9

Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore sat in his office feeling pleased with himself. His recent efforts to clear his name from the Harry Potter living at the Dursleys scandal were bearing fruit, and it seemed a short time indeed before he could put that setback behind him entirely.

It was indeed excellent news.

And, further plots were coming along nicely. The situation with Harry seemed, if not quite as well in hand as he might've liked, still doing splendidly on all issues of concern.

Save one.

Gilderoy Lockhart.

He was an excellent choice of guardian for the purity of the blood protection he could offer, but there was another matter, a much more concerning one on the whole to the Headmaster of Hogwarts.

Could he be controlled?

At first the answer had been obviously 'Yes', but Albus was now wondering if he had somehow been deceived, as the man was acting nothing like he should have from what he'd seen on his first and only (since graduation, really) trip looking through the young teacher's mind.

On the one hand it was excellent they had such a qualified Defense Against the Dark Arts instructor already signed on so early after losing their last one. While on the other, the man had a disturbing tendency to escape Albus' best calculations.

For instance, he'd been certain the man wasn't qualified to teach at all.

At first he had been certain the man was a fraud, and was not terribly willing to hire him on that count. However, later demonstrations had made it clear that whatever he was, he was not the powerless and posturing fool Albus had first taken him for.

That was both good... and bad.

Gilderoy had admitted to being unable to defend against Legilimency, but he had somehow deceived Albus' probes in their initial interview nonetheless, and had been avoiding meeting his eyes since then. So, whatever it was he had used, it appeared he had used it up. But still, Albus did not know what or how it was done, which he considered to be worrisome.

Then there came the man's disturbing tendency to know about things he shouldn't, no one should, have the slightest clue on. Severus bearing that bit of prophecy to Voldemort was among the least well known secrets available, yet he had known. Indeed, he had threatened him with that knowledge.

The existence of a prophecy was not unknown. That one was guarded for Harry by the Ministry of Magic was something of an open secret. But the part of his Potions Master in its dissemination was quite unknown to all but a few. Indeed, Dumbledore had been convinced it was unknown to all but himself and Severus...

And Voldemort.

Well, that raised a disturbing line of speculation as to where Gilderoy might have heard the secret. However, for all of his foibles, faults and secrets, Albus had felt his newest teacher to be a good man. Perhaps, it was possible that the spirit of Voldemort had, during its wanderings shared certain tidbits of information with other dark creatures.

Secrets were all that Voldemort's disembodied self could presently offer, so it made sense after a fashion for him to offer those in trade for assistance he so desperately required, and it would be among dark creatures, as the only ones liable to trade with the former dark lord.

And, according to Gilderoy's books (although not, curiously, his mind on that one occasion he had been afforded to read it), he had quite a large amount of experience as a hunter and destroyer of dark creatures, some of which may well have parted with information at some point, either during the hunt or slightly after, in trying to bargain for a release.

So, yes, it was indeed possible that his newest professor had come by that knowledge more or less innocently. However, it was also possible that he had not. And it would hardly do for the school's reputation to have two defense teachers in a row possessed by Voldemort.

Albus regretfully resolved to keep a much closer eye on Gilderoy from now on.

He was just concluding this when a letter arrived from Gringotts. Curious, Albus opened it, and upon seeing an itemized list, saw that he was getting his bill for Harry's little shopping trip.

His jaw fell open and he fell backwards out of his chair a moment later.

OoOoO

My appointment with Albus Dumbledore did not go as expected. Or rather, I should say his rather steely cold reception of me was new. But, as I saw the open bill lying on the desk, I at least knew why.

My smirk was openly mischievous. "Really, Albus, the boy had nothing, and as you ought to know, celebrities do not live cheaply. He is now in a far better position to survive the attention and stares you knew all along he would be receiving. At least now they don't point and gossip about his threadbare and ill-fitting clothes, or shoes held together by that fascinating muggle thing they call tape, I believe it is."

He was scowling at me. "Gilderoy, I believe there might be a little abuse of trust here. You might have made a little effort to be frugal."

"Oh! But we did, Albus!" I blurted, interrupting his monologue. Allowing my eyes to stray close enough to him to see the list (without including his face) I even pointed to one item helpfully. "There! You see?"

"And what do auto-sizing charms have to do with frugality?" He muttered.

I sighed and rolled my eyes. "Albus! That is a little boy, doing what all little boys do: He is growing. Indeed, at that age they grow up so fast it is scarcely credible. By buying auto-sizing clothes he will be able to remain in those same outfits for far longer. It's a simple matter of spend a bit now to avoid having to replace everything later. Very frugal. And indeed, we went the extra mile on that by going for the self-mending and cleaning charms, as well."

I was, in point of fact, a little annoyed at the goblins for itemizing this bill, as it meant there was a whole paperwork trail of everything Harry now owned, and that included rather a few things I'd rather people didn't know about.

"And the Sneakoscopes and bookbags? Why more than one expanded pouch?" His eyes bulged a bit. "And those MATERIALS!"

I rolled my eyes. "Albus, he needs them. I've got a half dozen myself, and it was just easier as we were picking up mine to have the same done for him."

"GRAPHORN hide!? Moke skin alone is expensive enough, but Graphorn? What ever possessed you to have pouches made out of two of the most expensive materials available to wizard-kind?!"

I leaned against a shelf, stroking book bindings as I couldn't look at him. "It's really a necessary expense, Albus. You know the boy, Harry gets into trouble completely without meaning to. He will be keeping most of his possessions in those pouches, especially while at school. Thus, to avoid losing a fortune in keepsakes, tools and materials it became necessary to ensure that a pouch would not be casually destroyed if one of his schoolmates flung a jinx at him. Graphorn hide is even tougher than dragons', and repels most spells."

"It is, for that reason, very difficult, and consequently very expensive, to enchant." The Headmaster spoke in heavy, serious tones. "And for a full-featured, top of the line, multi-compartment pouch such as this, to say nothing of FOUR of them!"

"Oh, pish-tosh," I pish-toshed him, airily waving a hand. "You can count on it as some measure of recompense for that abusive childhood you gave him. Besides, it was necessary. But, as the spells on them are so solid, it was a once-in-a-lifetime expense, and it is over now. Harry's needs are met in that department, and someday his great grandchildren will be thankful for them. Besides, 'A wise man must be prepared to abandon his baggage many times in his life.' Harry has already had more than one destroyed out from under him. It will do him good to have the security of holding certain things close."

Albus lay down the list and calmly folded his hands over it. "Could you at least explain why four of them? And why the combination with moke skin?"

"Yes, certainly. I got him a number of pouches to aid in organization. Thus, books in one, potions in another, and so on." I shrugged, pulling out a book I found interesting.

"With the size requirements and sorting charms you'd requested, that hardly seems necessary." I noticed his hands rather white about the knuckles and revised my earlier snap judgment that he was taking this calmly.

Okay, yeah, you probably could fit a small van inside each of those pouches, provided you cut it up into small enough bits to fit past the entry hole. And, there was that extra option I'd insisted on, where when one put his hand in the pouch and thought of something, if it was in the pouch at all it would be right there in your hand, so no fumbling about.

Still, I calmly shot back, "Necessary? Hardly. Desirable? Yes. The boy has never owned anything of his own before, and sadly that means he has yet to master that difficult yet life-saving art of putting things away properly and cleaning up after himself. After others? Well, you made certain he had that part mastered. But cleaning up after himself? He hasn't got that yet, and we will be performing drills and inspections to make sure he learns. Having him keep only appropriate things in their given pouches is the start of that."

"The moke skin?" He prompted.

I found an interesting page on the tome I had cracked open, and spoke in a somewhat distracted tone as I studied it. "As you well know moke skin is highly prized among wizards for moneybags and pouches, being able to shrink down to practically nothing until their owner actually needs something from inside them. Thus appearing and disappearing at his convenience, and being very difficult for thieves to locate or steal from. Harry needed this level of protection for his belongings, as much because of fans as of enemies. I won't have him robbed by grabby girls seeking for a souvenir."

Albus sighed, and by the shuffling of papers and what I saw out of the corner of my eye, I could tell he was once more perusing that list. Fortunately, most of it was genuinely school related materials.

"I can understand the astronomy sphere and lunaglobe, a portable potions lab of that magnitude is perhaps wasted at his current level of development, and a dagger of goblin silver surely is. But what I find most curious about this list are the fire crab, puffskein, kneazel and fwooper, as Harry already has a pet in the form of his owl, Hedwig."

"Yes, I know." I returned, turning a page in the book. "However, Harry has to grow up sometime, and one of the best lessons for that is to take care of another living creature. He needed pets. He loves magic. And those are all fairly common, and useful, examples of magical pets."

"Fire crabs are hardly common..." Albus began.

"Oh! But they are!" I broke in. "At his social level anyway. Granted most poor folks are turned away by the special license required, but of them all that one is most valuable about teaching lessons he could only otherwise acquire in future classes on Care of Magical Creatures, and thus the best way to judge on his own whether or not to take that subject."

Not to mention that the shell of the turtle-like creature was highly prized as a cauldron. And even if we ourselves were not so unscrupulous as to harvest it by killing off the animal deliberately, all pets die on their own eventually.

All of those animals were valuable for one reason or another. The puffskein most of all, as the docile, cushion shaped (and it behaved much like a pillow also) animal was better than a kitten about loving youngsters, and Harry still very much needed large infusions of love.

I noticed that Albus didn't choose to select that one for singling out alone.

He also neglected to complain about the kneazel, as we both knew about the catlike creature's uncanny ability to detect unsavory or suspicious activity, and could guide their owners effectively in many situations.

No, we both knew that Harry needed that sort of protection. And his kneazel kitten, Augustus (Gus, for short) loved him to death.

My own kneazel, Belisarius, was bought at the same time and for much the same reasons. It took an instant liking to me and I needed one. We'd already picked up Crookshanks for Hermione, but she didn't know yet.

She would soon. We'd be holding her birthday early this year so she could spend it with her muggle family, although few enough of them were pure muggles anymore. Still, the principle of family time counted.

"So, Harry is now keeping a small menagerie of pets?" he asked.

"No," I admitted cautiously. "We haven't the space for it. They are waiting to be delivered until we have a proper home, unfortunately."

"Then the shops, at least, will accept their return and refund the money," he nodded, as if to himself.

"So you'll blunt his education to save a few coins?" I asked, unconcerned.

"I will do what is best for the boy!" he insisted.

"Are you so sure that's for the best?" I asked, with lofted eyebrow.

I had never, before this moment, seen Albus angry. He was now, rising out of his chair. "My judgment is not for idlers, the ignorant, vainglorious or status seekers to question! And certainly not for my subordinates to do so! I will decide what is best for Harry, just as I have always done!"

In that moment I decided not to tell him of the book I carried in my pocket, the 'Tale of Harry Potter, Part One: The Tragedy' which implicated him most severely in its pages and spelled out Harry's treatment by the Dursleys in detail, always drawing it back to Albus who had put him there and kept him there and prevented anyone else from finding out what was going on. It even mentioned the man's spy doubtless informing him of all that went on there.

It was poison to the man's career, worse that every word in it was both true and verifiable. Harry himself had been shocked by its contents, even after having written most of it himself from observations of Dursley memories in a pensieve.

And, in order to be fair, he'd asked that we hold off on sending it to my publisher until we could confirm that was Dumbledore's intentions. But by his fiery insistence that only he had any right to be deciding what was good for Harry... no, I'd be adding that last sentence of his to the dedication of the book before I sent it off to be printed.

I shrugged, turning toward the door of the office. "Then, I guess we have nothing more to speak of."

"What of your visit to the Flamels?" he inquired, trying to stop my departure.

"What of it?" I returned, unconcerned, not turning to face him.

He attempted to put on that old grandfatherly look again. Trouble was I would never again be fooled by it, as I'd once seen the proud and haughty, uncaring manipulator of innocents hiding underneath.

He truly didn't care in the least about the cost paid by Harry in his schemes.

"I was hoping you could tell me what went on. Tea?"

I restrained myself from surrendering to the urge to roll my eyes at his lame peace offering of a beverage I would never drink. "I arrived to the shouts of a man who felt abused by too many visitors. Really, Albus, you could have told me you'd been pestering him with gold diggers and distant relations all week long before you sent me there. How could you think they wouldn't spoil any chance of success?"

"I had hoped..."

"Then it was a vain hope." I cut him off. "Whatever you'd intended, all you did was create a situation in which that man would listen to no one."

No one. True; but not nothing. The presence of his Stone being returned had been very persuasive. However, the Flamels and I were agreed to say nothing on it. They would disappear shortly and allow the world to think them dead, so that Albus Dumbledore would drop them from his schemes.

It was the least I could do to help them, really. And they'd already keyed me in to the visitor portion of the wards of their next intended home, so I could drop by and pay them visits from time to time.

We did have that couple decades of training to get to, after all.

"Gilderoy," Dumbledore spoke to me sternly. "Since you have so abused my trust in this issue, I must insist you pay this bill out of your own funds."

I gave him a nod. "I shall make certain that Harry knows that." And I made a note to add to our little book a mention that Dumbledore refused to pay even one knut toward the reestablishment of Harry after he was rescued from the very poverty to which Dumbledore had originally sent him (and thus was partially responsible for).

Oh dear.

What Dumbledore knew, Snape knew, and right now he had in his possession a list of all of our new defensive arrangements. On reflection, a paper trail was unlikely. In the muggle world it would be a certainty, but the two were at odds on so many issues and this was one of them.

Parchment had long been viewed as precious. In the muggle world, industrial technologies had turned paper from a rare treasure into one of the cheapest materials around. But the same could not be said of parchment, which was what the wizarding world still largely used for important documents, receipts among them.

They probably had charmed quills to do most of the work of accounting. From what I recalled of my various memories this was so. So this could be the only copy of the itemized list of our purchases.

It probably was, in point of fact.

I headed over to Dumbledore's desk and reached over to pick up the item in question, quite calmly Obliviating him with my wand held in my off hand behind my back as I bent over.

Yes, just about anyone can be shot when they're off-guard and not expecting it. How else do you think Draco got a shot in on him?

However, I obviously didn't put enough power into it, as the old man shot to his feet and drew his wand. Unfortunately for him, I was within arm's reach and simply used my martial arts to snatch it out of his hand, stun him, and then repeat the Obliviation, this time with far more force.

And I didn't do much, as I feared that too much would cause the master Occlumens before me to find a blank spot in his mind and correct it, breaking through my charm.

So, all I did was to remove his memory of certain items, and my casting the spells. He'd still recall most of the objects on that list, the clothes and potion supplies and so on, and that was by far the bulk of the cost. But not any of the sensitive, secret stuff we could be counting on to stay secret, as we might be relying on it to save our lives.

Dumbledore awoke, having no memory of our short duel, and we said our goodbyes. Then I departed, folding and pocketing the note on my way out.

I was also making a note to add to my final pre-publishing alterations to the book containing the story of Harry's early life, those interesting and yet horribly damning facts about Snape targeting Harry's parents for his Lord, thus killing them almost as surely as though he'd done the deed himself.

And, how Albus had supported that abusive monster in his career of child abuse and endangerment, including said Harry Potter, ever after.

Really, the issue here was not money. It was Dumbledore's callous abuse of someone who'd never done any harm to him (indeed, never meant any and who had loved the old bastard like a grandfather) then refusing to do a thing to make right all of what he'd personally mucked up in the first place!

No, the more I learned, the less excuse there was for Dumbledore's actions regarding Harry. A note about how he had - quite illegally, stolen him as a child from his Godfather, the one man on Earth who had a RIGHT to raise Harry, also ought to be added to his list of crimes.

Albus, as head of the Wizengamot, the magical court system, could have gotten Sirius a trial as easily as naming a date for it. The Aurors would have brought him in for it on time without batting an eyelash. The fact that he had NOT done so was reprehensible to say the least.

I made a note to look in on the Potter's will, as I had no doubts at all that it had not been followed. And, if fanfic convention was to be any guide, Albus was one of the witnesses for it.

If so, that fact was going to find its way into Harry Potter's book.

As for myself, yes, I could pay the bill. It would hurt, but all I'd have to do to make up the loss was publish a few more books. I had a manuscript I was working on half-finished already, telling the full story of the rise of one Tom Riddle, including especially his half blood ancestry and his murder of his own father, as well as the imprisonment of the last pureblood of Slytherin's line.

But there was a chapter on horcruxes still to write.

I stopped by the Room of Requirement, in its version of the Room of Hidden Things, on my way out and calmly picked up Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem. I then popped directly over to the Ministry of Magic and bought the property that was the former Gaunt home - including the house and all its contents.

It was, unsurprisingly, very inexpensive.

From there I went to St. Mungos, where Sirius was still being held (and holding several of the nurses in turn). Obtaining permission to pop out with him on a day trip, we stopped by #12 Grimmauld Place where he keyed me into those protective enchantments and I promised to buy that place from him, too.

Actually, I was starting to have cash flow problems, as much was flowing out but only a little was flowing in. So that's why I promised only to buy it in the future. On hearing this, however, he proclaimed he'd be glad to be rid of the cesspool of horrid memories and sold it to me for a single knut.

I was glad to get it.

Entering inside, I retrieved the locket, executed Kreacher and grabbed a copy of 'Secrets of the Darkest Art' for the horcrux creation spell detailed within it (and silently blessed that the Black's dark library had a copy).

Returning Sirius to the hospital where he could cavort with the female staff members, I then dropped by the bank, found the will (a bit difficult, as it was magically disguised to prevent reading) discovered that everything there was even worse than my most horrible predictions, filled that information in on Harry's Life History, then visited my publisher to drop off the Harry Potter book before I retired to my own penthouse, where I put out the 'Do Not Disturb' sign and sucked down the memories of a curse-breaker.

That part of me that was still the original Lockhart wanted to immediately pop over to Gringotts, hire a team of curse breakers, and send them to the Gaunt House with instructions to search for a golden box hidden under the rotting floorboards of the place, and protected by enchantments, explain that within that box was a ring with a horrible curse upon it, and ask them to solve the whole problem for me. That would certainly be the easiest thing.

The trouble is, I wasn't that trusting. Not anymore.

Griphook betrayed Harry, joining in on a scheme to rob the bank together, and then abandoning him in the middle of it, running away shouting 'Thieves!' after he'd gotten what he'd wanted. Actions which can be boiled down to "I'll get what I want then leave you to take all of the blame" constitute betrayals.

Such actions do not build trust.

So I wasn't going to be trusting a goblin any time soon. I wasn't quite to the point of declaring war on them, but all of those sappy fanfics where goblins were just waiting to shower love and blessings on anyone who was willing to accept and work with them were false.

They were mean, petty, and just as willing to work for Voldemort as the most pureblooded of wizards. While people suffered, it was business as usual for the goblins, who made no complaints at all, and even prospered under the new management, going out of their way to secure its interests, as obedient as any Death Eater to the Dark Lord's commands.

That put them very near to being an enemy to me. Very near indeed.

My plan now was to acquire those necessary curse breaking skills myself, then apply that knowledge to first the uncovering, then the destruction, of each of the horcruxes in turn, as they became available.

But! As I didn't feel like killing Harry (and curse Rowling for making him a horcrux too), I'd have to do that another way than simple gross destruction - and that way involved a careful study of the horcrux creation spell.

It was simple, really.

To make a horcrux a dark wizard had to first rip his own soul apart, so he had a fragment to emplace. Fair enough, I understood that, even though I was never going to go there. But it was the NEXT part that held my interest! The spell to infuse the ripped part of a soul into an object.

That was the weak point, the exploitable loophole.

It was simple, really. That spell already existed to move a fragment of a soul from a place in which it was already bonded (as the caster must, as anybody, have his soul made an integral part of him at birth) and break those bonds to transfer the separated fragment to another container.

So, all I had to do to destroy a horcrux WITHOUT destroying the object it was made of was to adapt that second spell, the one to move a soul piece out of the originating body and into an object. My aim was simply to modify that and create a version to switch Tom's befouling essence from those irreplaceably valuable objects he'd hidden them within, to cheap, disposable ones that no one would miss when I destroyed them.

MOVING the soul fragment was already an established bit of magic, including all of the tricky bits of breaking and reforging bonds. I just had to finagle a way to change targets from person -> object, to object -> object.

And it didn't seem like it should be too hard.

There need be no further tearing, in fact I was sure I didn't want it, as it was my intention to eliminate the entire soul fragment, not spread it around.

The memories of the first curse-breaker turned out to be insufficient to unravel the spell to where I could do what I wanted to do with it. I was about to devote all of my time over the remaining week to this project when I caught sight of a bucket of large, hairy spiders out of the corner of my eye.

Oh yeah. The transfigured marshmallows I'd asked Tonks for. Well, it was either use them or let them go to waste, and it really was better to use them.

So, yes, I had time before I wholly devoted myself to the horcrux project.

I had seen, on our vacation to Italy, an amazingly ugly business suit on our thrift store hopping. My first thought upon seeing it was that only an Addams would wear a suit like that.

And that gave me such a great idea that I immediately resolved to buy it at once, and got it on the spot.

Stripping out of my finery, I put on those dull duds and stood in front of the mirror long enough to fudge my features into an approximation of Gomez Addams, from the films.

After all, Gilderoy was a celebrity, recognizable on sight, and I didn't want to sully his image of a famous figure of Light by going and doing anything even remotely Dark while wearing his face - and the plain truth of the matter was there were some things of that variety I just had to do.

Liberally placing spiders all over my body, til I looked very much like a stand in for that initial scene in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark', body decoratively covered in big, hairy spiders, I apparated away.

There was some shopping to be done in Knockturn Alley.

Walking through the Leaky Cauldron with a huge Gomez-grin on my face, I even startled the wizards there with my spider-covered presence, getting reactions as bad as people dropping out of their seats. As I moved toward the Alley entrance one of my spiders scuttled up over my face. Grin never faltering, I plucked it up, kissed its hairy topside, and placed it back on my shoulder with a fond pat.

Several among the witches swooned.

Then it was more of the same as I strolled through Diagon Alley, with people shying away from me openly and mothers clutching their children behind them as I passed, all the while I was as gracious as a duke as I walked by.

Creepy, but gracious.

The slightly demented politeness was a good touch, I felt.

Once I turned onto Knockturn Alley I could sense the people behind me were almost relieved.

Just as I entered Borgin and Burke's a spider crossed my face again. This time I picked it up and took a bite out of the transfigured marshmallow, starting to chew just as the shopkeeper caught my eye.

I offered him a piece.

This seemed even to upset the imperturbable Burke slightly, although he hid it well as he declined.

Crunching and grinning at the same time, I pointed to a half dozen dark arts objects, including that 'touch me and die' necklace Draco later used to try and assassinate Dumbledore, just to cover the fact that I was really there to purchase the Vanishing Cabinet.

Because, really, why leave such a thing in enemy hands?

Burke swallowed noisily (and did I detect a hint of nervousness? But Why? He dealt with worse, or just as bad, regularly I'm sure) as he rang up my purchases and asked, "Name, sir?"

"Gomez Addams!" I shouted with the movie character's cheerful pride.

Burke nodded. "Yes, sir. Your family still has credit with us. I shall deduct the price from that, after deducting your preferred customer discount, of course. Do you want everything delivered to the same address?"

"Of course!" I didn't let my act slip, in spite of panicking inside. "All but those two," I waved idly to the cabinet and necklace. "Those I'll want shrunk and gift wrapped to carry out personally. In fact, why don't you gift wrap it all, my dear fellow?"

Burke cleared his throat nervously. "What... paper do you wish, sir?"

I seemed to consider this for a moment. "Human skin would be too formal, I think. Aha!" I snapped my fingers, as if coming to a decision. "Just the thing! Tie it all up in mummy wrappings, won't you, dear boy?"

"Yes, sir." He gave a small bow, unusually polite, I thought. "Is there to be a card?"

"And flowers." I pointed to him as though he'd been missing something important. "A stinking corpse lily and two dozen flytraps, if you please, along with four dozen dead, black roses."

It wasn't what I wanted to do, but it was what the act demanded, and this would be a bad time to run screaming off into the night. So I held the grin on my face and just played up to my role.

"What shall the card say, sir?" He asked in unusual obsequiousness.

Another spider crossed my face, although this one just scuttled over quickly to the other side, so I ignored it as I posed in thought.

"Happy Anniversary!" I cried out, thinking that was nicely generic. But his quill didn't move, still waiting expectantly, so I finished in a softer tone. "To my beloved Morticia, the sweetest, loveliest, most disturbing wife any man could ask for."

Now the quill began to scratch, and the man made slight nodding motions that I had lived up to (or was that down to?) his expectations on this.

Now hopefully if there were any true Addams on this world that would include their own Gomez and Morticia and they'd just... aw, heck! Who was I kidding? The moment I got out of this shop I was going to revert to my old face, burn the suit, hide the cabinet, and never EVER go anywhere near this idea again!

And that's just what I did.

Although, when I got back to my apartment, sloughing off the transfigured marshmallows into their bucket where they belonged, I found Dora there looking around, apprehensive.

Already back in my own face and attire, I asked her, "What is it, Dora?"

Not looking at what I was doing (she was busy checking under furniture and the like), she answered, "Something happened to the bucket of live spiders I got to serve as models for the transfiguration you asked me to do."

She held up an unopened bag of marshmallows.

I fainted.

OoOoO

It took me four days and absorbing Lockhart's complete collection of curse breaker memories before I was able to do it, but I DID adapt that spell (which would take a bit of soul, already infused into its parent body by birth, then move that soul bit to another object and infuse it there) to take a soul bit out of one object and into another, changing which one was the horcrux.

I was a little weird by then, having absorbed waaay too many memories in far too short a time period, but I did succeed in transferring those soul bits of Tom's trapped in the locket and diadem from those priceless relics and into a pair of thrift store coffee mugs.

Ugly ones, too.

Two Avada Kedavra curses later and the world was short by two horcruxes. And believe me, I WANTED to kill Voldemort, so desire was no problem! I even used Pettigrew's wand to do it, as no one would be surprised to find those curses on the wand of a convicted Death Eater.

One quick trip to the hovel of the last of the pureblood descendants of Slytherin, one golden box retrieved (not so hard a task as I had feared - as Tom had only been roughly late teens when he'd hidden it there, so his spell work, while impressive for his age, was not so hard to beat). Box opened, ring retrieved, soul swapping spell performed, and a third ugly coffee mug got an Avada Kedavra curse upon it, ending roughly half of the total horcrux list.

I was even able to remove the nasty, ugly, really bad curse from the ring, seeing as how I already knew it was there (and who had placed it - after all, it HAD to be Tom, as he'd been wearing it before and got no ill effects).

I even removed the secondary and backup curses. Why not?

But, as Rowling had said that Nagini only became a horcrux after Pettigrew had started to help the Dark Idiot return, that meant there were only six at present, so we were down by exactly half.

The next was Harry.

I had to laugh, a demented cackle of an overstrained brain. It was all so easy! I didn't even have to do a THING! By now I understood that I'd never had to do this at all to save Harry from being Voldemort's horcrux.

It was simple, really. The process of horcrux creation goes as follows: a dark witch or wizard commits an act of murder to rend apart their soul, tearing off a fraction of it. Then, as it is the nature of souls to self repair, they had to cast a second spell to take that fragment out of their bodies and put it in something else, something they'd want to hide at some great distance from themselves lest that implanted fragment migrate home to their bodies and ruin the spell's terrible and costly protection.

Going over that again, more simply. You create a soul fragment within yourself, then take that out and put it somewhere else.

Harry already HAD a soul fragment inside of his body! He had his own, whole and complete, plus a bit of Voldemort's existing as a separate thingy (which could never join or fuse to Harry's, as it belonged to someone else entirely).

Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes, the cackling madness. What else? Oh! Right! All Harry had to do to be free of Voldemort's spirit's influence, cut off their connection forever, and cease being a horcrux for his parents' killer was to cast the horcrux creation spell himself.

I am NOT talking about the 'commit a murder' part! Harry already had a separate bit of soul fragment tucked away in there, no point in making another when all you want is to get rid of the first.

The horcrux creation spell existed to take a bit of soul fragment out of your body and put it in something else. You see how simple that is? Harry's main problem was that he had a bit of soul fragment in him that he didn't want. If he cast that spell it would be expelled forever.

It would take that fragment of Voldemort out of him and put it in something else, making that object a horcrux instead of Harry. I'd suggest into a toilet paper roll or some other thing that we could use to graphically illustrate our disrespect for the Dark Idiot.

A Dark Bedpan, perhaps?

And it was past time that I go link up with the Granger family to go back for another week of stolen vacation time.

OoOoO

Immediately upon their return from their first week of time travel vacation, the extended Granger family had put everything out on the porch, and then proceeded to give their home the most thorough cleaning it'd ever received, all working together to banish even the slightest trace of a memory of dust or spots on the carpet. Magic did help a little bit in some cases, but they didn't know many of those spells yet, and so it was good, old elbow grease, water and cleansers that got most of the work done.

Afterwards, they started on the garden.

Sometime during this they had purchased a second bed and dresser for Harry, and divided Hermione's closet so they could share. In fact, though on some level they knew their current pasts were false, they were doing all they could to force reality to fit their memories.

They even got Harry an appropriate toothbrush of the appropriate color and put it in the spot I'd claimed for him.

It was a little scary, really.

I had started off the week intending to visit every evening, in hopes that would keep charging whatever it was Harry needed with that blood magic thing of his. But, I had gotten so busy that that had fallen off my charts.

Also, I may have gone ever so slightly mad putting so many memories inside of my head. But at least there were fewer horcruxes in the world.

So it was with some surprise to me to return there and learn of a screaming match between Ted and his wife over the issue of her having taken the kids in for some cosmetic magic touch ups, fixing Hermione's oversize front teeth for one, although Miranda's chin and Moria's ears, their worst features, were also looking far better than they used to.

They'd gone from nice but ever so slightly clownish to downright good looking in one simple change apiece.

Good for them.

Harry's scar was also slightly less prevalent, so it looked like it had been a whole family thing. Although Ted had apparently blown his top about it. It wasn't a money issue (I knew, as I offered to pay any costs just trying to stop their argument), but that they'd used magic.

I'd always thought it odd that Hermione, who loved magic to death and was a good person in general, seemed to choose magic over her family. Okay, so magic was fun and it was useful, but family was family.

Why not have both?

Unless, as it seemed now, it was her family that had forced her to choose between them. That was so often a bad thing for parents to do, as so often their children's choices surprised and horrified them.

It was pure speculation on my part until now. The only hint of evidence had been Hermione assertion that her parents wouldn't let her fix her teeth magically. I'd never thought that made any sense, but wasn't about to argue, as parents did have the right to lay down rules like that.

I just would have reserved any rules I made for something important. Getting in between a woman and her appearance meant you'd pretty much always lose, and losing out on a Parental Prerogative demand meant that parental relationship you'd based that demand on would be damaged.

As witnessed by Hermione getting her teeth fixed magically at her first opportunity, and later on having a crappy relationship with her parents, to the point of wiping out their minds so they WERE no longer her parents!

Frankly, I'd never have given her a choice between be 'a bushy haired, beaver toothed bookworm who obeys me' or 'a merely bushy haired bookworm who might be interesting to boys'. No, that's a battle you'd ALWAYS lose! So never make it. Only draw the line on important stuff, basics, 'No sex before marriage, no drugs, no alcohol, no tattoos, etc - in short no messing yourself or your future up' and even then lay out your case so she can agree on it.

Pick your battles.

It wasn't like there was anything inherently, morally wrong in looking good. It could be, and often was, taken to extremes, nurturing both vanity and pride (which were both sins, and so to be avoided).

But there wasn't any inherent virtue in ugliness, either.

All girls want to be beauties, even the ones that haven't got any real hope of it. No, make that especially those that had no real hope of it!

But the battle Ted apparently wanted to fight was one where he preferred to use mundane methods to magical ones, even where there was no mundane way to correct a problem (such as Hermione's oversize teeth), a stance that had never made sense to me, except perhaps as a control issue (ie, this is the way I understand things, therefore the route you will choose).

But I think the real source of their argument was that Miranda had once been on his side, only now she was pitching for the other team.

Nothing I could do about that.

And, demented lunatic though I was, I knew better than to try.

Miranda had her own magic and magical memories now, and it would be cruel indeed to ask her to give them up. That she was acting as eager a convert as Hermione had been was hardly a surprise. She was her daughter's mother, and they shared many traits in common. More now than ever before.

But Ted was, just as plainly, feeling his position in the family challenged.

Sigh.

Well, that was something that lay within their own power to resolve, the best I could do would be to give them what help I could. And, considering that I'd very nearly lost my mind so offering proper and appropriate counsel was out, that help just could possibly be in the form of another week of vacation!

Even Ted was eager for that (work had been stressful lately) so we all suited up and headed out!