[From Litha to Lammas]: More Marvellous-Cunning Than Mortal Man's Pondering, goblin Harry, 2/5
Part One.
Title: More Marvellous-Cunning Than Mortal Man’s Pondering
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: None, gen
Content Notes: AU (goblin-raised Harry), violence, present tense, angst, humor
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: This part 5700
Summary: AU The second half of goblin-raised Harry’s third year and the first half of his fourth year at Hogwarts. Harry is a proud participant in the next goblin rebellion, getting justice for his godfather, freeing artifacts who shouldn’t have to be enslaved to humans, and creating alternatives to silly human traditions.
Author’s Notes: This will really make no sense unless you’ve read the three previous stories in this series: “Music Beneath the Mountains,” “In Their Own Secret Tongues He Spoke,” and “The Dragon-Headed Door.” Like those fics, this one takes its title from Tolkien, specifically the poem “The Bidding of the Minstrel”; the section titles come from that as well as other Tolkien poems. This should have five parts, and will be posted over the next five days as part of my “From Litha to Lammas” series.
Thank you for all the reviews!
Gallantry Bent
“Did you get to participate in the attack on Azkaban? I heard it was very exciting. Did the Ministry’s army of Heliopaths come out to oppose you?”
Harry smiles at Luna as they settle at the Ravenclaw table. This is the first time they’ve seen each other since the holiday, because Toothsplitter decided it was too dangerous for Harry to ride the train with other students-Aurors were on the platform-and sent him by the tunnels of fire instead. “I didn’t see any Heliopaths. Just Dementors. But it was exciting, and Dementors are extinct in Britain now.”
Luna’s eyes get a little sad at that. “I don’t want to think of anyone becoming extinct.”
Harry pats her shoulder. “I know, but they weren’t really free, you know? They were enslaved just like the basilisk was being enslaved to the spirit in the diary. It was for the best that they be set free. And we treated them like honored enemies. We faced them and destroyed them ourselves.”
Luna nods, apparently a little reassured, and they start listening to the song of the stools and torches, which are always amused by the new crop of first-years.
*
“Mr. Potter, come with me.”
Harry ignores Professor Snape’s command when he walks past the man’s office on the way to Charms. For one thing, the man was so dishonorable as to be a bully and refuse the duel that Harry proposed to him. Harry would have cursed him, but Snape has gone past a line that Fudge never did, and earned Harry’s deep contempt without such mercy.
For another, Harry has Charms, and it won’t do to be late and disrespect a professor who actually deserves the respect.
A hand closes on his shoulder and jerks him around. “Listen to me, you little brat-”
He doesn’t get far before the stones beneath his feet buckle and rise and slam him into the ceiling. Snape’s hand opens in protest and he lets Harry go. Harry sighs as he stares up at Snape, trapped now on the hump of stone between it and the ceiling.
“That really wasn’t smart,” Harry said. “Do you want to be added personally to the goblin war, the way the Dementors were? I don’t think that’s a good idea, but I’ll do it if that’s what you want.”
“What is going on here?”
Harry glances up with a smile as Professor Flitwick comes down the corridor. He’s glad that it was Professor Flitwick who found them and not one of the other adults. They’re all too human to understand what’s going on here. “He told me I had to come with him, and then he jerked me around with his hand on my shoulder.”
Professor Flitwick puts his hand over his eyes. “Severus, how many times have I told you that you can’t do that? The school speaks with Mr. Potter. It won’t put up with your mistreatment of him even if he would be inclined to do so.”
Harry just nods, and decides not to add that he wouldn’t put up with it, either.
“Get me down from here, Filius!”
“I can’t,” Professor Flitwick says, shaking his head. “I can’t speak to the stones and make requirements of them like Harry can.” He turns to Harry. “Could you do it, please, Mr. Potter?”
“Harry, my boy, please let Professor Snape down.”
That’s Professor Dumbledore, who looks old and weary. Harry wonders if he had friends among the Dementors, and feels a little sorry for him. He sighs. “Stones, would you please let the professor down?”
The stones take a moment to think about it-they’re independent actors in their own right, after all, not just there to serve goblins-and then roll back down into the floor. Snape drops with a bump. His face is very red as he gets off the floor and dusts off his robes.
“Five hundred points from Ravenclaw!”
Harry shakes his head as the stones open beneath Snape’s feet this time, drop him down, and then seal around his waist. Some humans don’t listen very well, as Toothsplitter said, and some are clapping their hands over their ears and singing childish songs.
“Harry, I did ask you to let Professor Snape go.”
Harry blinks at the Headmaster. “Sir, I didn’t make that decision. The stones did. They don’t like the tone he’s using to talk to me.”
The Headmaster turns very slowly to Snape. “Severus. I am going to ask you to apologize to Mr. Potter, and to reverse the points that you took from Ravenclaw. It seems to be the only way that you’ll be free again.”
“I am not going to apologize to the attention-seeking brat who is exactly like his father!”
“Please don’t cut off his hand,” Harry says very quickly, because he can hear that grumble gathering in the castle. The floor thinks it’s a grand idea, but the walls disagree and think the man’s head would be better.
“What?” Snape is staring at him.
“The floor wants to cut off your hand, but the walls want to cut off your head.” Harry pauses to listen. “And the ceiling just wants to crush you in your sleep tonight. Look, all of you, thank you very much for the defense. But I don’t think this is the best way to handle it.”
“You-you are threatening me?”
“I did that last year already, with the duel,” Harry reminds him. “This is the castle making plans to kill you. I’d be a little more concerned, if I were you.”
Snape only keeps staring at Harry. He’s stuffed his thumbs into his eyes, as well, Harry thinks. He glances up as someone moves down the corridor, and sees Ginny Weasley heading towards him. He smiles in relief. He’s been teaching her to listen to objects more often as well as to swim and defend herself. Maybe a human interceding is the best result.
“I came as soon as I heard the floors talking,” Ginny gasps, leaning against the wall for a second. “What’s going on?”
“Snape insulted me and took five hundred points from Ravenclaw and tried to pull me off my feet,” Harry explains. “So now the floor and the walls and the ceiling are all arguing about different ways to kill or punish him.”
Ginny pauses. “We can’t let them?”
“Miss Weasley,” Professor Dumbledore says repressively.
“Oh, very well,” Ginny says, and turns to look at Professor Snape. She’s almost fearless, with her chin up in the air and her hands no longer trembling the way they did at the beginning of the year. Harry’s very proud of her. “Listen, Professor Snape, Harry isn’t even commanding the castle to do it. It just likes him and the way goblins pay attention to objects, and it wants to kill you. If you apologize, you can live. If you don’t, then you can die.”
Snape stares at her. Harry wonders if he’s going to listen even to her. She’s Harry’s friend, so Snape may decide that’s the same thing as her being a “Potter.”
(The last name focus confuses Harry. He didn’t know his parents, so how can he act like his father would? And he’s much more a goblin of his clan. If Snape was addressing him that way and expecting him to obsess over smithing and be too quick to draw his daggers, that would make more sense than expecting him to behave like a Potter).
Snape finally grits his teeth and spits a quick, “Sorry, Potter, points reversed,” through them.
The floor takes a long moment to consider it, but finally lets him go. Harry nods in approval as the hole snaps open and then mounds up beneath Snape the way the stones did when they first slammed him into the ceiling, so that he can stand on the regular floor. “Thank you,” Harry says.
Snape doesn’t bother with the thanks. He straightens his robes and stalks back into the office.
Professor Dumbledore turns to Harry. “I understand that it might not happen on a regular basis in goblin culture,” he says gently. “But I would appreciate it if you could try to make exceptions for Professor Snape and-allow some leeway for his perspective.”
Harry shakes his head. “There’s no such thing as leeway for insults, sir. I’m sorry, but if that happens again, then the castle is going to react the same way-or the sinks, or whatever other objects are around. And next time, I may not be quick enough to stop it. Snape is the one who’s going to have to change.”
Professor Dumbledore walks away without another word. Harry is a little surprised that the man didn’t want to talk to him about the war and the Dementors, but maybe he doesn’t see how it’s connected to him and his willingness to ask Harry to lie yet.
Well, there’s something more important Harry has to do now. He turns back to Ginny and bows to her with his fist clasped over his heart. Ginny blushes bright red and bows back to him, even though she doesn’t have to, and then turns and walks away back down the corridor with a light skip in her step.
“I think we were on our way to class, young goblin,” Professor Flitwick says in Gobbledegook.
Harry beams at him. He’s glad that he has an adult here who can speak the real language, who sees that he’s a goblin and is comfortable with it. He thinks it’s something he would never really get otherwise.
Words Half-Forgotten
“Professor Lupin? I have a letter for you from Sirius.”
Professor Lupin drops the goblet of potion he was about to take towards the floor. Harry is quick to catch it. He peers at it in interest. “Is this the Wolfsbane that Snape was brewing the other day? Doesn’t it taste awful? Has anyone worked on trying to improve the taste? Does it help you with the transformation?”
Lupin has backed up against the wall of his office and he’s shaking. Harry frowns at him and puts the goblet on the floor. “Sir? I promise, I haven’t told anyone else about the fact that you’re a werewolf.”
“How did you know?” Lupin whispers.
Harry bites his tongue against saying that it was completely obvious from the very first. He’s learning some lessons about how to live among humans. “Sirius told me.”
“Sirius Black.” Lupin shuts his eyes and takes a huge breath that makes his chest almost flutter. “The mass murderer? The wanted fugitive?”
“The only people who think he’s a fugitive are the Ministry, who were stupid enough to start another goblin war,” Harry says. “He’s innocent, and he never got a trial. He’s told me that the real traitor was Peter Pettigrew. Poor Sirius was the one who suggested they swap places as the Secret-Keeper, and he cries a lot when he tells me about it.” Harry shakes his head. He never knew his human parents, but he’s sorry for how much their loss cost Sirius.
“No, Harry.” Lupin is keeping his voice soft in the way that adult humans do when they’re talking to human babies. Harry doesn’t even know why Lupin bothers. He’s a werewolf, why doesn’t he embrace that difference and be different himself? “You must have mixed it up. Sirius is a very skillful liar. I know. He fooled me for years. Peter Pettigrew is dead, killed by Sirius in a fit of rage.”
“No,” Harry says patiently. “There was only a finger left behind, and he can turn into a rat. And Sirius has seen a picture of him in rat form, and he knows that Ginny’s brother had him as a pet. But he disappeared a little after Sirius got here. Sirius was searching for him when he was here as a dog, and I’ve been looking since Blackeye won’t let Sirius out of healing yet, but I can’t find him.”
Harry does have a plan to deal with that, but so far it hasn’t worked, because it involves asking other rats about Pettigrew’s presence, and the house-elves keep the castle annoyingly clear of rats. But Luna is in the Forbidden Forest talking to some of the rats there each week, and surely she’ll find something soon.
“I can’t believe what I’m hearing.” Lupin slides slowly down the wall.
“You should, sir. You have keener hearing than most humans, after all.”
Harry thinks that Lupin will cheer up because that’s a compliment, but instead, Lupin shivers like Harry told the walls to kill him. “Please,” he whispers hoarsely, “I don’t want you to ever say something like that again, Harry.”
Harry sighs. “All right. But I still have a letter for you from Sirius.” He holds it out firmly to the professor. He wasn’t there when Sirius wrote it, and he isn’t going to open it, either. Things like this are private.
Lupin takes the letter and turns it over in his hands, which are shaking again. Then he swallows what might be his cowardice-Harry hopes so, because being around someone this frightened is honestly irritating-and tears the envelope open.
There’s only a small piece of parchment inside, but Sirius lingered over what he wrote there for more than an hour. Harry watches closely, because among goblins he would want to be near to support someone receiving such an important letter, but Lupin clears his throat delicately, and Harry sighs and turns away.
“He says that he’s innocent,” Lupin whispers.
I told you that. But Harry is trying to be kinder about-things, and just nods and says, “Yes, that’s true. Did you want to see a memory of him confronting Pettigrew? I don’t have it with me because I don’t have a Pensieve to put it in, but he could send it to you.”
“He would be willing to offer that to us?”
Harry has to turn back, although he keeps his eyes away from the letter. “Of course. Why wouldn’t he? He’s innocent. He has nothing to fear from his godson and his friend seeing the memory.”
Lupin drops his eyes as if ashamed, and goes back to stroking and pondering over the letter. Harry decides that perhaps he isn’t going to say anything else interesting after all, so he puts his hand on the doorknob and asks it to let him out. The door swings open gently at the same moment as Lupin clears his throat.
“Yes?” Harry asks politely, turning back around and shutting the door so it doesn’t have to stand open.
“I was worried when I heard about the war the goblins had started with the Ministry. And someone said that you actually want along to Azkaban and killed Dementors with your daggers.” Lupin gives Harry a worried smile. “I know that isn’t true, because not even goblins would be so reckless as to take you with them, but I thought you should know people are spreading those rumors.”
“Don’t worry, they aren’t lying about me,” Harry says, touched that Lupin cared that much to inform him. He must know more about goblins and their attitudes towards lying than Harry thought. “It’s true. I did confront the Dementors and I killed a few of them. I wasn’t instrumental in confining the prisoners with the dream-helmets, though. You’d have to talk to my master Toothsplitter if you want to hear about that.”
Lupin turns dramatically paler, although he was already pretty pale. Harry scrutinizes him narrowly. Ginny looked like that last year when she had the diary. Is there another piece of Tom Riddle’s soul drifting around here? It’s possible.
“But-why would they take you along?”
“They wouldn’t take me in the vanguard. And they made sure that I was safe.”
“But they’re being reckless, challenging the Ministry this way. And I can’t even imagine what’s going to happen now that they’ve destroyed Azkaban. The Ministry isn’t going to have a choice but to take that as an act of war.” Lupin passes his shaking hand over his face. “Why would you be caught up in that, Harry?”
“I’m a goblin.” So Lupin doesn’t care so much about the lies being spread by the Ministry after all, and he doesn’t think of Harry as a goblin. The disbelief spreading across his face proclaims it. Harry sighs and shakes his head. “Professor, what do you want me to say? This whole war started partially because Dumbledore wanted me to lie And Sirius, who is important to me, was wrongfully accused and put in that horrible prison for twelve years. And the Ministry sent Dementors to our bank to get him back.”
“The bank is under the lawful dominion of the Ministry,” Lupin begins.
Oh, it’s ignorance. That’s better than just ignoring. “No, it isn’t, not according to the treaties. And Fudge came into the bank and made a bunch of accusations and gave us a bunch of insults. So I cursed him with his blood to not be able to lie or hurt us.”
Lupin sits down hard in his chair. “Curses are incredibly advanced work, Harry. You could have hurt the Minister.”
“Do you not care that the Dementors could have hurt us?” Harry asks quietly. “That Sirius could have had his soul sucked out?”
“I mean-of course I do, but you’re too young for all of this.” Lupin waves his hand around. “Sirius should have come to me with the evidence of his innocence. I could have handled it. You’re a child, still.”
“But Voldemort didn’t think so, and Snape doesn’t think so, the way he keeps giving me grounds for a duel.” Harry shakes his head. “And my people don’t think so. I need to be protected because I’m not as good a fighter as a goblin warrior yet, but almost no one is. It’s going to be all right, Professor Lupin,” he adds, when he sees Lupin’s mouth opening. “We’ll protect Sirius and get Pettigrew and get Sirius a trial. You’ll see.”
Lupin shivers and bows his head. Harry wonders if he should stay or go, but then, abruptly, Lupin springs up from his chair and howls.
“Oh, you didn’t drink your potion and now you’re transforming.” Harry sighs a little as he watches Lupin drop to all fours and get covered with hair. “Sorry for interrupting and preventing you from drinking your Wolfsbane.” Transforming without it looks painful.
Lupin glances around the room with his jaw dropping open and his mouth dripping with saliva. Harry frowns. Honestly, that doesn’t look sanitary. He wonders if someone has worked on a potion aimed at reducing the amount of werewolf drool.
Lupin focuses on him then. His eyes are bright red and more than a little mad. He slinks around the desk, crouching as if he’s going to spring.
“Stop that,” Harry tells him, and then repeats the words in Wolf, using his fingers around his ears to outline the necessary movements.
Lupin stops for a second. His ears come up, and he stares at Harry as if he’s looking for fur and a tail. Then he snarls and, apparently tired of the slinking, just coils up and springs all at once.
Harry moves gracefully out of the way, and asks the floor if it’ll help him. The floor uncoils into what look like stone chains, and they grip Lupin’s paws and hold him in place. Lupin tears at the stone and howls and scrapes and flings himself around and in general acts like some of the bad-mannered dogs who don’t want to walk on leashes that Harry has seen in the middle of Diagon Alley.
“You’re loud,” Harry tells him.
Lupin utters another chilling howl.
Harry sighs. He had other plans for this evening, but he’s the reason that Lupin didn’t drink his Wolfsbane potion, and the reason that he’s in so much pain now. Harry sits down on top of the desk and thinks for a bit before he’s sure that he can do a reasonable translation of a goblin New Year’s tale into Wolf for Lupin. He starts motioning with his fingers and practicing his growls, then starts telling it.
Lupin snarls and strains to get to him, teeth snapping close enough that Harry has to move back on the desk a few times. The desk doesn’t feel like growing taller when Harry asks. But after a few minutes of Harry telling the story of Snow-Eyes and the Cavern of Scales, Lupin falls silent, staring up at him with blazing eyes.
“…and she came around the corner that the path of quicksilver had led her to, and found the sparkling wave of it reared up in front of her…”
Harry is proud of his translation of “quicksilver,” a combination of “fast” and “moon,” and it seems to soothe Lupin-the pride, or the story, or both. He falls into a heap in the middle of the office, still held by the stone chains but closer to being curled-up now. He even rests his snout on his tail at one point, and yawns a little, which reminds Harry of Sirius in dog form.
Harry smiles at him, and keeps telling the story.
*
“What’s that?” Ginny asks, dancing back from the owl that’s slanting down to Harry on the grounds. They’ve been outside practicing Ginny’s knife-fighting skills for almost an hour now, and Harry is incredibly proud of her. She’s getting very good at this, for a human with no prior training.
Harry takes the note from the owl, scratches its head, and then sighs as he opens it. The parchment is even upset about being used for such a stupid purpose, that’s how bad it is. “It’s another apology from Professor Lupin.”
“About transforming in his office?” Ginny is striking at her own shadow, spinning around and kicking. Harry has impressed on her the importance of not wasting a single moment. She doesn’t listen as well as Luna, but it’s pretty well.
“Yeah.” Harry sighs and shakes his head, dropping the parchment into his pocket. He’ll use it for notes later, and maybe that will soothe it. “It’s my fault, anyway. I’m the one who kept talking to him until the time passed for him to take his potion.”
“Can you tell him that?”
“I did, and I informed him why I can’t accept his apology. It would make me complicit in a lie. But he just won’t listen.”
“Well, talk to him again and maybe he will.” Ginny hefts her knives. “Can we go back to practicing?”
“Yeah, all right,” Harry says, happy to work with a human who’ll listen. He was going to do Lupin the favor of not thinking of him as human, but apparently he doesn’t like that, so Harry, reluctantly, has to put him back in the category of humans who clap their hands over their ears.
Restlessly Daring
“But there’s not really a goblin rebellion going on,” says Michael Corner loudly. He’s sitting down the Ravenclaw table from Harry, the paper spread out.
Luna gives Harry a pained look. Harry nods to her. It’s only fair that he take this. Luna handled the last misconception. She smiles at him in thanks and goes back to talking with the ant who tried to steal her sugar yesterday. She thinks she might be on the verge of learning its scent-language with her Sense-Enhancing Charm.
“Yes, there is,” Harry says, leaning over so his yearmate can see him. “I was there when we destroyed Azkaban. It’s a real rebellion.”
Michael stares, his fingers tapping the paper, and then shakes his head. “That’s not what the Daily Prophet says.”
“Well, but they wouldn’t,” Harry says. “Because they support the Ministry, and we embarrassed the Ministry.”
“But why have there been no strikes since then?” Michael folds his arms and nods around the table. He doesn’t have an adoring audience, but he’s pretty good at pretending he does. Harry is a bit impressed.
“Because we’ve been moving underground,” Harry explains. The goblins have no worries about him telling anyone this. It’s not like the Ministry can put up a real resistance. “We’ve taken away the lodes of silver and gold that the Ministry depends on to forge Sickles and Galleons. There’s always been a supply of money that wasn’t under the control of us goblins, but now there isn’t.”
Michael stares at him. Harry waves his hand a little. “I can’t take credit for that, though. I didn’t come up with it, but I was there when it was discussed.”
“That’s illegal!” Michael bursts out.
“So was asking for a weregild when they didn’t pay the Dementors anything, which Fudge did.” Harry shrugs. “Lots of things aren’t illegal in war.”
“I mean-aren’t you worried about the people who might starve because of this war?”’
“We aren’t taking their vaults unless they fight us. We would never do that.” Harry makes his voice gentle and serious. A goblin warrior wouldn’t be so gentle if Michael confronted them with this silliness, but sometimes Harry not being accepted as a fully-trained warrior yet is useful. “And the Ministry could have not sent Dementors to our bank or called us liars and started the war in the first place.”
“Mr. Potter, please come with me.”
Professor Dumbledore has swept across the Great Hall towards him. Harry sighs a little as he gets up. He and Dumbledore have sort of had a truce since he came back from the holidays, because his description of the Realm of Song before that seemed to calm the man down, and there have been no private visits to his office. But Harry thinks that’s about to change. “Sure, sir.”
*
“You said that you started the war with the Ministry because they called the goblins liars.”
“Yes, sir. We can’t really tolerate that.”
“I still wish you thought of yourself as human, Harry,” Dumbledore says, but he goes on before Harry can ask why. “Does that mean that you have also started the war with me because I asked you to conceal the truth of Professor Quirrell’s possession?”
Harry blinks. He would have thought Dumbledore knew this without having to ask for confirmation. “Yes, sir. Of course.”
“But there have been no attacks on Hogwarts.”
“Oh, we wouldn’t do that,” Harry says, a little shocked. “There are non-combatants here, and objects that want to go on existing. Azkaban was different because those poor walls and floors were so miserable about containing the prisoners. They asked us to disassemble them so they could go on to a different existence. But we have instructed no goblin to deal with you directly, of course, and taken half the contents of your vault, and prepared tunnels around your old house in Godric’s Hollow that we could use to attack you if we had to.”
Dumbledore drops his glasses, which he took off to polish. Harry catches them before they can break on the desk, just like he caught Lupin’s potion before it could spill. The glass of the lenses has an interesting song, but Harry has to ask it to wait as Dumbledore is blurting out words.
“You took half the contents of my vault? That is impossible!”
“Well, no, sir, it isn’t. We did it, you see.”
“There was no notification of this!”
Dumbledore’s magic is lashing around the office. Harry looks at him in concern, but, well, he’s still the one armed and trained here, and he would back his speed with his daggers against Dumbledore’s speed with his wand any day. “We sent you an owl when we did it. It would have had the official seal of the clans on it.”
“Not the Gringotts seal?”
Harry shrugs. “The bank is the way we deal with humans, most of the time, but in this case, you offended goblin honor. I’m not a bank employee, either. The seal would have looked like this.” He draws his dagger and traces the symbol, the crossed knife and rock, in the air, and then lights it on fire with his wand when Dumbledore stares blankly at him.
“I-recall a letter with that seal. I thought it was odd, but I didn’t recognize it, so I threw the letter away. Of course I never would have done that with a letter that had the official Gringotts seal!”
“Well, it didn’t come from Gringotts,” Harry has to point out again.
Dumbledore watches him with a hopeless expression. Harry reaches out to pat his hand. “All you have to do, sir, is say that you’re going to tell the truth, and let me tell people about Professor Quirrell.”
“How can I damage Professor Quirrell’s reputation?” Dumbledore whispers. “How can I cope with this?”
“Well, I just told you how, though,” Harry says. It’s depressing when humans don’t even listen to English. “And why would you care so much about protecting Professor Quirrell’s reputation? He let Voldemort into his head willingly. That’s not something I did even when I was carrying around a piece of his soul.”
Dumbledore takes a deep breath. “Trust me when I say that there are secrets about Voldemort than must be kept, Harry. I would like more people to acknowledge that he has returned, but if people knew that his spirit was active enough to possess others, what is to keep servants of his from seeking him out?”
Harry shrugs. “But Quirrell did that even when most people thought he was dead. Concentrate on fighting him when he comes back, not trying to control everything.”
From the slow way Dumbledore blinks, he might actually be incapable of taking that advice. Harry feels sorry for him-actually, truly-but he has laid out the courses of action that Dumbledore has. It’s not his fault that Dumbledore keeps trying to find a third course that doesn’t exist.
“Will you restore the money to my vault if I spread this rumor?”
“It’s not a rumor, and not me personally. But you could write to the clan heads and explain what you’re doing to make up for asking me to lie, and I think they’d probably give the money back. They haven’t spent it,” Harry has to add, because he knows that Professor Dumbledore will probably have that misconception. “They just took it as a punishment.”
“Why do they think they have the right to punish us this way?”
Harry tilts his head. Dumbledore is still thinking of Harry as a human, obviously. “Because you wanted me to be a liar, sir, and I’m a goblin.”
“You are a human boy! Who is important to the fight against Voldemort.”
“How?”
Dumbledore shakes his head. “If you had demonstrated the maturity to be told that, then we would not now be having this conversation.”
“If you insist, sir,” Harry says quietly, and gets up and walks out of the office.
There are humans who listen-two of them, maybe three if he can count Sirius-and humans who listen some of the time, and humans who don’t, and humans who clap their hands over their ears, and humans who are singing their own song so loudly that they think everyone else dances to their tune.
*
In the end, Dumbledore sends a private apology to the goblins, so his vault is restored, and Harry sees one article about Quirrell being possessed. No one human pays much attention, but Harry doesn’t see that as a huge problem. Dumbledore didn’t promise everyone would believe Harry, just that he would stop making Harry into a liar.
As far as Harry’s concerned, he’s kept the bargain.
In the meantime, the war against the Ministry is proceeding apace. A few Aurors tried to invade the bank and disappeared. One of the Ministry undersecretaries, a woman named Umbridge or something similar, proclaimed that goblins were dirty creatures who should all be put to death, and she lost her vault and was mocked by goblins who went into various shops she frequented to tell people all about her (and what she used to spend her money on). That gets enough laughter that Umbridge resigns her public position.
Professor Flitwick did talk about resigning, but as far as the clans are concerned, he doesn’t need to. He just needs to counteract any nonsense Dumbledore spreads, and he’s done that with a bright, cheerful manner when the Headmaster did try to insinuate there was something wrong about the way the goblins were conducting the war.
By the time Harry is on the train with Luna, heading back to London, he is confident the Ministry knows it’s losing, and will make the ritual submissions needed, including an apology for sending the Dementors to the bank.
But things would sure be easier if they could find Peter Pettigrew.
“Harry,” Luna says suddenly, when they’re about five minutes out from King’s Cross.
Harry blinks and glances up. Luna looks embarrassed, which is so rare that he reaches out and puts his hand over hers. “Are you all right? Did someone say something mean to you?” He’s visited several people over the last year and explained that they can either stop bullying Luna or they can fight him. Not one person chose the duel, which is a little amazing.
“Yes. I-I found something, and I didn’t tell you. I forgot because I was so busy helping Daddy research articles for the next edition of the Quibbler.”
“Never apologize about that,” Harry says firmly. “The Quibbler is important.” It makes Luna happy, so he knows it is. “But what did you want to tell me?”
“I found Peter Pettigrew,” Luna says, and extends her hand. On her palm is a crystal cage with a Stunned rat lying inside it.
Harry stares at it with his mouth open, while Luna says anxiously, “I hope you’re not too angry. I took the liberty of asking some of the spiders, and it turns out that he never fled from Hogwarts grounds at all. He was living in Hagrid’s hut, and so none of the rats from the Forbidden Forest could find him, but the Acromantulas in the forest sent some small spiders back with Hagrid to make sure that he was properly taken care of, and-”
Harry hugs her, hard. “You’re perfect, Luna. Never let anyone tell you otherwise.”
“Oh.” Luna smiles at him. “Thanks. My father says so, too, but it’s nice to get confirmation.”
Part Three.