FicWad

Chapter 6 - If your quill offends you...

At two forty-six pm, Harry sent Dobby to the magical post office in Hogsmeade. As the office closed at three for the day, he thought it prudent to conclude his business quickly. Though it was unlikely that he would be bothered on this fine June day, he didn't feel like wearing his cloak disguise in the warmth, and certainly wasn't willing to risk being seen by any Hogwarts staff or Order members.

Hermione's highly-incensed reply letter had made it quite clear that she had no intention of giving him the benefit of the doubt. She was apparently convinced that, no matter what he had to say, Dumbledore could trump it.

His anger at Dumbledore had run its course over the few weeks he'd been on his own. He wasn't livid anymore -- but that didn't mean he was at peace with what had been done. The old headmaster had many things to answer for, but Harry wasn't willing to expend any more energy on fuming about it. When the time comes, he thought, there will be an accounting.

Meanwhile, he could still feel amused at just how many people worshiped the very ground Dumbledore walked on. People like Hermione and the Weasleys were quite prepared to accept as gospel every word that procedeth out of the mouth of Albus. Being honest with himself, Harry couldn't blame any of them too harshly. After all, hadn't Harry himself shouted to the spectre of Tom Riddle that he was Albus Dumbledore's man? But that had all stopped for him when he learned the prophesy, and what came along with it.

Yes, there were many dozens of things that Harry wished to tell Hermione. But he would not tell her until he had her word. She had several good traits; loyalty, honesty, strength of conviction, passion for causes... and not bad looking, either.

It was truly a shame that she was relaying everything he said to the Order. That much became evident when Dumbledore's letter arrived at the Post Office -- a letter that mentioned some of the things in Hermione's letter. She must have wasted no time getting him involved, he thought. I bet she flooed him as soon as the owl flew in.

He smiled to himself a little at that, picturing her eager, excited face jumping up to take action. 'I found him!' she would have said, in great self-satisfaction; ignoring the fact that she had not found him, and still had no idea where he was. Hats off to the obfuscatory Owl Post privacy charms. Because those charms were used by the highest members of the government and the Wizengamot to keep away cranks, even Albus Dumbledore himself wouldn't be able to sway them to reveal Harry's location.

So far, only the goblins and elves knew where he was. A house elf would rather die than reveal a sworn secret of the household master; all of Dobby's helper elves for the library trip had been bound by the same code of honor as long as they were about his work. And the goblins were quite pleased that he had given them his trust. They loved having and withholding information that the wizarding world thought they simply had to have. It was one of the many ways they asserted themselves behind the scenes, and proved to themselves they weren't puppets of the human government.

So the simplest thing, now, was what he was doing. Dobby's errand took him to the post office, to put Hermione and Dumbledore on the list of people who were not to be able to contact him under any circumstances.

It was a simple matter of trust; he had dozens of examples of proof that Dumbledore could not be trusted not to meddle in his affairs, his mind, or his life. The safest course was simply to give the man no handle with which to grab hold.

And because he could not trust Dumbledore, he could not have her giving his information to the old meddler. Hermione's blind trust in any authority figure reflected great credit upon the muggle education system -- designed to create unquestioning drones -- where she had begun her education as a muggle.

He was tempted to move to Canada, just to make it harder for the meddling Order. But he was comfortable here, had friends and a nice home here, and -- thanks to his lawyer, the goblins, and Dobby -- had an anonymous place to do a little healing. As young as he was, Harry's habit of standing apart from himself and observing showed him that he had some major mental healing to do, to go along with his physical injuries. And he needed to be left alone to do it. Harry needed to be free of the obligations, expectations and duties that everyone in his life was trying to attach to him.

Sighing, he turned to his library. Let's see what I can do to make the wards stronger. He had wizard wards on his home-burrow, Goblin wards, Elven wards... Maybe I can find some troll wards, or Veela or centaur, he mused, part of his mind on what dinner would bring.

Harry's power and facility with magic had nearly doubled in intensity and finesse, in only five days, thanks to his new realizations. He had discovered that conflicting emotions within him also caused conflicting magic, which would start canceling itself out. With some of the conflict removed, he could see that he was, in fact, much more powerful than anyone had suspected.

In fact, now that he'd learned to calm himself at will, Harry now knew that Dumbledore's manipulations of his life were directly contributing to his emotional instability, his internal conflicts. All this time, people had been trying to tell him that the 'power the Dark Lord knows not' was love, and they were completely wrong. Love, hate, fear, hunger... all the strongest emotions had been fighting for supremacy in Harry for years, sapping his ability to focus. Every once in a while, one emotion would gain supremacy, and his power at those times had been unambiguously magnificent. Contrary to current 'wisdom', however, it was not because his'love' was his secret power. It was simply that this quiet, introverted young man felt everything strongly, and those feelings conflicting within him had been crippling.

And either Dumbledore knew this and fostered it, or the headmaster was so oblivious and clueless as to be useless. Even money either way, Harry thought. Flip a coin.

***

August

Standing in his well-stocked and well-indexed library, he considered just how useful the indexing charm had been. He had studied the library charm that made it possible to search for things by topics, by relationships with other things, or by title or author. That was commonplace, he knew. What was not so common was how Harry was using it.

With what he had gained from Strength of the Mind, Harry had gotten the idea of finding a way to make the library indexing charm work for any repository of information -- like his mind. He had cast the indexing charm on his library and then spent a quiet evening studying the charm in action. At the end of the night, he had modified the celeritas charm to include automatic cross-referencing. Now, anything he read while that charm was in place was exhaustively indexed with anything else he knew. He had, in effect, a concordance in his head. Every word was now related to every other word. At his command, every thought could trigger a related thought, in a rapid-fire fashion that retrieved linked information astonishingly fast. Astonishing, that is, to anyone but Harry.

He had also, through practice, brought himself to the point where he could endure the heightened influx from the spell for longer and longer periods. Still only a few hours a day; but a few hours at a pace that had enabled him to complete all his NEWT studies for the next two years. In three days.

He had learned that his mind was the focus for his magic; not the words, or the wand, or the motions. With his mind exercises, he could see magic at will. Much like the 'aura' perception he had already had experience with; but now, he could do it at will, and see things in much greater detail.

He could look at a ward, or a charm, and see immediately what the purpose of it was. To Harry's eyes, examining spell work in this way was like zooming in on a piece of cloth. Zoom in far enough, and one could see the individual fibers, the spaces between, the strengths and weaknesses. He could see how to duplicate it, after seeing it only once. He could see where it was weakest. And he could see the 'spaces' where one could bypass it completely, accomplishing whatever he wished without the ward or charm having any effect at all -- conceptually, it was like ducking under a trip-wire.

He could even change a spell after it had been cast.

He could transfigure a spell after it had been cast, and spent quite a bit of time deep in his cave, in his practice room, casting slow spells and changing their route in flight, then changing the spells altogether.

Harry had learned more in two months, on his own without teachers or tutors, than any current student at Hogwarts was likely to learn in the rest of their lives. Not merely because of volume of material, but because of the difference between rote memorization and true learning.

He knew the difference because of his research into education. Students, both magical and muggle, memorized and recited things that they didn't really understand. Remembered them long enough to pass the exam. And two months after that exam, that student couldn't tell you even the small fact they'd memorized. On into early adulthood, most wouldn't even remember that they had taken the class, until prompted by another.

Learning, however, was more than gathering and storing information; it was gaining the understanding of how that thing fell into its place in the universe. It was gaining adepth of understanding that showed not just /what/is so, but /why/. It was the difference between rote memorization and true education; the difference between just being able to use something in daily life, and being able to improve it or replace it with something better.

If necessity was the mother of invention, then comprehension was the father. Without understanding and ability, all the necessity in the world could not spawn progeny. Old Mother Necessity could be the biggest slut in the universe; but without an injection of "Oh, now I get it" from Mac-Daddy Brains, cute little Baby Invention would never be conceived.

Harry came to a decision: he would not be returning to Hogwarts on September 1st. That would have to be delayed. There were too many things that had to be done first.

He knew that there was nothing at Hogwarts that would, or could, protect him from Voldemort. The moment he appeared on Platform 9-3/4 -- or any other platform -- he was immediately exposed to the possibility of another attack. Because there was no if; there was only when.

He knew that, whether he believed in prophesy or not, the rest of the wizarding world believed in it, including Tom Riddle. So whether or not it was true, Voldemort was going to proceed as if it were, and keep trying to kill Harry Potter, and never stop until he thought he was safe.

He also knew that Death Eaters never attacked singly. Like any other bully, they were strongest as a gang, and individually weak and cowardly. So any future attack was not going to be one-against-one, but Harry against many.

Harry would have to get tough, get hard. Transform himself into a regular Billy Badass. Make sure that, when he was attacked, he could handle the battle, make it his own, and stomp necks.

Emotionally, he was quite torn. All the friends he had ever had in his life would be on that platform, on that train, or at that school on September 1st. His friends needed his new learning to survive. He was honest enough to know that the fiasco at the Department of Mysteries had only ended in a tactical draw because the cavalry had arrived and the bad guys had scarpered. Had Dumbledore and the Aurors not arrived, Harry and his foolishly brave friends would have been snake-food.

On the other hand, if he turned up before he was ready, he would not be any help, and could jeopardize the fate of the wizarding world. The Death Eaters didn't know the prophesy, and wouldn't hesitate to attack him or his friends to gain favor with ol' snake-face.

No. He needed at least another month, perhaps more.

Especially since Griphook had agreed to help him to learn more about goblins. In one visit to try to understand his accounts and holdings, he had realized that he (like all wizards) knew next to nothing about the diminutive bankers.