Chapter 5: Gringotts
Some two hours after Professor McGonagall had left, Hermione emerged from her room once again. She’d unwrapped her books, and browsed them quickly… before coming to the conclusion that she would want a couple for background reading, but not too many.
Which was good- without Professor McGonagall around, she doubted she could carry more than a couple back from Flourish and Blotts!
And of course, her pockets were still too full of gold that she didn’t want to put down, lest it get lost or stolen, so she was considering seeing if she could get a vault at Gringotts. Her father had told her that she could hold onto any she didn’t use for the next year.
She had also unwrapped her wand again, and practiced picking it up. It still did the whole tickly tingly thing every time- except each time, it was more manageable to her.
It also seemed like it wasn’t nearly as strong if she picked it up within about a minute of putting it down- almost like whatever was causing the feeling was fading instead of just vanishing.
Which it very well could be- even when holding the wand, she could only barely tell that the tingly feeling was there, and even then only if she concentrated. Ollivander and McGonagall both had no idea what the feeling was, so…
She walked quietly up to the bar.
Tom, the barkeeper, looked up. “Good afternoon, Miss Granger,” he greeted. “Did you need something?”
“I was thinking about visiting Gringotts,” she muttered. “Then probably Flourish and Blotts again.”
He nodded. “You know where you’re going, then,” he observed. “Make absolutely certain you don’t wander down any side streets- some of them can get dangerous. As long as you stick to Diagon Alley, and really anywhere up or down the street, you’ll be safe- the shopkeepers will look out for you.” He paused. “Do you remember how to get into the Alley and back?”
She nodded. “Yeah. Three up, two across. And the brick with the cross on it to get back.” She paused. “I’ll need to go get my wand, though.”
He chuckled. “Yeah, that’s pretty important.”
Hermione stopped in the courtyard out back of the Leaky Cauldron and took a deep breath before drawing her wand from her pocket. For some reason, even though it was twice as long as the pocket was deep, and she had a handful of galleons in that pocket as well, it fit entirely inside it.
She managed to only shudder this time, without having to pause to cope with the tingle. She raised it, tapped the brick… and, as the archway started to open, she pocketed it again.
Finally, she stepped back out into Diagon Alley.
Her eyes immediately fell on Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlor… but she decided against it. Perhaps she could visit later, once she had fewer coins and more books.
She turned, and set off down the cobbled street for the bank, Gringotts.
“Uh, Hi,” Hermione muttered, walking up to a free teller.
The goblin looked at her over his counter. “What do you want?” he asked.
She flinched at his unpleasant attitude, but stood strong- or at least, as strong as she could. “What does it take to open a vault?” she asked.
The goblin gazed at her for a couple of seconds. “How old are you?”
She winced. “E-Eleven.”
“We do not allow wizards below the age of seventeen to register new Vaults,” he told her calmly. “We do, however, allow wizards of at least eleven years to reclaim Vaults left by magical ancestors.”
“Oh,” she muttered. “And I don’t have…” She sighed. “Thanks anyways.” She started to turn away.
“There are Vaults that have been passed down through muggle lines,” he told her calmly. “And many more that have never been reclaimed because the eligible wizards do not think to check for them.”
She paused, and looked at him again. “Say what? Er… How do I, ahh, check?”
The answer to Hermione’s question involved quite a lot more commotion than she expected.
A runner had guided her back to an office in the back of the bank. Then, the very curt goblin that worked in the office had spent nearly forty-five minutes having her do various things with various magical devices- none of which involved her wand, she noticed, so presumably they could do this before she got a wand- and, finally, seemed to decide that he’d pushed her around enough.
He put the latest instrument away, told her to wait for a moment, and started working at his desk.
This took another ten minutes, before he finally pushed a form towards her, alongside a very sharp quill in an empty glass inkwell. “Sign this,” he told her.
“Huh?” she muttered, and looked down at the document.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t written in English, so she couldn’t read it at all.
“Um… What is it?”
“Just sign it,” the goblin grumbled.
At the same time, she felt a sudden encouraging, reassuring warmth against her leg. Her wand… was telling her it was okay?
She was tempted to fold her arms and refuse to sign anything she couldn’t read- but for some reason, she felt like she could trust her wand, and it was telling her it was okay.
So she took a deep breath, took the quill, and looked at the tip. It was, indeed, extremely sharp. “No ink?” she asked.
“You won’t be needing any.”
She scowled, put the quill to the page, and signed it on the line he had indicated. The quill used a bright, ruby red ink… that seemed to be coming out of it.
No sooner had she finished than a stinging cut suddenly appeared on the back of her hand- and promptly disappeared again, without leaking a single drop of blood.
She let out a gasp of surprise, and almost dropped the quill, staring at it.
The goblin took the form, inspected it, and set it aside before reaching forward to pluck the quill out of her hand, sign the form himself, put it back in the empty inkwell, and set them back away.
“What- What was that?” Hermione asked, breathlessly. Her wand was still providing a reassuring warmth- but it was a quill that had cut her when she used it!
The goblin ignored her as he put the form into a drawer of his desk. He waited a couple seconds, before opening the drawer again to remove a tiny golden key, which he pushed into her hands.
“Now go.” He pointed at the door.
She stared at him, then sighed, rose, and left the room. She already knew he wasn’t going to tell her any more if she asked.
The warmth from her wand faded as she went, leaving behind a trace of its warmth.
Finally, she stepped out into the passage.
Griphook, the runner that had taken her there, was waiting for her- though he looked quite bored. “This way, please,” he told her, when she closed the door behind her.
She followed silently.
The silence didn’t last long. After a minute, she stepped up to walk next to him. “He… He gave me a key,” she muttered. “Does that mean anything?”
Griphook paused, looking at her. “He gave you a key, did he? Without explaining?” He sighed. “Again. Probably had you sign a document you couldn’t read, without explanation?”
She nodded.
He nodded as well. “That would have been the Vault Agreement,” he told her disappointedly. “It must be written in Gobbledegook- that’s our language- and signed in blood for the magic to take effect.”
“Signed in-?” she asked, wrapping her hand around the hand that had gotten cut. Her skin was still slightly red.
He nodded. “We use Blood Quills for that,” he told her. “He’s supposed to explain ahead of time, but…” He sighed. “He’s already gotten in trouble for that three times this month- especially when it cost us an extremely valuable Blood Quill two weeks ago, thanks to a girl whose natural wards were so strong they destroyed it when she tried to use it.” He sighed. “We had to teach her how to temporarily weaken her wards before she could sign it. Anyways, if he’s given you a key, you have a vault and that key will open it. We don’t give out unassigned keys.”
“Oh,” she muttered, looking at the key in her hand again. “Can… Can I visit it? Or-?”
He nodded. “Yes, this way.”
Griphook led Hermione back out to the great marble hall of the main bank, where all the tellers and the main entrance were- then back up the hall a ways and into one of the many doors along the side.
She blinked in surprise when the room on the other side of the door was not marble but stone- a long, stone tunnel that sloped downwards and curved out of sight, lit by wall-mounted torches. Railway tracks were built on the floor, with a little flat spot at the top- but there was no train.
Griphook gave a whistle- and after a few seconds, a cart came hurtling up the tracks and rolled smoothly to a stop at the top, waiting for them to get in. It looked much like the minecarts in that Minecraft game she’d played once, just larger and less… blocky. It also had a door in the side, and benches on either end.
She sat down on the bench that was facing downhill, with her back to the door, and Griphook sat opposite her before the cart took off, hurtling down the tunnel. It seemed to have a mind of its own, weaving in and out of various caves and ravines, taking switches this way and that, and it seemed to be passing over converging junctions as often as it did diverging junctions. Every so often, the track went up for a little before resuming going down.
“Wow,” Hermione muttered, peering over the edge as the cart crossed over an underground ravine. For some reason, her usual fear of heights didn’t extend to looking out of vehicles, such as airplanes or even roller coasters- that one had really surprised her. “This place is really complex,” she observed.
Griphook nodded. “Don’t lean over too far, some of these passages can get pretty narrow,” he warned her. “But yes. The Gringotts Underground is designed to lose anyone that enters or departs- these carts will only function properly when operated by a licensed Gringotts Goblin acting under their own free will. Many of these tracks in either direction form loops or travel to various traps, often with quite a few forks and merges with other wrong turns before reaching the end.” He sighed. “Even the lowest-security Vault in Gringotts is protected by nearly two hundred junctions along the shortest route from the Main Hall- completely aside from the invisible protections we employ.” He twisted around to look in front of them. “Looks like we’re headed for the medium security block, where most common wizards’ Vaults are.”
“This is taking forever,” Hermione observed. They were still going down, and the air was starting to get hot.
Griphook nodded. “We passed through the Med-Sec block a while ago,” he told her. “It looks like we’re headed for the Maximum Security block. Not many vaults there. Don’t reach too far outside the cart- before long, the air down here will be hot enough to boil water, and the protective charms on the carts only go so far.”
“We didn’t, like, miss it, did we?” Hermione asked, as a sudden heatwave heralded hurtling across a bridge just feet above the surface of a small underground lava lake.
“Nope,” he told her promptly. “That lake we just crossed is the only entrance to the Maximum Security block. Not long now.”
No sooner had he said that than a sudden blast of cool air met her face, and the track leveled off. The cart made a few more turns- then rapidly decelerated, and came to a full stop with a soft bump against a stop block.
“Ahh,” Griphook nodded. “Here we are.” He gestured to the side, as he opened the door and led the way out of the cart.
Hermione followed him gingerly, and looked up at the wall he had gestured at.
Set into the stone wall was a massive metal door, with what Hermione recognized as a tiny keyhole in it, even from so far away. There were a few strange symbols engraved in the door.
“Alright,” Griphook said, looking at it. “A bit overkill, but it works, I suppose.” He turned to her. “This Vault happens to be what we call a Cursed Vault. That key of yours will open the door- but that door is not the only thing protecting it, even at this point.”
“It’s cursed,” Hermione muttered.
“Well… Sort of,” he agreed. “More like warded. Once you open the door, you’ll have to authenticate yourself to the wards. First, you’re going to insert the tip of the key into the transparent blue barrier behind the door. You’ll see a burst of energy travel through the Vault- and at that point, you will be able to enter it.
“Before you enter it, though, if you insert the tip of your wand while the key is still partially inside, you will also be able to use your wand to open the door if you lose the key, and neither one will open it unless you are the one using it.
“That done, you’ll want to walk in, key-first, to ensure the wards are able to familiarize themselves with you. Once you do that, you’ll be able to treat the wards like they don’t exist at all- though others, including myself, will be unable to enter unless you hold their hand across the threshold each time. It will act as a solid barrier to them otherwise- and if they do manage to bypass it, they will die.” He sighed. “These wards were invented and implemented shortly after apparition was discovered, but before anti-apparition jinxes were invented; nowadays, they would actually be illegal on a home or business, but are just fine in one of these vaults. Are you ready?”
She nodded. “I’m ready.”
Hermione stepped into her vault, the process finally completed, and stared around, finally taking in the contents of her new vault.
There was a tidal wave of gold so large she could probably live luxuriously for her entire life, without working for a single day. There was an entire wall of bookcases, each loaded to the breaking point with books. There were shelves upon shelves of other assorted trinkets. There was a rack full of swords hanging on one wall. There was- There was-!
She reached over, and plucked a quill from its holder on a shelf next to the door. Yes, the tip was extremely sharp. “Is- Is this what I think it is?” she asked.
Griphook looked. “If you think it’s a blood quill, then yes,” he told her. “Speaking of- if ever you encounter a blood quill out in the wild, be wary. A wizard’s blood is a very powerful thing- and blood as fresh and pure as that which a blood quill procures…” He sighed. “If you sign an agreement with a Blood Quill and violate it, the best case scenario is that you lose your magic, but most often you die. If you write a document with a blood quill, your magic will do its level best to make it come true. If you don’t have enough magic… you lose your magic.
“And… If ever anyone tries to force you to write something with a blood quill, anything, no matter what it is, run. Forcing someone to write a statement about themselves with a blood quill is an ancient form of mind control, and it cannot be reversed without causing you to lose your magic.” He sighed. “Fortunately, all other forms of mind or body control, including the Imperius Curse, are reversible- and prevent Blood Quills from functioning. They only work for the willing mind.”
She placed it deftly back in its place. “Okay. Let’s leave that here, then.” She took a deep breath. “So… that ‘Vault Agreement’...?”
“The only thing you are agreeing to in that Agreement is to allow Gringotts to protect whatever you place in this Vault.” He shrugged. “Pretty hard to disallow that.” He gestured towards the cart behind him.
She took a deep breath, and scanned down the rows again, pocketing her wand.
A ripple of energy suddenly blasted out from her, rippling throughout the whole Vault.
“Yeek!” she gasped, looking around wildly. “What- What was-?”
“Oh, it’s wand-keyed?” Griphook blinked. “Huh.” He looked up at her. “Thanks to that, your wand will serve as an access point to anything in this Vault, from anywhere, both insert and remove- just pull it in or out of a pocket, cabinet, or whatever else that will fit it, while holding your wand and desiring it to enter or leave your Vault instead.” He chuckled. “Very convenient for Vaults this deep, even though it only works with the most powerful wands- and it seems yours is strong enough.”
She winced. “Er… Yeah. I mean, given its core…” She trailed off. “So, I can go home and summon stuff from here, without actually visiting?” she asked.
He nodded. “It’ll only work for you, and only with that wand.”
“Meaning…” She drew her wand again, then stuffed her hand into her pocket and removed the handful of galleons left in it.
Then she concentrated… and put them back in her pocket.
There was a gentle tinkling as a few galleons dropped out of nowhere to land on the tidal wave.
“Oh my,” she muttered. “I can… I can feel everything that’s in here.” Then she frowned. “Forty million galleons… how much is that worth, anyways?”
“Quite a bit,” Griphook chuckled.
“Well yeah, I know that, but…” She looked around, emptied the rest of the coins- mostly sickles or knuts, the large numbers of them to make up the larger denominations were a pain- from her pockets by the same means, and stepped up to one of the shelves to pick up a piece of parchment lying in clear view of the entrance.
She read it through, and scowled. It looked like it was a message from her long-dead ancestor- but it didn’t tell her much.
It only told her to take the ornate box that had been sitting on it home… and open it with ‘an unlocking spell’. Apparently, she would be glad that she did, but it didn’t say what was inside, or why she would be glad.
“Hey Hermione.”
Hermione looked up at her mom, Emma Granger, when she heard her voice.
“Hi,” she answered, around her ice cream; she had finally gotten over her shock, finished buying the extra books she wanted and sending them to her Vault, and headed to Fortescue’s to get some ice cream. She’d been slowly consuming this huge ‘un-meltable’ ice cream for a few minutes before her parents had arrived. “How was work?”
“Went pretty well,” Dan answered, sitting down at her table. “Hmm, that looks good. You happen to have any of those wizard coins left?”
“Er… About that,” she muttered.
“Uh-oh,” he observed.
Hermione smiled. “Well, a few hours ago, I went to Gringotts.”
He blinked. “You went back to Gringotts?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yeah. Thought I’d see if I could get a vault to store the rest of the gold for next year.” She sighed.
“They refused, didn’t they?” Emma asked.
She nodded. “They did. But apparently, I have- through at least one of you, but no idea which, really- some ancient magical ancestor that was…” She paused. “Really rich.” She sighed. “No idea who it was. Goblins wouldn’t tell me, and they didn’t leave anything in the vault to tell me either.”
“... The Vault,” Emma repeated.
She nodded. “They let me ‘reclaim’ their ‘lost’ vault. Which means…” She trailed off, took a deep breath, and continued. “Which means I now have… Literally millions of galleons.”
“Oh my,” Dan muttered. “But how long does it take to get them?”
“Thanks to magic… all I have to do is put my hand in my pocket when I’m holding my wand.” She paused. “I, er, did spend all of the stuff you gave me, by the way. Lotsa books for background reading. But I won’t be needing any more gold for…” She paused. “My entire life, I think.”
Then a waitress walked over. “Good evening,” she greeted. “Can I get you two something as well, or…?”
“Go ahead and get something,” Hermione told her parents. “I’ll pay for it.”
Dan nodded slowly, while the waitress blinked in apparent surprise. “Alright then. Um… What’s on the menu?”
“Fancy,” Dan observed, inspecting Hermione’s wand. It was around ten minutes after they had returned from Diagon Alley, and Hermione was recounting the day’s adventure to them in the kitchen.
She nodded. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the fanciest one in the shop,” she told him, and sighed. “It gets even fancier when I hold it, too.” She held out her hand; she had already set her wand on the table to wait by the time they had finished getting changed for the evening.
He reached out, and set it on her outstretched palm.
She didn’t close her hand on it; she didn’t need to. White light rapidly rippled its way through the carving, filling it to the brim with vibrant energy.
“Oh my,” Dan muttered.
Emma looked instead at Hermione. “Something wrong?”
She shook her head. “Oh, no, it’s just…” She sighed. “Most wands don’t do that. And whenever it does that, it sends this… tingly feeling through my body as well.”
“It’s not hurting you, is it?” Emma asked.
“Oh, no,” she answered, placing it on the table and watching the light fade from the carvings as she drew her hand away. “As a matter of fact, it seems to be doing quite the opposite. Whenever I’m holding it… I can lift my trunk, effortlessly, with a finger. But only when I’m holding it.”
Dan tilted his head. “Why is it so different? Er, if you know.”
“Because…” She sighed. “Because a wand has two components,” she answered. “There’s the wood… and the core, which is of a powerful magical substance. This one’s Vine wood… which is pretty rare to find in a wand anymore, according to Ollivander, but not all that special.
“The core, on the other hand… Most wands have a phoenix tail feather, a unicorn tail hair, or a dragon heartstring.” She sighed again. “This one’s different. It… It has a hair from…” She took a deep breath. “From the head of a goddess.” She paused. “Nobody knows what goddess, only that she anonymously donated the hair to Ollivander’s shop by way of a snowy owl a week and a half ago. He crafted it into a wand… and this was the result. This…” She trailed off. “Masterpiece.” She curled up in her chair, wrapping her arms around her knees. “I keep wondering if I really deserve something this special,” she muttered. “It doesn’t seem to care, though. It even helped me overcome my fears when I was getting that Gringotts vault- and whenever I’m holding it, I feel safe, no matter where I am. Even though I don’t know any magic yet.”
Hailey accepted the note Hedwig brought her the following morning, and flipped it open. “Oh, he’s thanking me for… Wow. That was fast.” She leaned back in her chair, and looked at Hedwig. “Remember that letter I had you take to Ollivander? I put one of my hairs in it… and apparently, he just sold the wand he made with that hair.” She looked at the unaddressed letter. “I wonder what this ‘Hermione Granger’ is like?” Then she looked out at the window. “And I wonder if he would appreciate more hair? I mean, if my wand has a core from the same phoenix as Voldemorts…” She shrugged. “Oh, why not.”
A minute later, she had a small collection of hairs folded gently inside pieces of paper and tucked into a sealed envelope. On the face of the envelope, she wrote three words- one, Ollivander, was english.
The other two, she had written in a strange script she had never seen before… but could understand perfectly anyways, and somehow knew that he would as well. She had no idea where she’d learned it.
You’re welcome.
She then set the envelope aside, and smiled at Hedwig. “Whenever it’s convenient, then,” she told her. “No rush.”
Hedwig let out a hoot of laughter.
Ollivander stared at the face of the sealed envelope the snowy owl had delivered. The same owl as had come the morning before to take the note of thanks he’d drafted for whoever had sent him the goddess hair.
There was his name… and two words, written in that same strange script as had been on the note wrapped around the first hair.
The envelope had some thickness to it too- it probably had multiple hairs in it.
He sighed, and set it aside unopened. He would open it later, in his workshop; for now, he was going to finish breakfast.
Was that really all it took to get goddess hairs for wand cores? Thank her for the donation, and tell her who received it?
He said a quick prayer, praying that he wasn’t going to be unwittingly furnishing goddess wands to any that would misuse them. Like Voldemort.
“Alohomora,” Hermione muttered.
The lock on her bedroom door, which was standing wide open, clicked.
She tested the outside handle. The latch withdrew into the door, exactly as it was supposed to for an unlocked door.
So she locked the handle again, and tested again. It wouldn’t move.
“Alohomora,” she repeated.
It clicked.
And when she tested it, it opened.
She took a deep breath, locked the door, stepped outside, and closed it, such that she had locked herself out of her bedroom. She tested the handle just to be sure.
“Alohomora.”
The lock clicked, and when she tested it, the door opened easily.
She closed it again, this time with her inside the room and the door not locked, and sat back down at her desk with a smile. “One week,” she muttered. “One week, and I’ve already learned a spell.” She glanced at the door. “Not all that useful of one, but…” She shrugged, and pointed her wand at the little box she’d retrieved from her Vault, the one that had been sitting on that note.
“Alohomora.”
The extremely complex lock on the front of it burst open. The top of the box flung itself off- and all four sides also threw themselves off, as the box rapidly disassembled itself.
Inside was… She caught a brief glimpse of an odd red sand inside, before it burst into flames.
She let out a shriek of terror, tipping her chair over backwards- but then… the flames were gone. When she stood back up to look at it, completely unharmed and wand in hand despite bouncing her head off of the hard floor, the sand had all been turned to ash.
But why? What was it?
She was about to turn to the door to get a broom and dustpan when a tiny, newborn bird stuck its wrinkled head out of the ashes.
“What in the world-?” she asked.
There was no answer, unfortunately. Her parents were both at work.
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Dawww, cutie phoenix chick
Bonding with a phoenix, Hermione is going to have some political power in the future.
Hey Phoenix huh I like it
Goodbye frog~!
Hermione gets a phoenix? Isn't that interesting...
hmm that has IMPLICATIONS on Harry if the "I will not tell lies" happens here...
11285502
Uh...Why? That's pure fanon.
11285778
Perhaps the author was inspired by this concept from another fanfic? Aside from the wand ingredients, healing properties and convenient teleportation, I'm not sure why else Hermione would be receiving a phoenix instead of sticking with the cat she got two years later.
Now Herminoe won't have to buy owl for her school anymore.
Loosing or breaking that wand going to be pain in the ass, also illegal blood quills used by goblins somehow makes it okay. A phoenix, does she really needs it?
Ohmygosh, a Phoenix?! So much I need to know more aboutttt! Will Hailey and Hermione meet?! Will we ever find out what relative Hermione's Vault is from?! Who will Ollivander sell the next wand to?!
11285752
It does...
As I recall, it was "I Must Not Tell Lies", though.
11285826
That's quite a lot of reasons. There's also the rarity of a phoenix.
11285888
... She might. A phoenix doesn't necessarily carry mail.
But Hermione never got an owl in canon anyways- she used Hedwig or school owls- so it's no big deal.
11285898
... He never said the blood quill was illegal, per se. Just dangerous. And probably should be illegal, but the high nobles like to have them around for dealing with uppity muggleborn.
Minecraft were created around 2009. Hermione, I assume, enrolling in Hogwarts around 1991.
Please, change it for something else more fitting (there could be pixilated minecarts in some games of that time period, right?) or just for an encyclopedia with pictures reference. Or Indiana Jones, if there were minecarts in those first three movies.
11289520
I've actually altered the timeline so she's starting in 2021- precisely so I don't have to think to hard about what did or didn't exist six years before I was born.
11289619
Oh.
Well, would probably be good to add that.. somewhere. I think it's something that reader should know to perceive the story correctly.
11289758
Yeah... I don't often find very many good places to drop clues like that, though. But who knows, I found a good spot in TGwDJL, I'm sure I can find one in here somewhere!
EEEEEEEE!
Hermione has a pheonix familiar!