Ch. 16 — The Owl Parliament
Ch. 16 — The Owl Parliament
“There are house-elves here?” Hermione said, staring, horror-struck at the bustling crowd preparing dinner. “Here at Hogwarts?” She was appalled to discover that unpaid house-elves were kept in the castle.
Luna turned from watching the house-elves and looked at her curiously. “The largest number in Britain, my dad told me. Over a hundred.” She looked back into the kitchen. “Only the rich families can afford one, he said. Ours sold ours ages ago.” She turned back and took a bite of her pudding.
“I’ve never seen one!” said Hermione.
“Well, they’re too busy cooking by day,” said Luna. “And like the crumple-horned-snorkrack, you’re not supposed to see them. They’re good at hiding.” She narrowed her eyes, thinking. “I bet they’re really good at hide-and-go-seek.” She had forgotten both her pudding and her pumpkin juice.
Ginny nodded. “I bet they only come out late at night when no one is awake. Do a bit of cleaning . . . see to the fires . . . get the laundry. That’s the mark of a good house-elf, isn’t it, that you don’t know it’s there?”
Luna innocently twirled a bit of her hair between her fingers, staring at the house-elves. I bet she’s planning on talking them into a hide-and-go-seek game, Harry thought. He poked her cheek with a spoonful of pudding. When she turned and opened her mouth to say something, he stuffed the spoon in it. She closed her mouth and grinned at him. He released his magic.
“But they get paid, don’t they?” she said. “They get holidays off, right? And sick leave, they get sick leave, don’t they? And pensions? And everything else?”
Ginny looked at her. “Have you lost the plot? House-elves live for work, they don’t want sick leave or pay. And holidays? Days they couldn’t work? They’d call that punishment!”
Hermione flung her spoon down. Ginny shook her head. “An’ you won’t get them any of those by starving.”
She glared down at the food on their table in one corner of the kitchen. “It’s slavery,” Hermione said, and breathed heavily through her nose. “That’s what this is . . . slavery. Pure, unadulterated, slavery.” She crossed her arms and stared angrily into the kitchen at the house-elves happily scurrying around everywhere.
Actually, she had a very good point. Harry had thought of Bit as a servant. What if he wasn’t? He couldn’t imagine that wizarding Britain used slavery, but then again they did a lot of things he knew would horrify the non-magicals if they ever found out about them — obliviation was just the first of many crimes, they would say. Only one way to find out.
Harry sighed. “Bit!” he said. Almost immediately, a familiar house-elf appeared.
“Bit’s here, sir” the elf proudly proclaimed.
“Bit, are house-elves slaves?”
Bit looked insulted, and drew himself up straight. The house-elves nearby also looked affronted. “Elvesies are family, sir!” he stated emphatically and proudly. “Hogwarts takes care of elvesies and elvesies take care of Hogwarts!”
Well. That was a non-answer. And Hermione seemed to agree. Okay, this required a different tack, then. He thought a moment.
“Are there any restrictions on when and where Hogwarts elves sleep?”
Bit shrugged. “Elvesies sleep where students can’t see us sir,” he said, curious at the question.
Well, while that was true for any servant, it implied they didn’t have a set place they had to use, like assigned bedrooms.
“Are there any restrictions on where you can go? What you eat? What you drink? How much you eat and drink? When you can take breaks?”
Bit shook his head, no, at each rapid-fire question, ending with, “No, Princey, sir.”
The others glanced over at him. Ginny mouthed, Princey? with an incredulous look at Luna, who was hiding a laugh behind her hand.
Harry ignored that. “If you wanted, could you take a nap, right now?”
Bit looked scandalized. “But, I has work!” He waved at the rest of the room.
“But, if you wanted to, no one could stop you, right?” Harry persisted.
Reluctantly, Bit said, “Yeeessss.” He looked miserable at the confession.
“In fact, you could take the entire day off and not work if you wanted, right?”
The house-elf shuddered and looked revolted at the concept. “Bit is a good elf, sir! Bit works when there’s work, sir! Bit not lazy, useless elvesie, sir.”
“But you could, if you wanted, without punishment, right?”
Harry watched him closely.
The house-elf shuddered and adopted a distasteful expression, “Only bad’s elvesies does that when there’s work, sir!”
Harry nodded and turned to Hermione. “So. Hermione. House-elves are not charged for rooms, they pick where they want to sleep, they aren’t charged for food, they can eat and drink as much as they like, they can work when they want, and not work when they want.” He paused. “Slaves would love to have that much freedom.” He studied her stubborn expression for a bit.
“According to the finance books I’ve read, a business is allowed to exchange room and board for wages. And servants are limited on the food they can eat, when they can take breaks, and their accommodations are assigned. They can’t chose what work they want to do.”
“Sick leave?” she challenged him.
That was a fair point. He looked at Bit and raised an eyebrow.
Bit pulled on his ear, but said to Hermione, “Any sicks elvesies goes to Pommy, miss. And she won’ts let them work until theys well, she says, miss.” He pulled harder on his ear.
“Free medical, with time off until they are certified well,” Harry said to Hermione.
“Pensions?” She was starting to whine.
Another look at Bit.
Bit looked back, puzzled. “What’s a penshun, sir?”
“When you are too old to work, you’re given room and board and no one can tell you to work.”
Bit staggered back, “Not work?” he said in a horrified voice. “Would have too? Not work, sir?” he asked plaintively. “We die without work — penshuns are for bad elvesies, sir?
Harry looked at Hermione. “I would say pensions are not an issue.”
He turned back to Bit. “What do you mean you would die without work?”
“Oh, elvesies must have a family and work, sir, or theys loses their magic. And dies.” Bit was pulling hard on both ears. All the elves that had been close had retreated away with frightened looks.
Harry studied him closely. “So, in short,” he said slowly. “You trade your services in household work for wizards in order to get the magic you need to survive?”
Bit started nodding quickly.
“And if a wizard family fires a house-elf, they gradually lose their magic. If they don’t start working for another family, they die?”
Wow. That was . . . extreme. And it did add in an opening for coercion. If someone can’t survive when they leave, they’ll take an inordinate amount of abuse just to stay alive.
Bit kept nodding.
Harry looked back at Hermione. “They trade labour for room, board, and their very lives.” He raised an eyebrow. “Sounds pretty equitable to me.”
She looked back at him, then down at the food on the table. “They should be paid, so they can get things for themselves,” she said sullenly. She looked back up at him. “And they are treated horribly by wizards!”
Harry nodded. “That may be true. But maybe you should talk with the house-elves before you make any unilateral decisions about what they want and don’t want. Sounds like the elves are being treated the way people lived in the Middle Ages. Servants in a castle traded their services for room and board.” He blinked. “Were they slaves?”
“Pay?” She definitely was whining, now.
Harry turned back to the house-elf. “Bit, if I gave you a sickle for you to spend on anything you wanted, what would you spend it on?”
Bit stared at him blankly. “A sickle, sir? For me, sir?” He blinked several times, then shrugged. “Why would you give me a sickle, sir? What would I do with a sickle, sir?” He clearly didn’t understand.
“Buy things for yourself? Things you want?” Hermione pleaded.
Bit looked around, bemused, “But, everything Bit wants is here.”
Harry looked at Hermione.
“Fine,” she said grudgingly, and started picking at her pudding with her spoon.
“Hermione,” he said lightly. “Now that the task is over, I can relax and work slower. Take some time, yourself, and talk with the elves, find out what they want. They might surprise you. Then you can figure out what you need to do for them. Forcing them to accept your ideas of what’s best for them brings you down to the level of the ones you say are abusing them.”
She huffed, but didn’t say anything more. Bit went back to whatever he had been doing. The kitchen quickly started bustling just as before.
But it was a puzzle. The house-elves could be dreadfully abused, tied as they were to a specific family. It was worse than slavery, in fact, for even slaves could run away if the abuse became more than they could bear. The house-elves could not. He could tell that this was a problem that would vex even Celestia.
The four really weren’t that hungry when dinner came around, but they went upstairs anyway. Harry had, after all, agreed to meet with Ginny’s brother, Charlie.
Oddly enough, most of the Gryffindor students ate very quickly and left, after a few congratulatory remarks to Harry.
“Probably having a party now that the first task is over,” Hermione explained on seeing his puzzled expression at how quickly he and his friends were left alone. Even his dorm-room mates left rather quickly.
Charlie arrived soon after dinner started. He was astounded, after proper introductions, when Harry told him that, “Yes, I can talk to dragons. The Chinese Fireball was quite upset that you moved her eggs and her to a forest. No protection at all for her eggs, she said. Said she’d have to stay up all night guarding the eggs from small animals that would try to sneak into the nest and eat the eggs.”
“Ah,” said Charlie. “Well, that explains why they all were so restless all the time, even at night. We didn’t think anything would try to sneak past the dragons, so we didn’t put any spells on the nest to keep pests away. Bigger predators, yes, but not small ones.” He nodded with a wry expression. “Not a bad idea, actually, casting a spell to repel pests from the dragons’ nests.” He nodded again.
“Well, we’ve already fed the dragons a Sleeping Draft, and we’ll be leaving as soon as it gets dark enough to hide us from the muggles, so we can’t test your language skills right now.” He sighed and stared at his plate for a moment.
“Look,” Charlie said, “I’ll see if I can get a port-key authorized at Christmas. If I can, would you please come? And we’ll see just how much they really understand. Maybe you can even teach us a few words?”
Harry shrugged. “Sure. I won’t have anything else to do.”
“So, why do you think the dragon could see through your disillusionment charm?”
He shrugged, “Her magic is just so much more powerful than mine that the spell just didn’t work very well,” he explained, reasonably. He couldn’t very well say that the dragon had told him she was tracking him by his body heat without giving away the fact that the dragon had actually been helping him.
They talked a bit more about the dragons before Harry and his friends headed back to Gryffindor Tower while Charlie re-joined the Sanctuary workers.
When they finally returned to the Common Room after dinner in the kitchen, they discovered a party in full swing. Apparently, after Harry’s performance in the task, the Gryffindors, led by the Weasley twins, had decided to “adopt” Harry as their entry into the tournament. Dean had shown off his talents at drawing by creating banners, one of which stretched wide across the far wall. It proclaimed, “Welcome to Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns” and included an all-fours pony Harry at one end and a two-legged, robed, pony Harry at the other. The other banners depicted him out-flying the flames behind him, Fleur running with her robes on fire, Cedric with his head on fire, and Victor entirely on fire!
And when he entered the common room, it burst into applause and yelling. Every level surface, and a few that weren’t, was covered with food and drink. Punch, pumpkin juice, butterbeer, and even an occasional shot of fire-whiskey had made an appearance. And the wings spell was in full use, with dozens of students flitting about overhead. It was almost like being at one of Pinkie’s parties.
Having just eaten, the four weren’t hungry, but enjoyed the party nonetheless. The canary creams were a surprise, and Harry wondered what other animal forms they could embed in the candies.
The golden egg was a bit of a disappointment, the noise hurt his ears terribly. Harry considered giving it to Victor, but was unsure if the wizard would be appreciative or insulted.
۸-_-۸
Wednesday’s Daily Prophet had extensive coverage of the first task, with several pictures of the champions: One each of Fleur, Cedric, and Victor on fire. Cedric came out of the article as being brave and talented, the other two received only criticism for their “lacklustre” performances. Harry was singled out for special coverage, with a front page picture, above the fold, of him appearing in mid-air with the dragon’s flame closing in on him and then him barely escaping its reach. Inside was a picture of him putting on his armour, with speculation on if the armour was magical. There were several articles inside, all speculation, again on where Harry had been, why he was still a unicorn, if being a unicorn gave him special powers, and so forth.
He examined the newspaper over breakfast — he had a subscription, as Blueblood had taught him always to keep an eye on the press. On average, he decided, it was about the best he could hope for from that particular source. He expected Luna’s coverage of the event to be a bit more interesting.
The Quibbler promised a special Friday edition on the Tournament with a full account of what had happened, and then gave a decent summary with several nice pictures. Colin was doing well for himself, it seemed.
Flitwick asked Harry in the Wednesday morning Charms class to demonstrate and explain the spells he had used, and why. That the dragon had been able to track him regardless of the disillusionment, silencing, and de-scenting spells was a surprise to everyone. Then Flitwick asked if he would be willing to talk to the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh year classes in a special combined class Wednesday evening. He couldn’t see a reason not to, so he agreed. Harry suggested to the professor that maybe he should ask Fleur, Cedric, and Victor to do the same, and ask them what they would have done differently, now that it was over.
When Professor Moody heard about the class, he quickly added the other three years. “It’ll be a good experience to see the thought that goes into an action plan, as well as see the real-live consequences when things don’t go according to plan. And they never do.”
The “class” began almost immediately after dinner — why wait? Everyone was already there! Those who had been absent for one reason or another were sent after. Even Trelawney and Pince made an appearance. Harry saw the school janitor, Mr. Filch, in the very back of the room.
It was very odd, being at the front of the room, sitting behind that enormously wide table. Fortunately, Harry had been with his mum several times when she had to attend speeches and such, so really large crowds weren’t too much of an issue. Only, this time they were listening to him! That was nerve wracking.
Flitwick and Moody acted as moderators and alternated asking questions.
Being the one with the most points, Harry went first. This time, he explained up front that he wore the armour because what idiot wouldn’t wear armour if they could when facing a dragon?
Moody had obviously been very pleased with his reasoning.
Further, he explained, in his research he had found that most of the previous tournaments had had the champions sneaking by or evading a dangerous monster. A few had even had them subduing a monster. So, he, his two tutors, and a few others, others had developed different strategies based on what he might have to do. And that everything they had planned played to what they considered his best talents and skills.
And flying had been a big part in all of them. After all he could move and dodge much quicker in the air than on the ground. And any creature he would have to face had to be ground-bound, for the most part, or it would simply flee from so many wizards and witches.
Anything that wouldn’t flee so many magic users gathered together would be so stupid it would be easy to outwit, or too dangerous to be brought anywhere near such a large crowd.
When the task was explained in the tent that morning, all he needed to do was adapt one of the strategies they had come up with.
He also explained his rationale for actually going after the golden egg instead of simply making a few feints and then giving up. “So,” he concluded, “I really don’t think I had that much of a choice. But my main goal was simply surviving.”
Fleur’s summation was about the same, with the addition that she should have either moved quicker or cast a flame-proofing spell on her robe. And used a disillusionment spell after the dragon fell asleep.
Which was pretty much the same thing that Cedric said — move faster, make his clothes flame-proof, and use a disillusionment spell.
Victor’s statement was simple and short. “Not use conjunctivitus.” And that was all he had to say. Considering that he and Cedric were both still slathered in orange skin-burn crème, that was really all he needed to say.
Then came the audience’s turn. Someone had asked about his having help in violation of the rules. To which he answered, “The rules say that none of the schools’ professors can help their champion with any of the tasks in the tournament. That the champions would begin the first task only with their wands. Students are not professors, so they can help all they want. And while Prefects can maintain order, they, also, are not professors paid by the school.” He blinked. “So, not a problem.” He shifted in his chair. “And I went one further than the other champions. When I entered the arena I had nothing else other than my wand — not even clothes.” He smirked. “And summoning things from out of the arena after a champion enters it was a tactic often employed in previous tournaments.”
The questions continued for another hour before the class was dismissed.
۸-_-۸
Thursday morning brought a flood of mail in the parliament of owls. Oddly enough, while the three other champions, and the heads of the three schools, were almost completely hidden by the owls flocking to them, Harry received none!
He exchanged looks with those seated around him, shrugged, and went back to finishing his breakfast. Something was rotten in Griffonstone, as Blueblood was wont to say when a sneaky noble tried to slip something past Celestia or Luna. He should have received mail. Where was it?
His eyes lingered on the Headmaster. He had a feeling that the wizard was involved in that right up to his bushy eyebrows.
But today was Thursday, he wouldn’t have time between classes to get any answers. After dinner, tonight then. He’d lose a little sleep before Astronomy class, but not much.
۸-_-۸
“Good evening to you, Mr. Sparkle,” the Headmaster said, “Professor McGonagall —” he nodded to the stern witch, “— tells me you have a question?”
Harry studied the wizard for a moment. He seemed completely relaxed, eyes twinkling, as the three of them walked towards his office. No reason to dance around the bush. “Where’s my mail?” he asked mildly. “The other champions all received mail in response to the article in the Daily Prophet. It seems odd that I, somehow, received nothing.”
Professor McGonagall gave him a sharp look, then stared at her boss.
“Ah, well, yes, there is that,” Dumbledore said, stroking his beard. He hummed softly for a few steps.
“Back when you were first placed with your relatives . . . ,”
Harry raised his eyebrows, not liking where this was going.
“. . . in order to prevent your enemies from finding you using the simple expedient of sending you an owl-mail and tracing the owl, I put a mail-owl re-direction intent-spell on you. Anyone who intended mail to be sent to you or your relatives would be delivered here, instead.” He looked down at Harry. “It kept you quite safe while you were at Privet Drive. And, it appears, it is still working.” He smiled. “Being anchored here, it never reacted to your disappearance.”
Harry stared up at him. “Where is it, then? I think, my being here at Hogwarts, it should be safe enough for me to receive mail.”
The wizard chuckled softly. “I think you underestimate your popularity. You would soon be inundated by mail and have no time to study or prepare for your tasks.”
Harry frowned. “If that’s so, then why haven’t you done the same for the other champions?”
He smiled gently. “They are of age, and make their own decisions,” he explained.
Harry stopped. “Do you read the mail for important documents?”
The Headmaster waved a hand negligently, “Oh there were exceptions for official letters from Hogwarts and the Ministry.”
Harry stared at the man, gobsmacked. “So, all one of my enemies had to do was bribe someone at the Ministry to send me an official letter and follow that to my uncle’s house? Or, better yet, send a letter-bomb?”
Dumbledore stared back at him a moment, a slight crease forming on his forehead. “Oh dear.”
Harry closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and slowly let it out. “And what about Gringotts? If my parents were as wealthy as all the books say, then I’m sure they must have sent something about finances in all these years. My uncle got a monthly statement from his bank, after all.”
The Headmaster pursed his lips and stroked his beard. “Ah, yes, I suppose they would at that.”
Harry sighed gloomily. Clearly, those missives had never been examined. “There could be all sorts of important documents buried in there,” Harry said, reproachfully. “If you are my guardian, then it is your responsibility to handle those documents. Because you obviously have not upheld your responsibilities, I’m sure the Ministry would be happy to appoint someone else, if I ask them. So, I ask again, where is my mail? At this point, you have no right to keep them from me.”
Harry was angry, but he had to keep his temper. That was another Blueblood lesson. No matter how angry you are, don’t show it in public. Except in your words.
McGonagall didn’t look too happy with the situation, either. She looked just short of apoplectic from the way her mouth had reduced itself to a simple line.
They started walking in a new direction.
“I intended to sift through the mail,” Dumbledore said, “but the events after that Halloween were so hectic, I didn’t have time. Between the school, trials, funerals, and endless bickering in the Wizengamot, it was over a year before I had a moment to relax. And . . . I just forgot.” He shrugged. “I am not perfect. I am only one man, and the demands on my attention were great.” He looked down at Harry sorrowfully. “I will remove the spell tonight.”
They had stopped in front of a door in the dungeons. “I have had the house-elves placing the mail in here,” the Headmaster said. He again looked down at Harry sorrowfully, as the door opened.
Harry’s jaw dropped. He had expected a bit of mail. His mum was always getting congratulatory mail on the things she did. And business solicitations. But this was far, far beyond anything he had expected. Just what were the wizards sending him letters about?
He supposed the other two had that reaction, as well. This wasn’t a room, it was a warehouse. Floor to ceiling shelves lined the walls and through the room, leaving narrow aisles only a house-elf could traverse. In one corner was an elf-sized table, above it a wide window. Owl perches lined one side of the table, three rows deep.
As he looked around, he noticed that the shelves appeared to be colour-coded.
“Oh, dear,” Dumbledore said.
The room’s size was impossible to determine, they simply couldn’t see far enough to tell. It had to be at least as big the Gryffindor Common Room, based on how wide it appeared. Maybe even as big as the Great Hall, although Harry found it incredible to believe that many wizards and witches would send him mail!
“Scriffy!” the Headmaster said.
“Scriffy be here!” came the almost instant reply. The house-elf looked at them, then at the room. He looked at Dumbledore expectantly.
“Could you please bring me all the mail in here from Gringotts?”
The house-elf grinned and snapped his fingers. A box of envelopes and scrolls half as tall as Harry appeared.
They stared at the box.
Harry looked up at Dumbledore. “This is going to take forever. As it’s your fault that this has piled up, I think you should be the one to help clear it.”
Dumbledore looked back at him. “I am a very busy wizard, I haven’t much time to spare on such an endeavour. I doubt I would even be able to keep up with the mail influx,” he said apologetically.
Harry just stared at him. “Have you ever heard of delegating? I’m sure if you assigned a few house-elves to the task, this room would be empty in record time.”
Dumbledore nodded, although McGonagall looked a bit scandalized at his tone.
“Scriffy, can you tell me about what all this is?” Dumbledore waved his arm across the room.
“Scriffy know! That wall be birthday cards!” He pointed at the far wall. “The next three rows be birthday presents. Theses five rows be other things, letters and boxes. And that section,” he pointed to opposite wall, “Be legally things.”
“Birthday presents?” Harry said incredulously. “People have sent me things?”
Scriffy nodded energetically. “Oh, yes, Princeys birthday be busiest day of year, then is Halloween, and then Christmas.”
Harry angrily turned to face Dumbledore directly. “How could you do this? They must think me the most ungrateful wretch to ever live!” he said harshly. “I want five house-elves assigned to this task tomorrow. Hermione and I will draw up reply letters, and they can start sending them, starting with the oldest letters first!”
He shook his head violently. “I’ll need to take out a full-page ad in the Daily Prophet and The Quibbler apologizing for this, and explaining how I only discovered this today. Oh, Rita Skeeter is going to love this story!”
He grabbed the box of Gringotts correspondence in his magic and stormed out of the room. There went his evening nap before Astronomy class!
۸-_-۸
He, Hermione, Ginny, and Luna came up with twenty different letters just for the people who had sent things to Harry, on special occasions, over the years.
Ginny and Luna had admitted that they, themselves, had sent him cards on his birthday, and even a present or two when they got older! Ginny had blushingly admitted, “I even sent you a sickle out of my allowance, a couple of times.”
Dear _______,
I only recently discovered that people have been sending me mail ever since that terrible Halloween when my parents died. Words cannot express how deeply sorry I am that you didn’t receive any kind of reply or acknowledgement of the [letter/present/letter and present/card/card and present] you sent me _________ [for Halloween/for Christmas/for my birthday/[end]]. I sincerely thank you for thinking of me at that time, and then taking the time to send me something. It truly makes a difference to me, today, that someone I didn’t know would take the time and effort to do something so nice and generous. I wish the very best for you, and your family.
[for those that sent something he couldn’t use] Please understand that I am now fourteen, and although I appreciate that you sent me something so nice, it is not something I can enjoy at this moment. Therefore, I have forwarded your present to Saint Mungos Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, Children’s ward, in your name. Again, thank you for thinking of me.
Sincerely, Prince Harry James Potter Sparkle [signed]
P.S. I also apologize for the form-letter nature of this response. The sheer volume of mail I now have to process makes it impossible for me to read and respond individually to each communication, even though I desperately would like to do so. If you have attempted to communicate with me more than once, you will probably receive more than one letter in response, as I am tackling the backlog starting with the oldest mail and working my way to the present. Thank you for your understanding and patience.
۸-_-۸
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*Reads story description*
Oh... raised and taught by Twilight, aka the magic nerd
This sounds fun
Dot's a lot of mail.
I believe Rita could love to put in the prophet how the great Albus Dumbledore decided to steal the mail from the poor orphan and how the many fans never knew about it... And let's just hope that she don't decide to just check where was Prince Harry before going to Equestria
One word for that dear part of the chapter, bold prediction it’s harry’s Godfather
Dear Prince Harry James Potter Sparkle,
REQUEST FOR ASSISTANCE - STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL
I am the wizard Tinfoails Smith, a researcher in ancient Egyptian runes, and the son of the famous Pallatian Smith. During my fathers time in the state of Nigeria as a cursebreaker, he accumulated a substantual collection of galleons, but when he was suddenly taken ill and we were forced to return to Britian to be treated, we were unable to bring them with us due to a hostile customs agent. Since the recent rebellion in the country, I have returned, only to find that his accounts have been frozen.
I am in dire need of some generous wizard in the country so I can move my father's wealth out of this place and get him the medical care he needs. All I am needing is a goblin letter of reccomendation, granting access to your vault so I can move his galleons. Since half of something is far better than none of anything, I am willing to split his accumulated wealth between us once the galleons have been moved.
Please respond at your earliest convenience, because political tensions in this country may render my fathers wealth out of reach permanently.
Your friend,
Tinfoails Smith
Harry does have a point. Rita is going to LOVE to hear that all the letters, gifts and etc that Harry has been sent over the years he never got due to Albus putting a ward that redirected all his(Harry's) mail to him as his 'Magical Guardian'. On another note Gringotts will also be interested to hear that the reason they never heard from their client was cause he never got their letters. Then again after popping into Equestria until the start of this story he had a excuse for the years since then. That being Owls not being able to deliver to other dimensions.(When not allowed to by the author of course.)
Oh wow, never iccoured to me these letters existed, perhaps they just were thrown away in the books outside scenes XD.
this is good; keep up the good work!
Woah good point. It would make sense a 'hero' of his renown would get mail throughout his life and for it to stack up so much. So glad house-elf have such useful magic, skills, and time. I'm interested to see if harry will figure out a way to 'reward' them although that'd be understandably difficult, heck the work itself is like a reward.
Also, on a side note befriending the house'elf would have all sorts of benefits since they know all about Hogwarts. Dumbledore probably forbid them helping with any school stuff after students (Fred & George) were caught getting the elfs to do it for them.
Oh gods the dreaded common sense! How can wizard kind resist such foul magiks?
Anxious for the Dragon episode though, those talks are going to be interesting at the very least. Twiggles would be proud
9876387
Nigerian Prince - Wizard Version is absolutely hilarious! Well done good sir, well done!
Harry teaching a class was a bit of a surprise. The warehouse of mail and packages was an even bigger one! Honestly, you can't fault Dumbledore too much for this. The spell was well intentioned and even logical in its reason for existence. That he forgot he unfortunate, but understandable. Although how it absolutely never crossed his mind again is somewhat hard to believe. Anyway, nice chapter.
9876387
Dear Mr. Smith,
I’m sorry to hear about your father. Given that ten years have passed since your letter was sent - again, I apologize, perhaps you’ve read the article in the Prophet or The Quibbler detailing the mail SNAFU I was involved in - I hope that your issue was resolved to the best of your ability.
I’m sure one of the other prominent wizard families of Britain was able to assist you and your father, and wish you well.
Thank you,
Harry Potter
9876387
That’s great!
9876401
More likely that JKR never thought of that aspect of being famous. Until she was that famous.
Nice. It's always good to see someone who understands what house-elves can do, and relys on them to do their job. Trust and responsibility are of the few dignities that can be granted them in their position.
9876423
"Sparkle!"
There's no opening quotation mark here.
Fleur is a veela, a race with natural affinity for pyromancy - why aren't her clothes already fireproof?
What, veela don't have accidental burnings when they're young, or sick, or exhausted?
Glad to see SPEW was nipped in the bud. Of all the meaningless subplots in the series, that one was perhaps the most inane. Hermione didn't even research the subject; she just heard that Hogwarts had house-elves and assumed 'slave-labor', and she was off to the races.
Goblet of Fire remains my favorite book in the series, but it is far from flawless. The whole deal regarding house-elves was pointless to the plot of the book (and the series for that matter), so I'm actually glad it was dropped for the movie. One of the few things I'm glad was changed in that trainwreck.
9876387
Hahaha, that makes soooo much sense.
Dat a lot of mail, oh lawd oh lawd
Wow I think once Twilight arrives she is going to be very happy at her colt sending out this reply.
9876458
Thanks for pointing out the missing quote.
“Fleur is a veela, a race with natural affinity for pyromancy - why aren't her clothes already fireproof?”
You’d have to ask JKR that question, because Fleur’s robe’s burning is part of canon.
9876506
My guess is fluer didn't think of fireproofing HER CLOTHES because SHE was already fireproof.
This is one chapter that demonstrates why the wizarding disdain of muggle tech can be a good thing, since while there's probably safeguards to protect against, say...a howler that JUST explodes and in a lethal manner, a mundane letter bomb would probably be overlooked, and that's assuming anyone wanting to harm Harry would even think of using one, given that they're mostly wizarding pureblood supremacists that would probably think using muggle tech completely beneath them.
9876506
She's also only 1/4 Veela, so maybe she doesn't have anything more than a low level charm field?
Instead of going out of your way to make Dumbledore look like an idiot how about just using the real reason? Dumbledore interntionally kept Harry cut off from the wizarding world so of course he kept any Owls from finding Harry. After years of no response the fan mail would eventually stop and once Harry was at Hogwarts there was no further need for the block.
Well if Dumbledore was Harry's guardian he would also have been in charge of the Vault so Harry wouldn't have gotten those letters anyways. Same for any official documents regarding Harry since those would be handled by his Guardian (Dumbledore).
I liked this one, The Mail one is always a good plot point used in lots of HP fics.
9876547
So the old geezer would be free to pick the Potter vaults clean? Empty them completely to fund the Order, despite not actually being a Potter himself?
I'd think the vault would have protections against non-Potters going in there, draining it dry.
Man, isn't there enough in the books to beat up on Dumbledore about, without fabricating your own original outrage?
9876423
9876387
Dear Mr. Potter,
I deeply regret to inform you that Mr. Tinfoails Smith has died here in Azkaban Prison about a year ago. Enclosed you will find your letter.
Sincerely,
Kingsley Shacklebolt
Head Liaison to Azkaban
9876363
This isn't the only story of this nature the author has done either. The other one is already waiting for a sequel and has finished 1st year. That one seems to be intended to be a multi-year story though, while I expect this one to ONLY be 4th year, with a possibility for sequels depending on how things go. While they are similar, there ARE differences between them, so I do recommend reading both ^^
9876387
Needs more spelling errors and bad grammar.
9876374
Undoubtedly, the house elves already named this room 'Harry Potter's Treasury'.
That's like my Email inbox after a few months of neglect
9876506
9876514
Also, dragonfire vs less extreme versions.
9876547
Uh, well, that's the thing. (This is canon) Dumbledore illegally declared himself Harry's guardian in the Wizengamot. Gringotts doesn't recognize illegal incarceration without proper paperwork filled and proper fines paid so Sirius never stopped being Harry's documented legal guardian.
I am SO GLAD the little pudding interaction with Luna was in here. We get to see a little bit of Harry being playful. We dont get to see much of "him" because he has been keeping up the Dickish Diplomat Face Blueblood has helped him form so much. Outside of his introspection and teaching spells to help/thank others his personality hasn't gotten a chance to show.
yep Dumbledore is proved to be a dunderhead agene i love it.
i do hope Harry has a good supply of Owl treats handy for all of this mail going out.
this story is so totally amazing i love it.
Nice point the letters thing, just though Harry was a bit too agressive with Dumbledore as the headmaster os very busy and did it wih the best intentions, even if poorly.
And there goes the last of my empathy towards Harry I felt, gone like a unsupervised pancake left at the table next to a dog who can reach the table standing on their back legs. woosh!
So... was the goal of this fic to make Harry as unlikable as possible? Because if so good job.
Seriously though having Harry be an asshole to everyone around him is getting old. We need a reason to sympathize with him beyond circumstances that, by the way, none of the people he lashes out at are responsible for.
9876991
I don't think tkepner is interested in changing anything in the story except for errors.
9876991
9876953
First, all the one’s he’s lashing out at, as you put it, are adults who are in position of authority that they have regularly failed to execute in a proper fashion. It’s really hard to be respectful of someone who has repeatedly failed to do their job. Yes, most of the errors were in the past, yes, some of them are honest mistakes, but all you have to do is read the newspapers to see people in respectable positions being attacked for things they did wrong decades ago. Why should Harry react any differently than that?
Again, he doesn’t know these people, but he does know that at least one of them wants him dead. When you’re in a team where one person is going to backstab you, and you KNOW this, it is really hard to trust ANY of the people you interact with. At the same time these people expect you to forget everything about your former life and love the life you are in -- where someone is trying to kill you. Would you trust any of them? Would you be on edge every time one of them tells you something new they did wrong? And, no mistakes about it, in a normal environment at least three of the people who are supposed to be supervising Harry would have been fired from their jobs for negligence or incompetence. And yet, these people expect him to trust them?
The Triwizard is supposed to be about the contestants, and they are supposed to participate without help from their professors. Yet we plainly see the other two headmaster/Headmistress cheating and telling their champions things they are not supposed to divulge.
9877029
You can justify it any way you want but we need a reason to root for Harry and when he goes around acting like a snobbish asshole at every moment, no matter how justified that attitude may be, it makes it really hard to care about him. He needs some redeeming features or to at least have his personality toned down from asshole to snarky jerk. I recommend taking a page from Harry Potter and the Crystal Empire, while I'm not a big fan of Harry's characterization in that story it at least does a better job of making him snarky without making him unlikable.
He's gotten a LOT of lessons from Blueblood. Valuable ones.
Who, as people who only watched the show might not know is not a complete ass, but a diplomat that wears that snooty act of his like a mask. Potter's life would have made a decent Scootabuse fanfic if you filed the names off a bit, and unlike the canon series...he got some quality parenting. And a Canterlot noble's education from what has to be the best sources short of Celestia Herself, being Blueblood. And probably lots of mom and friend time to teach him that he's his own person- or rather, pony. Utter booknerd Sparkle, he is not. He's the young scion of the third most-powerful Equestrian princess and has had a lot of love and self-reinforcement and top-schooling to go with it.
Of course he's not a passive, pitiful wizard-waif. He's had the chance to grow a backbone, develop confidence in himself as a talented unicorn, and has Twilight Sparkle and everything around her as role models. He's a Prince with the Capital Lettering.
By comparison, wizards are not very good at parenting. They f'ed up with the Dursleys. They would have shoved him whole-hog into Hogwarts without a clue compared to his wizarding peers and as it's pretty obvious from the outside, if Voldemort's people had half a brain cell, he'd have been dead three times over at least before getting his letter in spite of his "protections".
9876462
Speaking of SPEW, I only recently realized that it's probably a nod to the original SPEW, the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women.
Yeah, this is where you can see that even though Harry has been taught a lot by Twilight he is still clearly a teenagaer. Huge attitude with authority and thinking he is right about everything. Boy needs to step back and realize these people were just trying to keep him alive. Hopefully he will learn that by the end of the story.
9877029
At the end of the day, one needs to answer a simple question - do you want the audience to root for Harry? Since the story is centered on him, it's probably safe to presume that the answer is yes. Right now, a significant part of your audience is making it clear that they do not want to root for the character as you have written him, and that is not something that you can fix with justifications in the comments. You don't have to follow anyone's advice on what should be done, but given the range of responses and the consistency of them, I think it's time to acknowledge that Harry Potter Sparkle is suffering from a lack of likeability.
That's assuming that Voldemort wanted him dead.
MoR took a really good look at that. Heck, even pure canon: we're supposed to believe that when everyone was dead, we knew the reason was that a killing curse rebounded. After all, someone saw that, right?
Oh, right -- nope. There's a destroyed house, a dead master wizard, a living child, and ... people just invented stories of what happened and declared it to be truth.
What did Voldemort want? Hmm ... could he have used the boy as a vessel for life? If he thought the boy could kill him, tried to, and failed, then perhaps his misunderstanding of the prophecy told him that "well, death here, death there, both have effectively died once, so the prophecy is fulfilled"?
Heck, who says that Voldemort was even trying to win that wizarding war? Even that wasn't well handled if your goal was to wipe out the central government.
Besides, even if Voldemort wanted him gone, why would the rest of the DE's want to kill him?
It isn't until Voldemort comes back that they want Harry. And not to kill him, but to get the pieces needed for the ritual. They had to keep Harry alive until then.
Think about that for a second. Imagine saying "We need this child alive. But they are not yet powerful enough -- we have to feed encounters at them until they have gained the power we need for this ritual".
(That's Milo, Natural 20. They want Milo to reach 9th level spells so he can Wish Voldemort back to full strength. Turn every D&D trope on it's head.)
Fundamentally, Rowling's book 1 was wish fulfilment for 11 year olds. We don't see any real world building until book 3, and the time turners are effectively ignored/destroyed after being used once.
A consistent universe was an afterthought in canon, and the holes are just big enough for whatever vehicle you want to use. :-)
Hmm, the "next" button broke again.
9877029
I really refuse to believe he was raised by Twilight Sparkle & the Elements to ANY extent all I see here is Blueblood the Noble and that is no bueno.
Now onto my other observations:
*If Harry had a vibe check he would immediately implode.
*It is hard to wish him well when he such a big smartass that you are legally obligated to say "buenos dias" upon encountering him.
* Looking at the some comments I have to agree so much that Dumbledore probably did more good than bad even if he had some mayor blunders .
*TWIGGLES WOULD NOT BE PROUD