C030 - Christmas & Paranoia

With the booklet that explained my mum's fascination with the A-logo of the brotherhood secured, I checked the rest of the rooms for hidden items. Eventually, I did manage to find another extended-space pouch in the master study that was hidden behind blood wards I was able to open with a drop of blood.

In it were five thousand galleons, a lone unremarkable wand, and a letter of my great-great-great grandfather Valluin Macnair, the one who had this place built. According to the letter, the gold and wand were for his descendants if they ever needed to flee quickly and didn't have time to visit the 'pesky, greedy goblins' to get funding required to hide.

Curiously enough, I found another such hidden bag for the exact same purpose hidden by three other ancestors, and it seemed like none knew of the actions of their parents. Four generations of Macnairs hid twenty-eight thousand galleons in the house back to back. Valluin's son hid the most with nine thousand galleons, Valluin's granddaughter, who was my great grandmother, hid the least because the vaults were running dry and her husband was obsessed with betting on Hippogriff races - whatever those were.

The fact that Walden turned out like he did if his father squandered all of the family's money while gambling wasn't so weird anymore, but what was weird was that my grandmother, Walden's wife, Cassandra Macnair née Gamp squirreled away as much money as she did because she feared her husband would spend the last of it on a cause she deemed unaccaptable. Her letter was even written in blood, and it sounded like Cassandra Macnair hated everything about my, no our family except for her daughter, my mother. And of course Voldemort. She really disliked everything about Tom.

The weird part about it was that she was even able to hide the galleons. Her sister, my great aunt Bella Farley, had told me about the stringent magical wedding contract Cassandra was forced to sign, and it shouldn't have allowed her to do this.

I found nothing else in this giant noble man's house and started roaming the gardens of the place. Despite Patrick saying he worked on it a little in his offtime, the place was overrun with greenery. There were no ugly weeds or animal droppings littering the place, but it still looked uncared for to my eyes. Maybe Patrick had a different sense of aesthetics.

My eyesight gave me a rough estimation of how far the wards extended and it looked like a respectable range to my untrained eye, but I didn't know enough about wards yet to erect better ones or improve the three century old ones placed here.

The only reason I could even identify the blood ward on the first hidden cache of money was because Flitwick had shown me a blood ward. Wards in general had patterns. Patterns that I could recognize thanks to my eye ability.

With nothing else catching my interest, I hopped on top of my broom to meet up with Patrick. I lamented the fact that my extended pouch wasn't a proper way to store my treasure and promised it a nice polish for when I got back to Hogwarts.

The flight southward was entirely uneventful. The distance between Glasgow and Leeds was around 350km or 220 miles, and I kept a steady pace on the Firebolt as I flew just below cloud level for a little over an hour and a half.

It might have been uneventful as I saw no planes or birds, but something about flying so high above ground for such a long time... if it hadn't been -5°C, it would have been even better. But that was what my expensive enchanted Quidditch gear was for as the goggles shielded my face from cold winds, the gloves kept my hands nice and warm, and the cloak trapped the air warmed by my body around me.

Thankfully, Patrick and I didn't need to choose a spot exactly. Just being close to Leeds was enough to call him over to teleport me on the last stretch.

I circled the city a little nonetheless since it was my first time here, but it looked perfectly ordinary to me, so I eventually flew east in the direction of York, landed a good mile away from the nearest muggle roads.

My vision as I landed reported nobody present, just like I needed, and I called Patrick over to get me... home.

When Patrick teleported me over, I realised... he wasn't kidding. This place was a shack at best. The 'house' itself could barely be called one and still looked like it was made by a settler from the early Middle Ages that didn't have the correct tools. If it didn't come with glass windows and a stone chimney, I would have thought Patrick was messing with me, but the stylized A from the brotherhood on the wooden door frame and those very same glass windows and the chimney clued me in that he was not kidding.

"You really weren't joking about the condition of this shack, Patrick... where's the closest muggle from here?"

"The town is over that hill, but nobody lives there. Patrick doesn't know where the closest muggle is," the elf said as he pointed to a hill I quickly walked to. And, indeed, I could barely make out the silhouette of a town with the help of moonlight, but none of the fifty houses had any light in their windows.

"You said something leaked in the soil a few decades ago, so the muggles were moved?"

"Yesyes. Patrick was there as a little elf. It was great master Cavendar, your great-grandfather who spilled a whole barrel of kraken blood down the hill, and the government wizards came and made them all move away."

"Why? Is kraken blood special?"

"Patrick doesn't know. Stupid Patrick," the elf said in a tone that finally betrayed his roots as an obedient house elf bound in servitude.

"No worries, I'll find out later," I said in a calm voice and concentrated on my magical vision in the dead of night.

I immediately found a few magical herbs and a few creatures, too, but thankfully, it was the cute, non-threatening kind. Whatever this kraken blood did, I couldn't see any threats to my person at this moment, and because of the snow blanket, I did not see if the floor looked any different either.

"Let's go inside and see if the trace finds me here," I ordered and made my way inside the shack.

The entire thing was slightly bigger inside than the outside suggested, but it was still a single room and while there was a toilet slightly hidden in a corner, there wasn't even a shower or a bathtub. I saw a wooden barrel outside that likely served as an opportunity to bath, but it was far from the amenities of the room I shared with Harry at Hogwarts.

"Alright. Have you eaten yet, Patrick?"

"Patrick has," the elf said and snapped his finger.

From the stove, a plate floated toward the wooden table next to what likely served as the kitchen of this place.

"Your dinner is ready."

I looked at Patrick with a lifted eyebrow and sat down. The elf stayed in the room and looked at me with curious eyes. I unveiled the plate and looked at an impressive looking pizza that easily beat any of those the elves at Hogwarts had made me.

"Patrick watched fat, hairy muggle make this in London. Patrick learned all he could."

'So he found a chef in an Italian restaurant and copied him? Did he have to be fat and hairy?'

If he did as I thought, Patrick found a good chef. This was the best pizza I had eaten thus far, and I let him know. With a big grin, the elf excused himself for the rest of the day, which was admittedly already pretty much ended.

"Tomorrow's Christmas Eve and the day after I'm supposed to be in Crawley, a city south of London to meet with the Farleys. Five days after, I'm invited to Bones Manor for a dinner just before New Year's Eve. Who knew they'd live in Nottingham? That's actually kinda close to here. After that, I have four more days before I'm back to Hogwarts..."

I trailed off and took out my wand to cast a simple chantless 'Lumos' and held the spell for five seconds until I stopped it with 'Nox'.

After that, I got ready for bed and slept in the luxurious muggle bedding on a queen-sized bed I had Patrick get for me.

Living like a savage without running water didn't mean I'd have to sleep on a stone slab like a caveman.

The next morning, I woke up to loud winds and the creaking of wood. The house had magical foundations, so I didn't fear it falling on me, but the cold still crept into the house.

"Patrick!" I called out loudly, and the elf appeared instantly, which meant the sneaky little bugger was already inside but invisible.

"Yes?"

"Could you please do something about the cold?"

"Gladly," the elf said, and with a snap of his fingers, the fireplace roared to life. He looked visibly relieved about getting the house warmer, which made me look at him weirdly.

"If you're cold too, why not light a fire?"

"Master didn't say it was okay," the elf excused with a look that told me he thought the question was stupid.

"You don't need my instructions to keep a room either of us live in at a hospitable condition. You freezing yourself serves no purpose, and I can quite literally create fire or gather simple firewood with a wave of my hand... just like you."

"Understood," the elf said with a small grin.

Was this another test from him I passed?

"Did any owl come for me?"

"Indeed so. Patrick gathered your mail on the table."

I sat up and groaned at my idiocy. I didn't think any of it through, did I?

"I'm stupid. If I wanted to stay here to hide, I should have blocked owl mail first. Hiding from Malfoy and Dumbledore is pointless if he can just send an owl for me to get my location by following the bird..."

"Patrick could kill every owl with you as the destination?"

I looked at Patrick strangely before shaking my head.

"No need, I'd rather you didn't kill any innocent owls in my name."

"... weird, but Patrick understands..." the elf mumbled under his breath.

"Did I get a letter from the ministry?" I asked as I slowly got dressed for the day. I was going to go to Leeds for some last-minute shopping in the muggle world since the shops were still open until roughly early evening on Christmas Eve. They'd be closed for two days after and I didn't want to wait on the shopping.

"No letter from the ministry, only gifts for you," the elf explained and pointed to a small mountain of colorful packages in all colors.

"Can you check for cursed objects?" I asked as I took the packages in with my ocular ability.

"Patrick can," the elf said with a nod.

"Did you check for cursed objects?"

The house elf looked like at the ground with a lost look for a moment and shook its head.

"Ugh, please do so and drop me off in Leeds before you do," I instructed and opened one of the trunks Patrick had prepared for all the cash he stole... liberated from the criminals.

With £50000 packed, I had Patrick drop me off near the first arcade in Leeds, which were shopping streets or malls in these years. Leeds was actually quite well known for these streets and had several that were established in the late 19th century, three that I knew were opened a good hundred years before.

I once more stocked up on new dress shirts, underwear, sporting equipment, and muggle sneakers for almost £5000 after I hit another magically induced growth spurt. I purposefully browsed the more expensive shops because anything of lesser quality wouldn't make sense to buy in the muggle world, especially after I stocked up on wizard currency after finding the hidden caches in the old family home that I planned to store in a non-goblin wizarding bank, likely with the dwarves in Switzerland.

Afterwards, with my purchases of the first few shops hidden in my newest expanded pouch and inside my newest stylish wool coat I got for a ridiculous £900, I continued my shopping spree and purchased luxury food en masse.

For some reason, 16-17 year old looking me was allowed to buy wine in an expensive winery and I bought five bottles for a staggering £11500 that I only paid because it wasn't even my money to begin with. A forty year old Scottish whisky bottle for £1500 as a gift to my Uncle Farley tomorrow also found its way into my bag on the recommendation of the nice sales lady in that winery. It turned out the two shops next to each other were run by the same family, not that I minded.

I understood nothing about wine or whisky, so I'd have bought horse piss if the lady had recommended it to me. The luxurious looking shop looked kinda too high-class to be selling that, though.

Another £700 were gone when I bought a box of the most expensive cigarillos that whisky shop had to sell, and I found myself in a small arcade that looked much more shabby than the rest afterwards. But my eyes told me that there were magical items in at least one shop, so I wanted to see what I could get here.

I entered what looked to be a thrift store doubling as a book store and immediately saw several hidden magical items among the items present.

"Oho, a magical?" A hideous woman from behind the counter at the back asked in a jovial tone when I stood in front of a book shelf.

I didn't need to ask why she knew, but I still feigned ignorance, "A magical, miss?"

"Aye, lad. No need to hide it," the woman said with a cackle and stood up. "You'd have run right past that shelf there otherwise."

I looked back, pretending to see the magical texts for the first time, and looked back to her in fake astonishment.

"Are you a Hogwarts student then, laddie? Hmm, I reckon a second year, maybe. A muggleborn to boot. One with rich parents, eh?"

That was indeed what I wanted her to see as she stepped closer. Funnily enough, my eye ability saw past her glamor charm and while she wasn't the prettiest witch I'd ever seen, the brunette lady with earthen brown hair and warm, brown eyes was not nearly as ugly as she tried to look. So I saw her true self as she saw whatever I wanted her to see; an ignorant muggleborn with money to spend.

"You're really insightful, ma'am," I said without confirming or denying anything in case she could tell the truth from a lie. The next sentence was tricky, though, but only because I had to set it up in advance by having some the elves of Hogwarts call me by a nickname based on my father's 'Lestrange' family name. "I'm called Lester, what may I call you, miss?"

Since there were elves who did actually call me Lester, that was not a lie.

"No need to call me miss, lad. I'm a hag, Lucillia is my name."

"Lady Lucillia then. What do you sell here?"

"Hehe, all sorts of curiosities, of course. Nobody more easy to fool than rich muggles," the pretty hag cackled.

"Huh, you should hear their newest advertising motto, then: sex sells. You should use the glamor to look a little prettier than you are, not much uglier," I advised with a small foolish grin.

"A truth seer? Or a talent for auras?" Lucillia mumbled as she scrutinized me after abruptly stopping her cackle.

"Nothing quite as advanced. I could feel the glamor because I've seen it used quite a lot at school, you know," I deflected with a chuckle of my own.

"I see, I see," the hag muttered with an appreciative grin. "Let me hear it then. What are you looking for? Virgin blood of humanoid creatures for some wicked ritual? Phoenix hearts? Unicorn eye balls?"

Recognizing the purposeful shocking and illegal ingredients for what they were - a means to rattle me - I faked a distraught expression and shook my head.

"No-no. Nothing of that kind. I'm a Ravenclaw, so at best, I'd try to get a few rare books from here? Maybe some rare bladed weapons to impress my head of house? He's a half-goblin, you know?"

"Yes, I have heard of the great Filius Flitwick," the hag said with a weird look I couldn't judge properly. "You browse this shelf and the one next to the counter then as I look for the swords, axes, and knives I cannot usually sell openly," the hag suggested and walked to a hidden room in the back.

First, I found a handwritten book on the importance of numbers in warding - curiously enough about all prime numbers and not just the magically powerful numbers 3, 7, and 13. It was probably written by a muggleborn or halfblood with a mathematician for a parent. Then I found another book about wandlore and one about magical foci around the world.

Those three caught my eye, and I walked them to the counter to browse the shelf there. I found another tome on magical materials and their purposes, going all the way from woods used in wand crafting to the mythical sands of time used by time turners.

Sadly, there was no price listed for any of the items I wanted to buy, so I waited near the counter to haggle with the hag.

"Aye, didn't even try to steal the books, not that you could have. What a proper gentleman, no?"

The woman said with mirth as she placed a heavy trunk on a stool next to the counter.

"Do you only take galleons? Or may I pay with British pounds?"

"I'll take either, but I don't care for the going rate of the goblins. So you'll have to decide if my rate is to your liking," the hag said and quoted her prices for the books.

Altogether, I bought the books for £28500 and 120 galleons. I didn't know if I made a deal with that or not, but I didn't care about paying enough to buy a small house at this time in Leeds as someone who was quite literally a millionaire in muggle currency already with only evergrowing caches of dough unless Patrick got caught.

"Thank you, I knew your parents must be loaded, little Lester," the hag praised with a manical laugh that told me all I needed to know about how much I paid extra for those books. With £50 to a galleon in goblin conversion, I did just pay 570+120 galleons to her which was quite a lot for books you could sell hundreds of times by simply copying them with a dupli-quill that cost 11 sickles exluding ink and parchment.

With my remaining muggle money, I bought five more ancient looking daggers with varying amounts of rust on them from the hag. She was honest in telling me she had no idea what material they were made from, and she sold them to me after getting them from a mermaid tribe who picked these up from shipwrecks around the world.

But in my magical sight, four of them were golden in color, with the fifth one being green - whatever that meant in an item. There was no way I wouldn't buy them, even if Lucillia looked at me like I was a lunatic.