It was a little worse than Harry had first thought. He'd been forced to buy over sixty books and a lot of them had more than five hundred pages! He'd spent most of his time in his bedroom at number four Privet Drive, just reading and trying to understand what the hell the authors of the books were going on about as he encountered words that he had never seen before, so he had no clue as to their meaning, and as such, he had no hope of understanding what the books were trying to teach him.
The Dursleys left him alone for the most part, as they had done all summer, because of the threat of his guard. He had been interrogated by Hestia Jones, though, an Order of the Phoenix member, when he'd come back late at night with a charmed bag bursting with books. He'd ignored her as best as he could, brushed off her questions and then he'd finally lost his patience when she wouldn't let him enter the house and he'd shouted at her that he'd been gone all day and that it wasn't his fault that she'd never noticed that he wasn't in the house like he was supposed to be. He'd gotten a letter from Dumbledore the very next day expressing his 'disappointment' that Harry had broken his rules and had needlessly put himself at risk by wandering around on his own. Harry had torn the letter to shreds in his anger that had flared bright and cold, burning furiously inside him.
He spent his days in a virtual rage when he stopped to think about things too much and he'd kicked his trunk more than once…he always regretted it. So instead, he had taken to annoying his aunt, practising the cardinal Dursley sin of asking questions to try and figure out what in the hell these books were going on about. That had ended badly, Petunia had thrown a dictionary at him when he wasn't looking and the thick spine, the part of the book to unfortunately hit him, had left a knot the size of an egg on the back of his head, but at least now he had a dictionary to help him, not that he understood much more of what the books were about even with the help of the dictionary.
He was back to being confined in his room, though. He didn't know what had changed or why the threat of the guards outside the house no longer worked, but he was back to being locked in his small, plain bedroom, but at least he had a mountain of books to read and a dictionary to give the illusion of helping him when, in reality, it didn't help him understand anything at all.
Locked away in a small room, however, Harry had more time to think about everything that had happened and without the distraction of going down to the kitchen or out into the garden, he was stuck with his thoughts and the burning anger was making his head hurt. He couldn't believe what he'd found out. He still couldn't believe that Dumbledore hadn't told him that he had a seat on the Wizengamot, two of them after Sirius had died, or that he was sitting in them in his place! He'd had no clue about any of it; about Dumbledore being his magical guardian, the lordships, the bank vaults he had, his claim to the Black vaults and the Black lordship…he hadn't even known that his parents had legitimised him with Sirius' blood! Why the hell had no one ever told him these things?!
Everything was always about the war, always about him and Voldemort, about that damn prophecy and how he had to kill the Dark Lord to save the wizarding world…it was like that was all he was to them, a shield and sword combo to be pushed in front of Voldemort, something to be used to keep everyone safe and to hell if he was injured or even killed in the attempt.
He scrubbed at his damp eyes with the back of his hand. He'd been pulled around by the hand like a clueless child, doing everything they wanted him to do and they hadn't even had the decency to tell him about his own birthright. He swallowed hard and painfully past a bone dry throat, it was almost as if they were expecting him to die, so any information about what he could claim as an adult was irrelevant because they didn't expect him to live that long.
His body froze as his mind played that thought over and over again, he felt bile at the back of his throat and he swallowed it back down. He didn't want to die…all he wanted was to live his life in peace, to maybe settle down with a partner; he knew he wanted kids already, even if he had to adopt them, and he wanted a nice house with a big garden. He wanted to be normal! He didn't want to be told of prophecies or be told that he had to kill someone. He didn't want to be dragged into this war, he didn't want to fight! Why should he? This wasn't his war! He hadn't chosen this, he'd been dragged into it and set up like a lamb to slaughter. They meant for him to die and they were slowly taking his control away from his birthright…his lordships, his vaults, his property and stock holdings…everything that his parents had wanted him to have, everything that they had planned and prepared meticulously, from his trust vault to his legitimisation and his lordship, it had all been slowly removed from him and he hadn't even known about any of it!
This was all Dumbledore's doing, he knew it. Lucius Malfoy might have been a filthy Death Eater, but he hadn't once lied to him. How the hell did it get to the point where Dumbledore had taken everything that should have been his away from him and Death Eaters were actually helping him? He couldn't understand it and it made his head hurt all the more as he tried to figure out what on earth was happening.
How had it gotten to the point where he could trust Lucius Malfoy more than he could trust Dumbledore? He was confused and angry and he didn't know what to do or even who to speak to! He'd even contemplated sending a letter to Lucius Malfoy asking him for his advice, that was how bad it had gotten. He didn't know where that moment of madness had come from, but he was so confused and he didn't know where to turn, or even who to turn to. How had this even happened, really?
Things got even worse than that though as he had been summoned, via Ministry guard, to go to the Ministry of Magic and he had gone willingly enough. He had only just been let out of his room for the first time in days to sit at the table to eat his cousin's half-chewed toast crusts when the door had knocked. Dudley had been entertaining the verbalised thoughts of starting up an old game of 'Harry Hunting' and Vernon was in a particularly bad mood that morning, so he had jumped at the chance to leave Privet Drive when ordered to go with the Ministry workers, even if it was for a couple of hours.
His Order guard had seen him leaving, however, he could almost feel their eyes on him, and as he'd climbed into the back of an enchanted, green Ministry car, with all of his belongings as requested by his Ministry guards he might add, he'd seen the pale shimmering of an invisibility cloak as the person underneath it had spun on their heel and disapparated, likely to tell Dumbledore immediately that Harry had been taken into Ministry custody.
He hadn't stayed in Ministry custody though, as soon as he'd arrived at the Ministry in London, he'd been greeted, informed briefly of what was going on, and then he'd been handed right on over to Lucius Malfoy, who, he had been informed, had taken legal custody of him in the name of the Wizardry Protection Movement.
He'd tried to fight it, shouted that he didn't want to live with Malfoy of all people, but no one had wanted to listen, as far as they were concerned, he had no rights as to where he even lived! He was underage and after what Lucius had fed them, they were all eating out of his hand and were eager to put Harry with Lucius. As a founding member of the Wizardry Protection Movement they claimed that he was the perfect person to take custody of him! He was told to calm himself down and go home with his new custodian as there was nothing else he could do as he was underage and nothing he said or did would change what had already happened.
It was just three days after his trip to Diagon Alley and all of his things were now in a guest bedroom of Malfoy Manor, which was almost as big as the entire upper floor of the Dursleys' house and he was still reeling from what had happened, the papers were going ballistic with the story that Lucius had taken custody of the 'neglected' boy hero and had adopted him as his own son, but Lucius Malfoy refused to comment on anything or his reasoning behind taking custody of him except to tell the media that Harry had been neglected. Harry was kept well away from the public and the reporters.
He was Lord Potter and Lord Black; the papers had figured that much out when Lucius had taken Harry to the next called meeting to introduce him, but he still needed a guardian until he graduated and Lucius Malfoy was now that person after filing for his custody on the grounds of severe negligence by his previous magical guardian.