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Chapter 1255: The Treasure of the House-Elves
🕑 Added 2024-10-05 15:00:18 +0000 UTC“How can there be house-elves without masters?” Hermione pressed. “Were they all cast out by their original families? Or did they free themselves, like Dobby?"
She looked excited, and Evan knew why. Hermione was thrilled by the idea of house-elves without masters.
After all, even though there was no progress, she had never given up on S.P.E.W.
Hermione would never give up as long as she had the chance.
She campaigned for house-elf rights, wrote articles for the newspaper, urged wizards to treat house-elves better, and during school, she would visit the kitchens weekly to talk to the elves.
Hermione had done a lot, but with little success.
Aside from Dobby, almost no house-elf shared her views.
House-elves didn’t want wages or holidays; all they wanted was work. The more work they had, the happier they were. If they failed to complete it, they would happily punish themselves — whether by whipping, burning their hands with irons, or cutting themselves with knives — before hurrying back to work.
In the eyes of traditional house-elves, only masters who treated them like this were good masters...
They regarded lifelong service to their masters as the greatest honor, especially after the Black family created a perverted tradition. Many house-elves dreamed of being like their ancestors and having their heads cut off by their masters when they were too old to work, and having their heads hung on the wall side by side with their ancestors' heads as decorations.
Even house-elves in France had adopted this practice, treasuring it.
So to house-elves, Hermione’s campaign was heretical.
Over time, she became the least welcome person in the kitchens.
When other students went to the kitchens, the house-elves would come around and stuff all kinds of food into their arms.
But when Hermione came in, the house-elves would scatter and hide immediately...
S.P.E.W. had made little progress, but if there were many house-elves without masters, this could change things. Without the constraints of a master, it would be easier to fight for their rights. These elves could serve as examples for others to follow.
"Don't get too excited, Hermione. I may not have made it clear. These house-elves still have masters in name. They are not expelled house-elves like Dobby, but their masters are actually gone," Fred explained. "Imagine that those ancient pure-blood Wizarding families lost their descendants for various reasons during the inheritance process. Without family members, the family perished, but the house-elves are still there. These house-elves who have lost their masters will not be loyal to the new wizards. They are just..."
"House-elves who’ve lost their masters?"
“Yeah, if you ask them, they’ll tell you stories about their long-gone masters — pure-blood Wizarding families that disappeared ages ago, and ancient surnames from centuries back,” Fred explained, pointing at the house-elves working in the room. “The elves you see now are the descendants of those masterless house-elves. Technically, they still nominally belong to those extinct Wizarding families."
Bound by ancient pacts and magic, house-elves were slaves to the wealthy, ancient Wizarding families.
The same was true for their descendants, and although many of these Wizarding families were no longer around, their effectiveness still existed.
House-elves would not defect to other wizards, even if their masters were long gone.
This situation was quite common in the Wizarding World, especially in the old days when Wizarding wars and duels were frequent. A slight disagreement could lead to death, and entire families could be wiped out. House-elves, as the last members of those families, might have multiplied for centuries.
After listening to Fred's explanation, Evan realized that this was indeed a possibility.
He had once read a book about the crests of Wizarding families in the United Kingdom. Over the past few hundred years, the number of families that had disappeared recorded in those books was innumerable, as many as hundreds of thousands. Even if not all families had house-elves left, as long as one-tenth of them had, it would still be a considerable number.
“At some point, these masterless house-elves gathered in the underground world of London, which lies on the fringes of the Wizarding World. They live there in obscurity," said Fred. "I heard that their history of living there could be traced back to a thousand years ago."
"This is the first time I've heard of such a group of house elves."
"I just found out about them not long ago. Only the house-elves know about their existence, but they regard this as a taboo and won't easily tell anyone about it," said Fred. "If it weren't for the werewolves and Dark wizards causing so much trouble in the Underground World recently, George and I wouldn't have known about it."
"What are the werewolves planning to do? Why are they occupying the house-elf territory?" asked Evan.
"It may be because of the treasure of the house-elves. Many of these house-elves are the last members of those ancient Wizarding families. When they moved to the Underground World, they took the last things of these families with them," said Fred disapprovingly. "I’ve seen some of their so-called treasures, which are not of much value. The concepts of house-elves are different from ours. The items they value and collect as treasures are not actually of very high value. The real treasures of those pure-blood Wizarding families are generally kept in Gringotts..."
That was true, but it was undeniable that there would be some gains from doing so to a certain extent.
However, it sounded like this was something only a wizard like Mundungus Fletcher would do, not something werewolves would do.
Greedy werewolves? Wasn't it a little weird?
They had been living in the underground world for many years, coexisting with the house-elves. While their relationship might not have been friendly, there was no need for them to attack the elves or take over their territory.
House-elves only looked weak, but they were actually very powerful in combat.
Evan was a little confused as to why the werewolves did this. He suddenly wondered if this matter was related to Voldemort.
Assuming that the werewolves were now obeying Voldemort's orders, could there be some hidden secret behind all this?
"Have you and George paid these house-elves?" Hermione asked.
Compared to some vague conspiracy or something, she was more concerned about this.
“No wages, they didn’t want to accept any. They only wanted us to provide food,” said Fred. “Please, Hermione, don’t bring up S.P.E.W. again — it just doesn’t work for house-elves..."
