Chapter 4: Year Two (II)Summary:Holly reflects on what she's learned, schemes several schemes, a certain house elf is still curiously absent, and the Defense curse strikes again.
Notes:(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter TextTo say Albus Dumbledore wasn't expecting to be woken up hearing that the Chamber of Secrets threat was solved was an understatement. And yet, somehow, it seemingly was.
He looked at the helpful but ominous note on the wall then the ruined diary in his hand. Tom Riddle's diary and, unless he was much mistaken, a destroyed horcrux. It was proof of his long-suspected horcrux theory.
The Diary was clearly the cause of the Chamber being opened once more, making it the "heir". With it destroyed, Albus supposed that did make the heir "handled". The fact it was a destroyed horcrux confirmed there was a basilisk present. The only unconfirmed portion was the basilisk being dead. He had found an irritable rooster nearby which certainly suggested it true but there was no hard proof.
It begged the question: who found the Chamber and killed the beast? Certainly, it was not a professor, no matter what Gilderoy may say. That meant a student was responsible. But who was capable of such a feat? They would certainly need to be a parselmouth.
Perhaps it was unsurprising then that they stayed hidden rather than revealing such an ability. The only student he suspected of being one was Holly Potter and she seemed much too studious to do such a thing. She was, however, quite an enigma with her self-imposed social isolation and frequent disappearances. Perhaps he should finally meet the girl soon.
After asking, Severus informed him his Dark Mark was still present, proof Tom still lived. It was horrifying but proved that Tom had made multiplehorcruxes. It also supported the unfortunate likelihood that Holly Potter herself was an unwitting horcrux. Lily's protection would keep it suppressed and, while he was researching for a solution, it was an unfortunate reality that she was tied to Tom's life. Still, he would keep looking for a cure.
Holly woke up hours later than usual to her aching body, still in her tattered robes, and thoroughly questioning her life choices. She hadn't known it was possible to be so sore that even breathing hurt but apparently it was.
'Did I seriously duel a horcrux and kill a basilisk while delirious? If the Sorting Hat ever finds out it'll sort me again into Gryffindor for sure.'
Holly sat up with a groan and vanished her ruined robes. Her body was littered with dark bruises and her palms scraped. Somehow she had no broken bones or any serious injuries. The only visible blood was from the rooster peck. That hardly counted. Considering what she'd done, it was a shockingly good outcome.
Too bad that didn't make her body hurt any less.
She ducked her head out to ensure her roommates were gone and stumbled off the bed. After a few quick spells to remove the grime, she achingly pulled her robes on. She slowly made her way to the Great Hall for a quick breakfast, ignoring the frantic conversations. She needed to plan but was in too much pain to focus. That made things simple.
First things first, she needed some bruise cream and pain relief potion. Any more plotting would come after that.
Holly made her way through the day's classes with the minimum effort to keep up appearances and retreated into the Room of Requirement afterwards. After brewing and drinking a pain potion she bottled the leftover before applying Room provided bruise cream. With that done she sighed in relief and laid down on an extra comfy couch.
Then came the more complicated task: going over what she learned from Tom's horcrux.
Tom Riddle, aka Voldemort or Diary Tom, was only 16 at the time but his mind was already packed with knowledge, vile goals, and an impressive number of mental issues. They said, "know you enemy" and well, Holly knew everything about Tom. His thought patterns, dueling habits, magical knowledge, fears, everything.
His knowledge of spells and magical theory was invaluable to her. She'd need to practice it herself still of course, but it'd save countless hours. Equally invaluable was his skill with wandless magic. His dueling skills were formidable and she could incorporate them into her own with practice. She knew the moves, but muscle memory couldn't be stolen sadly. Finally, she'd stolen his knowledge of mind reading and mental defense. That was a high priority to learn. By incorporating it with own she'd become a far better mind reader than before. His Occlumency would be vital to learn for protecting her secrets.
Also invaluable was the intelligence gathered. She knew of his crippling fear of death. How he planned to make six horcruxes for a seven-part soul. She knew his pride wanted Hogwarts Founders' artifacts as his horcruxes. That he believed he alone understood the Room of Requirement and likely hid one inside the Room later. That he planned to use places of personal significance, such as the Seaside Cave and Hogwarts, to hide his horcruxes. That he'd found his muggle relatives in Little Hangleton and was planning to murder them during the upcoming summer.
Of course, it'd take time to sift through the plundered memories in depth. Time to truly understand the magical theory for herself instead of relying on Tom's understanding. Months of practice to make the skills truly her own. She may have stolen Tom's knowledge of spells, but she hadn't physically cast most of them herself. She didn't know how it felt with own magic.
Holly looked to the targets to try a spell she only knew from Tom's memories: the Blasting Curse. She took aim at a reinforced target. "Confringo!" The spell hit the target slightly off center with a blast, throwing dust into the air. When the dust settled there was a crater of stone missing.
"Pretty sure that was weaker than Tom's but not a bad starting point. Now what about nonverbal casting?"
She took aim at the crater and tried to cast a silent incendio. Tried and failed. She thought for a moment of how Tom simply intended a spell to fire. How it felt for him. Her second attempt worked but was weaker than normal. A few more times and it matched her usual power.
That wasn't too bad. Now she just had to do that with every spell she'd learned herself and stolen from Tom. It was amazing. She was speed learning years' worth of material. Granger would never beat her now. The look on her face with Holly beat her next class, casting silently, would be priceless.
Only, a thought occurred to her. 'I can't publicly have my skills skyrocket like that. It'd be too suspicious.'
She was only a 2nd year. Granted she was far ahead of everyone except Granger, but still a 2nd year. Tom was the same way and his Diary's self was 4 years older than her. If she randomly started demonstrating skill greater than many 7th years her professors and Dumbledore would obviously notice.
If Dumbledore got suspicious… Tom had experienced that. He'd been watched constantly from the moment he arrived at Hogwarts. Granted it was because Tom was blatantly a sadistic sociopathic when he met Dumbledore, but still. He'd stalk her for the rest of her time at school. Question her about where she disappeared to. If he found out she'd run away from home it'd be a nightmare.
That had to be avoided at all costs.
The other thing that needed her attention was the basilisk corpse. With them being so rare every scale and fang would be worth tens of galleons. The intact corpse of an ancient basilisk was practically invaluable. Obviously, she'd be selling it to Gringotts. The difficult part would be haggling over the price. She'd need to keep some fangs and a portion of skin for armor too. Maybe some venom too.
They'd be needed for fighting Tom.
Good thing goblins were so helpful.
Speaking of goblins being helpful…. could they help with the horcruxes? They were master craftsman and cursebreakers. Maybe they could remove the soul piece without destroying the object? She'd rather not destroy the Founder's artifacts after all. It was worth asking about at least.
Even if they couldn't, they could help with retrieving the Horcruxes from whatever defenses Tom left guarding them. They'd help for the right price.
'Probably best to ask about that in person this summer though.' Maybe it was her stolen paranoia, but Holly seriously doubted the school owls weren't monitored somehow. There were probably keyword alerts or something similar. Writing about horcruxes would undoubtedly set any possible alerts off. Writing about the basilisk should be safe though. Hopefully.
Holly settled into a suddenly materialized writing desk to start writing her letter to Gronuk. 'Dear Gronuk, would Gringotts be interested in buying a fresh ancient basilisk corpse? It is fully intact and…'
---
Holly settled into her new routine over the following weeks. She still spent her free time in the Room of course but gone were the books and comfy couches. Now it was a target range, used for practicing Tom's advanced spells and nonverbal casting. It was slow going but she was making progress. She guessed she'd be done by the end of the year.
Every night before bed Holly spent an hour meditating and working on her Occlumency. She knew the theory and how Tom's occlumency shields were designed but still struggled. She wasn't going to simply copy him. Tom's were a simple wall but she wanted something more effective, something dynamic. She knew from experience they were quite breakable after all.
Regardless, she needed to catalog all her memories first, both those originally hers and the stolen ones. Once that was done she could start building a mindscape to defend them.
She was grateful for being able to magically shut away some of Tom's memories. She did not want to keep all of them.
Wandless magic practice was going far faster, with Holly able to cast some 2nd year spells and various more advanced ones. Accio was the first advanced one she learned. She was practical like that.
What truly excited her was wandless and nonverbal casting. The first time she managed a lumos she stared at the ball of light in her hand, a grin across her face. Now she could cast a few 1st year spells, along with a few useful more advanced ones like illusions and Notice-Me-Nots. That would make her summer interesting.
Her new routine also included haggling with Gronuk over the basilisk corpse. He was shrewd and trying to get every galleon possible. Their letters were cutting, filled with debate over current market values. (And figuring those values in the first place was a pain. Who knew it was so hard to find the black market value of potion ingredients? Holly now, that's who.) Gronuk was arguing her sale would flood the market and drop the price. She countered by arguing that obviously Gringotts would control for that by limiting sales and fixing the price. The longer it took the more she reminded him how rats had likely already gotten into the corpse.
After several weeks they agreed on a ludicrously high number of galleons, along with the specified fangs, venom vials, and section of skin for herself.
Holly watched as the Gringotts retrieval team arrived at the castle and argued with the headmaster at the gate. She had no idea how they got into the Chamber itself, but she trusted their capabilities. Two days later Gronuk informed her the payment was in her personal vault and thanked her for her business. She smiled and stuffed the letter into a pocket, oblivious the nearby students' stares at Holly's victorious grin.
When Holly heard of a dueling club she scoffed. It would be useless for her to go unless she dueled an upper year. But that would reveal her skills and couldn't be allowed to happen. She skipped it, instead practicing in the Room of Requirement.
The Room created something new: beanbags launchers fired at her from multiple angles, forcing her to dodge, all while trying to hit a target. For fun Holly increased the beanbags speed and made the targets move. It was good fun even if she was always heavily bruised afterwards. With Voldemort back though she needed the practice and pushed herself further.
She celebrated Christmas in the kitchens with Tilly and the other elves. She'd snuck a small tree in earlier and decorated it with them. Her gifts of assorted cookbooks were met with happy tears and dozens of boney hugs. They only let her go after her pockets were filled with sweets and offered their help however possible.
Eating with the elves, her fairy lights floating overhead, Holly was oblivious to the outside world. For several hours they drank butterbeer and made merry. Holly never noticed a certain set of twins staring at her before they shrugged and got back to stealing food. In the morning Holly woke up on a house elf sized couch, surrounded by dozens of hungover elves.
If breakfast happened to be later that morning nobody complained.
The rest of her 2nd year was spent practicing. Whenever she wasn't in classes, doing now easy assignments, or eating, she was in the Room of Requirement. Most days were spent at the target range practicing nonverbal spells and improving her aim. When Tilly visited she practiced wandless magic. Her wandless capabilities slowly improved to include some 3rd year spells and most 1st year spells nonverbally.
She had a fun idea she was working towards with it: if she could silently cast a Bludgeoning hex from her fist as she landed a punch her target would go flying back. It was stupid and probably pointless.
Still a fun goal to work towards though.
And if she daydreamed about using it on a Wizard Nazi like Adult Tom and feeling like Captain America? Well, nobody would ever know about that but her.
The only problem was trying to hide her rapidly improving skills. She had long surpassed Granger in the ranking but started needing to intentionally slow down. Her acting skills were being put to test as Granger glared at her every class, no doubt trying to learn how Holly was winning. Classes were entirely review for her now. While useful, it was difficult hiding her boredom. At least her assignments were easy enough to finish quickly.
Snape may have suspected something because his random questions were now on 4th and 5th year material. Even Granger couldn't answer them. With every class he slowly got more and more advanced. By the end of the year he'd probably reach 6th year material. Obviously he was trying to humiliate her. Holly may have had Tom's knowledge, but she was feeling the pressure. She was not going to let Snape win.
When Snape started assigning her to work alone she didn't complain. That would be admitting she couldn't do it. So she worked alone and would brew the best damn potions in the class. She knew she should've hidden her competency, but she refused to back down from Snape.
Holly did notice something weird while reviewing parseltongue. It was the last stolen skill she practiced, the lowest priority to learn. It was only useful for visiting the Chamber after all. She was practicing and noticed the words were coming naturally, not from Tom's memories. It didn't feel like any of the other languages she'd learned from skimming.
Looking back on that night… she opened the Chamber without a thought. Maybe it had something to do with parseltongue being a magical language? Or maybe she'd already known it? Either way, it didn't seem particularly important to her.
There were several spells of Tom's she didn't practice. Not practicing fiendfyre was common sense, at least for now. She knew she'd need to learn it later, but it could wait. The Cruciatus was another. It was evil and there wasn't a non-sadistic use for it. Why torture someone when veritaserum exists? Other curses she skipped for the same reason. Honestly, whoever created generational blood curses was wasting their time and plain evil.
She had considered practicing the Killing Curse but didn't. Strictly speaking, she was practical enough to see the use for it in a serious fight. But the description of the required mindset of malice and hate was unsettling. She had intimate knowledge of horcrux creation now after all. The last thing she wanted to do was split her soul. She could avoid that by using it in self-defense but for some reason wizarding law didn't make an exception for that. Maybe once Adult Tom returned she'd revisit the topic. For now she didn't need to know it.
Similar thoughts applied to the Imperious as well. Wanting to dominate the will of others didn't come naturally to her, she wasn't The One Ring. It'd be exceptionally useful in wartime but it wasn't needed now. She'd learn it later when needed.
---
Finals practically were a joke for Holly. She could've done the practical portions entirely with nonverbal casting. The hardest part was hiding her skill. Her Girding Potion was textbook perfect (she couldn't bring herself to sabotage it, that'd mean Snape won). In Charms her pineapple waltzed but tripped after several minutes. Her Transfigured pincushion was perfect but the embroidered H.L.P. had uneven stitches. In Herbology her fluxweed was repotted perfectly but she accidently cut herself on it.
The written portion was even easier. Thankfully she didn't have to hide her knowledge as much on them. She was a known bookworm after all. She checked her answers before turning it in and walking out far earlier than anyone else. Same as last year, Granger glared at her. Only now she seemed… resigned? Envious? Disappointed maybe? Hopefully she hadn't given up. Holly quite enjoyed their petty rivalry. Maybe she could send another note? Something to consider for the next year.
Holly was distracted enough that she didn't notice anything until a hand suddenly clamped onto her shoulder from behind. She turned her head enough to see Lockhart wearing an entirely fake smile, his eyes filled with poorly disguised contempt. Just as Holly was about to curse him into oblivion, she felt a wand tip jab into her back. She froze up, wondering 'what the fuck is going on?'
"Holly, Holly, Holly. You're an elusive girl, you know that? Adds to your infamy. How about we have a chat, one celebrity to another?" He reached into her pocket from behind, taking her wand from her. With a slight jab of his wand he ushered her down the empty hall towards an unused classroom.
She'd learned her lesson about underestimating people from her duel with Diary Tom. Lockhart may be a fool but he had the advantage and looked deranged. Her mind was racing, considering her options.
With his wand at her back and disarmed she was limited. Attacking his mind was too risky. Same with physically attacking or calling Tilly. A nonverbal wandless body bind could work but it'd be tough with him still behind her. Maybe she could distract him or get someone's attention? But there were no witnesses. With her reputation she could be missing at least a day before anyone noticed.
With no other options available, she went along with it.
She was led into a classroom and sat in a chair. Lockhart circled around to her front, wand still pointed at her. "You know you're the main reason I took this job? The book sales and influence were factors of course. But pulling Holly Potter under my wing would skyrocket my fame. It was brilliant!"
He paused, fixing her with a furious glare. "Only you ignore your fame and wealth. Ignore your fans. Ignore me. And they still worship you!! You're more famous than I'll ever be yet you reject it! It's maddening!"
"You know how hard I worked to be this famous? How hard it was to track down the people who actually did the things in my books and modify their memories? Months of effort!"
"And the bloody Chamber of Secrets! A basilisk killed right under my nose! It would've been my masterpiece! Only, nobody came forward and I couldn't take credit. This year has been a waste and it's ALL. YOUR. FAULT!" By the end of his rant, he was red faced, his shaking wand still pointed at her.
This was bad. This was very bad. She needed a distraction and needed it now.
An idea popped into her head. A stupid, risky idea. If it didn't work, well, who knew what he was capable of.
So Holly spoke up. One simple sentence designed to piss him off even more.
It was even true.
"It was me who killed the basilisk."
His expression shifted from anger to shock, wand twitching downwards, before slowly twisting into senseless fury.
But for an instant he was caught off guard. In that instant Holly struck.
She lashed out, sending him the mental equivalent of a kick to the head and a nonverbal wandless body bind at him. It struck, freezing his furious expression in place as he fell over in front of her.
Holly reached down to his prone form and pulled out her wand, taking his coin purse too. She stood back up, smirking as she looked into his eyes.
"The funny part is that it's true. Now, I believe you said something about memory charms? I'll be taking that, thank you very much."
With a flick of her wand she stunned him and dove into his mind. She stole his knowledge of memory charms, the names of everyone he stole credit from, and his memories of their encounter. Feeling vindictive after seeing his schemes firsthand, she spelled FRAUD across his forehead and stole his watch before leaving.
Holly was tempted to scramble his mind completely. Seriously considered it even. But she knew how he valued his fame and reputation. Exposing him as a fraud and letting him rot in Azkaban suited him better.
On that note, she had some anonymous letters to write.
---
A few days later on the last day of the term Holly spotted the papers headline and grinned.
Gilderoy Lockhart Exposed as Fraud!
Nobody had seen Lockhart after their confrontation. People were quick to attribute it to the supposed curse on the Defense position. Maybe he couldn't remove her spell and ran to hide his face. Or maybe he noticed the suspicious gaps in his memory. Didn't matter either way to Holly.
She had no doubt he'd be found and jailed soon.
Holly read the whole train ride back. Halfway through the ride back she'd looked up to see Granger sitting across from her, buried in a book of her own. Holly mentally shrugged and got back into her book. She had hundreds of books from the Room of Requirement to get through. Absorbing Tom's skills had distracted her from the massive backlog.
When they got to the station Holly hopped off out and started her walk out. She saw Granger running into her parents' arms and getting wrapped in a hug. Pushing down her feelings, Holly snapped her eyes away and rushed to the exit.
She wasn't jealous. She wasn't. She was independent and didn't need anybody else.
(Maybe one year she'd believe it.)
Notes:Holly's whole plan summed up: Link
Alternatively: Link
Hope you're liking this so far, love hearing what ya'll think.
Chapter 5: Summer 1993Summary:A treasure hunt is started, Big Brother is thwarted, Holly becomes even more of a recluse, and a certain wizard breaks out.
Notes:(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter TextHolly walked into Gronuk's office feeling nervous. She trusted the goblins' expertise and discretion of course, but horcruxes were nasty business. Diary Tom's memories and the one book she had on the subject said there were only two ways to destroy them. If the goblins couldn't help she could always use a basilisk fang but she'd rather not need to destroy the artifacts.
"Welcome back to Gringotts Miss Potter-Black, how can we help?"
"I was wondering if Gringotts would be able to help with something rather difficult." She reached into her magically expanded bag and pulled out a wooden box. Gronuk was visibly shocked at the Diadem of Ravenclaw, shifting to disgust upon sensing its foul aura.
She'd retrieved it at the end of the term, not wanting to get possessed, and replaced it with a fake. She was sure to also damage the vanishing cabinet Tom knew of beyond repair.
Fucking Wizards unknowingly having a massive security hole.
She'd tried delving into the Diadem horcrux's mind as well. It was repulsive but necessary to check. Since it was made after the Diary, there'd be more knowledge and vital intel. Unfortunately (or fortunately for her stomach) she couldn't. The horcrux was too dormant, it hadn't gained strength by possessing someone. There wasn't an active mind within to read and was inaccessible.
"It's been turned into a horcrux by Voldemort. I'm wondering if Gringotts could destroy the soul fragment without destroying the Diadem."
Gronuk looked at her briefly before focusing on the Diadem. "Such a thing is possible but difficult. The fragment would need to be transferred to another object then destroyed. We can do it. For a fee of course."
"That would be excellent, thank you Gronuk." Holly was ecstatic. How could she not be? She was a Ravenclaw and saved the famous Diadem. As pointless as she believed house pride and rivalries to be, the Founders were still brilliant witches and wizards. Completely mad in Slytherin's case, but still brilliant.
Unfortunately, the next topic quickly brought her mood back down.
"However, I believe there to be more, also using famous artifacts. I have a list of potential artifacts and hiding spots. I would like to commission a team of Cursebreakers to search the provided locations."
Gronuk, the consummate professional he was, simply asked for the list.
There was a risk to doing this of course: if Adult Tom ever returned and checked his hiding spots it'd be disastrous. But that was unlikely. Holly knew from his diary horcrux Tom believed himself exceptional in all things. He'd believe it impossible to learn of them, much less find them. Pretty stupid considering he wanted to hide them in places of personal importance, but hey, it made her job easier.
Holly double-checked her list before handing it over.
Locations:
-Gaunt Shack, Little Hangleton
-Riddle Manor, Little Hangleton
-Seaside Cave, South End
-Vaults of Inner Circle Death Eaters, Gringotts
Likely Artifacts:
-Locket of Salazar Slytherin
-Helga Hufflepuff's Cup
-Sword of Godric Gryffindor
Gronuk scanned the list for a moment. "There is a slight problem with one of your specified locations: it is against Gringotts policy to search through or destroy items from our customers' vaults."
Before Holly could interrupt, he grinned widely, looking devious.
"However, it is also against Gringotts policy to store a horcrux in them. Your commissioned search will be done."
Holly walked out of Gringotts later in disguise, with the purified Diadem in her trunk. The horcrux purifications and search she'd commissioned would cost her tens of thousands of galleons, but it was entirely worth it. Adult Tom was a monster that couldn't be allowed to live.
Besides, she had literal piles of gold to spend. Between her updated investments and the basilisk sale her accounts had done shockingly well in the last two years. It'd be less than a year before her investments made that loss back.
Holly had considered wandering the continent like last year but decided against it. She needed to stay close to Gringotts for updates on the horcrux search. Besides, she had too many books she needed to read. She couldn't go anywhere beyond Europe without an ID and passport anyways.
Although… maybe the goblins could make fake IDs for her? That was certainly possible. Shapeshifting would make it easy. She filled the idea away for next summer.
Holly hid her trunk under a bridge with a strong Notice-Me-Not and settled into her summer routine soon after.
---
Much like before Hogwarts, she spent her days reading in public places, passively skimming the minds of muggles passing by. Once a week she visited Knockturn Alley and the bookstores there. They had far more rare and interesting books than in Diagon. Plus, the shopkeepers didn't question her purchases either. During the evening she practiced wandless magic in her trunk apartment.
Obviously she tried using the Diadem one day. It was a legendary artifact, how could she not?
Putting it on was overwhelming. Her mind raced too fast and her senses were overwhelmed. The first time she tried she'd fallen over. After a few more attempts (while sitting down) she'd written it off as being almost unusable for her.
"Almost unusable" because she'd found the increased brainpower helped her with occlumency.
Every night Holly still worked on her occlumency. Sorting her memories took far longer than the books mentioned, even with the Diadem, but that was expected. She'd stolen several decades worth after all.
She finally decided on how to design her defenses too: a fake façade layer first of what people expected with a hidden mindscape beneath to hide secrets and stolen memories. If she did it right it'd appear as if she didn't know occlumency at all. Exactly how she wanted it. She could use the façade to appear unskilled and mislead someone.
As for her mindscape design… she had an idea but it was rather ambitious. Extremely ambitious, even with the Diadem to help.
It came to her one day while thinking about the Room: why not have her mindscape be ever-changing like the Room? Obviously, she'd need security and to make it searchable for only herself, but she liked the idea. If she did it right her mindscape would be nearly impossible to navigate and have endless hiding places. It'd take far longer than the summer to make properly, but her defenses should be good enough by the time she went back to school.
For as great as her summer was going there was still a glaring downside: she couldn't use her wand. Thankfully that changed a couple weeks into her summer. After reading dozens of books on ancient runes Holly finally figured it out.
She knew how to break the Trace.
It needed to be done on a ley line but that was easy. There was one running right under Diagon Alley after all. She carved the runes into wood blocks, trying to stop her fingers from trembling in anticipation.
That night she went to Diagon Alley under the Cloak. Holly found the rune anchorstone in a corner of the Leaky Cauldron, a clear marker of the ley line underneath. She set up her rune blocks in a circle next to it. Inspecting her work for a second, she nodded to herself before stepping in.
Standing in the small circle, she waved a hand and the runes began glowing. "Tractiare. Tractiare. Tractiare. " There was a cracking noise and an odd feeling. It had worked!
She took out her wand and vanished the spent rune blocks. After a few minutes of standing around, no owls had appeared and she made her way back to her trunk apartment.
Being freed from the Trace left Holly feeling freer than ever before. Mostly because she was.
She despised the Trace. It only really applied to muggleborns and some half-bloods. What was the point? The official justification was to protect the Statue of Secrecy of course. But was it really? In reality it contributed to disparity between purebloods and those of "lesser" status. She was glad to be freed from it.
With the Trace gone Holly leapt back into spell practice but quickly discovered another problem: her Trunk was too small.
The Trunk apartment severely limited the spells she could practice. Not having the Room of Requirement's target range was a major blow. Briefly Holly considered moving into one of the empty Potter properties. One of them was sure to have dueling space. She'd be unable to skim muggle minds, that'd be a considerable loss. The speed of her learning would plummet.
Only then another thought hit her like the Hogwarts Express.
'Wait…. Some of those properties must have a library.'
---
Two days later Holly was walking through a freshly cleaned Potter Manor. Immediately after her realization she'd visited Gringotts. She'd paid for the cleaning and two-way portkeys for travel between Gringotts and the Manor. Getting the wards reinforced was obviously necessary too. Once again, Holly was impressed at the efficiency of the goblins. They clearly were more sensible than wizards.
It was almost everything she could want: a massive library with rare books, dueling space, a comfortable bed, good food, and halls to explore.
(It was also a connection to her family but that wasn't a factor. Not at all.)
She even had someone to talk to!
The goblins had brought over a house elf named Flory from another Potter property. When Holly had crouched down and introduced herself, Flory had broken into tears. Now Holly always had food in reach and the manor was spotless.
It took a few weeks to get Flory to stop bowing but she eventually stopped. Now if only Flory would stop calling her "Mistress Potter."
With the trace broken, she knew she could've gone to Little Hangleton or the Seaside Cave and start searching but decided against it. The goblins latest update said they were finalizing their team and would soon scout the locations.
They'd already found Hufflepuff's Cup in the Lestrange vault, purified it, and placed it in her vault. The Goblins obviously had it under control.
Instead Holly sunk into books and spell practice like never before. With a library of rare books to read and Flory constantly providing food the days bled together. Some days she'd read all day, completely ignoring everything except whatever book she was reading. Anytime she reached for food it was suddenly there. Whenever Holly eventually fell asleep facedown in a book she awoke in her bed.
Other days she'd spend in the practice room trying new spells she learned in the Potter library. She cast spell after spell until she was laying on the floor, sweaty and breathing hard.
Her favorite so far was a smaller but much stronger protego that she could cast wandlessly with her left hand and hold on her forearm like Captain America's shield. Or she could cast it on her hand and literallyslap incoming spells away. It was dumb, dodging spells was obviously better, but dammit it was cool.
She was living an academic isolationists' dream and loving it.
Holly had gotten so absorbed she'd completely lost all sense of time. It wasn't until Flory reminded her she realized the term was only a few days away. She'd spent two whole months studying and practicing until she crashed. Holly reluctantly left the manor for the first time in over a month and portkeyed back to Gringotts in disguise.
She instantly noticed the shift in mood among shoppers and tensed.
The alley had always seemed carefree and whimsical before, but now there was an undercurrent of fear. Where there were once crowds of people, only scattered groups visible now.
Families were rushing from shop to shop. Children were held close, parents looking alert. She even noticed guards walking around.
The cause was made apparent when she saw the posters lining the streets.
HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WIZARD?
Sirius Black, wanted for the murder of Peter Pettigrew and 14 muggles, escaped Azkaban and is currently at large. Call the Ministry immediately if seen!! Do not approach!!
Holly looked at the picture of the deranged man laughing hysterically before reading his name again.
'Wait, Sirius Black? Isn't he my godfather? I'd completely forgotten about that with everything else going on. Guess I know what he did now. Although… with how incompetent wizards are I should probably look into it myself.'
With her mind made up she finished her shopping quickly and left. Two days of frenzied reading and book packing later, her break was over.
Notes:Holly and Goblins dynamic in one meme: Link
I feel goblins are completely wasted in canon. Like, here's this race of curse breakers and master craftsmen, now lets completely ignore them when the whole plot of the 7th book is a treasure hunt in booby trapped dungeons for cursed legendary artifacts. Gee, its not like there's a whole race whose specialty is dealing with that kinda thing.
So yeah, Holly is stupid rich and hires them to do the horcrux hunt for her. The goblins meanwhile like Holly because (1), she makes them a ton of money, (2) she's respectful, and (3), she never bought into the hype and got blinded by the glamour of the human-centric "wizarding world."
Credit to White_squirrel's work Lady Archimedes for the Trace breaking ritual. That whole series is great, highly recommend it.
Chapter 6: Year ThreeSummary:Holly contemplates gun violence, has an unpleasant encounter, and meets a hoarder.
Notes:(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter TextHolly arrived to Kings Cross several hours early and made her way through the barrier. For once the magical side was blissfully empty. After settling into a cabin, she pulled out her Muggle Studies textbook to absentmindedly skim through.
She wanted to know how much wizards understand about technology and normal people. Or if they even bother to pay attention to regular news. It'd be rather awkward if she got caught using magic to steal from people after all.
Plus, if there was a risk of Adult Tom coming back… do wizards even know what a gun is? Tom knew being muggle raised, but what about the average Death Eater? Wizards may love their overly dramatic and "honorable" duels but that was impractical. If she had to fight she'd do it smart.
She had struggled choosing her other elective but decided on Care of Magical Creatures. Care of Magical Creatures was nearly useless to her of course. Only Divination would be worse. Ancient Runes or Arithmancy seemingly would've been far, far more useful to her. What they were, however, was time consuming. By picking the 2 easiest electives she'd have more time to practice and plot in the Room of Requirement.
She didn't need to take Runes and Arithmancy to test in them anyways.
Besides, she already had Tom's memories of the classes. Why take the more time-consuming classes when it'd be review for her anyways? She had learned all the material from Diary Tom already. Sure, the curriculum could have changed slightly, but that was easily fixed with self-study. Her time would be better spent expanding what she already knew.
That's when it hit her just how advanced she was.
Tom had been fanatical in studies with his overwhelming need to prove himself. He was only a 5th year when he made the Diary but was years ahead in his studies. Plus, he was a better dueler than most 7th years. All his knowledge was hers now, without the megalomania blinding her.
Now as a 3rd year Holly probably could out duel anybody under 6th year easily. Likely could beat most upperclassmen. It was… kind of crazy now that she thought about it.
Good thing she didn't have a god complex like Tom.
Grateful for her lack of megalomania, she lowered her book and closed her eyes to focus on strengthening her occlumency shields.
Maybe it was inherited paranoia from Tom, but Holly was wary of Dumbledore. She did not want him in her head. There were too many things she needed to hide. Like how she'd run away from the Dursleys. Or how she was the one that killed the basilisk. Or how she'd assaulted Lockhart. Or, oh yeah, how she'd stolen the memories of a baby dark lord's horcrux.
So yeah, occlumency shields needed to be at maximum strength.
Her mindscape still wasn't anywhere near ready, so she'd have to settle for her façade of useless memories with a solid wall underneath. It'd look like she didn't know occlumency while protecting her secrets. While more than most occlumens bothered with, it still felt clumsy to her. If Dumbledore tried to delve deeper than her meaningless surface memories and found the wall she'd be screwed. Once that happened he'd know she was intentionally hiding things from him and never let it go. He'd find the Room, maybe even search her Trunk.
It was sometime later that Holly was abruptly pulled out of her meditation as the train abruptly jerked to a stop. Her eyes snapped open, looking out the window into the darkness. They weren't at Hogwarts, that was clear. A flick of her wrist and her wand slid from her new arm holster and into her hand. With hardly a thought she silently cast lumosand was surprised at what she saw.
Granger was sitting across from her, averting her eyes from the sudden light. There was half a second of silence as Granger was blinking rapidly before Holly asked, "How long has the train been moving?"
"We're nearly there, but Hogwarts isn't in sight yet."
Holly looked back outside into the heavy rain and darkness. Was she imagining things or was it abnormally dark out? And was that something moving out there?
As that occurred to her the water on the glass began to freeze and her breath became visible. She locked eyes with Granger and a silent understanding passed between them.
This was not good. Not good at all.
Holly turned towards the compartment doors and began warding them quickly as possible. Soon the doors were locked, charmed impregnable, shielded, reinforced, had a Notice-Me-Not, and a repelling compulsion.
But it wasn't enough.
Before she could close the curtains, it appeared.
A faceless, formless black cloaked figure floating in the hallway (a dementor, the small, rational part of her mind supplied.) It paused outside their door and slowly turned to face them, ignoring that it shouldn't be able to notice them. Two pale grey hands, covered in scabs, appeared from its cloak and pressed against the doors. As it leaned in Holly felt the strain on the wards. Frost formed on contact with the glass immediately.
She froze. Somehow, she knew, simply knew, that it was focused on her. Wanting to get inside and closer still.
Someone was screaming. Was it her? Was it Granger? It didn't seem particularly important, not with the dementor's presence bearing down on her. She was helpless, frozen in her seat. What good was all her studying? There was nothing she could do besides shiver. Completely powerless for the first time since leaving the Dursleys.
She couldn't cast a Patronus. Diary Tom couldn't and what did she know? She had stolen all her knowledge from him after all.
She lost track of time. It could've been a minute or an hour. Her vision was slowly darkening, her wards weakening as the dementor kept focusing on her and pushing.
Just as her wards failed and the door latch unlocked a brilliantly white shape appeared and chased the dementor off. Her head cleared as its foul presence was suddenly gone. She blinked away the darkness and turned to see an ashen faced Granger slowly recovering as well.
Holly cast a warming charm on herself and pulled up her legs, wrapping her arms around them. She refused to look helpless, to be helpless. Especially in front of Granger.
Resolving to learn the Patronus charm, she spent the rest of the train ride ignoring her surroundings and focusing on repairing her shredded occlumency shields.
(Hermione Granger meanwhile was trying to reconcile the fact her rival had clearly been hiding her real capabilities. She'd had an unfounded suspicion before but now the proof was blatant. Nonverbal casting and warding. Two advanced fields of magic Holly Potter was somehow skilled in. That was 5th year material at least! Hermione spent her remaining time on the train making a study schedule to learn them.)
(Only later would it occur to Hermione that Holly was likely hiding more skills.)
---
Soon as the train arrived Holly ditched the crowds to visit the kitchens. Even the muggle studies book she was halfway through didn't sound appealing. All she wanted was a proper meal and good company. When she said as much to the house elves in the kitchen a few literally fell over themselves to hug her.
Several hours later Holly was feeling significantly better. The house elves were master cooks and provided endless food. They even gave her butterbeer from somewhere. She had a suspicion they weren't supposed to but knew better then to mention it.
They listened to her stories of the summer and shared everything that happened at the castle. According to them, the librarian madam Pince and Filtch were secretly together.
Who knew house elves had the best gossip?
Sitting on a couch by a fireplace, with her stomach full, Holly's food coma hit her like a truck. She slipped into unconsciousness under the soothing background noise of house elves working. Sometime later a smiling Tilly apparated her up to her bed, never waking her.
After breakfast she received her schedule from Professor Flitwick along with a slightly ominous note from the headmaster.
Apparently he wanted to talk to her before classes start.
Panic briefly overwhelmed her. Did he find out about something? What if he realized she wasn't living with the Dursleys? What about Lockhart? Was this it? She had to stay rational, panic would give her away.
She took a few minutes to double check her occlumency barriers before making her way up to the specified location. After giving the password "treacle tart" the stone gargoyle moved aside and let her through.
'What kind of idiot makes a staircase that rotates and moves up? That defeats the whole point of the stairs. Fucking wizards'
Still internally grumbling she knocked on the door before it opened.
"Ah Holly dear, come on in." Holly saw the headmaster sitting behind his raised desk but was distracted by all the… stuff. Wizard clutter? Trinkets? Whatever the wizarding equivalent term was, the headmaster was a hoarder. Trinkets covered the various tables and behind his desk was clearly a personal library.
'Oh how I'd love to get my hands on some of those. A hoarder like him probably keeps the best for himself.'
Holly was broken out of her bookish longing by the headmaster's amused chuckles. Her expression must've given her embarrassment away because the headmaster smiled. Before they could make eye contact she looked down to examine the nearest trinket.
"Every year people give me books for Christmas, never a nice pair of socks. After so long I dare say I have quite the collection." He popped a candy into his mouth, "Lemon drop?" She shook her head no without looking.
"Alas, it seems none ever do. Sadly, there are more serious matters. I heard a dementor went aboard the train without my permission and wanted to make sure that you are alright."
Holly mentally scoffed, there was no way he asked that to everyone who was scared. She was clearly getting singled out. Did he expect her to react badly? Or maybe he felt it was time to introduce himself and took advantage of the opportunity? Either way, he wasn't getting an honest answer.
She turned back towards him and carefully kept her eyes on his excessively long beard, "I'm ok Headmaster, the Dementor hardly even looked at me."
There was a brief pause but she didn't dare to look up and see his expression. "Fascinating. It seems I still can be surprised in my old age. Now, unfortunately there is another unpleasant matter to discuss." She tensed slightly.
"With the escape of Sirius Black, I'd like to ask you not to leave the castle. Even Hogsmeade could be dangerous for you."
Her eyes shot up to his face in surprise before she forced them back down. That… could be true. She hadn't had time to look into Black's past yet but it was better to be safe. Wizards may be idiots but it'd be stupid to ignore the warning entirely until she knew they were wrong.
But wait- "shouldn't there be some kind of extra security there?"
"Ah, as I announced at the Feast there will be dementors posted around the school by order of the Ministry. Hogsmeade itself will have auror patrols. However, Sirius Black has gotten past them before and cannot be guaranteed to keep you safe. I highly recommend staying within Hogwarts."
Holly was conflicted. On the one hand there was a potential serial killer after her. On the other, nobody knew she was a metamorphmagus. And she had the Cloak. She could easily stay hidden. Plus, she'd already forged the permission slip. It wasn't that she was overly interested in the town itself, but there was a bookstore and the nebulas feeling of freedom involved.
Still, why did she feel like she was missing something? Something about why Black would be after her. Come to think of it, Dumbledore hadn't mentioned that Black was her godfather. Or that he'd blood adopted her. They were puzzle pieces she couldn't quite make fit.
Good thing she had somebody to pump for information right in front of her. She couldn't risk reading his mind. That meant she needed to question him. Hopefully the blunt approach would work.
"While I was at Gringotts I learned Sirius Black is my godfather and that he blood adopted me. Would that have something to do with why you think he's after me?"
There was a pregnant pause and Holly risked a quick glance up and could see Dumbledore was visibly surprised.
That didn't make sense, obviously she had visited Gringotts to get her money. Did he think she wouldn't ask after her accounts? Or maybe he didn't like the goblins? That seemed common for some reason. Probably because of Binns droning on about goblin rebellions. Either way he obviously hadn't expected her to know.
"That is partially why. All I will say is that he was involved in your parents' death. Perhaps when you are older you will learn more."
'Diary Tom was right, he really can be condescending.' She quickly buried the thought and smothered her frustration into a cold anger. Blowing up at him wouldn't help anything.
"Thank you for the warning headmaster, if that will be all." Before he could think to respond the door was already closing behind her.
(As the door closed Albus Dumbledore looked towards Fawkes. "Perhaps Minerva is right. I may have too many trinkets if Holly never noticed you." On his stand Fawkes trilled in amusement before going back to sleep. Albus popped another lemon drop into his mouth and leaned back in his chair to think over their conversation.)
Holly was furious as she took a shortcut into the Room of Requirement. She wanted to practice the Patronus charm but was self-aware enough to realize it'd be pointless while angry. Instead, she had the Room create several moving targets shaped like Death Eaters that launched beanbags at her. As she destroyed one another would replace it.
Several hours later she was covered in new bruises and exhausted, but no longer angry.
Notes:Holly's reputation vs Holly herself
The dementor was never going to be as effective against Holly because 1) she kept it farther away and 2) its never explicitly stated in canon but I imagine occlumency helps to reduce the mental effect of dementors a bit. That means no fainting for Holly, as least for now.
Holly is good at separating her stolen memories from her own in order to avoid an identity crisis. Also helps her avoid picking up their personality traits. However, Holly is extremely wary and paranoid around Dumbledore because her only real knowledge of him is from Diary Tom's interactions with him. They don't exactly paint a good picture of the guy, he did intentionally intimidate an impoverished child by making him think all his possessions were being burned after all.
A bit overcautious on her part but hey, she's an unreliable narrator.
Posting this a few hours earlier than usual just to see if gets more views. Frankly I have no idea what the optimal time to post is, time zones are a bitch to plan around.
I've been doing minor updates on the earlier chapters. Mostly just grammar and giving chapters names. Hopefully that hasn't caused any annoying spam emails about updates.