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Harry Potter Squib Tales Chapter 67: Unfortunate Events
🕑 Added 2025-02-28 17:01:41 +0000 UTCChapter 67: Unfortunate Events
“And there we go,” I muttered to myself as I finished drawing the alchemical sigils onto the floor. Made from Delilah’s blood mixed with potent magical reagents, the ritual transmutation circle was finally ready to turn my girlfriend from a Squib into a proper witch.
“Is it ready yet?” Delilah asked me, and I glanced over at her.
“You know, you don’t have to be naked right now,” I told her, even as I admired the view. She was completely nude, arms folded across her chest as she watched me work. Tribal tattoo-like sigils had been drawn on her skin using the same ingredients the array itself was made of.
“I thought it’d be funny,” she said with a teasing smile.
“Well, I’m not complaining,” I chuckled. “And yes, I’m done. All you have to do is stand in the middle and I’ll trigger the ritual with the catalyst. Don’t leave the circle, whatever happens, okay? I’ll be with you the entire time.”
“I trust you,” Delilah replied as she stepped over the intricate ritual array I’d spent hours making, delicately avoiding stepping on any lines or symbols.
Giving it a final look-over, I nodded to myself before pulling out a bottled potion and handed it to her. She drank it, and the magic within it infused her. The ritual circle reacted, just like it had with Sam, and began to glow bright white. Unlike with Sam, however, the whole thing flashed, and when the light faded, the magical ink on Delilah had vanished.
“Did you feel anything?” I asked anxiously.
“Um, no?” she replied, looking down at herself. “Should I have?”
“Hmm. Sam said his skin tingled a little. Perhaps its because you already have a higher amount of magic inside of you it didn’t feel as weird?” I mused.
“We’ll need to find a way to do this without getting naked,” Delilah said as she walked away from the site of the ritual. The array itself was gone, leaving a scorched circle behind, and the air had a bit of static in it, but nothing else looked to have changed, which was good.
“And without directly applying the transmutation sigils,” I agreed. If we wanted to make everyone in the world into mages, it simply wouldn’t be feasibly to do so with a ritual that needed such strict requirements. Couldn’t exactly ask everyone to strip and paint themselves, could I?
“Something to look into,” Delilah noted. “So, how are things? It’s been a few days since the crash.”
“Ah, things are okay,” I said. “My car insurance isn’t holding me accountable at least. Plenty of evidence shows that the other guy was at fault. Repairing the car was pretty easy, too. A few Reparo spells from Remus and Sirius and it was good as new! Had to pay for a few new runes to be engraved, though. Turns out you can’t fix runes with the Repair charm.”
“That’s good. How’s Sam doing?” Delilah asked. She liked him as much as I did. He was a good cook and a better friend.
“Sam’s still a bit… shaken up,” I said. “Though his family is helping him through it.”
“I’m glad things seem to be going well with Sam and his family,” Delilah said. “I was worried he might be… well, it doesn’t matter what I thought might happen. It didn’t.”
“Yeah, I’m happy for him,” I agreed. “They seem a little confused, and I don’t think they really understand what it means to be transexual. Pretty sure they just think he’s batting for the other team, so to speak. But no big issues so far.”
I sighed. “Shame it had to come out like this. I know Sam wanted to talk about this, but not so soon. After he graduated cooking school, at least. The accident pushed the date up.”
“Mm. Yes. I found out a bit about the man, by the way. His name was Simon Patridge,” Delilah said as she pulled her clothes on.
“So, any idea who that guy was?” I asked. “I know you said you’d take care of it when we last spoke, but…”
“No, as far as I was able to dig up, he was just a regular person,” Delilah said. “However, I’m rather suspicious of the ‘official records.’”
“Why is that?” I inquired, curious.
“He was too clean,” she stated. “Simon Partridge was a completely ordinary man in his thirties who lived alone in a flat near downtown London, had a squeaky-clean record, and worked as a manager at a retail shoe store. No living relations, and no connections to anybody who might want you hurt. He owned the Honda he was driving when he ran into you, and the autopsy’s tox-report came back negative, so he wasn’t on any substances at the time.”
“Seems normal enough,” I said. “Though the lack of relatives is sorta suspicious. What else seemed off about it?”
“For one, his record was too clean,” Delilah claimed. “He could be just a law-abiding citizen, but everybody has something. Even I have a few notes about some dumb stuff I did in school. Smoking cigarettes and ditched class, shoplifted a few trinkets, you know. Small things to piss my dad off since he was kinda shit to me and mom.”
“I wonder what my records say about me?” I mused, mildly curious.
I probably looked rather odd myself. My mother didn’t exist in any government database or census, I hadn’t been adopted or anything like that, either. As far as the British Government knew, I’d just appeared when I was thirteen, according to the forged paperwork Mr. Archibald had gotten me. I assume he managed to do a bit more than the bare minimum, but I wasn’t sure. Nobody had tried to arrest me for being an illegal alien, though, and I did have a British ID and social security number equivalent.
I then shook my head, and looked at Delilah. “Keep me updated?”
“Of course. And I’ll do more digging, see if I can find out anything regarding his finances. That might help narrow some things down for us,” she said. She then leaned over and kissed my cheek. “See you.”
“See you,” I replied.
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“That should do it,” I said, withdrawing the needle from Harry’s arm. He rubbed the spot, smearing a smidge of my Wiggenwald Cream on it as I filled up some tiny glass containers with the blood I’d just extracted.
I carefully put the vials containing Harry’s red life juice into a safe containing a preservation enchantment that I used to store my important perishables, like rare potion ingredients and elixirs.
After the events in the Chamber of Secrets, Harry’s blood had contained traces of both phoenix tears and basilisk venom, two incredibly rare substances. And while there was a decent amount of the latter in Harry’s vault thanks to the deal he’d cut with the Ministry and goblins, the former was pretty much impossible to get ahold of.
Hence the fact I’d been drawing blood from Harry thrice a month, and then using Alchemy to separate the foreign materials from it. Thanks to that, I now had a small stock of phoenix tears and basilisk venom for my own use. It wasn’t much, just a couple drops, a scant few milliliters of both, but when I found a way to make my own Philosopher’s Stone that quantity issue would be solved.
“So, are you ready for school?” I asked. I’d be taking him to the Hogwarts Express tomorrow, and I hoped he was ready for his third year. Nothing as ridiculous as the Ministry unleashing Dementors should happen, but this was Harry Potter. Things were gonna get weird around him no matter what.
“Yeah, I can’t wait,” Harry confirmed. Inky handed him some cookies and milk which he happily took. “And I’m excited for Mr. Lupin to be teaching me!”
“Don’t expect him to treat you differently,” I warned.
“I wouldn’t want it any other way!” Harry assured me.
“Good. Have your penpal correspondences also been going well?” I wondered. He’d been communicating with Gabirelle via owls ever since France, just like Delilah and I did with Fleur. He’d also started sending owls to some other person. Apparently, they’d met in one of the many broom stores in the U.S.? Whatever the case, they’d been exchanging a lot of parchment about Quidditch and flying. Harry was such a broom nerd. It was cute.
“It’s great! Victor said he got accepted onto his team! They loved his flying!” Harry said.
‘I swear that name sounds familiar,’ I thought to myself before dismissing it.
“And anything from Gabi?” I asked, waggling my eyebrows. He huffed but reluctantly nodded.
“She said her year at Beauxbatons was fun. Not nearly as exciting as mine, though.”
“I don’t think anyone could have a year as ‘exciting’ as yours,” I drawled. He just shrugged, desensitized by his own near-death experiences.
“Well, I’m done here,” I said as Inky cleaned up the place. “Anything you want to do together on your last day in London?”
“We could see a movie,” he suggested. “And have dinner after.”
“You know, I have just the movie in mind,” I said with a grin. “How do you feel about seeing Jurassic Park?”
He looked intrigued and nodded and I went to look up the show times in theatres near us.
Harry loved it. Obviously. Who didn’t like dinosaurs? And the animatronics and special effects still held up! A few tears of nostaligia even wetted my eyes, which I managed to brush away without anybody noticing.
“That was fun! But I could have taken ‘em,” Harry declared as we walked out of the theatre, a wide smile on his face.
“I bet you could,” I agreed. He’d beaten a basilisk and, in the books, a dragon. Not even a T-Rex would be a match for him.
“So, where do you want to eat tonight?” I asked.
Before he could answer, a tingling sensation struck my left hand, and I tensed up as the source of the feeling was coming from one of my rings, specifically the one on my index finger. It was silver inlaid with turquoise, and was the Danger Sense ring I’d gotten in the U.S. that alerted the wearer when somebody with hostile intent was focusing their attention onto them. And right now, my finger was practically buzzing!
“Hey, Harry,” I said. “I need to use the bathroom. Do you?”
When he turned to look at me, I discreetly gestured to my Danger Sense ring. I’d told him about what it could do, and he knew what it meant when I was pointing to it.
“Sure,” he said with a nod, and we began to walk around, trying to find a place that we could duck into. I spotted a public bathroom across the way, and made a beeline for it.
As we walked, I took careful glances in the windows and other reflective surfaces nearby. It wasn’t the best option since it was getting dark out, but I managed to catch flashes of a pair of men prowling in my wake.
They weren’t dressed up and looked like regular Joes, but their eyes were sharp and never wavered from us, and they kept their hands at their pockets.
In addition, there was a black car slowly driving by. It seemed like it was trying to find a spot to park on the street, but thanks to the ring I could tell the driver’s eyes were locked onto me. It looked normal, but I saw a few things that stood out. Namely, the tree shaped hood ornament, and a bobblehead on the dashboard. Both were relatively easy identifying markers to remove, though, so even if somebody did get suspicious about the car, it wouldn’t matter.
When we reached the public bathroom, I made a show of stopping outside the door and bending over to tie my shoelaces. While I did so, I removed a pair of Stunner Ofuda to take out the men.
We were a bit too out in the open to act freely, though, so Harry and I stepped into the bathroom. A quick glance around revealed the place was empty, and I ushered my young companion into a nearby stall while I took up a spot behind the door.
When the two men entered – slowly so as not to arouse suspicions of any passersby – I flung the talisman at them, and the dropped like rocks as the paper slips stuck to them.
That was easier than I’d feared, but I didn’t want to risk it, so I approached them and carefully checked their pockets. I found a few unpleasant things in there, including a photograph of me taken as I was leaving my apartment, and two guns. There was also a bunch of tattoos on their arms that looked a lot like insignias. Ex-military? Or perhaps they were gang symbols?
I frowned. These weren’t just random thugs like the ones who tried to go after me and Delilah on Valentine’s Day, they were armed and trained!
‘Just like the bloody arseholes who went after her at Christmas,’ I realized. They were sort of dressed the same, carried the same types of weapons and drove the same style of cars. And while that didn’t exactly prove anything definitively, it was suspicious if nothing else.
“Is it over?” Harry asked as he emerged from the stall he’d been hiding in.
“Harry, call Dobby,” I ordered. When he looked at me in worry, I resisted the urge to snap at him. He didn’t deserve that. “Please, Harry.”
He nodded, and did as I requested, uttering Dobby’s name. A second later the House Elf popped into existence next to him.
“Mister Harry called for Dobby?” the floppy-eared guy asked. Instead of answering, Harry looked back at me.
“You’ll be following behind me, right?” he asked.
“Yeah, just gonna make sure they don’t try to follow us,” I assured him, and Harry nodded before taking Dobby’s hand.
“Can you take me home, Dobby?” he requested, and a moment later they vanished, leaving me alone in the bathroom.
“Inky,” I called out, and my loyal House Elf appeared. He gave the public bathroom a disgusted look before turning his attention to me.
“Does Master need Inky to clean this place?” he asked hopefully.
“No. Maybe later, or you can do it on your free time,” I replied. “I need you to tell Remus and Sirius some people were following me.”
The House Elf looked down at the two men at my feet. “Want Inky to send them over?”
“No, I want the two to be ready to receive guests in Castle Black’s dungeons,” I replied. “After you tell them, pop these men down there. Oh! And there was a third guy driving a car. It was black, had a tree shaped hood ornament, and a bobblehead doll of some kind on the dash.”
I paused as I remembered a minor issue. “Um, you have been given permission to enter the castle, right?”
“No, but Inky can give the prisoners to Kreacher,” Inky said, his expression twisting a little in distaste as he mentioned the cantankerous House Elf serving Sirius.
“Well, he’ll probably like that,” I muttered. There was something wrong with that elf. More so than was usual for House Elves, at least.
Inky nodded, unable to deny my assertion, before popping away to deal with my requests, taking the pair of goons on the floor with him. I decided to use the toilet while I waited, and by the time I was drying my hands off, Inky returned, his mission complete.
“Mean men are in the dungeon,” Inky informed me. “Kreacher is looking after them.”
“Good. And do Sirius and Remus know?”
“They do. Mister Sirius is at the apartment to be with Mister Harry. Mister Remus apologizes that he cannot come, but said he trusts you to do what needs to be done.”
“That’s a relief, didn’t want him to be alone,” I said, most to myself, before turning to Inky. “Alright, take me back as well.”
A disorienting pop later, and I was standing in my apartment’s living room, blinking the spots out of my vision.
“Forgot to close your eyes, eh?” Sirius said with a knowing smirk. He was sitting on the couch with Harry, the latter of whom looked relieved to see me.
“Yeah, going from dim rooms to bright ones is always a pain in the butt,” I grunted.
“Well, we never got to eat dinner, so how about some take out?” I suggested, and Harry nodded, still a bit subdued due to the threat we’d just narrowly escaped from.
A call to a nearby Chinese place later, and we were happily munching on wontons and Crab Rangoon.
“Who were those people?” Harry asked.
“No idea,” I said with a helpless shrug.
“Kreacher will find out,” Sirius said grimly. “I don’t like him, but he knows some old tricks to get people to talk.”
“I want to feel sorry for ‘em, but they had guns and tried to kidnap us, so I’m not gonna shed any tears,” I replied. “Just don’t break them too badly. And make sure they’re alive by the end, too. We’ll wipe their minds and leave them somewhere after we get what we want out of them.”
“I told Kreacher the exact same thing,” Sirius nodded, before shivering. “He was very… happy.”
“By the way, where’s Remus?” I wondered, trying not to think about a happy Kreacher.
“Think he had a date with Madam Bones,” Sirius replied. “Spending time with her and Susan, before the lass heads back to Hogwarts.”
“Oh,” I muttered, blinking a bit. “Then I should be expecting a visit from the Aurors soon?”
If Madam Bones had been near Remus when Inky had arrived to deliver the message, then that was a likely outcome. Inky’s message hadn’t been too explicit, or so I hoped, but one didn’t become the head of a Ministry department, especially not the Magical Law Enforcement one, by being unable to pick up on subtext and other subtle clues.
‘That was what I’d do if I was Madam Bones and I’d overheard some insinuations about men trying to kidnap the Boy Who Lived,’ I thought to myself.
Sirius just nodded with a wince, and I resisted sighing out loud.
“Well, I was expecting that to happen eventually. Better it happen because of something like this than due to suspicions about me breaking the Statute,” I grumbled.
“Yeah, probably don’t bring that up around her,” Sirius suggested.
Just as predicted, a stern knock on the door rang out, and I shared a look with the animagus and Boy Who Lived before walking over and answering it.
“Good evening,” I said politely. That was the proper response when coming face-to-face with the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, an auror, and a sheepish Remus.
‘At least the auror Madam Bones grabbed isn’t likely to be a problem,’ I thought to myself, hiding the relief I felt upon seeing it was Tonks. She recognized me as well if the widening of her eyes was any indicator.
“Where is Harry Potter?” Madam Bones demanded.
I just stepped aside so she could see past me into the apartment, where Harry was sitting at the dining room table. He waved at her with his chopsticks, and a flicker of relief passed over her face before she swept inside, her wand out.
“May I perform a check-up?” she asked Harry.
“Okay,” he said, swallowing his mouthful of fried rice.
A quick wave of her wand and some flashing lights, and she relaxed a bit more when nothing negative popped up from her scan.
“I assumed the worst when a House Elf appeared in front of Remus to warn him about a kidnapping attempt on your life, young man,” she said. “And Susan was very distraught as well.”
“I’m sorry to worry you both,” Harry said.
“It wasn’t your fault,” I told the younger boy, patting his shoulder.
“Do you know who these men were?” Madam Bones demanded.
“Not at all,” I replied. “Never seen them before in my life.”
Harry nodded in agreement, same as Sirius.
“I see,” she hummed. There was a note of suspicion I n her voice. She knew we weren’t telling the whole story, but wasn’t sure what we were hiding.
“If you do find out anything regarding these kidnappers, inform me post-haste,” she instructed us, before turning around and walking out. She Apparated away when she was gone from my apartment and the wards within, leaving Remus and Tonks behind.
“I should go. See you at Hogwarts, Harry,” Remus said, leaving to follow after Madam Bones, and soon only the Metamorph was left.
“Hey, there, I’m Auror Tonks, and I’m just here to get your statements,” the trainee auror said, fetching a quill and parchment. “Procedure, ya know?”
“Of course, of course, Nymphadora!” Sirius replied, a teasing tone in his voice. She grimaced at his use of her given name.
“Witness Sirius Black smelled like wet dog as he prepared to give his statement,” Tonks said as her quill automatically wrote out what she’d said.
“Low blow,” he grumbled.
“Where were you, and what were you doing when you first noticed these people?” the bubblegum-haired auror inquired.
“They were following us after we left the movie theatre,” Harry informed her. “We’d just seen Jurassic Park and were planning to get dinner afterwards.”
“Oh, neat, I’ve wanted to see that one ever since Sam told me about it!” she said, before coughing awkwardly.
“Continuing on! What did the suspects look like?” Tonks inquired, looking at Harry.
“Um, there were two of them on the sidewalk trailing us, and they had dark clothes on. Not quite suits, but better than run-of-the-mill outfits from a mall outlet,” Harry replied, thinking back to the event in question. “There was also a third following us in a car. I think one of the people on the sidewalk had brown hair, and the other had red.”
“These were Muggles, then?” she asked, having figured that part out quickly based on our descriptions of their attire and the inclusion of a motor vehicle.
“I didn’t stop to ask them,” Harry replied, a note of sarcasm in his voice.
“Alright, cheeky guy,” Tonks grunted in amusement. “Anything else?”
“They had guns,” he informed her.
“And how did you get away?” Tonks wondered.
“We hid in a nearby bathroom and snuck away when they weren’t looking,” Harry lied. Sort of. House Elf assisted teleportation counted as sneaking away. And they were unconscious, so they couldn’t exactly look at us, could they?
“Okay… one final question: do you know where these men are right now?” Tonks inquired, looking up at us as she did so.
“We left them in the bathroom when we gave ‘em the slip,” I said, and she glanced at me, raising an eyebrow.
“You were there?”
“I was with Harry at the time, yes,” I confirmed.
“I see… and you are?”
“Edward Rose,” I said.
“He is Harry Potter’s guardian when in the Muggle World over summer breaks,” Sirius spoke up. “I trust him, and have the paperwork attesting to such available if you want a copy for the records.”
“That won’t be necessary,” Tonks replied. “In order to not cause any confusion, it’s better that Mr. Rose’s name not appear on any documents.”
“Because I’m a Squib,” I guessed.
“Yeah, that too,” Tonks agreed. She then rolled up her report and put away the quill. “Have a good evening, folks. Good luck in Hogwarts, Harry!”
The auror left my apartment and only when I heard the ‘Pop!’ of Apparition did I allow myself to sigh.
“I’m surprised that went so well,” I muttered.
“Same. And it sounded like Tonks wasn’t gonna ask too many questions, either,” Sirius commented.
“Think it’s because she’s dating Sam?” Harry wondered.
“Probably. I’ll have to give him my thanks later. But I have a question for you, Sirius: am I really Harry’s guardian when he lives in London?” I asked.
“Absolutely,” Sirius nodded. “Never lie about paperwork. Way too easy to double-check that.”
“How can I be a guardian, though?” I wondered in confusion.
“There’s two types of guardians,” Sirius explained. “Magical, and Muggle. Unless you have a magical parent, the former is usually the Headmaster if the person is an underaged Muggleborn attending Hogwarts. The Muggle guardian is usually the non-magical parents or close relatives. Since I’m not cruel enough to put Harry under the control of his aunt and uncle, I pushed a few galleons around the Ministry to change the Muggle guardianship from them to you.”
“Oh. Thank you. I’d have liked to know that sooner, though,” I commented.
“The paperwork only got finished a few days ago. Was gonna break it to you eventually, but I kinda forgot until now,” Sirius admitted, rubbing the back of his head.
I rolled my eyes at him and his forgetfulness, but couldn’t help but feel a sense of gratitude towards him for the kindness.
“Guess we really are like brothers now, huh, Harry?” I said, looking over at him, and Harry grinned widely.
“I guess so!” he said happily. From the size of his smile, I don’t think he minded all that much.
“Come on, let’s finish the food before it gets cold!” Sirius suggested, and I sat back down at the table.
I still had the feeling something was off, and that I was just waiting for the other shoe to drop, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it.
‘I will ensure that Harry will stay safe, and so will my friends and family,’ I promised myself.
Whoever those men had been, I would discover their identities, and the mastermind behind them would suffer!
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Author's Note: Hey guys! Since you've all been such great readers and patrons, keep an eye out for another chapter later today! Consider it a February Bonus!
