FicWad

Chapter 5 - Greenhouse of the soul

Moody stood in the entry hall at Number 4, Privet Drive, scratching his chin and surveying the mess. There was a lot of dried blood and other things on the floor, but that didn't put him off as much as it might have. He'd seen too many puddles of blood over his years of fighting evil to be worried until he actually saw the body.

But where was the body? He could see the marks where Harry had been dragged, or dragged himself over to the wall. Why hadn't the alarms gone off? There's only two ways young Potter could have been injured this badly without setting off the wards. Either he'd done it to himself, or that bloody so-called 'family' had attacked him.

If the young man had attacked himself this viciously-- say, in a suicide attempt -- then his corpse would still be here. One thing you had to say for Harry Potter: he didn't quit things half-done.

So that left the Dursleys.

Anybody who saw Alastor Moody at that moment would have seen his countenance become even more frightening than it normally was. His fifty-plus years as one of the most successful aurors the ministry had ever seen had taught him how to deal with muggles. He quickly apparated to Diagon Alley, cast a glamour upon himself and stepped through the Leaky Cauldron to muggle London. Right where he knew it would be, there was a muggle police call box.

Not many minutes later, he was striding back toward Diagon Alley for his next apparation -- out of sight of the muggles.

***

Harry was having the most revealing time of his life. Using his celeritas charm from The Strength of The Mind, he had been able to understand quickly why its use was limited to only a few uses at atime. Using it on the book that it came in, he was then able to understand why it was limited. It was simply a matter of strengthening one's ability to continue to use the spell. Like any muscle, it could be built up to be stronger.

Heeding Healer Goosecreature's instructions to the letter, Harry was spending a lot of time sitting on his bum; and he was loving it. For the first time in his life, it was possible to relax his mind and body. No dashing about doing his Cinderella bit for the Dursleys. No dashing about the halls rushing to classes like Divination that had no true bearing on his life. Or perhaps on anyone's life, thought Harry.

Dobby was taking excellent care of him. Rather than cleaning up all of Gryffindor tower, Dobby now had one wizard to look after; and Harry was probably already the tidiest male wizard in Britain. Having spent his entire childhood picking up and cleaning up after unappreciative slobs, he had intimate knowledge of how much work was caused by dropping a sock on the floor. So while other boys his age would make messes, it seldom occurred to Harry to do so.

As a result of Dobby having more time available, he was the most eager conversationalist, and was helping Harry to learn things that the young wizard suspected no human had learned in hundreds of years. Things like who the rulers of the other races really were, and how their respective governments worked.

Additionally, the mind magic book had helped him to learn the concept of critical thinking, and how to apply it. It made so much sense to Harry --immediately -- that he wondered how people managed to get through their lives without it. His life was surrounded by thousands of examples of how people refused to think rationally; and he was somewhat ashamed to admit to himself that he was just as big a culprit.

No more, he thought. Everybody says you shouldn't be dumb. But nobody bothered to tell me just what 'dumb' is. Until he began to read. One side-effect of the celeritas charm was that, after reading and absorbing the contents of a book, he was able to see instantly how the information in it matched and dovetailed with other information from other sources. Access to so much information -- some of it conflicting and unblushingly contradictory -- was forcing Harry to exercise the critical process.

Some things, like personal preferences, could conflict with no contradiction. If one person said pumpkin juice was heavenly and another said it was bilious swill... if they were both telling the truth... then it was possible that they were both correct, and there was no factual conflict. But if one said pumpkin juice was orange pumpkin color and another said it was cerulean blue... well, Harry was learning that more information and more understanding meant less contradiction.

Nearing the end of June, Harry had learned to integrate his mental ability to 'stand apart' with his newly-acquired reasoning skills; and coolly used his observations to deduce some things about his life-- not all of which were very nice.

For example, Harry had to face up to the hard deduction that Dumbledore was lying. Thinking back on all of his personal experiences, at home and at Hogwarts, there were too many factual conflicts to continue to believe hardly anything the old man had said.

The tunnel to Honeydukes? The Sorcerer's Stone? The Chamber of Secrets? The Tournament? No one with a rational mind could believe that all due care and attention was being paid to the safety of students.

And Harry realized that he was not being trained to fight Voldemort. Since the day he had learned he was a wizard and received his first wand, Harry had not been taught a single, solitary skill or piece of knowledge that would help him defeat Voldemort. And Dumbledore was still keeping the prophesy a secret.

Ergo: Dumbledore didn't want him to win.

The headmaster had not taken any steps to assist Harry in preparing for facing the worst Dark Lord in centuries. Occlumency? A painful joke. Dueling? A Lockhart farce. Physique? Sitting on abroom while it flies you around is not even exercise, and is certainly not going to build any 'Quidditch muscles'. Love? Doubtful, unless Riddle was acutely allergic to group hugs. Strategy? Harry doubted there was anyone at Hogwarts even qualified to teach that.

If Dumbledore was to be believed, then Harry was being groomed to fight the Dark Lord by studying gardening, animal husbandry, and home economics. He was quite sure that this state of affairs had been reported to Voldemort by his many vassals. He was equally sure that Voldemort felt very little fear about Harry Potter, world-famous skrewt-herder.

Harry had also come to realize that Tom Riddle was never going to quit until Harry killed him, or was dead himself. Not because of a stupid prophesy made by adrunken mush-brain Divination teacher, but because Riddle was a psychopathic terrorist, and you can't reason with insane people.

He made himself a 'what to do' list, based on what he was able to conclude so far. Ignoring for the moment that this was most un-Harry-like behavior, he surveyed his work:



fact

action

Dumbl can't be trusted

avoid and ignore

I am emancipated and rich

be my own man

I have 3 libraries

read them

I'm tired of being the victim

take charge of my life

People around me are sheep

give them a new shepherd

Dobby's English is weak

Help him with it

I don't know much magic

learn more from my 3 libraries

Voldemort's a dick

Kill him




"Dobby?" he called.

"Yes, Master Harry?"

"You know about my library at my house in Grimmauld Place, right? You have seen it?"

"Yes, Master Harry."

"How much work would it be to move it here and put it with this library?"

"Dobby could do it in one hours by himself. Double elves cut time in half."

"So, if you had six elves, you could do it all in five minutes?" Dobby thought about it, then nodded. "Do you know where to get that many elves to help you?" The elf nodded again, and Harry got a fun thought. "Good. Get word to your friends and find out if they can do it at seven o'clock tomorrow morning. Get as much help as you think you'll need. Any questions?"

"Master Harry... some of Master Harry's books are not... some of them have been taken. Even to other places."

"People have been taking my books out of my house?" Dobby nodded, yes. "Do you have the ability to find them and get them?"

"Dobby is Master Harry's house elf." He stood tall, his diminutive stature taking on an impressive stance. "Dobby has power to return and protect all of Master Harry's things."

"Okay, Dobby; just don't get yourself hurt. If getting my books back from wherever they are puts you in danger, just come back and let me know. I don't want you or your other elf friends hurt."

Two weeks earlier, that little sentiment would have sent Dobby into a paroxysm of weeping glee. Today, it just made him smile; proud to be a valued friend of The Great Harry Potter. He bowed and disappeared with a small pop.

***

At seven o'clock the next morning, thirty-one house elves from all over Great Britain began rapid-fire popping into the large library at Number 12, Grimmauld Place. Since there were so many elves, they didn't bother with boxes; they just grabbed afew books and disappeared -- often just in time for another elf to appear where they were standing to grab some more books. Like a well-rehearsed ballet, elves popped several times per second for the show. The noise was terrific, waking the entire Weasley clan from their slumbers except Molly, who was downstairs preparing the morning meal. She let out a squeak when the little shelf of cookbooks she referred to in the kitchen was snatched by an elf and disappeared.

In Houghton Regis, Hermione Granger was sitting at her desk, at the window of her bedroom, having the first cup of tea of her day and reading a musty old tome. Until, that is, an elf showed up with an impertinent look on its face, snatched the book right out of her fingers, and disappeared.

At Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in Scotland, the headmaster was sound asleep in his quarters when no less than seven elves entered his office, took many books, and left again seconds later.

At Malfoy Manor, the books taken there by Severus Snape were gone before the family even realized what the alarms meant.

At home after his comfortable breakfast, Harry smiled quietly to himself while the rapid procession of elves popped in and out, putting each of his books on a shelf in the library. He was amused at the idea of having his books snatched from fingers, over outraged protests.

At four minutes past seven o'clock, the work was done, and thirty-one elves stood in Harry's comfortable sitting room. Harry stood with his after-breakfast tea, beaming at them.

"Thank you. Thank you all, my friends. You have been a great help to me, and to Dobby... and I hope you had a little fun doing it." He bowed slightly at the waist and inclined his head to them, showing his respect in the old elven manner.

An older elf whom Harry didn't know stepped forward. "I am Colter. I wished to see for myself about Dobby's new master, and I have seen. Harry Potter is a good master. We will take our leave, young master, but we shall not forget." Colter bowed, which led all the rest of the elves to bow, before they all disappeared -- except Dobby, who was smiling so hard his lips were in danger of meeting behind his neck.

"Colter likes you, Master Harry."

Harry didn't know just what to make of that, but he knew more friends wouldn't hurt.

***

Dear Harry,

Just what kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into now? Professor Dumbledore came and asked me, along with my parents, if we knew where you were. I told him I thought you were still with your family, but apparently that isn't true.

Harry, I know you aren't comfortable with the Dursleys, but you have to understand that Dumbledore just wants what's best for you. Can't you see that? I can't believe you have to make everything so hard when everybody is just trying to help you. You need to learn to trust him.

By the way, I was reading a nice book with my morning tea when a house elf showed up, yanked it out of my hands and disappeared. No greeting, no words, just rude. That wasn't very nice.

Write to me, I want to know what's going on. The Order is driving me crazy!

With love,

Hermione

Harry stood there, holding the letter and working his way through his mental calming exercises, and finally sighing. His owl post was still being filtered and anonymized by the efficient service provided by the post office, and they had provided him with a nifty little magical indicator to hang in his home. The indicator chime had gone off, so he had sent Dobby to the post office to get his incoming mail.

And this was what he got. Of all the... After last year, if there was anyone Harry thought would be willing to listen to him, it would have been Hermione. But now she was back in her 'teacher knows best' mode. He reached for his notebook and a biro to dash off a note.

Hermione,

I am recovering from the attack nicely, mentally and physically, with the help of a good healer. Thank you so much for asking... oh, wait; you didn't.

You are truly the queen of ultracrepidarianism.

Hold this letter in your left hand and promise that you will not reveal my secrets to anyone without checking with me first. When you have done it, I will know, and I will explain everything.

Hoping this finds you well and enjoying your summer, I remain,

Your friend,

Harry

Harry rolled up the notebook paper and secured it to Hedwig's leg with a rubber band. Easier to attach than string, and less likely to fall off before arrival, and was less to get in the way if the owl had to perch for a rest while carrying it.

There, he thought. That's a nice word that should keep her busy for a few minutes. Ultracrepidarianism: the practice of giving opinions outside of one's knowledge. But it wasn't in any magical dictionary, and wasn't in any muggle dictionary published any time recently. She would have to go to a library to find that word, and he knew she would go. She couldn't stand somebody else knowing something she didn't.

One of his books had taught him monitoring spells. There was no need to put any complicated spell-work on the letter; just a simple magic-detection and identification was enough. When she gave her word, the little snow globe on his mantle by her picture would turn cloudy and ring with a pretty bell sound.

Something so simple, and yet so foreign to the learning given out in such miserly handfuls at Hogwarts. It was almost as if the teachers were jealously making sure that the students couldn't know as much as their teachers did. Shelves, rows, cavernous rooms full of books on how to brush teeth, shine shoes, and turn paperweights into turtles. Anything even marginally more useful than that was locked up in the Restricted Section at the library -- or missing completely.

Just what's so all-fired'restricted' about Polyjuice Potion? he wondered. The school claimed they were the most prestigious school for preparing young witches and wizards to be safe, well-adjusted and productive adults. Was that true? Was learning how to comb one's hair and transfigure household bric-a-brac the best that the best school could offer?

Most students that Harry knew spent their time devising ways to avoid studying any more than absolutely needed for a decent grade. And if one were forced to face it, a passing grade wasn't all that difficult to achieve. A few people like Hermione took great pride in memorizing great volumes of meaningless trivia; but the only profession wherein that knowledge would be of any use was in the Ministry -- and as amuggle-born, there was precisely zero chance she would ever be permitted to work there.

Harry knew that muggles grew up learning at least asmattering of maths, history, literature, science, and the arts; exposed to awide variety of topical areas to help them decide which specific field they wanted to pursue as their own interest later in life. What did Hogwarts offer?

Arithmancy -- math -- was optional from day one. There was nothing in place to ensure that the average wizard could even be sure he got the correct change at the candy shop. Thanks to Binns, history was about as useful as teats on a boar. No fine arts were taught, and no art or music appreciation classes were even available. And the only actual'science' Harry had seen was Herbology.

This was supposed to be an education? From the most prestigious magical school in the world? Harry shuddered to think just what criteria were used to measure and determine that prestige.