The House of Black and the Raising of her Heir

by beanclip

Summary:

The family magics decide that the Dursleys are not only unsuitable guardians, but that their heir must be removed from their care immediately. And so it is, that Harry Potter is raised alone, and in an empty house, with just a deranged house elf and the magics of the House of Black to raise him.

The family magics of Britain were distraught in the wake of the war. Ancient families were left without their lords, without heirs, and some were eliminated entirely.

It had happened before, of course. People of all types have fought since the dawn of civilization, and with time such things will mend. Society remembers, and the children that are left learn their history, and magic shifts and settles over time as new heirs come into their roles.

With the growth of villages and cities, records are better kept and disputes are less violent. It becomes rare for a party to become so grievously injured that the entire estate of their attacker is demanded as weregild by Magic herself. It becomes even rarer for magics to become lost or forgotten entirely, as an heir can always be found and the injured party can, too.

Lines still end of course. Lords die with no suitable heir named, or the last of a line marries into another family, and the family magic of one grows to accept the other. The last of the Slytherins marries into the Gaunts, or the last of the Peverells into the Potters.

It's rarer for lines to merge through gift or adoption, but when Heir Potter and Heir Black called each other brother, the family magics took notice. It grew stronger when Heir Potter gifted his brother shelter in a time of dire need, and was cemented when Heir Potter gifted Heir Black his firstborn and heir. Nevermind that his mother had tried to disown Heir Black in the meantime. The magics knew she lacked both the authority and the true intent to make it stick.

So it was that at the age of four, Harry Potter's guardians were deemed unfit by Magic herself. The magics of the Potter and Evans lines had already joined those of the Black family upon Mr. and Mrs. Potter's deaths, though the Potter money, property, and other items were held in trust for the boy alone until he reached his majority.

It was obvious from the start of course that the Dursleys were unfit guardians. Magic had waited though, because truly there were no other adult family members alive to qualify for the job. It was puzzling, honestly, that no other wizards had stepped forward to claim such a powerful child, and it was odd that nobody had seen fit to check on the boy.

But on November 8th, 1984, Vernon Dursley got violent and young Harry's magic flung out, wild and terrified in an effort to save him.

And so it was that the House of Black decided an empty house and a deranged house elf were the best the family could manage for her heir. Kreacher was not up to the task alone, of course. The House herself managed the care of the child, with input from the various portraits and dead family members left within her walls.

Nobody had been told that Mistress Walburga Black had died, so Kreacher was still able to buy food and potions and other supplies without raising suspicion. The goblins knew, but who were they to dare interfere with how a wizard family decided to care for their heir?

A second house elf was bought and bound to the family to cook and clean, and a third to garden and nurse Harry back to health. Kreacher was left with doing the shopping and managing the other Black elves as he'd long been used to.

Kreacher missed Master Regulus immensely, and brought Harry his old clothes and toys over time. Once Harry learned to read, Kreacher brought out all of Master Regulus' old school books, as well. In consultation with the house and the portraits, Kreacher made sure that Harry was taught everything a young Black heir needed to know.

By the age of seven, it was decided to take Harry on his first trip out of the house. He'd progressed well in his studies, but he'd long since shown signs of needing a practice wand, and he was incompatible with any of the wands Kreacher could dig up at Grimmauld Place or the other Black properties. The boy had been increasingly restless as well, and though he understood why he couldn't leave the house, it didn't make things any easier.

Kreacher dug up his most prized possessions for the trip: Mistress Walburga's old wand and a glamour amulet that would give him her appearance. It was a Black heirloom, reserved for the head Black elf to pass down, and only to be used rarely. Kreacher knew that no respectable family would send their young heir to Diagon Alley alone or with just an elf though, so the disguise would be needed.

The House of Black knew that it wouldn't be good for her heir to be raised in total isolation. The elves and the portraits had been commanded to speak properly from the moment Harry arrived, and the elves did what they could to keep up with affairs. Several history books had been added to the Black library shortly after Harry's arrival, as well as back issues of both the Daily Prophet and several global newspapers. Every quarter, the elves were sent to a selection of shopping districts to gather available owl-order catalogs, and then they spent the day invisibly watching, taking notes on current fashions, slang, and topics of conversation. As Harry got older, he got to practice his French and Italian by reading these reports. It was lonely, true, but it was for the best.

Harry was popped directly into a private office at Gringotts when the time for their appointment came. He'd practiced conversations with the Black portraits, learning how to properly greet and converse with everyone from his pureblood peers, to servants and other creatures, to shop owners and mudbloods. He was dressed in new robes reflecting the latest French fashions, and Kreacher had visualized his Mistress Walburga in the glamor wearing the height of fashion as well.

Harry was shocked to feel the family magic welling up in response to each question the Black account manager asked, and watched with interest as Kreacher put the will of the family into words. In addition to finding a training wand, Harry was getting his first look at the Black family vault, the Potter family vault, and his personal trust vault that day. He'd been deemed old enough to start learning about finances, so the family was requesting statements and turning over control of the trust vault to him that day.

Harry felt the family's permission when he asked Kreacher to take all the training wands plus three real wands back home with him, and later felt the family's outrage at learning withdrawals had been made from his trust vault recently both to Albus Dumbledore and Vernon Dursley. Kreacher spoke the family's will, asking all activity on the trust vault be frozen and evidence of wrongdoing collected, and that excuses be made to prevent activity by anyone not chosen to represent the House of Black by the family magic herself.

A new trust vault was set up for Harry to use, with a new key and the same amount of gold and the same monthly deposit schedule as the Potter vault had.

Kreacher watched Harry closely as they explored the family vaults to see if any artifacts spoke to him. He ended up taking home a ring, a necklace, and a belt buckle, all in silver and crafted with an elegant simplicity that could easily serve for everyday wear. They were all heavily enchanted, the ring to protect against poisons, the necklace to protect against various mind magics, and the belt buckle to boost any shield charms and improve his speed and reflexes.

The ring had a curious additional enchantment that must've been uniquely crafted for the original wearer. The owner could create a personalized whitelist and blacklist of ingredients, so the ring could warn him of the presence of anything, poison or not, that wasn't food in his dishes. Even better, the whitelist could be tailored in the form of whitelisted recipes, such that he could be warned of a single additional spice in any otherwise known dish. When he though about how curious it made him, the family magic brought to mind a Black daughter with a severe dairy allergy several centuries ago, for whom the ring had been painstakingly crafted.

Harry selected several books on dueling to bring back with him, but was warned off of the Potter grimoires until he was older.

Harry's schedule changed after that first trip outside. Once a week, Harry and Kreacher both donned glamor amulets and had an outing in either a wizarding or muggle area. They went to formal dinners and coffee shops and even tried street kebabs outside Buckingham Palace after a tour. The family had decided that it was crucial Harry learn to blend in well with muggles as well, so the House bought muggle histories and novels, and the elves added muggle gossip and fashions to their quarterly investigations.

Harry's studies changed, as well. He was allowed to start brewing simple bruise balms and other beginner potions now that he was seven, allowed to start tending some of the tamer magical plants in the Grimmauld garden, and a dueling room showed itself for Harry to practice his defense spells in. All his regular lessons in history and law and magical theory and astronomy continued, but now he was usually given permission to try the small charms and transfigurations he read about as well. Less fun were the litany of household charms Harry was now expected to perform to keep his room tidy and his own appearance immaculate.

***

The summer of Harry's 11th birthday arrived, and Harry was buzzing with excitement. For the first time that summer, Harry's French was deemed fluent enough to visit France, and for two weeks they'd seen wizarding districts and muggle tourist spots and been overwhelmed with the hospitality of the elves who had been keeping up the Black Villa in Marseilles.

Harry was surprised nobody had ever noticed that he'd been essentially kidnapped, but it had never been reported in either the wizard or muggle papers. Kreacher had even assigned an elf to watch the Dursley family this past year, but she'd never seen any evidence of wizards contacting them.

Nobody had ever raised a fuss about the Potter trust vault being frozen either, so it had been folded into Harry's Black trust vault a year ago. His personal investments were still modest, but doing well. He'd sent anonymous letters to students at various boarding schools, offering startup funds for their businesses which he learned about through his quarterly elf reports. Mostly they were magical businesses, students selling enchanted items or sweets or recreational potions to their peers. He'd made two offers to students at muggle universities though, too. He'd been able to negotiate all the contracts through Gringotts, and the goblins claimed to be very happy with his choices.

His birthday came and went with no letter, and the elves tried to reassure Harry that he was a real wizard, it didn't mean anything. Kreacher suspected that the family magics had identified Albus Dumbledore as a clear and ongoing threat to their heir, making any mail from him or the school undeliverable as the wards around the house were still raised to wartime levels.

Kreacher took Harry school shopping regardless. Presorted stacks of school books by year were easy enough to identify, as were starter potion kits and school robes. The wandmaker was difficult, first insisting that he could only sell a wand to wizards with a school letter, then claiming that Harry had already bonded enough with a used wand so no other wand would now choose him.

Both Harry and Kreacher were upset at the treatment, and Harry had taken to muttering under his breath about how he was a real wizard no matter what anyone thinks. Kreacher was offended at the implied insult as well, going on about how the Potter magic was certain that his Hogwarts tuition had been paid at the first instance of Harry's accidental magic, as soon as he'd been added to the Future Students Book, as is proper for any well-raised wizard.

They relied on guesswork for the rest of Harry's school list, as deceased Blacks recalled what they'd been required to bring and the Black elves quietly asked elves of other pureblood heirs what they were packing. Kreacher brought out Regulus' old trunk and satchel to store his things in, telling Harry that they were both Black heirlooms that had been kept in the family and lovingly restored with each new generation.

Harry was talked through the steps to renew each of the charms for them, then instructed on renewing the runic enchantments as well. Expansion and featherlight and weatherproof charms, and tampering and anti-theft wards went on them both, and the long-deceased Arcturus Black I explained that these variants were Black family secrets, usually performed by the lord for his heir and each of the family’s other sons and daughters each year.

Arcturus I was a spellcrafter and master wardsmith when he was alive, and continued to teach Harry after his successful renewal of the trunk charms. He proceeded to teach Harry wards to keep a room or his bed safe at night, then a variety of detection and privacy charms he thought every heir should know. As September grew closer, other members of the family chimed in with their suggestions on making alliances, how to comport himself, and briefs on who the other children up to fourth year were.

Adding the Potters to the Black family made things especially difficult, as the family loyalties were in many cases contradictory. For instance, the Malfoys were recently allied to the Blacks by marriage and had got on well for centuries before that, but their relationship with the Potters was cool at best. Even worse, the Potters had reaffirmed close alliances with both the Weasleys and Longbottoms shortly before their deaths, but the Weasleys and the Malfoys had an ongoing blood feud and the Longbottoms had been grievously offended recently by the Lestranges, who also had an otherwise friendly relationship with the Blacks.

It had been decided that it was safest to downplay the Black connection until they had more information, so Harry still bore the Potter name and face despite being the Black heir. He was advised to be neutral-to-friendly with everyone for now, and that he shouldn't let on anything about his status or how he was raised.

The elves had spent the summer infiltrating Hogwarts, posing as free elves or those bound to a house with no living master. They copied the Hogwarts recipe book first, so that Harry could add it to his ring-approved dish list, then read through what information they could gather by listening to conversations conducted in public spaces in the castle.

Harry spent the train ride to Hogwarts making tentative friendships with a Weasley, the Longbottom heir, and a mudblood, though he cringed to think how he'd inadvertently offended the Malfoy heir when they met. He sorted into Slytherin of course, as every Black except Sirius had done for centuries, and during his first week of classes tried to both retain his friendships with three Griffindors he met on the train and his Slytherin classmates. As the family had suggested, he didn't hold back in his classes, showing himself to be both powerful and talented, though he was by no means a genius.

Of course, maintaining the friendships was easier said than done. Weasley proclaimed himself to be mortally offended both by Harry's sorting and his attempts to repair things with Malfoy, while Malfoy stubbornly refused to even acknowledge him. Even worse, it seemed he'd managed to offend his Head of House as well, though neither he nor the family could figure out how. Eventually, Harry resorted to setting his elves spying on the man full time. It was almost as though he was acting on an existing blood feud between their families, though the House of Black couldn't find any documentation of such feud with the Potters, nor with any family Snape could have secretly been claimed by.

After months of watching and listening, all the elves could determine was that Snape's anger was at "Potter" specifically, and therefore must have been an individual feud with just Snape and Heir Potter. Kreacher remembered a tentative friendship between Snape and Regulus Black before his death, so the family thought that despite the Potter mutterings indicating evidence of a hatred for a Black as well, it was unlikely Snape extended this disgust to the entire Black family.

After careful consideration, it was decided to play into the man's prejudices. A recent wizarding history of Britain planted where Zabini would see it, and then a carefully executed "discovery" of Harry's parentage and personal history during Potions class was all he needed to lay the groundwork for his deception. Harry expressed sorrow over his family's fate, then deliberately adjusted his appearance to precisely match James Potter's over the next few weeks.

Family magics were tricky, so he could only rely on portraits and printed works like books and newspapers for information about the dead. Specific memories of an individual without a portrait or journal were lost to the family forever, but even still, Harry was able to adopt some of the Potter-specific mannerisms the portraits knew.

His close tie directly to the Black family magic came in handy as well as he intentionally shifted his appearance, becoming only the second metamorphagus the family had produced in well over a century. He was keeping that ability a secret for now of course, as it was quite obviously a Black trait to anyone with any study at all of the various family magics. The family offered him other Black gifts as well, like their talents for human transfiguration, the Dark Arts, and spellcrafting, though they agreed he should keep his extracurricular talents quiet for now.

Upon learning of the Black metamorphagus talent, Harry had been fascinated to learn of the interaction of the Black family magic with other families upon marriage. In the case of Andromeda Tonks, her husband's family magic was so weak after generating centuries of squibs that the Black magic easily dominated the marriage, despite her successful excommunication from the family, her personal bone deep hatred of the family, and her fervent desire to leave it.

Narcissa Malfoy had desired to truly join her husband's family as well, and the Malfoy family magic was strong enough to grant her wish and welcome her upon her marriage.

Bellatrix Lestrange's marriage was peculiar, in that neither she nor her husband particularly liked each other, nor cared which family they belonged to. Bellatrix had been mad for years before her marriage, freely wielding the Black family talent for the Dark Arts, despite it being a double edged sword. Her marriage resulted in an unholy mix of family magics, as both she and her husband held on to their talents and neither truly joined the other’s family. Bellatrix's years of Dark Arts practice followed by over a decade in Azkaban had resulted in a branch that the family had quarantined and decided was too dangerous to mix freely with the rest of the family. It would take a properly titled Lord Black to formally remove her entirely, though it was easy enough in the meantime to ensure that she would not infect the rest of the family, either while alive or after her death.

These familial interactions of course were why squibs and mudbloods were looked at with such disgust by true pureblood families. Squibs indicated that the family was weakening in relation to other families, meaning that marriages were more likely to result in only the partner's family magic remaining. Mudbloods were even worse, often succumbing entirely to their partner's family. Proper families shuddered at the thought of their family magic being consumed entirely as the Tonks and Evans families had, and rumor had it that the last of the once great Gaunt line had even succumbed to that of a muggle from a long-extinct squib line.

The benefits of new blood and powerful offspring were usually considered minor compared to the utter shame of one's family magic being too weak to stand up to that of one's spouse. Mudbloods often didn't understand the shame, having such weak family magic to begin with that they didn't know what they were missing. Those taught the old ways still knew though. They learned the old stories of muggle offspring promised to the fae becoming the first wizards, and of promises made through debts and deceit that bound one family to another as vassal or ally.

The school year continued, and Harry expertly manipulated his teachers so that they only ever saw him as James Potter reborn. It quickly became a game to see how quickly he could get detention during Potions, and for how small of an offense. By early December, though, he backed off slightly, having caught Malfoy studying his interactions with Snape too intently for comfort.

Harry stayed at the castle for Christmas, and bought carefully selected gifts for each of his acquaintances. A book for Granger on magic-resistant creatures, quidditch gloves for Weasley, and a plant for Longbottom. For his Slytherin year mates, he got an identical, impersonal box of chocolates, understanding the need for distance with each of them, especially as they were all at home for the holiday. For his Head of House, a treacle tart, which the elves assured him was James Potter's favorite, and for the meddling headmaster he bought a beautiful green and silver scarf.

His favorite gift though was for the Weasley twins, who he learned had a remarkable talent for pranks and designing creative enchantments. For them, he bought a wide selection of rarer potions ingredients that he knew they'd been having trouble obtaining themselves, plus a 300 galleon credit to Harry's favorite apothecary in Knockturn Alley. He'd already decided to offer them an investment contract once they were a little more established, but for now he wanted to see what they'd do with a bit of financial breathing room. He'd signed the gift as well, almost giddy at the thought of his first non-anonymous business investment.

Harry received far more gifts than he expected, from all his student acquaintances as well as a number of students he'd hardly spoken to. He recognized most of the names; Shafiq and Bones and Diggory and Patil among others, and was disgusted to identify blacklisted ingredients in five of them. His necklace warned him of a compulsion layered into a gift from the Headmaster. He quickly identified the gift as a Potter heirloom, and even with the help of the family and several cursebreaking books it took him well into February to cleanse the cloak completely.

Other compulsions or potions were attached to various cards and gifts that were delivered through the end of the holiday break, and Harry even started identifying potions in his food shortly before the break ended. The family taught him how to seamlessly vanish drinks from his cup and food from his fork without either his teachers, fellow students, or any unseen elves noticing. He carefully collected these items both for study and as evidence, and learned how to identify both his poisoner and his intended behavior.

He finally granted the headmaster his wish at the end of February, after months of eating alone and in secret, with his meals delivered to him directly by his trusted elves. The unwelcome enchantments on his cloak were finally fully dismantled, so he put it on and let himself be led to the Mirror of Erised. It took two weeks of waiting by the mirror plus intentionally being caught in the halls after hours by Filch before Dumbledore finally acted. The family magic seethed at his blatant manipulation of Harry, but put together a plan for the inevitable confrontation over the philosopher's stone that Dumbledore was quite obviously orchestrating.

By the time final exams were over, the plan was firmly in place. Harry had written several letters to the Hogwarts Board of Governors, the Ministry DMLE, and the Flamels, explaining everything he'd learned about the Stone and the situation. Should Harry be injured or killed, it would be easy enough for his elves to arrange for the letters to be owled to their appropriate recipients.

He'd discovered that Professor Quirrell was both possessed and after the Stone, and had obtained proof of both those facts and Dumbledore's knowledge of them. He'd also obtained detailed knowledge of the flimsy "protections" in place. For the past couple months, an elf had been watching Quirrell as he murdered unicorns and lost his sanity. He'd be warned immediately when Quirrell eventually went after the Stone.

The day finally came, and Harry pulled out the bag he'd prepared with everything he'd need to navigate the “protections”. A small flute, a broom, the family's chess knowledge, and his wand were sufficient for most of them. The trickiest bit had been identifying the fire in Professor Snape's room, then finding and brewing a potion that would allow him to pass through the flames.

Harry made it through the rooms quickly, catching up to Quirrell just as he knocked out the troll. He entered the last room just behind the man, ready for their confrontation.

In the end, it was rather disappointing. The man was utterly mad, ranting alternately about how he was all powerful and Harry should join him, then how they were mortal foes and how easy it would be to kill a mere child. He didn't even need his wand to kill him in the end, simply grabbing his face and holding on until the wraith escaped and Quirrell's body turned to ashes. The last thing Harry saw before passing out was the enraged face of Professor Snape entering the room.

When he woke up, Harry was in the hospital wing. His memories were scattered and his mind felt as thick as molasses. Dumbledore was there, saying something about sacrifice and his mother, but Harry soon fell asleep again.

The next time he woke up, Harry's things were on the bedside table. He quickly got dressed, and to his relief found his enchanted objects in his pocket. He hissed as he tried to put on the necklace and then the ring, unsure why they would burn him now, but deciding to leave them off until he could figure it out.

He told Dumbledore and then Snape his story of what had happened, then agreed to return to the Dursleys for the summer despite a distant feeling of wrongness about it. He was in a daze through the leaving feast and their final night in the dorms. Harry was confused to see that his trunk had already been packed for him.

He didn't get a chance to fuss with his jewelry until the train ride back to London. He found an empty cabin and warded it as strongly as he knew how, then called for Kreacher.

He remembered something about Kreacher being his friend and able to help him, but it was bothering him how fuzzy his other memories had gotten. Kreacher quickly summoned the other Black elves when he learned what Harry wanted, and together they were the voice of the House of Black for him. For ten frantic hours, they taught Harry how to read his influences off the jewelery, and then relayed knowledge of how to counteract or unravel them one by one.

By the time the train stopped, Harry was able to wear the items again, though they still burned. Kreacher donned his amulet, this time taking the guise of Vernon Dursley and loudly greeting Harry in the muggle part of the station. Kreacher popped them back to Grimmauld as soon as they were out of sight, and Harry proceeded to spend the entire summer undoing the damage that had been done in his sleep, bit by bit.

Harry spent most of the summer alternately deep in conversation with the family portraits and looking up purges or countercurses to try in the family library. There was a bit of a fuss when Kreacher caught a misbehaving Malfoy elf attempting to steal Harry's mail, but a plan was quickly hatched to trick Lord Malfoy into freeing the creature, and Dobby was thrilled to swear service to the Black family instead. They were careful not to let the Malfoys know he'd been freed, so it was easy enough to keep Dobby in the Malfoy household where he could pass along any information he heard to his new family.

Interestingly, while the Malfoys had never been overly kind to the elf, they weren't the ones who had driven Dobby so close to madness. A Black elf from the Swiss estate who had followed her Mistress into a healing specialty was called to Grimmauld, and it was discovered that Dobby was bound personally to Dumbledore as well.

Upon learning of Lord Malfoy's plans with the Chamber of Secrets in the upcoming year, Dobby had disobeyed his master's orders and gone straight to the Headmaster. Dumbledore bound the elf, creating an enormous tension in his magics, especially when his two masters gave him contradictory orders. Lord Malfoy commanded Dobby to stay quiet about the diary, while Dumbledore commanded him to share all he knew and to act as he saw fit to prevent damage.

The healer elf, Matilda, ended up taking charge of both Harry and Dobby for the summer, guiding the two of them through the necessary purges. A couple of the potions she required were too complicated for Harry to brew in his state, so she arranged to buy them from a trusted potioneer, and expertly sifted through the information that the House of Black could gather.

The spell Harry found the hardest to break he only managed the day before he was to return to Hogwarts. The House of Black almost openly declared an everlasting blood feud upon its identification, and the house trembled with barely contained fury the rest of the year as the family decided what action to openly take. Dumbledore had hidden a magical drain on Harry's core during that hospital stay, one that would keep his available power level constant while siphoning the excess off to an unknown recipient. It was impossible to prove either the caster or recipient, though the Black elves confirmed that only Snape, Pomphrey, and Dumbledore had been close enough and alone with Harry long enough to be the caster. It was easy enough to reason that Dumbledore would be the recipient though, as he both cast the rest of the bindings and was so obviously concerned with manipulating Harry.

The family identified the leech used as a dark ritual originally developed by the Peverell family, with elements of an imperius layered in to bind an enemy's mind and magic to the caster’s will. The only known copy of the ritual was in a grimoire held in the Potter family library, and together the family magics worked out how to destroy the binding.

In a nod to the special brand of anarchy the Potters were known for, they elected to break the binding in a way that would cause the maximum whiplash as the magics rebounded. They were not happy that their private magics had been turned on their heir, and a debt of months worth of magic would be torn from the recipient in an instant, likely putting the recipient into a coma from magical exhaustion until the debt was fully repaid. Furthermore, the whiplash was intended to quite violently disrupt the recipient, tearing loose any other bindings he'd cast simultaneously.

It was known to be quite dangerous to tear bindings loose in this manner. Marriages would be nullified in an instant, both any the recipient was a part of and any he'd presided over as binder. An Unbreakable Vow so untethered could form a new attachment according to the original intent of the vow at the discretion of Magic herself. Any additional leeches would compound the effects of this tearing, and any elves or other creatures bound in service to him would be freed. He'd be torn from his bonds with more sentient magics, such as his family magic or his connection to the school or ministry, and any familiar bonds would be torn loose as well.

None of these bonds would be lightly broken, and the Potter magic was practically giddy at the thought that more than one teacher could be recovering for the start of the school year.

Harry woke from the unbinding ritual just in time for Kreacher to pop him into an empty train compartment. He was shocked to learn that nearly half of his classmates had passed out unexpectedly last night, and that both the conductor and the sweets trolley witch failed to show up.

When they finally got to Hogwarts, two hours late, it was Professor Flitwick who led the first years across the lake instead of Hagrid. Professor Kettleburn was still hitching up invisible horses to the carriages as they walked up, working frantically alongside Professors Vector and Burbage.

Those four were the only professors at the high table that evening, and after a quick sorting they each led a group back to their respective dorms, promising that explanations could wait for tomorrow.

Gossip ran wild of course, and an enterprising first year Gryffindor spread a story that Harry later confirmed with his elves. The hospital wing was packed with professors and house elves, and a unit from St Mungo's had been called in automatically when the Headmaster, Deputy Headmistress, and mediwitch had all fallen unconscious last night. The unit had gathered all the fallen staff and called in the aurors to investigate, and had so far determined that a binding had been violently broken, likely by accident. The whiplash had broken the wizard's other bindings, and though everyone would make a full recovery, it was likely the professors would experience magical exhaustion for as long as several weeks depending on how severely they were bound.

The investigation hadn't revealed who it was that set off the chain reaction, though the medical unit clearly had a good idea of whose magic it was that had rebounded so violently. Dumbledore was far worse off than any of his staff were, and was likely to remain in a coma for several months. A criminal file had been opened against him, though they were unable to remove him into ministry custody until a new Headmaster could be named. Minerva McGonagall was among the hardest hit by the backlash, along with Poppy Pomfrey and Severus Snape. It would be at least three weeks before any of them would wake up, much less be capable of resuming their duties.

The Board of Governors was called in urgently to find replacements. An acting Headmaster was needed, as well as suitable teachers to take over most classes. This year's defense professor hadn't even shown up, ostensibly deciding to forego his contract upon seeing all the professors who were out.

Lucius Malfoy was appointed acting Headmaster, with Augusta Longbottom as acting Deputy. A freelance Healer was contracted as a substitute mediwizard, and other members of the Board were assigned into suitable teaching spots. The four awake, full-time professors were assigned acting Head of House duties, and the thoroughly shaken magic of Hogwarts started to settle.

She was deeply uneasy at the backlash, having noted the strain in the past few decades between her Headmaster and her duty as a school. At the moment of the backlash, every ongoing contract with every teacher had been broken, and all her house elves had been released. Even worse, she'd felt acutely the tension in her wards, warped so far from their purpose and with holes torn so large that she was on the verge of collapse. She drew her new Headmaster's attention urgently to the wards, and was relieved to hear him calling for wardmasters and aurors to follow him to her wardroom.

Usually, such an invasion would be both deeply inappropriate and highly offensive, a massive security risk to her ongoing duty to the students. However in this case she was just relieved, welcoming a dozen into her stronghold. She heard their panic at her state and urged on their messages, and soon she held well over a hundred wardmasters. As they took up her load and started to repair her, she fell into an exhausted slumber, letting the rhythm of the school days pass her by.

Days turned to weeks, and by October all but Dumbledore had been released from the Hospital Wing. With Headmistress McGonagall returned to full duty, the last of the temporary staff left. Augusta Longbottom was still the Transfiguration Professor, signing on full time in light of McGonagall's promotion. A rotation of aurors had taken the Defense spot, rotating out every two weeks.

Repairs to the wards finished and the wardmasters left, followed by a sweep of the school by a team of cursebreakers. After a couple weeks they left as well, with trunks full of cursed items and the reassurance that the curse on the defense post was broken.

A fully vested Headmistress meant that Dumbledore could finally be removed from the school, so he was remanded to the Ministry cells and fitted with the strongest of magical binding cuffs to await his trial. Many argued in his defense, but in the end the evidence was too damning. The state of the wards or the evidence of bindings would've been enough to sentence him to life in Azkaban alone. At the urging of his family magics, Harry sent anonymous evidence of Dumbledore interfering with custody arrangements and covering up child abuse as well, which resulted in at least 30 current students being placed in new homes.

When the news broke, a Black squib approached the family, formally offering to raise any Black child, should the family deem him a suitable guardian. Harry was in the middle of Potions class when it happened, and he was vaguely aware of both the offer and the family's acceptance in the back of his mind. The next thing he knew, a surge of energy washed through him and he collapsed.

He woke up to the furious face of Professor Snape, surrounded by curious students.

"What are you playing at, Potter?" he snarled, clearly furious at the interruption.

"Not Potter, Black," Harry said, still dazed. "Hercules Cygnus Black."

Malfoy choked behind him, and he saw Snape focus on him. "What do you know?"

"He's been adopted, sir, look at his face. Someone asked for him, and the Potter family magic must have given him to them."

"Well, Potter? Who adopted you?"

"Marcus Cygnus Black," Harry responded, still in a daze. Furious whispers were silenced at a glance from Snape.

"I thought he was dead," whispered Malfoy. "He hasn't been seen since he was declared a squib in 1928. He was mother's grandfather's baby brother."

"The Potter family magic gave their sole heir to a 75 year old squib, who's barely related and from a dark-aligned family to boot? And the Black family magic, tojours pur, let it happen despite the boy's mother?" Snape asked incredulously.

"Mother always said I'd be the only Black heir," Malfoy whined instead of answering him, "It was going to be just like the old stories, two perfect lineages coming together and I'd be declared Minister overnight. Not even the Dark Lord could be so perfect."

"Malfoy, cease your whining. Zabini, see Potter, er Black, to the hospital wing. Tell Healer Jordan that he's just been unexpectedly adopted and needs a full workup. Everyone else, back to your seats, there's still 20 minutes of class time left."

When he was released from the hospital wing that evening, Harry made his way directly to Professor Snape's quarters.

"Sir, do you have an open floo?"

Snape stared at him, waiting as Harry fidgeted and the pressure of the family magic got higher.

"Please, sir."

Grumbling to himself, Snape turned, leaving the door open for Harry to follow him. He pulled on robes over his night clothes and a cloak, then waved his wand to close and lock the door.

"In you go, then. Gringotts, I assume?"

"Yes, sir."

Harry tried not to show how nervous he was when he tossed the floo powder into the fire. He'd heard all about floo travel, but never actually tried it before, given his living situation. He tumbled out of the fireplace, scooting out of the way just as Professor Snape followed.

His eyes locked on an older man who was clearly a Black, surrounded by Black elves he knew. He saw Snape following as he approached, and quickly decided that pressure from the family magic plus a year surrounded by Slytherin pureblood heirs was enough excuse for him to know how to properly greet his new guardian.

After introductions were made, he put on a show of meeting and accepting each of the elves into the service of the House of Black as her official heir. Next, they met with the Black account manager, from whom Mr. Black collected special regent keys to the Black and Potter family vaults, as well as the last decade of statements. Finally, Mr. Black was presented with regent rings, with which he'd be able to vote on behalf of all Potter and Black seats in the Wizengamot.

As everyone was getting ready to go, Harry got highly uncomfortable again, squirming until he could identify what the Black family magic was trying to tell him.

"I'd like to claim Lord Riddle's seats and assets as well," he finally said, "On behalf of the deceased Mr. and Mrs. Potter as weregild, and on behalf of myself as restitution for winning an unlawfully fought duel."

A pressure started in the room, gradually growing greater until the goblin they'd been speaking to shifted and coughed. "Oh," he stated, seemingly putting together what was happening. "As Lady Magic decrees, so it will happen. Just a moment."

He left the room and the tension eased. Harry could feel Snape staring at him but he ignored him, trying to think of something to talk to his new guardian about instead. He'd nodded off before the goblin returned, with four others following him.

"Lady Magic has granted your request. Silverclaw is here to go over the Riddle holdings. Lord Riddle's vassals have also passed to your keeping. As such, Griphook, Sharpnail, and Rurock are here to discuss the Lestrange, Yaxley, Nott, Mulciber, Macnair, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle accounts."

Harry could hear Snape and Black reacting beside him, but he listened only to the Black magic, saying, "Only statements and anything needed to claim regency for now. It's late and I think we're all tired." The goblins nodded and started summoning account statements. Harry felt another pull and asked, "Is this only their wizarding assets? Is there someone else to talk to about any muggle or black market holdings? Who should we talk to about ICW and non-ICW foreign holdings? And…the Dumbledore case. I'm one of many unpaid claimants owed restitution from the Dumbledore and Ministry accounts."

The air grew thick again, waiting for a response. "Maybe we'd best get a barrister?" Mr. Black asked, shifting uncomfortably. "You're owed for the Ministry's private use of the Potter cottage at Godric's Hollow I believe, in addition to the other claims. Shall we let the details be settled in court?"

The air shifted, as though considering a response, and Harry said, "Yes, I believe so. As long as all relevant parties are notified of the restitution claim and change in vassal loyalty, the Wizengamot seats are claimed, and the weregild and restitution payments are started I think that's enough for tonight."

The air settled again, and there was an audible sigh of relief. Mr. Black packed up all the statements and the goblins left. Harry and Snape made their way to the floo, and Mr. Black promised to look everything over, hire a barrister, and write with any news or immediate concerns.

Back in Snape's quarters, he said, "Black, a word?"

"Yes, sir?"

At Snape's gesture he settled onto the couch, and Snape took an armchair. Tea popped onto the coffee table, and they each prepared a cup.

"You seem unusually attuned to the Black family magic."

"I'm not sure how unusual it is sir, but it's pretty loud if you're listening right."

"I'd have thought you'd be more attuned to the Potter magics. Or possibly Evans."

"No, sir. The Potter magics were absorbed as a Black vassal the night my parents died. A couple years later, the House of Black declared my muggle guardians unfit, and she raised me herself as sole heir to her proper Lord."

"She?"

"The House of Black. My family magic, sir."

"That's highly unusual."

"Yes sir. She was most distraught when no other suitable guardians stepped forward to claim me. The elves did their best but she knew I'd have, erm, social difficulties being raised in total isolation."

"Did the muggles not report you missing? Who did the Ministry think was raising you?"

"I'm not sure, sir. We, that is the family and I, decided to keep things quiet at first, let things play out. That is, to get first hand knowledge of the political situation and such. No enemies, no promises, stand out as little as possible until we got a better idea of things. Well, that was the plan at least."

"You realize this will create quite a stir don't you? Four of your five roommates have probably already noticed that they're now your vassals but they don't know why, and you've quite firmly declared yourself and all the the House of Black as a party both wronged by the Dark Lord and in direct opposition to his goals."

"Good. I mean, that's kinda the point, sir. Maybe they didn't know it was a Black they'd wronged at the time, but nobody should be surprised that Harry Potter was wronged by Voldemort or that he's in direct opposition to Voldemort."

"And the Ministry?"

"They've already sentenced Dumbledore, the rest are relatively minor offenses. Negligence for the guardian thing and they return my house to me and I think we're square…no wait Sirius Black needs a trial too. Then we're square."

"Sirius Black needs a trial?"

"Yes, he was waiting for one in Azkaban when things went crazy after the war, then a combination of bribery and incompetence misplaced his papers and they forgot to give him one. Don't worry, sir, he's quite mad. He can't claim the lordship, so my guardian will still be regent until I come of age." Harry paused, lost in thought for a moment. "The Black magic is unsettled at the blood feud between you and our brothers, Sirius Black and James Potter. The extant Unbreakable Vow and acknowledged life debt are a strain as well. The family would like to settle the feud and all extant debts, from Severus Snape and any family he claims to the House of Black and any family we claim, including offenses committed by the Marauder brothers as a whole. We can offer standard weregild in recompense, or if there's something specific you desire, we will negotiate to offer it to you."

Snape was silent for a moment, then coughed and asked, "You are qualified to negotiate on behalf of the House of Black?"

"Not as such. The family makes her will known and I can put it into words to translate for you. We can invite my guardian to be present for negotiations if that would make you more comfortable, though as a squib and long exiled from the House of Black he has difficulty hearing her desires. Or we can have our Head Elf present for negotiations. I've found he listens best to the will of the family. He usually handles all our purchasing, contracts, and any goblin affairs."

"I see. Let's schedule a meeting then. Your guardian should be there for propriety, and your elf to speak on behalf of the family. To whom should I address the request?"

"The House of Black. An elf can deliver it directly if it's properly sealed and addressed."

"Alright then. Goodnight Mr. Black. I'll try to schedule the meeting for this weekend."

"Yes, sir."

***

Saturday morning, Harry woke with a groan and saw that he had just 30 minutes to get ready for the meeting with Snape. He was clean and presentable and thankfully not late for the meeting, but he was not happy to be missing breakfast.

"Sit down with us, Mr. Black," Snape called as Harry entered his private quarters. "We were just starting."

Once everyone was settled with a cup of tea, Kreacher took the lead.

"The House of Black is offering restitution to settle the blood feud between Severus Snape and our sons, Sirius Black and James Potter. Furthermore, we wish to settle any grievances on behalf of the Marauders as a whole. As the injured party, you may begin with a request that may or may not be sufficient to your claim, or you may begin by listing your grievances."

"The House of Prince hears this offer and is willing to negotiate to settle our personal blood feud. May Lady Magic judge the worth of my claim to the extant Potter potions journals and patents."

As at the bank, a tension rose in the room, and Kreacher seemed to be listening intently.

"The House of Black offers rights to all extant Black potions patents, as well as copies but not originals of Black potions journals, and first rights to potions ingredients but not cauldrons, ladles, or other paraphernalia currently in any Black vault or estate, or in those of our vassals. In addition, the House of Black offers full ownership of one business, house, or storefront not to exceed the value of one 4 bedroom cottage in the country, or one Diagon Alley storefront with attached 2 bedroom flat."

When Kreacher stopped talking, the weight in the air seemed expectant.

"When you say Black patents, Black ingredients, and copies of Black potions journals, does this include the Potter patents, ingredients, and journals?"

"Yes, it includes all living and dead vassal families of the House of Black, as well as those families we have absorbed over the years."

"The House of Prince accepts the settlement from the House of Black."

"The House of Black will notify Gringotts of the settlement. Potions patents will be transferred directly from our vaults and those of our vassals to the family vault of the House of Prince. Same with the copies of Black journals. Ingredient inventories for your perusal will be prepared and sent to you, as will a list of properties and businesses that meet our agreement. You will have one month from the date of receiving the inventory to select what you wish to take ownership of. If no existing Black properties meet your needs, then we will reopen negotiations and select something suitable to buy. Is this acceptable?"

"Yes, and I'd like the storefront if possible, in any British shopping district with sufficient foot traffic not dominated by students. With no tenants."

"Of course. There exists a 2 bedroom flat and storefront on Diagon, and it has long been a Black family property. Do you need further details or should we have the deed transferred as is with the patents and journal copies?"

"I don't need to see it, if it's empty I think I know which storefront it is. I'll just need to clean it up and hire some people. Since the bonds broke, I'm no longer obligated to teach, so I'd like to open an apothecary after the school year ends. Do you know if the flat is furnished?"

"I believe it is, but I can send along a detailed listing of the property with photos. The House of Black would like to offer to invest in your business as well, both in the spirit of mending the rift in our families, and as a business decision because Slug and Jiggers is a disgrace."

"I see. Send along a contract and we can negotiate. I'll need to hold off on a decision until I've spoken with a solicitor and an accountant, and gone through the journals and ingredients that'll be available."

"As you will. We hold negotiations through Gringotts, so you'll hear from us. Let's write and sign the terms of the ended blood feud, and we can go from there."

Kreacher wrote out the terms, and Snape and Black signed it. When they shook hands, the magic of the room settled dramatically, and it looked like Snape had shaken off over a decade of his age. Kreacher cocked his head as if listening, then said, "The Malfoys will offer settlement to the Weasleys as well, and the Macnairs to the Abbots. That should settle any vassal blood feuds not already addressed by weregild or public legal proceedings."

"Is it truly just to carry the feud of one generation into the next? The Malfoy-Weasley feud has been ongoing for centuries, how can either side hope to pay for that? What about the Lestranges, why not offer payment to Longbottom as well?" asked Snape.

"The Lestranges were tried and are in prison for their crimes, including those against the Longbottom family, so the score is settled there by the law of this land. As to the justice of carrying a feud into the next generation, the answer is complicated. You were grievously wronged and victim to a severe miscarriage of justice, which the family had both the means and the will to rectify. If you'd forgiven Potter upon his death and not taken it out on his son then maybe that would've been enough, but maybe not. As with the Malfoy-Weasley feud, it was your choice to carry the insult into the next generation, whereupon a new feud was building. These things tend to grow with time, not weaken, but it is certainly not in the best interest of the House of Black for our vassal to engage in an ongoing blood feud with our ally. The sooner it is mended, the better."

"Very well, is there anything else we need to discuss?" asked Professor Snape.

Kreacher shook his head no and departed with Mr. Black, and then Harry left as well.

***

The next morning at breakfast, Harry was approached by a furious Malfoy on one side, and all five current Weasley students on the other. They yelled at both each other and Harry until he stood up on the table and made a crack of thunder so strong it shook the walls.

"Enough! The House of Black cannot have its vassal at war with its ally. If you cannot enter negotiations for a peace in good faith, you will both lose all Black investments and political support and you both will be publicly shunned as an enemy of the House of Black. In this case, both parties are injured and both have done grievous wrong. The starting point of negotiations will be for you both to undo the bloodline curses you cast, and a promise from each family to never cast them again. The adults have done worse to each other, but as it stands the only injury either of you can claim are harsh words and minor hexes. This is easily mended. You aren't required to like each other or socialize together, only to behave civilly."

They stared at each other in tense fury until Percy stated formally, "The children of the House of Weasley are willing to negotiate."

"The heir of House Malfoy is willing to negotiate," Malfoy finally replied, spitting it out as though it was physically painful to say.

The next weekend, negotiations were held for both feuds, with Harry, Mr. Black, and Kreacher attending as mediators between their vassals and allies.

In the end, the Malfoys and Weasleys agreed to return a long list of books and artifacts that had been stolen on either side, which had proven useless as their respective family magics refused to work for their sworn enemy. The Weasleys lifted the infertility curse that had been placed on the Malfoys in the 1850s, and the Malfoys lifted the poverty curse they'd placed on the Weasleys in retaliation. Both sides agreed to civil words and to cease attacks on each other's reputations. They had each come with a far longer list of grievances and demands, but eventually Mr. Black stood with the weight of the House of Black behind him and declared the matter settled and even. Neither was happy, of course, but they still signed and the matter was settled.

The Abbott-Macnair negotiations were similar. Theft, curses, and sabotage had plagued the families for centuries, though a curious result of the war was that the living members of both families had scarcely met in the recent generation, much less put an effort into antagonizing each other. Similar to the other settlement, they broke their respective bloodline curses with the promise never to cast them again, returned stolen property, and agreed to speak civilly about and to each other.

Harry returned to the castle exhausted that night, and was surprised to see a headline the next morning about the settlements. The accompanying article had a surprising amount of detail, making Harry wonder who the leak had been.

***

Harry was excited to go home to Grimmauld that Christmas. Mr. Black worked with Kreacher and the portraits to try and recall what the holidays had been like in his childhood, and he dragged Harry into long hours of traditional rituals and decorating. The rest of the break he spent getting up to speed with his new properties and vassals from Lord Riddle.

It had been months, and he still kept finding new properties and businesses formerly belonging to either Lord Riddle or his vassals. Several parties had since come forward claiming to be owed payment for wrongdoing by Lord Riddle, but in each case Harry's claim held out as both the most grievously wronged party and the one who saw the least justice from the legal system.

He pushed for settlements between his other allied parties as he learned of burgeoning blood feuds, and had started feeling out the family magic about how to wield the family's combined political weight in the Wizengamot.

Offers for marriage and business contracts started being sent to the House of Black as well, and Mr. Black had started making some tentative adjustments to the investment strategy of the family's wealth. The loss of income from ongoing potions patents was far larger than Harry had expected, and the resulting loss of tithe from the Riddle vassals was even more considerable.

Mr. Black brought Harry with him to his first Wizengamot meeting that break, where Harry formally declared Mr. Black his regent, and Mr. Black claimed 20 seats on behalf of his house and his vassals. There was uproar among the lords when they heard, but Lady Magic substantiated the claim and there was nothing to be done.

They'd discussed Mr. Black's strategy ahead of this first meeting, namely to provide a new leader for the Dark faction to follow in the absence of Lord Riddle, but also to be grey enough on certain issues to be palatable to the Light faction in the absence of Dumbledore.

The Light claimed to support creature and muggleborn rights while consistently voting to oppose them, but it would be easy enough for the new Black block to vote in support of both. Similarly, the Light claimed to stay out of family matters and claimed that any healing potion or spell could be deemed beneficial and given permission for professional use by the Ministry, but Mr. Black and his barrister had compiled a list of over 100 treatments legal in other jurisdictions that were banned as Dark Arts in Britain. Removing the ban on Dark Arts had long been a major goal of the Dark faction, and the House of Black approved of getting it reapproved piecemeal for now.

Curiously, the formerly Riddle vassals stayed in their seats and pretended to vote as usual, despite their vassal contracts clearly stating that their votes, titles, and property were his to use as he saw fit. It seemed that nobody was counting too closely, relying on the magic of the Ministry herself to keep track of the votes and call the outcome.

More curiously, the day after that Wizengamot meeting, Lords Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle owled to ask for a meeting with the House of Black. They met at Grimmauld, with the three Lords representing themselves, and Mr. Black, Harry, and Kreacher representing the House of Black.

They'd come to negotiate a collective release from their vassal bonds, as apparently losing their votes was a step too far in a way that forfeiting patents and ingredients was not. Unfortunately, their original vassal agreements with Lord Riddle were quite permanent.

Kreacher explained that as they had willingly sworn themselves in their entirety to Riddle, there was nothing that could release the current Lords from that relationship. However, as the next generation hadn't sworn yet, they could take a step away by refusing the family vassal oaths when they come of age. As for ownership of their property and vaults, the House of Black would only be able to give them back in trade or as payment for a great service equal in value, for something that rests outside the expectations of a vassal. The House of Black expressed no intention of giving up the Wizengamot seats, however, as rightful payment for grievous injury to her heir. Kreacher suggested that the topic be revisited upon the naming of new Lords unsworn to the House of Black, as maybe her grievance with their respective houses would be lessened by then.

With the formal claiming and settling of her grievance with the House of Riddle, the House of Black had fully absorbed the Riddle family magics into her whole, and she was eager to learn of what new gifts she could bestow on her family.

From the Riddle squib line, she saw a peculiar kind of financial literacy and investment intuition that suited itself well to both muggles and squibs, explaining how they had remained remarkably solvent through the Great Depression. There was also a minor drive towards self-sufficiency, of the sort to ensure that the family's food was grown themselves, on land they owned outright. The House of Black eagerly passed these gifts on to her regent, knowing they would serve him well.

A second gift she found came most recently from the Gaunt line, and was the relatively rare talent of a born fluency in parseltongue. This talent was ubiquitous in the Gaunt line, and went hand in hand with both the power to command snakes to do one's bidding and a variable talent for parselmagics.

Upon learning of this talent, the House of Black dug through the current owl-order catalogs, as well as the listings of her properties and vassals, searching for books she could now add to her family library. The most fruitful listings were from a Dutch dwarf clan that specialized in liquidized estate auctions, and an Indian community whose library was being sold off. The House of Black bought the entirety of both estates in hopes that estates with so many books written in parseltongue would also come with artifacts enchanted with parselmagics, so her heir could study them, and the hope that some of the accompanying journals and books would touch on these subjects as well.

The House of Black was less enthused about the unassisted flight and mind magic talents of the House of Riddle, as she saw little reason brooms or apparition wouldn't be perfectly suitable for any travel needs.

The House of Black already had a rather substantial talent for mind magics even before Riddle's, as it was a minor talent in several lesser houses that she'd absorbed over the years. She could bestow any number of largely overlapping talents to her sons and daughters, from an innate talent for leglimency or occlumency, to perfect motor, visual, or verbal recall, to resistance to veritaserum or the imperius, the confundus or obliviation. There was even a talent that imparted an echo of the memories of one's recent blood ancestors, the use of which had set off the first case of the now infamous Black madness.

When Harry returned to school, he was buzzing with excitement about the family’s newfound talents, and had brought copies with him of books in parselscript that the family thought he should read first. Now that he was aware of the talent, he occasionally caught whispers in the walls that he was sure came from a snake.

Classes resumed and Harry's vassals retained a cool but furious demeanor. Mostly they knew better than to obviously attack him or try to sabotage his work, but Malfoy had to be reminded several times that he would be wise not to start another blood feud on behalf of his house.

By April things were still tense, and the whispers in the walls were getting both more frequent and more violent. The House of Black had no specific memories of a snake in the walls of Hogwarts, but a couple of books in the new parseltongue section of her library described both the existence of the Chamber of Secrets and that Slytherin had left a monster in it to protect the school.

Defense was still being taught by a rotation of aurors, who were mostly acceptable teachers. All except for Auror Proudfoot, who was visibly ill. He arrived in mid-April, pale and shaky and barely able to string a coherent sentence together, much less teach a class. His arrival coincided with a series of messages written in blood, petrifications of blood traitors, and the disappearance of three mudblood students in quick succession.

Auror Proudfoot had been arrested before the end of his two weeks, though rumor among the students was that he'd claimed to have no knowledge of the attacks when questioned.

After he left, Harry found a diary someone had tried to flush down the toilet in a girl's bathroom. He took it back to his dorm with him, and was shocked at the strong forbidding feeling he got from the family magic when he tried to write in it. He called for Kreacher, who conjured a lead box lined in silk, then floated the diary into the box and popped away without explaining anything.

Unfortunately the attacks didn't stop after Auror Proudfoot's arrest, and the snake in the walls sounded more and more agitated.

By mid-May, Harry was pretty sure the monster was a basilisk. He was rather upset at the failure of both the school and the aurors to either find the beast or stop the attacks, and so he'd decided to investigate it himself.

He was poking around in the bathroom where he'd found the diary, when he saw a small snake carved into the faucet of a sink that didn't work. When he hissed open, a door swung open, and Harry hopped in the passageway to investigate.

He found the chamber to be just as dirty and damp as he expected a sewer to be, and periodically he hissed open again to unlock various doors. He found a library, sleeping and living quarters, a potions lab, and what looked like a kind of experimental bestiary with a variety of animals Harry thought extinct all sleeping in a form of stasis. There was even a room that looked like a giant nest that was scattered with a variety of different eggs.

Not seeing the beast, Harry finally returned to the main chamber and addressed the large statue saying, The Heir of Slytherin demands an audience with Salazar's monster.

Several of the carvings of snakes scattered throughout the chamber seemed to awaken at that, hissing demands for proof of his status and stating their offense at his lack of decorum and respect. Eventually the statue's mouth opened, and Harry hurriedly shut his eyes when he heard a large snake moving inside.

Harry tried commanding the snake to stop killing, tried to reason with it, tried to offer it food or gifts or another home. It was utterly mad unfortunately after so many centuries alone, and eventually it became clear that Harry would need to kill it.

He'd already been led on a blind chase throughout the chamber through their “talk”, as the basilisk fixated on its need to kill the intruder and seemed incapable of any other thoughts. Eventually Harry cried out for help, and was surprised when he felt the sorting hat fall on his head a moment later.

Ignoring the hat's inane prattle about how his courage and valor would've served him well in Gryffindor, Harry took off the hat and drew the Sword of Gryffindor from it. The next time the beast tried to eat him, Harry stood his ground and let the Sword guide his hand into its mouth and through its brain.

Harry felt woozy and frowned at the scratches the basilisk had left on him. His forehead felt even worse, he didn't remember getting stabbed there.

As he collapsed, he saw a black cloud emerge from his forehead, and the last thing he heard before passing out was an inhuman shriek.

***

He awoke to chaos.

He was in the Hospital Wing again, wounds bandaged up, sword and hat in his lap, and a very smug looking phoenix sitting in the side table and chirping at anyone who got too close. Mr. Black and Kreacher were there, as were Professors Snape and McGonagall, and Madam Pomfrey.

The Blacks were arguing that the artifacts were rightfully won by the House of Black in battle, while Headmistress McGonagall argued that they were the school's property, left to the Heir of Gryffindor, to defend the students in their hour of need. Professor Snape was snarling under his breath about how foolish boys who go looking for trouble shouldn't be rewarded for the messes they create, and Madam Pomfrey was trying to force everyone out so Harry could rest.

Harry shifted as he woke up, and when the room had quieted, Kreacher spoke with a voice that he knew was the will of the House of Black, supported by Harry's memories of the event which were available now that he had awakened.

"Heir Black entered the Chamber of Secrets this evening in his capacity as Heir Slytherin, to bargain with the beast below the school. When he failed to negotiate a peace, the hat and sword appeared to Heir Black in his capacity as Heir Gryffindor, to defend the students. He slew the beast, and was brought out of the Chamber by Gryffindor's phoenix. The House of Black is willing to keep her hat, sword, and phoenix at the school along with any other Gryffindor artifacts necessary for the protection of the students on indefinite loan, with the understanding that these are property of the House of Black, not of Hogwarts herself nor her Headmistress nor any future Heads."

"Agreed," said McGonagall, pursing her lips as though tasting something unpleasant.

"The House of Black claims sole ownership over both the Chamber of Secrets and all its contents to do with as she pleases. Furthermore, the House of Black requests a knighthood or modern equivalent bestowed on our heir by Hogwarts or the British Ministry or an equivalent organization in recognition of the service our heir provided to an entire generation of students and staff."

"Agreed, so long as we have your word that no further danger to the students or Britain will come from the Chamber or the former House of Slytherin," McGonagall replied.

"The basilisk is deceased now. My regent and my heir will need to conduct a thorough search of the Chamber and renew its wards, but we can promise such by the end of summer."

"That is acceptable then. Will the House of Black testify in the case of Auror Proudfoot?"

"We will," Harry cut in. "Have they checked him for nonstandard possession or magical bindings yet?"

"I'm unsure…" McGonagall checked with Snape and Pomphrey with a look. "Not to my knowledge, but I can pass along the suggestion. His colleagues and family insisted that his behavior was wildly out of character for him, but they found no suitable explanation for it. He wasn't under an imperius or any standard potions or compulsion spells, and it certainly wasn't a standard possession by spirit or demon."

"No, he foolishly mishandled a cursed object he acquired during the sweep at the beginning of this year. It is an object made by one of the most vile dark rituals in existence, one which contributed to Lord Voldemort's purported immortality. The House of Black will only testify privately about the nature of the object with oaths in place to prevent both knowledge of such objects reaching the public, and to discourage future attempts to create them."

"I see. I'd like to request to be present for this testimony then, and I believe Professor Snape would like to be present as well."

After that, things got quieter. Pomphrey was able to usher out Snape and McGonagall, and she declared Harry to be healing as well as could be expected. Mr. Black and Kreacher stayed with him, even selecting neighboring cots to sleep in each night until Harry was released.

Days slipped by and soon the end of year exams were upon them again. Teams of wardmasters and cursebreakers had been let into the Chamber to ensure the future safety of the students, and Harry, Mr. Black, and Kreacher had each explored the Chamber thoroughly, touching each scroll and egg and object with their hands or magic so that the House of Black could add their impressions and contents to her library for study.

The eggs were identified as being from a variety of presumed extinct species, mostly of snakes, though a couple were dragon eggs as well. The family was thrilled that over half of her new books were in parselscript, and that everything from the journals to the spell books was in such excellent condition.

Once the wards were secure, the House of Black hired a team of magizoologists and dragon tamers to make recommendations about the animals in the chamber. The basilisk corpse had been harvested of course, and its shed skins collected, but the rest of the animals were alive, presumably sane, and presumably safe to study while they remained in hibernation.

It took the family until midsummer to remind Harry and Mr. Black that the basilisk parts should be offered to former Professor Snape as part of their agreement. They'd worked out an investment contract for his apothecary, and their first visit in late July showed that it was already doing well.

When offered to schedule a tour of the chamber so he could select his ingredients, the magic nudged them to offer more. Mr. Black explained how they'd been working with the animal teams to identify and study the creatures left in the chamber, and how the House of Black had offered to welcome one of their number as her child, so she could gift them parseltongue to assist in their studies.

The sheer envy on Snape's face was obvious, so Mr. Black carefully worded an offer to welcome him into the family as well.

There were several kinds of relationships that would give Snape autonomous access to the chamber and also allow the House of Black to gift him one or more of her talents. She could name him a vassal, or her child's brother, which would allow him to keep a full hold on his existing family magic and name. She could tie him to the family to mimic a marriage bond, though she had no suitable spouse to offer. She could fully adopt him as her son, likely naming her regent as Snape's new father, and fully melding his magics into the family.

In the end, he chose adoption, along with Charlie, formerly Weasley and Rolf, formerly Scamander from the dragon and creature teams, respectively. The House of Black was thrilled to be able to put family in charge of her treasures, and was far more willing to see her dragon eggs or basilisk liver removed from the chamber for study knowing that they were still in the hands of family. She was quite thrilled that all the profit from her potion patents was now back in the family, as well.

Sirius Black finally had his trial that summer, and after a formal apology and a token payment for harm done, he was released. Luckily, the Ministry paid for his treatment at St. Mungo's. When he was well enough to return home, Kreacher hired him a new nurse elf and the family kept close watch on him.

In the interest of not restarting the blood feud with their new brother, the elves actively steered Sirius and Severus away from each other, and Mr. Black made sure they both knew to keep their distance as well.

Severus largely abandoned his new apothecary to be run by his employees after his adoption, spending all his time in the Chamber's potion lab exploring the regenerative properties of basilisk liver. By November of Harry's third year, he had a cancer cure ready for patenting. He worked with Rolf (formerly Scamander) to get it approved for international use, then impressed upon him the vital importance of basilisk ingredients being available for ongoing harvesting.

To the end, Rolf and Charlie bought out a Romanian dragon refuge, bringing the Chamber's eggs out of hibernation one by one to hatch there. They added neighboring properties for their new snake habitats, thus becoming the world's only XXXXX snake breeding program.

Harry's third year was mostly uneventful, except for a strange meeting he witnessed between Professor Trelawney and Severus. Severus had emerged from the Chamber to go home for the night, covered in runespoor blood from his experiments that day. He ran into Trelawney as he rounded a corner, getting the blood all over her face and hands.

She fell into a trance at that point, and her voice got harsh and strange as she said something in Severus' ear. After a couple minutes she seemed to come back to herself and left.

Severus returned to his furious studying at that point, finally presenting the Conference of International Expert Diviners and Fortunetellers with his powdered extract of runespoor blood to aid their Sight into the past, present, and future.

Fourth year started with a lot of excitement over the Triwizard Tournament, though Charlie was rather furious at the misuse of nesting mother dragons. He and Rolf had started publishing a steady stream of papers and books on their studies of snakes and related creatures, by that point. Recently, Charlie had started insisting that he could almost make out what the newly hatched wyverns were saying, only their accent is too thick.

The family had bought out several more parseltongue estates in the few years since they'd learned of the talent, and largely agreed with his assessment. They'd been on the lookout for any books out of China that appeared similar but different to parselscript to help in their studies, or even better, they hoped to invite a witch or wizard with the talent to join the family through adoption or marriage.

The House of Black was furious when Harry's name came out of the goblet as a fourth champion. Harry forced a hole in the Hogwarts wards so Kreacher and Mr. Black could join him, and he and Kreacher took turns casting diagnostics on the goblet and parchment while Mr. Black tried to argue with the judges for another champion to be chosen instead of his heir.

Aurors were called as well, and eventually they turned over evidence that the goblet had been confounded, as well as the list of names of people who had touched the parchment with Harry's name on it. Mr. Crouch was arrested, and Professor Moody was taken in for questioning as well when he started acting shifty.

It was announced that the goblet required a champion from her fourth school, but that anyone could enter their name to compete for that school. Unfortunately for Harry, when the names were drawn again the next day, he was still chosen as the fourth champion.

Moody never returned to teaching when the aurors found out that he was actually Mr. Crouch's supposedly dead Death Eater son. The aurors took Crouch Jr's veritaserum testimony about Voldemort's plan to return seriously (especially in light of the horcrux testimony they'd heard just over a year prior), and there was a unit of aurors set to guard the school at all times. During the tasks the guard tripled, keeping a close eye on the champions.

The House of Black was grudgingly happy that the Ministry had so forcefully declared her heir a legal adult. He could still use a regent, especially while in school, but he was able to immediately claim both his titles and full ownership of his Wizengamot seats, which would make them much harder to remove from either Harry or the House of Black in the future.

She was also quietly excited for the opportunity for her heir to prove his strength. Her sons would work together of course to teach him what he'd need to know for the tasks, but he'd be alone for the actual doing of the thing.

She filed a grievance formally against the House of Crouch, against the father for imprisoning her son without a trial in a severe miscarriage of justice, and against the son for an admitted attempt to murder her underage heir and return his bloodsworn enemy to fight him.

When the case was settled, the House of Black offered half the Crouch estate to the House of Longbottom in a gesture of goodwill, acknowledging that her rightful grievance against Heir Crouch had not been property paid when he escaped his prison sentence.

Everyone came home for a proper family Christmas this year, and even Sirius and Severus managed to be in the same room for a couple hours without killing each other.

The second and third tasks went as expected, and Harry reflected again and again that the advice of his family on dealing with XXXXX creatures had been invaluable. Somehow the auror team failed to recognize that the cup was indeed a portkey as in the original plan Crouch Jr. described, so Harry was whisked off to an unknown graveyard upon touching it.

The House had prepared for this possibility. Harry broke his emergency charm, which should've portkeyed him to Grimmauld if a ward wasn't up. It was enchanted to automatically alert the aurors of his location and that he'd called for help, and it was sending continuous updates to the family as well. It was based on tokens the dragon tamers brought with them to care for the most dangerous species, and sent continual updates on the wearers physical health, any spells cast on them, plus a name and magical signature of the caster, any injuries obtained from a magical creature, plus the identity of the creature, and the identity of whose orders it was following, if applicable. Copies would appear to a list of emergency contacts, both on paper and as a stream of constantly updating impressions, and data from such charms had been accepted as evidence in international courts for decades.

Harry suspected that since his portkey didn't work, his contacts wouldn't find it easy to apparate to his location either. He tried to get a sense of his location, and recognized the distinctive feel of the Riddle family magic. It seemed to poke at him curiously, as though unsure how he could be both hers and another family's.

He struggled to get free of his bonds as Pettigrew conducted some necromantic ritual on the shriveled body of Voldemort. He rose from the cauldron and started some rant about how awesome his powers were.

In the meantime, Harry called desperately for the House of Black to aid him. When it became obvious she couldn't hear him, Harry turned to the House of Riddle instead. He explained what Magic herself had given him in restitution for the wrongs done by her house. He explained that the House of Black had been searching for Riddle properties for years now, welcoming them into the family and celebrating their gifts.

He told the House of Riddle about his squib regent who had been using the Riddle gift of finance to better the family and fix years of neglect to the accounts. He talked about the House of Black's adopted sons, who were using her gift of parseltongue to study her kin and share the knowledge with the greater wizard community. He talked about the great efforts the House of Black had made to buy up every book on parselmagics or in parseltongue that existed, to add to her famous library, and how she was searching for the right child to add to her family the gift of dragon speak, as well.

Harry explained the discovery of the Chamber of Secrets, and how the House of Black treasured these priceless artifacts, and how she'd treated them with the utmost care and respect. He showed her the treatment of her vassals, and how everyone had benefited from the end of pointless blood feuds. He told her of his upbringing as heir, and how the House of Black had taught him to respect muggles and to blend in with them, and how he'd been taught to keep a polite distance.

Harry's rapid discussion with the House of Riddle ended about when Voldemort's villain speech did. Voldemort called for his followers, tossed Harry his wand, and demanded a duel. He raised his wand and Harry wished vehemently for a way out.

"Fight me, you coward!" screamed Voldemort, clearly just as insane as he'd been in Harry's first year when they met.

"The House of Black does not recognize a formal challenge from her sworn enemy, the House of Riddle. Lady Magic, I have no wish to be here, nor to fight, and I've already been granted payment in the form of restitution and weregild for the unjust insistence of the House of Riddle to continue this blood feud. I ask that Lady Magic lend her judgement to the matter so it may be ended permanently."

A crack of thunder sounded, and half the Death Eaters summoned collapsed. Voldemort collapsed as well, shrieking and waving his wand about. Cracks sounded and it was clear the apparition and portkey wards had fallen. Harry felt his family arrive, then saw a swarm of red cloaked aurors.

Harry stayed where he was, kneeling on the ground, comforting the House of Riddle as it died, and welcoming its talents and magics into the House of Black. It turned out that Lady Magic had acted on his intent, rendering Voldemort and his followers squibs unless they were present unwillingly. Even Lord Malfoy was spared given the circumstances, though he'd made it clear he had no particular loyalty to either Harry or the House of Black.

Everyone was questioned and Voldemort and his Death Eaters were arrested. The House of Riddle insisted that Mr. Black stay for a tour of the grounds before he went, so he obliged the House and took Kreacher with him.

Severus worked on Harry's injured arm and leg as they waited, and he filled in his family on both what happened and the impressions he'd gotten from the House of Riddle. The family returned to Grimmauld for the night together, and in the morning Charlie escorted Harry back to Hogwarts.

He was declared the champion, Voldemort was declared dead for good this time, and Cedric was still alive with barely a scratch on him.

***

The rest of Harry's years at Hogwarts flew by with far less fuss. Harry negotiated an investment contract with the Weasley twins to kick off their joke shop business, and later invested in Colin Creevey's photography as well as his brother's journalism to enable them to start a new paper.

Harry became the first Defense professor to stick around longer than a year in over 50 years. Eventually he managed to convince his parents' friend Remus Lupin to replace Professor Binns as the History Professor, and Severus eventually recommended a suitable replacement as Potions Professor as well.

The House of Black found her dragon speaker, and shared the gift with Charlie and his spouse, and with Rolf who eventually married Luna Lovegood. The House was especially thrilled to add her to the family when she discovered that Luna was the Heir of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff.

With heirs to all four Hogwarts Houses in her family, the House of Black was able to appoint Harry as Headmaster, where he brought back all kinds of courses that Arcturus Black I had told him about as a child. Spellcrafting and warding and enchanting were added back to the electives list, and eventually well-supervised courses in rituals, the Dark Arts, and healing were added, as well.

The Riddle part of the family magics were indignant at all the useless subjects taught, so eventually literature, maths, muggle history, and the natural sciences were taught at Hogwarts as well, at just as high a caliber as any other boarding school in Great Britain would teach them. When her first student was accepted to Oxford for university after graduation, the family magics preened to an extent that muggle subjects were always taught thereafter.

Severus never married, but quickly made a name for himself by creating potions with impossible-sounding uses and requiring XXXXX creature parts, some long thought to be extinct. He cured incurable diseases, published another dozen uses of dragon's blood on top of Dumbledore's famous list, and even invented and released countercurses for some of the worst curses in existence.

Harry eventually married a former quidditch player, who took over as the Hogwarts flying instructor when Madam Hooch retired. He kept up the practice of adopting new members into the House of Black, sharing his family's gifts and establishing new Black families at their long-abandoned estates around the globe.

The House of Black watched as her family grew, fingers reaching into each major industry, her sons and daughters teaching new wix, leaders in their fields, and inventing new magics, and she was happy.