it looked like a dangerous question from the number of pointed teeth that the goblin was showing.
"Not at all Mr Griphook," Harry answered simply. "It is a matter of prudence on my part. There will be times when coming to Gringotts for gold will not be an option that I will have, and for that matter when it would be impractical as I would wish to make purchases in the muggle world. I have no reason to doubt Gringott's ability to protect my gold at all."
Griphook studied Harry for a moment. "Very well," he said at last. "Gringotts will provide all that you will require to set up an account with a muggle bank for a fee of only five galleons. These documents will be ready at the same time as the ledgers you have already requested. If you will wait in the lobby?"
"Thank you very much Mr Griphook," Harry said, standing from the chair with a smile. "I hope you have a most profitable day."
Griphook inclined his head in acceptance of the platitude, and watched as Harry stepped out of his office.
~oOo~
Harry had sat in the lobby and studied his ledgers closely for the forty-five minutes between his receiving them and Hagrid's return for him. He made notes and he made calculations in his note book, and when Hagrid finally arrived his suggestion of getting robes first was respectfully rejected.
"I think I'm going to need a bag before anything else Mr Hagrid," Harry pointed out. "I don't have a coat full of pockets like you do, and even if I had such a coat, I wouldn't be able to hold up as many pockets as you, nor such large ones."
"Er, right," Hagrid agreed. "Can't think why I didn' think o' that meself. Right, a bag, and of course your school trunk."
The shop Hagrid took Harry to was at the only junction in the area. Just outside the door was a post that had five signs coming off it. In fact, all the different streets, or perhaps alleys, joined at that point and the luggage shop was in the middle of the circus.
"Diagon Alley," Harry read.
"That's where we jes came from," Hagrid said.
"Knockturn Alley," Harry continued.
"Not a safe place tha', not for yourself at any rate. Dangerous stuff sold there, an' by dangerous people at tha'," Hagrid supplied.
Harry nodded and moved around the pole to the next sign. "Nortic Alley."
"That's where yeh get all the best stuff fer travellin', whether it's portkeys an' floo powder, or if yer wantin' a boat to 'oliday on. They got maps an' guide books an' all sorts o' things," Hagrid explained.
"Possibe Alley."
"Tha's got all the law firms an' private or special'ty medical practices an' things like tha'. Glad to 'ave never 'ad a need to go down there meself," Hagrid commented. "They's all professionals though."
Harry filed away that information though. He was definitely going to need to go down there later. "Mort Alley?" Harry questioned. That was a name that really intrigued him.
Hagrid shifted uncomfortably. "Yeh don' really want te be goin' down there either Harry," he informed his young charge. "It's not like Knockturn Alley, but it's still not a place yeh really want te go."
Harry frowned. "Mr Hagrid?"
Hagrid shuffled some more. "I admit, I ain't been down there meself ever, like I've 'ad to go buy things fer the garden down Knockturn, so I only got here-say as to what's there," he told the boy. "But I hear it ain't no place for a respectable wizard."
Harry made a note to have a look into that later as well, but for now there was important shopping to be done – and instructions to be given to the sales clerk.
"Sir, I cannot lift this trunk when it is empty," Harry said firmly, demonstrating that he was barely able to lift one side half an inch. "How will it be of any use to me full then except as furniture?"
The clerk blinked in surprise at the boy's tone, but moved on from the trunk and its compatriots that had been sitting together under the banner 'standard Hogwarts trunk'. It took a while, and much badgering of the sales clerk, but eventually Harry left with a hump-back chest that could be shrunk down to the size of an old three-pence coin and would always only way as much as one. It also had one regular compartment, one regular-expanded compartment, a secret expanded compartment in the hump-back lid, and another heavily expanded compartment that had been set up as a lab/office/study space. It had four locks and five keys – one key for each lock and the fifth to make it grow or shrink without use of a wand. Harry also bought a simple satchel with an expansion charm on the inside and another charm so that it wouldn't get heavy.
In total, this cost him fifty galleons, which caused Harry to wonder if these people really were aware of the value of gold, or if having magic just made the cost of producing goods that much cheaper.
Somehow, he suspected the latter.
Then it was off to get the robes Hagrid had mentioned earlier. The shop was called Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occassions, and there was a boy with short, slicked-back, peroxide-blonde hair already in there being fitted. Standing on the small pedestal for fittings, Harry asked for them to include plenty of room for growth.
"Are you a knut-pincher or just poor, to ask for robes that grow with you, rather than buying new as you need them?" the boy asked with a sneer.
A knut, Harry recalled, was the smallest unit of currency used by these people.
"Wiser is the miser," Harry answered shortly, and clearly baffled the other boy completely as he said nothing else until his mother came to collect him. When Harry's robes were done he paid a total of five galleons for the whole lot (with a reminder that his dragon-hide purchases weren't able to be spelled, so he'd have to come back to get re-fitted for them when he grew) before stepping out and joining Hagrid where the large man had been waiting for him in the book shop across the way – Flourish and Blotts.
Hagrid had been doing his own poking about, looking at the various different books available, and Harry saw no reason at all to rush in this shop. Knowledge was valuable after all, especially when entering a new culture.
Harry bought the entire Standard Book of Spells set, as well as a tome called Moste Potente Potions that looked to be the first and last word on why potions did and didn't work, listing reactions between different ingredients, the purpose of the different preparation methods and the reactions they caused, the effects of different temperatures on different mixtures, and even why different cauldron metals and stirring rods were used in different potions. He bought a couple of books on magical gardening: an encyclopedia of magical plants, and a book full of garden-management techniques (both magical and mundane, as some magical plants acted funny if exposed to other magical sources). A book on self-transfiguration entitled Arte of the Animagus was added to his pile, as were four different editions of Hogwarts: A History – each one produced by someone from a different 'house' and with about two decades between each of them, which would show Harry how the school had changed over the years.
Then he found the arithmancy section and picked up one of every book available to him there. It was numbers after all, and numbers were his passion. Also, since a number of the arithmancy books mentioned using arithmancy with runes, Harry picked up a pile of books on runes as well.
The number of books he ultimately collected would have cost him several hundred pounds normally, but the magical world proved its oddity to him again by charging him only forty-five galleons for the lot.
The next stop was the apothecary and potion supplies shop, where Harry bought a 'deluxe starter ingredients kit' and a standard, solid, pewter cauldron which he put the ingredients inside before putting the whole lot (five galleons) into his trunk. After that, Harry begged off buying a telescope, saying he'd get get it later, and they headed for the wand shop, Ollivander's.
Hagrid settled himself on a stool in the corner of the shop, and Harry was handed wand after wand after wand. One reacted in a way that Mr Ollivander approved of (a holly and phoenix feather combination) but Harry didn't like it – which surprised the old man – and the hunt was back on for the right wand. In the end, apart from the wand that was half-right, no other wand in the shop responded to Harry at all, not even the one in the window, and Ollivander had to point them towards one of his competitors.
Harry bought a wand holster and a wand maintenance kit from the man first though – two galleons, and the holster was enchanted to prevent anybody except for Harry taking any wand from it either manually or magically.
Ollivander's competitor that they were directed to by the old man was in Possibe Alley. The man was a specialist, dedicated to making custom wands for discerning or difficult customers. He also did wand repairs in the event of accidental breakages, though that was a slightly more expensive service.
The man's name was Peter Jones, of the 'keeping up with the Joneses' line. Yes, that family, the magical side anyway. The non-magical side of the family was in America, making their impression there.
Again, Hagrid waited on a chair in the corner while Harry and Mr Jones got on with the business of getting the boy a wand.
"So, you're the once-a-decade tricky customer I suppose," Mr Jones said as he guided Harry further back into the shop. "Start by telling me what was the closest fit in Ollivander's shop, and then I will examine you for any spells that might alter how you receive wand materials and remove them."
"Mr Ollivander thought a thirteen-inch wand of holly with a phoenix feather core was best suited to me," Harry answered. "But it felt wrong, like only part of me would be able to use it, not all of me."
Mr Jones nodded in acceptance of this, then brought out his own wand and started casting diagnostic and detection spells. All colour left his face. No mean feat for a man who already had a near porcelain complexion. He actually looked grey.
"Mr Hagrid, would you be a good chap and pop next door for me? Ask Healer Mason to come around? I'm going to need her help with removing the spells that are interfering with Mr Potter getting a properly suited wand," Mr Jones called out.
"Certainly," Hagrid answered, and bustled off out the door. He returned a few minutes later with a thin-ish woman of impressive stature (once she wasn't next to Hagrid) and steel grey hair.
"Peter?" she asked as she moved past Hagrid (who had resumed his seat) and into the room where Jones was already removing some of the spells from Harry's person.
"Agatha, I would be much obliged if you would lend a wand to the situation at hand?"
"And a full physical examination would be appreciated too Ma'am," Harry added. "My guardians don't like to admit that I exist, so I haven't ever been to see any medical person except for the school nurse at immunisation time. You will be appropriately compensated for your time, I'm sure you are very busy."
The healer looked horrified at the idea that anybody would neglect a young boy's health needs, but nodded in agreement and removed her wand from her sleeve. Harry suspected a hidden holster.
It took half an hour to remove everything from Harry that wasn't of him. This included a number of blocks on his magic, a small collection of wards against a variety of things which Harry was quite sure he did not need to be warded against, a series of vaguely unpleasant compulsion charms, and the piece of soul that had been stuck to his scar – which Healer Mason healed right up as well.
All that removed, Mr Jones started the process of making a wand appropriate for Harry while Healer Mason simultaneously ran a full and proper health check on the boy, making a list on a piece of parchment all the potions he would need to take in order to counter his malnutrition, stunted growth, and correct his poor eyesight (a very recent advance in medicinal potions). She also wanted him to come to her private practice next door to receive his full list of immunisations – both magical and muggle, since even muggle diseases could be spread to the magical community.
The wand presented to Harry was made from rosewood, which had been varnished darkly to bring out the most beautiful depths of colour. The magical core that ran unseen within its eleven inches was a hair from a luck dragon. Mr Jones didn't say from where on the luck dragon, though he did say it had been willingly given in exchange for a good scratching behind the ears and was the only one he had in the whole shop. This beautiful piece of craftsmanship was placed in a dark rosewood box with ebony and ivory inlays on top of a velvet cushion – this box would open only to Harry's magical signature and would be where he stored his wand when he wasn't using it, like when he slept.
Wand and box cost fifteen galleons (Harry was assured that wands from Ollivander cost an average of seven and had a bunch of Ministry tracking charms that Harry didn't have to worry about), then Healer Mason shuffled him over to her private practice next door, gave him all of his injections plus a few more, as well as a prescription of potions that he was to take, as well as how often he was to take them. When he paid her the ten galleons her secretary stated was the fee for Healer Mason's services, the healer herself secured a promise from Harry to come back for a check-up next time he was in the area.
"Now, I want te get yeh a birthday present," Hagrid announced as they left Possibe Alley and returned to Diagon. "How about an owl? They're right useful creatures, carry yer mail an' everythin'."
Harry thought about it. "Can I pick which owl?" he asked.
Hagrid chuckled. "Course yeh can!"
In Eyelop's Owl Emporium, Harry cooed over a beautiful snowy owl for a while, but knew that she was too showy and obvious to be properly useful as a mail owl. If he got her for his owl, everybody would know instantly that he was sending or receiving mail if they saw her with a letter. Which was a shame, he thought, because she really was beautiful. With a last stroke of her breast feathers, Harry moved on.
He found instead a brown owl, though strictly speaking a tawny owl. She had a masked face and a few different shades of brown through her feathers and Harry decided she was just what he wanted. She wasn't too big, or too flashy like the snowy had been, she was perfectly friendly and clearly a very intelligent and dignified bird.
"Oh, she's a beaut Harry," Hagrid complemented. "Not as impressive as that snowy yeh were lookin' at earlier, but very nice. I can see why yeh picked 'er. I'll jes pay for 'er an' 'er cage, maybe some owl treats as well for yeh te feed 'er while yer bondin'."
"Thank you Mr Hagrid," Harry said as he continued to stroke his new owl's breast feathers. "Now, what shall I call you?" he mused quietly. "I think Archimedes will suit you, even if it isn't strictly a girl's name. What do you think?"
The newly dubbed Archimedes butted her head gently against Harry's hand, clearly approving the name.
Hagrid returned with a bag of treats and said Harry was right to take the bird and the cage she was in. They returned then to the Leaky Cauldron, and Hagrid set up Harry to stay there until September first, when he would be leaving for Hogwarts.
This arrangement suited Harry fine, as it allowed him access to London to buy stationary and his telescope, set up his bank account, and sell some of his galleons, sickles and knuts for quite a lot of money to put into that bank account. He also bought more books (regular education and some good fiction this time) and an entirely new wardrobe for himself from 'muggle' London, both casual wear and some smart stuff, from his underwear to his shirts and shoes, whole new look. He burned the Dudley cast-offs he'd been wearing before.
These tasks done, Harry settled himself into the room he had at the Leaky and read his way through as many of his new books as he could. The first two he read were on mind magic and how to better retain information through a thing called occlumency (which the book taught him), and how to speed-read (a muggle book, but just as useful as the other one). Having read these two books first allowed him to plough through a good two-thirds of the non-fiction books he'd bought – he lingered over the novels, since they were for enjoying, not just for absorbing the information they provided.
Sometimes he needed to get up and stretch his legs though, and on these occasions generally took himself to Possibe Alley, initially to find and then later to visit with his new solicitor: Mr Edward James Doyle. He had a number of legal matters that needed to be sorted through after all, and so much better to get them out of the way before he would be out of the way himself.
On the thirty-first of August, Harry finally took himself down Mort Alley.
~oOo~
Mort Alley was like no other Alley that Harry had yet been down (and he'd been down all but Knockturn by this point) in the magical district. The other Alleys were very much the same: olde style buildings, wizards and witches in robes, everything just a little bit dusty or odd to give it that 'genuine antique' feel. Though some places were more dusty than others of course. No place beat Ollivander's for dust, for example, and the places in Possibe Alley had more rippled glass since they were all very clean. Nortic Alley went more for the smell of brine down the whole length, and as said before, Harry hadn't been down Knockturn. What he'd seen of it implied a lot of grime though, or very dark varnish.
Mort Alley, however, reminded Harry more of the shopping complex he'd gone to in 'muggle' London to buy his stationary, new clothes and his telescope. All the shops were very clean, all the people were in normal clothes – jeans were everywhere and there wasn't one robe of pointy hat in sight – and actually it looked like the sort of place that Harry would be doing his shopping in from now on.
This one Alley had everything that the other three Alley's he'd been to had, and a lot of stuff that they didn't.
"Lost kid?" asked a friendly voice.
"Exploring," Harry answered, then turned to look up at whoever had addressed him.
The young man had green hair – clearly died, as the half-inch long roots were black – gelled into spikes, and was wearing a worn brown leather jacket over an olive-green ribbed turtle-neck and khaki trousers that were tucked into his big brown combat boots. Apart from the green hair and the leather jacket, Harry might have thought the guy was in the army.
The guy smiled. "That's great," he approved. "Not many from Diagon or the others approve of letting their kids wander into Mort, especially those bludgers over in Knockturn, right snobbish they are, think Mort shouldn't be allowed to stand."
Harry tilted his head to one side, playing up the 'confused little kid' card. "Why? Is it because no one here is wearing robes like in the other Alleys?"
The young man shook his head. "Nah," he answered. "It's because everybody here in Mort is 'muggle-born'. Or very nearly everybody anyway. The 'pure-bloods' who are particularly snobbish think we shouldn't get educated in magic at all, and then we get really up their noses by being better at the stuff than them who've been surrounded by it all their lives, even if we don't use it quite as instinctively. Take that shop right over there for example," the man said, pointing to a window that looked just like any electronics shop out in London even as he waved for Harry to take a seat on a near-by bench. "The snobby ones will tell you that 'muggle technology' doesn't work in places with high concentrations of magic, but it's completely bollox."
Harry frowned. "Why wouldn't electricity work just because there's lots of magic around?" he asked.
"That's just it," the guy said. "It does, but the pure-bloods – the snobbish ones anyway – don't want to admit that non-magical people have come up with stuff that leaves them in the dust, and they certainly don't want to admit that people like me who've come from a non-magical background could possibly come up with something useful and innovative. Actually, they don't like innovation at all. As far as they're concerned, a spell-crafter might come up with one new spell every five or ten years, never mind that old spells are being adapted and morphed into new ones here nearly every day."
"I'm Harry," Harry said at last, holding out his hand to shake. "Pleased to have met you."
The young man grinned in answer and wrapped his large hand around Harry's smaller one. "Mike, and likewise Harry. Now, are you going to be alright, exploring on your own?" he asked seriously.
Harry looked around at how Mort Alley was set up. There were shops all neatly in a row along the street, and there were stairs at both ends of the cobbled road that led up to the next level of shops, with walkways along, and then more stairs... it went up ten levels, but it was all very tidy and organised. Not really any chance of getting lost at all.
"I think I'll be fine Mike," Harry said.
"Alright then, I leave you to your exploring. By the way, some of the shops here take pounds as well as galleons, if you're a 'muggle-born' yourself," Mike offered.
Harry grinned. He was definitely going to be shopping here from now on. "Thanks Mike."
Mort Alley, Harry discovered, was great. Almost as great as numbers. From Mort Alley he could get the regular newspapers owl-mailed to him, he could get potions ingredients, he could get clothes, he could get books (magical and non-magical), he could get all sorts of travel stuff, he could get another pet if he wanted, he could even buy a house from Mort Alley! Everything under the sun and more was available in Mort Alley. There were even alternative magic shops – the kind that could be seen in London proper – that sold stuff pertaining to things like Wicca, and magic stuff from other parts of the world.
And the whole place was just disregarded because it was full of wizards and witches from non-magical backgrounds. Or weren't English. There were a couple of those too. First generation as English witches and wizards. It brought racism and snobbery to a whole new level really.
~oOo~
Harry took the floo to the platform early and settled himself into a cabin which he had calculated to be in the exact middle of the crimson coloured train. Archimedes was let out of her cage to stretch her wings, and Harry sat down with the last five text books he had yet to finish and the takeaway box of Chinese he'd bought in readiness – one of the waitresses where he'd bought it in Mort Alley the day before had shown him a reheating charm – so that he could have a hot lunch on the train.
Archimedes had clearly had enough of a stretch by the time other families really started showing up, as she settled onto Harry's shoulder and peered down at the book that he was reading – his second since arriving.
"Are you interested in reading too Archimedes?" Harry asked her with a smile. "Well, I'm already half-way through this one, but if you'll just let me finish it quickly I'll get out a more interesting book for you to read?" he offered.
Archimedes took a moment to stare at the page (it was a higher level chemistry text) before nodding her head.
Harry sped his way through the second half of the book just as he had the first, then set it aside on top of the other chemistry text he'd finished not long before. "What sort of thing would you like?" Harry asked her, opening one of the compartments of his trunk to reveal all of his carefully organised books. "Fact or fiction?"
Archimedes hopped down from Harry's shoulder with a slight ruffle of her feathers to land on the edge of the trunk. She stared around at the spines before tapping her beak on an inch-thick paper-back. The title down the edge of it read The Once and Future King. It was a version of the Arthurian legend, and one of the books that Harry had bought for leisure reading. One that he hadn't actually gotten around to reading yet.
Harry chuckled. "You'll have to tell me what you think of it when you're done," he commented as he set it up against the side of her cage so that she could perch comfortably and turn the pages herself as she liked – using her beak. Harry was aware that he was going to have some slightly worn-looking books if Archimedes was big into reading. She'd already done it to Harry's occlumency book, an arithmancy book and general mathematics book Harry had actually read twice each (the second read was for the fun of it), and the first of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Harry had only bought the one for now, as he wasn't completely sold on the way Tolkein wrote yet, on the other hand, he hadn't finished the first book yet, Archimedes had hogged it until late the night before. He'd probably buy the rest of them just for her to read, even if he eventually decided that the books weren't his cup of tea.
It was only fifteen minutes later when a chirping croak was heard from the floor, only just in from the door Harry had left only-just-open. Archimedes' head snapped up from her book – she'd only turned one page yet, but she was clearly reading, if much slower than Harry – and her dark eyes focused on the toad that had just hopped in. Her head was turned so that it was looking over her back, but slowly she turned the rest of her body around to be facing the amphibian as well.
"Do you eat toads?" Harry asked her curiously. He was fairly sure that tawny owls didn't actually eat toads, but then everybody had their own tastes.
Archimedes nodded, spread her wings, and swooped down on the unsuspecting creature. It was dead by her claws and down her throat in the same amount of time it took for Harry to finish reading his spread and turn the page. Then it was a hop and a flap back to her perch and she was reading again.
Harry chuckled and returned his attention to the last few pages of his advanced chem before closing the rear cover and moving on to the next one: basic pharmacology. It was two inches thick, but he finished it just as the train lurched into movement an hour and a half later. Three books down, one to go: A Comprehensive Encyclopedia of the Fungi of the British Isles. It was looking like he'd get to linger over one of his novels for a while.
Forty five minutes after starting the fungi encyclopedia, Harry was finished and putting it – and his other books – back into his trunk. He'd just pulled out Lord of the Rings and closed the lid of his trunk when a pair of twins knocked on his door.
"Hey, can we leave ickle Ronnie-kins here? He's scared of spiders, and our friend Lee just found us, with his new pet tarantula," the twins asked. They alternated, but it was so smooth that it was like they only had one mind. Or maybe they were psychic to each other. He'd read that it was a semi-recorded phenomena among twins. "We're just in the one next door," they continued, jerking heads and thumbs to their left. "If you get sick of him."
Harry nodded with a shrug. "No particular skin off my nose," he said.
"Excuse me," a girl with lots of bushy brown hair said, knocking on the door even though it was open and had three read-heads standing in it. "But have any of you seen a toad? A boy named Neville has lost one."
The red-heads all shook their heads, and the girl turned her enquiring eyes on Harry, who was himself wide-eyed and slowly turning to Archimedes. She had hunched her head down and her wings up and was clearly both embarrassed and trying to pretend that the conversation behind her wasn't happening.
"I think Archimedes may have eaten the toad in question," Harry said tentatively.
Archimedes straightened and spun her head around to pin Harry with a betrayed and accusatory look.
"Sorry," Harry added. "But I will defend her saying that if people are going to have pets that are prey to other people's pets, they should contain them better."
Archimedes nodded in satisfaction and turned back to her book.
The girl nodded and turned back the way she'd come, likely to tell the boy what had become of his toad. She paused a moment to stare at Archimedes, but then shook her head and continued on her way.
"Hear that Ronnie-kins? We've been tellin' ya to keep Scabbers in a cage since you got him. Now maybe you'll listen. All previous Weasleys kept the rat in a cage. No idea why you seem so keen on just keepin' the fat fur-ball in your pocket," the twins said, poking their little brother before giving Harry a wave and heading back into the next compartment.
Harry pulled out Lord of the Rings and started leafing through it. "Archimedes, did you move my bookmark?" he asked.
She turned her head to face him for a moment, shook her feathers, then silently returned to The Once and Future King.
"Fell out huh? Oh well. I didn't get far anyway. Back to the beginning," he decided, and locked up his trunk once more before settling back in his seat to read.
"Uh..." Ronnie-kins began, clearly trying to make conversation.
"You're here to hide from a spider Ronnie-kins," Harry said shortly, not looking up from his book. "Not make friends."
Ronnie-kins sighed and sank in his seat, and turned to look out the window.
"So it's true what they're saying," a voice rang out from the door of the compartment. Harry recognised it as the peroxide-blonde boy from the robe shop. "Harry Potter is coming to Hogwarts at last."
"Do yourself a favour and shut up before you make yourself look like an idiot before the school year has even properly started," Harry said flatly, not even looking away from his page.
"Do you even know who I am?" the boy demanded.
Harry didn't have to look up to know the boy was sneering, he could hear it in the boy's tone. A quick glance told him, however, the the kid needed lessons in how to sneer properly. He also needed to hit puberty and stop looking so 'pretty'.
"You're a pure-blood snob who thinks everybody should lick your boots or lay themselves out for you to walk all over. You are also an eleven year old, therefore a child, and therefore no one of any consequence yet. Your parents might be, might not be. Your levels of implied snobbery suggest that you have either influential parents or well-moneyed ones. From my limited exposure to you I calculate that your most frequent rebuttal to any serious problem is along the lines of 'when my father hears about this', possibly mother, godparent or considering we are headed for a boarding school then the professor who you will do your best to ingratiate yourself to," Harry rattled off, turning his page mid dissertation as he hadn't stopped reading. "Now, I am going to be as monosyllabic as possible to be sure that you understand me: be a chap and sod off."
Ronnie-kins and the peroxide-blonde were both gaping at Harry, who still had his nose in his book, and they were gaping for completely different reasons. Ronnie-kins in confused admiration, the peroxide-blonde in stunned and impotent anger.
The peroxide-blonde finally closed his mouth and slammed the door shut, leaving.
"Blimey," Ronnie-kins breathed.
~oOo~
"Merlin!" the hat exclaimed a short while after being set on Harry's head.
"I don't think that's an option," Harry answered in the echoing silence that followed.
To understand the hat's exclamation, it is required to understand what young Harry was thinking as the hat settled over his ears. Now, thought processes are sometimes disjointed and confusing, but it was going something like this:
"So the cowards go to Gryffindor because they want to be brave, the people with no social skills are in Ravenclaw where no one will mind if they bury themselves in books, the ones who want to be big some day but still haven't figured out how they'll get there are in Slytherin and really the only people worth knowing at the Hufflepuffs who everybody else thinks are a bunch of duffers. This whole society seems set up to make sure people have very few friends and there doesn't appear to be anybody who is truly impartial in this school, as the teachers were no doubt students here as well and will therefore grant special treatment of some kind to their old house. Then there's the whole racist issues that are no doubt rife throughout the whole school, as they couldn't survive into the adult realm if they weren't encouraged somehow, either by turning a blind eye or actively supporting the view. And there looks to be only ten teachers for seven years of students, plus that unpleasant-looking man skulking in the corner and Mr Hagrid, makes a total of twelve. There are approximately forty students in the incoming year, and if that is taken to be average then that's two-hundred-and-eighty students in total and while that's not a very big school, it still means that the students outnumber the staff by a little over twenty-three to one. Okay, twenty-three isn't so bad in a controlled environment like a muggle classroom, but there's no way that all of the classes here are going to be so well controlled, not with magic involved. Further more, this is a boarding school, so there's a lot of time that the students won't be in classes and a lot of time for uncontrolled circumstances for the students to get the best of their teachers. That's not even including the castle itself which will work against the teachers because the students are smaller and able to hide better in the many passages that no doubt exist here and the teacher's can't be alert all the time without going mad. Something really needs to be done about this place before the system fails the students even more than I have no doubt it's already doing."
It was at this point that the hat yelped its cry across the hall, and Harry's following response, both of which have already been mentioned above.
The hat coughed, and it actually sounded embarrassed. "Yes, you are quite right Mr Potter. However, considering your mind, I rather think that I should commune with Lady Hogwarts herself for a moment, so if you would please put me on the floor?"
Harry reached up and pulled the hat off his head and set it down in front of him.
"Thank you," the hat said, and was silent for about as long as it took for the students to ask each other "do you have any idea what's going on?" and get head-shakes in reply.
"Mr Potter," the hat announced. "Will be placed as the new headmaster of Hogwarts. Albus, you are excused."
Silence set in heavily.
"But I came hear to learn magic," Harry pointed out calmly. "Not run the school."
"And so you shall, Mr Potter," the hat assured with a chuckle, somehow shifting itself around on its brim where it was still sitting on the floor, "but at your own pace in between running the school. The headmaster's office is full of portraits of previous headmasters, and they shall be your tutors until you reach your OWL and NEWT levels."
"And for now?" Harry asked. "Where am I supposed to sit?"
The hat looked like it was grinning. "Why, in the headmaster's chair, of course."
Behind Harry, Albus Dumbledore spluttered indignantly.
"Albus, the house elves have already packed your things for you," the hat called out.
Albus paled and nodded weakly, then stumbled out of his chair, then down the stairs behind the table, and walked numbly out the door. He was going to spend a lot of time in bed taking calming draughts between Wizengamot and ICW meetings it seemed.
"There now Mr Potter," the hat said. "There is your seat."
Harry sighed, but got off the stool, picked up the hat and handed it back to McGonagall, then headed for the stairs up to the table and, with a put-upon frown, sat in the ridiculously ornate chair that Dumbledore had vacated – and why was his chair so fancy anyway? None of the other teachers had such fancy-looking chairs, and all the students were just on benches.
When he'd sat down at last, McGonagall called the next name on her list and continued with the sorting.
~oOo~
After the feast was cleared away, Harry stood up – on the chair so that he could be seen over the table – and addressed everybody, since all were present.
"According to what the staff have told me, tomorrow is a day off for first year students to familiarise themselves with the castle and for all returning students to hand in summer homework to the appropriate teachers." There were nodding heads around the room agreeing with this.
"I see no reason to change this, though I do wish to add that it would be preferable for first year students to have an older student to act as guides for them so that they do not become lost on their explorations. Please also do not attempt to explore the forest, as while it is on Hogwarts property it is the home of many other beings, and you wouldn't walk willy-nilly into a complete stranger's living room or backyard, which is what the forest is." There were some chuckles, but more nods of acceptance.
"Within the castle, I have been informed that the caretaker Mr Filch has a list of banned items posted on his door. Considering my new position, you will have to wait until the day after tomorrow to see this list, as I intend to commandeer it and study it thoroughly myself." He got a few more chuckles for that.
"Finally, Mr Dumbledore had left something ... unsafe behind nothing more than a locked door on the third floor. As such, please refrain from using unlocking charms on doors until Mr Dumbledore's something has been removed. Now, the train ride was long and the meal is no doubt beginning to have a soporific effect on us all, so I believe that the only remaining order of business is to find our beds," Harry said, finally smiling himself down at all the students (a good number of whom were older than him) who were now his charge.
Beside him, McGonagall stood up and called out "Prefects, if you would please lead the way out?"
Which they did, and soon enough the great hall was emptied of persons under thirty... except for Harry.
"Mr Potter, will you require a guide to your new quarters?" McGonagall asked. She looked pinched in the face slightly, as though her dinner had been sour. It hadn't been, but that was the look on her face.
"Of course I will," Harry answered. "I'm not psychic. Professor Sinistra? Would you do me the honour?"
Aurora Sinistra was thirty-five, the youngest female professor at the table and only Snape was younger than her at all (apart from Harry). She was also darkly skinned and the astronomy professor. It was because of this last detail that Harry had asked her – she was more likely to be used to being up late than any of the other teachers.
She smiled for him, showing her very white teeth between her full brown lips, and agreed.
"Goodnight professors," Harry said with a nod as he got up from his chair. "I hope you all sleep well."
With that, he took up a place beside Sinistra and walked with her through the halls until they reached a grey-stone grotesque; a form that was commonly confused by the uneducated as a gargoyle, except that since it was clearly not on a roof acting as a water spout it couldn't fulfil the basic function of a gargoyle.
"The headmaster's office and chambers are beyond this," she said. "As the new headmaster, only you may change the password. I'll tell you how Dumbledore did it once we're in his, er, your office. For now, the old password is 'lemon sherbert', Dumbledore has a fondness for sweets," she explained as the statue stepped aside upon hearing the phrase
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