chapter two
Hagrid and Harry walked over to gringotts and Harry nodded at the goblins standing in front of the marble building. He received a quick nod back, before the Goblins readjusted themselves. The inside was just like the outside, a big hall of marble and granite, with many desks lining the huge hall, Goblins sitting behind them, dealing with the various wizards and witches doing business with them.
Hagrid walked straight over to one of the many desks, where a goblin said, eying them warily, “Reason for your visit?”
“Mr ‘arry Potter wants to get some money out of ‘is trust vault”, Hagrid told him, pulling out a small copper key, sliding it to the goblin. He then turned to Harry, explaining, “See, everytime ye need to get money from ‘ere, ye need to bring yer key, be sure to keep that close and don’t lose it. Replacing a key involves a lot of blood, or you could just replace the key with a blood lock later on, though that is up to ye”
“Okay, Hagrid”, Harry nodded, his eyes fixated on the small key which the goblin was inspecting.
“This looks real”, the goblin spoke, “Griphook will take you to the vault 687”
Another goblin came running up, carrying a lantern. He took us from the main hall towards the inner workings of Gringotts, there was no more marble walls, just a huge connected cave system with stalactites and stalagmites hanging from top and bottom of the caves. They were traveling via metal rails, which they used a cart to traverse the rails. On their way down, Harry could see streams of fire from way down. Dragons, Hagrid had told him, they guarded the most secure vaults.
“Here we are”, Griphook calmly stated as the cart slowed to a halt.
The cart had stopped exactly in front of vault number 687. Harry was motioned to open the vault, so he put the key inside of the large lock, twisted it and with a hiss, like air escaping, the door slowly creaked open. What was inside was mountains of golden, silver and bronze, some of the piles were as tall as Hagrid and just as wide, others were more Harry’s or Griphook’s size. There had to be a fortune in here and all that was his? He couldn’t believe it. Sure, Hagrid had told him that his parents were wealthy enough to never have to work but still, knowing it and seeing it were two completely different things.
Hagrid handed him a pouch, “Fill this up with a handful of galleons, sickles and knuts, no worries about the size, the bag is enchanted to be light as a feather and bigger on the inside”
And so, he began stuffing money into his new ‘wallet’, happily thinking about all the things he could buy for himself. Clothes that actually fit him! Food that he could eat all to himself! So many things he could buy with this new fortune, without even putting a dent in it, “And this is all mine?”
“All yours and more”, the goblin said.
“More?”
“There are more accounts which you have inherited, the potter vault, the Evans vault -your mothers’- and some more that people have donated to you because they were so grateful for you defeating you-know-who”
“Wow- I had no idea… say, what is the conversion rate from galleons to pounds? I need some muggle money too”, after all, he needed muggle clothes that fit him and he doubted that the vendors in diagon alley had any normal clothing and well- paying with golden galleons probably wouldn’t fly in the muggle world.
“The current exchange rate is 5 pounds per galleon, though that can fluctuate from time to time, how much muggle currency would you like to withdraw?”, Griphook asked, getting a quill and some parchment ready to record the transaction.
“I’ll withdraw 500 pounds, so that would be what, a hundred galleons?”
“Plus the fee for converting currency, so 105 galleons”
“Just fantastic”, Harry nodded.
“What ye need so much muggle money for, ‘arry?”, Hagrid asked, cocking his head to one side.
“Just some things I need to get in muggle London, like a new wardrobe”, he explained, “and some money to get back to the dursleys, as I don’t think you’ll take me, will you?”
“No, no, I am confident in yer ability to get back to yer family”, Hagrid chuckled and they made their way back to the cart, which now traveled in the opposite direction, carrying them higher and higher until finally, they were back in the grand, marble hall and Griphook took them back to the same goblin that had greeted them when they first arrived and spoke something in his ear.
The other goblin nodded and got out a box of cash, muggle cash, counting out 500 pounds in 20 pound notes, gave it to Harry and put the box back to where he’d pulled it from. Harry deposited the money in his ‘wallet’ and walked off after thanking the teller.
Hagrid -who was motion sick after the extended drive on the rail system- excused himself and let Harry do the shopping by himself. His first stop was the luggage shop, where he had to buy himself a trunk.
“Hello, sir, I need a trunk”, he told the shop owner.
“Ah- going off to hogwarts are ya? Well, we have many options, there is of course the regular old trunk, though that does get full very fast. We also have trunks with expandable compartments, for books or for potions ingredients, we even have small greenhouses as options, so, what’re you looking for?”, the owner asked.
“I want a compartment for books and one for potions ingredients as well as one for clothes, how much will that cost me?”
“Well, three expendable compartments on top of a standard issue suitcase will cost ya a good 30 galleons and six sickles”
“Done”, he produced the money from his pouch and was on his way with a new trunk at his side.