Chapter Seven
The aftermath of the Quidditch World Cup was intense. Rita did a masterful job of impressing upon the general public the danger yet giving them ways to feel helpful or safer as well as writing shocking exposés on the high society Death Eaters who had been captured or killed. Most of the other journalists followed that trend, although there were a handful who chose to blatantly lick the Ministry's boots.
A few other reporters wrote articles on how Harry Potter and friends had worked to save and protect the children fleeing into the forest who had been seperated from their parents. A few of the older kids had given interviews and my name had been mentioned as the brains behind the impromptu sanctuary, albeit as they stressed that I was a friend of the Boy-Who-Lived. I wasn't entirely sure how I felt about the growing public awareness of me, far more stressful than being known as Hogwarts' resident seer and cryptid.
Apparently saving the lives of a bunch of kids from Death Eaters and ensuring we were all safe until the Ministry could do their jobs meant that a bunch of people owled my saying they owed me life debts, something I had not previously considered. Andromeda said that life debts were a serious business and trying to waive or deny them was at best insulting to the person and at worst something that could get Magic itself involved in, so I couldn't just not accept the life debt. Fortunately, parents taking on the life debts of their child was perfectly acceptable by both magic and social norms. A number of the people who owled were parents requesting to take on the life debt in their child's place. I wrote back accepting that offer and for those children whose parents had not already offered to take on the life debt, I said that their parent either could take the debt or I would call it in sometime after they turned seventeen.
The DMLE had a wave of new recruits who wanted to sign up to fight, which they were very happy about. Dumbledore had owled back and suggested that I attempt to sway the opinions of my peers, which meant he wanted me to recruit child soldiers for him.
The four of us went to Black Castle to discuss all that had happened. Sirius had wanted to cancel the ball that he was holding to celebrate his return to society and taking up the Black Lordship. Andromeda managed to convince him it was a horrible idea. It was more important than ever to appear powerful and cultivate alliances among both friends and enemies. In addition to the usual high society figures, a lot of members of the old Order of the Phoenix were being invited.
Molly wanted to skip the annual school shopping trip and just get everything we needed herself. We managed to convince her that that would just be giving into the fear that Voldemort wanted to perpetrate. She still insisted that we stay in a group at all times.
Once we got to Diagon Alley, Hermione and I begged Molly to allow the four of us to go to Lingua Loqui , the store that sold language potions. She agreed so long as we sent her a patronus message every half hour and were back within two hours.
The store was a small shop with a twenty-something eccentrically dressed wizard behind the counter.
“Hi, uh, we’re interested in learning languages?” Ron asked.
“New customers!” the man exclaimed. “I’m Poldirk, nice to meet you. Here’s a brochure with all of the languages we offer. Each is seventy five galleons, but you get a discount the more you do. Do you have anything specific in mind?”
“Probably us each learning a couple of different languages, likely the official language of some other countries. How does it work?” I asked.
“Right! So it’s a potion. You drink it, then wait an hour without talking or casting magic and then you’ll be able to speak and read in the language you purchased. If you want to do several languages back to back, you’ll have to wait two hours between each language potion. We require you to do them here so we can monitor for any ill effects,” Poldirk explained, gesturing with his hands.
“Ill effects?” Hermione questioned.
“You’re tongue might feel heavy, you might get migraines while the potion is taking effect and a small minority of people have trouble speaking the wrong language for a day or two afterwards,” he said.
“Sounds cool. We should do a really uncommon language that nobody else knows so we can secretly communicate,” Harry suggested.
“An excellent idea. I would recommend looking in our dead languages section,” Poldirk leaned over the counter and pointed to it on the brochure Hermione held. “It’s mainly members of the History Guild that can speak those languages for translating ancient texts. All of the dead languages have less that a hundred speakers in Albion and less than a thousand speakers worldwide. We also have the Official International language section, which you mentioned. Each language lists the number of speakers and where it is most commonly spoken.”
“We’ll have to discuss which languages we want to do,” Hermione said.
“Of course. Please have a seat and take your time,” Poldirk said.
“I like the idea of having our own secret language,” I said.
“It’s a good idea. Then we can split up all of the official languages, of which there are eight since English is spoken both here and in the US, er Keya that is. Then it’s German for Scandia, Russian for Slavia, French for Europa, Arabic for Ethiopia, Yumplatok for Ngunawal, Spanish for Muisca, and Mandarin for Anatolia. And we all obviously know English, so that’s seven left. And then maybe Latin and some magical languages?” Hermione proposed.
“I’ll do Gobbledok since I have a good relationship with the goblins and learning their language will only help. Harry should do Mermish, since merpeople are going to be involved in the Triwizard Tournament,” I said.
“I’ll start writing this down,” Hermione said, fishing out a piece of paper and a quill.
Eventually we decided on us each learning four new languages so we would all speak five including English. We would all learn Sumerian, which was the oldest language and had very few speakers as our secret language. Then Harry would learn Mermish, Hindi and Mandarin. Ron would learn German, Italian and Russian. Hermione would learn Latin, French and Yumplatok. I would learn Arabic, Gobbledok and Spanish.
“That just leaves when we are going to do this,” Hermione said.
“We can just come tomorrow. Mum would let us if we brought one of my older brothers as adult supervision,” Ron said.
“Excellent!” Hermione said.
We went back up to the counter, where Poldirk looked up from a book he was reading that was in another language.
“Made a decision?” he asked.
“We’d like to do four languages each. Could we schedule an appointment for tomorrow?” Hermione asked.
“Sure. I’ll need your names and what time you want to come in. Oh, and which languages did you want to do?”
We gave Poldirk the necessary information, then bid him goodbye and headed out to meet up with the rest of the Weasleys.
Molly was trying to chastise the twins and confiscate their prank supplies at the same time. Fred and George were nodding along to her lecture while discreetly handing Ginny shrunken bags which she slipped into her purse. Knowing the twins, Molly would only end up confiscating a small portion of their purchases which had already been allotted to be sacrificed to throw her off their scent while the rest was hidden with Ginny until they could retrieve them.
“Does Molly know about your business yet?” I asked the twins quietly as we unloaded the bags of school supplies onto the living room table after we returned to the Burrow.
“Nope. We’re going to officially-”
“-open business with an owl-”
“-delivery service soon, but only-”
“-once we’re safely at Hogwarts.”
“Smart. Have you figured out how to destroy Howlers yet?”
“We’ve made a potion-”
“-that will turn it into a-”
“-regular letter if you-”
“-pour it on the Howler.”
“Have you filed all the paperwork?” I asked.
“Yep, we have our Ministry-”
“-issued business license.”
“We also decided on Mundungus-”
“-Fletcher for the fifth person on-”
“-the Board of Directors. He’s-”
“-an adult and can help with-”
“-acquiring the harder to get-”
“-or less than legal ingredients.”
“Mundungus is a criminal. If he’s going to be a part of your business, you need to make sure that everything he does on behalf of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes is legal,” I warned. “Fortunately there is a loophole in a lot of laws regarding illegal substances. It’s illegal to sell them or sometimes to import them, but it’s not illegal to purchase them as long as it's within the country. Mundungus wouldn’t be selling to you since he’s a part of your business, he’d just be purchasing it on behalf of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes and getting reimbursed by your company account, which is legal. If you give me a list of your ingredients I can write down the legalities of each one.”
“We’ll bring that up when-”
“-we next talk to Dung.”
“Great. Now Maggie should be arriving soon and she and Ginny are going to go through my closet,” I said, standing up.
Ginny and Maggie would go through the clothes that I had outgrown the past year to see what they wanted. Neither of them liked what they saw as “charity”, but outgrown hand-me-downs were perfectly acceptable, especially as the only other options were the Weasley boys’ clothes or whatever the orphanage could afford to buy in bulk for lots of children, respectively. Whatever the two girls didn’t want, Maggie would take back to the orphanage for the other kids.
“Is there really going to be a Yule Ball this year?” Maggie asked, holding up a Ravenclaw sweater to her chest.
“Yeah, I’m really excited,” I said, pulling out a woolen winter cloak. It still fit, but I knew Ginny wanted a more feminine styled cloak than Ron’s old one now that she was going through puberty.
“And we’re allowed to go?” Ginny asked, taking the winter cloak and twirling around with it on her shoulders.
“It’s only fourth year and up, although third years are allowed if they are going as someone’s date. Teenage boys get really weird about romance at this age, so you can probably get a date if you take the initiative. Or worst case scenario, just sneak in,” I shrugged.
Maggie and Ginny discussed their electives. Maggie was doing Muggle Studies, Care of Magical Creatures and Arithmancy. Ginny was taking Muggle Studies and Care of Magical Creatures. Luna was taking Care of Magical Creatures, Divination and Ancient Runes.
After eagerly discussing the new classes, the conversation turned to Sirius’ Ball. It would be the first time both of the younger girls were going to a ball.