Skiving School! (For A Good Cause)
Next few weeks, Hermione was bound in the hospital wing. For some magical reason, no one knew what had gone wrong with the Polyjuice, and Snape was being… Snape. Let’s just say he wasn’t exactly motivated to make an antidote for someone who had ostracized his godson.
The Slytherin Gang tried their best to ignore the whole situation, especially Pansy, who despite her best efforts could not hide how hurt she was. She would have actively taken part in the whole Polyjuice shenanigans with gusto at that but alas. The Gryffindors & their stupidity. Vince and Greg were hurt because of the whole identity theft thing. Theo and Blaise were too busy with Neville and their studies to pay anything else any attention.
So one day, in early January, Draco took matters into his own hands (so to speak) and led his Slytherins to the hospital wing, Luna and Neville in tow. (Ginny MIA). Obviously, the Twins had to join them as well. Draco just couldn’t take the whole divide thing anymore. Also, he needed to sneak Harry out of Hogwarts. (Tomayto. Tomahto.)
“I’d think if you sprouted whiskers, you’d take a break from work,” Fred said, tipping the stack of books on the side table onto Hermione’s bed.
“Don’t be silly, I’ve got to keep up,” Hermione replied briskly and gave Draco one of her trademark glares. “I don’t think someone might have been able to warn me due to their divination abilities and such?”
“Oh! So we are friends again?” Draco asked in mock surprise. “According to my Divination abilities, someone deserved it after the way they treated their in-house friend and ostracized their Slytherin friends.” Hermione had the sense to look ashamed.
“What were you guys thinking?” Theo asked, still astounded at the level of their insanity.
“We were pretty sure it was Montague,” Ron muttered in a low voice.
“Which we would have told you was incorrect, if only you guys have talked to us,” Pansy pointed out sullenly.
“Well, you were the ones to walk out on us,” Hermione countered a little self-righteously.
“Because you called us evil and abhorrent in only so many words,” Blaise replied hotly. He looked still quite perturbed, to be honest. Neville placed a hand on his shoulder to calm him down.
“It wasn’t like that,” Ron huffed out and looked ready to battle but settled down at a pointed throat clearing from the Twins. “Look… I am sorry for what I said. I realized it as soon as I said it. I did not intend to hurt or be mean. It’s just…. I don’t know how to say it. But we have been indoctrinated to think like that, and somehow it came out of my mouth even though I don’t feel like that. I am sorry, really. I miss you guys, can we be friends again? And I promise I’ll think about the words before saying them?” Ron pleaded. (Honestly, those were quite big words from someone like Ron.)
The Slytherins still huffed and puffed for a little bit longer, but then they forgot about house rivalries due to a single bigger evil. Lockhart.
“What’s that?” Vince pointed at the golden card poking out from under Hermione’s pillow.
“Just a get-well card,” Hermione tried to hide it, but the Twins were faster than her and tossed the card to Blaise.
“To Miss Granger, wishing you a speedy recovery from your concerned professor. Lockhart… Order of Merlin… Blah, Blah, Blah.” Blaise read out loud incredulously. Each word louder and angrier than the last.
Ron, Harry, Theo, and Neville looked disgusted. Pansy, Greg, and Theo were swooning as Hermione blushed Weasley red. Luna just looked bored out of her mind at this point.
“You sleep with this under your pillow?” Fred mused, questioning Hermione's intelligence.
“Lockhart is the smarmiest bloke you could ever meet.” George was questioning Hermione’s sanity to begin with, and Draco was right with him on that point. But before they could all fall down that rabbit hole, Draco looked at Harry, who has bee sneaking glances at him the whole time.
“Can I talk to you for a bit?” Draco asked; Harry looked a bit surprised but came with him as the others went back to mocking and defending (Crazy!) Lockhart.
.....
“Where are we going?” Harry asked (finally). He had been following Draco silently so far. They were almost halfway down the tunnel on their way out of Hogwarts. Draco hadn’t read anything about this passage in the books, so he assumed it was one of the System-generated ones that opened after the last task.
So far, Draco had used it thrice. Once to try it out and see where it led to and the other two times… for stuff. (Let me keep my secrets, people!)
“Hullo!” Before Draco could answer Harry, Tonks jumped out of her hiding spot. Draco had become used to her shenanigans by now, but it took Harry a couple of minutes to calm down after that jump-scare.
“Who’s that?” Harry pointed at Tonks as if pointing at a wild animal (which might as well be true).
“This…” Draco waved his hands around Tonks as if presenting a million-dollar mystery relic, which wasn’t that much wrong. With her cheery, cheeky mischievous personality, the ever-present grin, her hair shocking pink (her favorite, for today), a couple of fingers wrapped in bandages (probably due to a recent bout of clumsiness), Tonks was truly one in a million piece.
“Harry, meet Nymphadora Tonks, my cousin. Tonks, this is Harry.”
“Wotcher, Harry? I prefer Tonks.” she shook Harry’s hand enthusiastically.
“Hi.” Harry smiled. “Still not sure what’s going on though?” He looked at Draco.
“We should sit down.” Draco pointed at the slightly raised spot in the pathway and sat opposite Harry. “So, remember… when we were friends and we were talking about you hiring a solicitor to manage your finances and stuff?”
“Draco…” Harry looked at him earnestly, “We are friends.”
“Are we?”
“Yes… why would you think otherwise?” Harry asked, “Is this because of the other night?” Harry asked in a small voice.
“No!” Draco said forcefully. “I was just being an idiot. Although we should talk about that… maybe later?” Draco beseeched Harry.
“Ok.”
“Right. Ok.” Draco rubbed his hands together. “So… anyway… I looked into it and it seems like someone has been using your funds from the family vault-”
“Who?”
“We’ll get back to that. So, you need to go to Gringott’s to settle that situation.” Draco hesitated for the next bit. “Tonks is a metamorphagus, you see. I met with a couple of solicitors Polyjuiced as you while Tonks accompanied me morphed as her Mom Andromeda Tonks for adult supervision. I hope you won’t hate me for that, but we made negotiations with financial advisors and solicitors and now you need to go there to sign and make vows to secure the contracts.” Draco said in a rush, too afraid to look at Harry’s reaction.
“Right… Ok… we have been talking about it for a while, so it’s not like you went behind my back or something. Stop looking so afraid.” Harry grinned. “I would have liked going on those outside excursions with you though. So, what are we doing today?”
“We are going to Gringott’s to secure you a financial advisor. They need your wand to authorize your vault and you need to make an unbreakable vow with your solicitor.” Draco explained. “I know it’s not standard practice, but pure-blood families tend to rely on it.”
“The vow? What?” Harry looked confused.
“It’s a blood magic thing. They won’t be able to tell your secrets to others… like ever or do anything fraudulent against you. If they do.... they die, essentially.”
“That’s harsh.”
“But necessary.” Tonks said, startling Draco, and by the looks of it, Harry had also forgotten about her. “I thought Draco was crazy like the Black curse-”
‘Black curse’ Harry mouthed to Draco. “Later.” Draco replied.
“-when he recruited me, but by the looks of it, it seems that someone has been using your funds for their schemes. Also, after last year, I bet you guys be needing someone with blood vows to keep your business secret and confidential.”
“Exactly! Like 007!” Draco exclaimed.
“You know 007?” Harry and Tonks looked flabbergasted.
“Have you seen Roger Moore? Better yet, have you seen Pierce Brosnan?” Draco smirked.
“Point.” Tonks and Harry nodded in understanding.
.....
“Harry Potter!” Griphook exclaimed, hard to guess if he was excited or anything.
“Hi!” Harry exclaimed his usual friendly self.
Tonks was sitting next to Harry as Andromeda, looking all prim and proper.
“Griphook, can we finally do the papers now?” Draco asked.
“Yes, sure, Mr. Malfoy.” Griphook took his clipboard and pointed at the parchment with a pointy finger. “If you see here, Mr. Potter-”
“Harry, please.”
Griphook looked at Harry and contemplated something for a few moments. “Harry… This here is your personal vault. You are to be provided with your monthly expenses and such with this one, your school expenses and other funds included. Technically, you own all this.” Griphook took out a long list of items, valuable no doubt. “but to access the entirety of it, you will have to wait till you reach adulthood.”
“I own all that?” Harry asked, eyes wide with wonder.
“Yes. Now this one here is your family vault.” Griphook took another parchment out of his clipboard. “By law, as the only heir of Potter family, this is all your assets and property and should be under your authority.”
“Should be?” Draco asked.
“You see around 11 years ago the vault was taken under guardianship-”
“By who?” Draco asked as Harry said “Why?”
“We goblins don’t interfere with wizard business as you well know, Mr. Malfoy. The wizard showed up with the vault key and ordered us to put it under guardianship.”
“Which wizard?” Draco asked, despite being fully aware of who it was.
“Let me see.” Griphook made a whole production out of turning over the parchment. “Ah! Right here. It says one Mr. Albus Dumbledore. It seems that under his orders the vault was put under guardianship and is currently being used by a total of eight other accounts.”
“What? Why?” Harry sounded shocked as he turned to Draco for possible answers.
“Later.” Draco took hold of his hand and said reaffirmingly. “How does Harry take control of the vault back again?”
“As I had said before, Mr. Malfoy, due to the extenuating circumstances, Harry here just needs to appoint a financial advisor, an adult, and he can apply to take the vault out of the guardianship. You could start and be done with it today if you wished so.”
“Can you be my financial advisor?” Harry asked and by the widening of Griphook’s eyes possibly shocking him.
“In general, wizards do not like goblins handling their assets, Harry.” Griphook said, seemingly testing Harry on his offer.
“Well, you are already taking care of it, kind of. Seems excessive to look elsewhere. I can make my solicitor a co-advisor if it makes things more professional?” Harry looked at Draco silently looking for support, sticking to the script they had rehearsed.
“We can do that.” Griphook replied with a determined glint in his eyes.
“Can we have it settled today? And as a payment for your services, you get one goblin-made object from Potter vault per year.” Harry asked.
Griphook’s eyes took an unholy shine at that. “Right away, Harry.”
It took 45 minutes for Griphook to prepare all the documents and 5 minutes for Harry to sign and obtain the vault key. On their way to the solicitor’s office, Draco couldn’t help but wonder about the power of money, whether in his world or this fictional wizarding world.
Mabel Beatrice Hatt was a sharp and cunning witch from one of the old blood families with their ties to the Royal blood line. McGonagall had suggested her as a well-reputed and well-known solicitor.
Draco had contemplated going to one of his Mother’s recommended solicitors, but then had changed his mind. Initially due to their Death Eater ties and of potentially being accused of manipulating Harry Potter as a Death Eater’s son in the long run.
Mabel Hatt had not only proved a worthy choice due to her professional prowess but also she had answered an age-old question for Draco. Mabel Hatt and McGonagall were ‘Roommates’ for the last 30 years or so. That old cat!
“Mr. Malfoy, Mrs. Tonks and Mr. Potter. Welcome!” Mabel greeted them as they were led to her room by her assistant. She pointed at the parchment spread on her table. “Give me two minutes to get rid of these, and I’ll be right with you and we’ll get the ball rolling.”
Mabel was a no-nonsense witch (Like attracts like, huh!). It took her 30 minutes to get all the documents signed by Harry and performing the Unbreakable Vow with Draco as peer witness and with Andromeda (Tonks) as adult witness. Harry left her office as a sole adult owner and authority for all intents and purposes of Potter properties, assets, and family name.
Finally something was going as planned.