Awakening || Harry & Hermione

Chapter 12.3

He took out a letter from his robes and handed it to Harry. "What I'm about to say next concerns your vaults and your parents' will. If you would like to be alone for that—"

"Hermione stays," Harry interrupted, reaching out and grabbing her hand.

"Well." Flitwick looked at their grasped hands and cleared his throat. "You once said that since wizarding society forced you to participate in a tournament only for adults, you should have been allowed the status and benefits of an adult to go with it. The good news is that we goblins are a reasonable lot: the moment you fought in the first task as an adult, you were given adult status in their eyes and all the rights along with it. For example, you are no longer restricted to your student trust account and have full control over the Potter Vault and all Potter Estates."

Harry's head spun with the possibilities of this revelation. The Potter Vault—would he finally be able to hold some of his mother and father's belongings in his hands? Have tangible proof of the people they had been? The Potter Estates—would he finally have a home?

"The bad news is," Flitwick jolted Harry out of his thoughts. "That your vaults, your investments, and your estates have been left to gather dust. Usually, you would have a legal guardian to manage your accounts and keep everything in order until you're old enough to do it yourself, but... well, let us just say your guardian took the 'hands off' approach to another level. Oh, there was no interference of the sort, but it has been... quite forgotten. Even if you do wish to visit the Potter Manor, it will likely be in a state of disarray."

Forgotten. Just like he had been all those years at the Dursleys. Forgotten.

"And then, there is the matter of your parents' will. Mind you, I have no authority to read into the details of your account nor the will. I only know general information by making use of my connections and asking a limited number of 'yes or no' questions. The first question I asked was if your muggle relatives were on the list of people you were supposed to go to according to the will. The answer," he sighed, ''was a no."

"What?" Harry said. "Then why was I put there? Who—"

"Dumbledore," Hermione said quietly. "He was the legal guardian, wasn't he?"

"Correct," Flitwick said, appraising her curiously.

Hermione looked down at the ground. "There's something I haven't told you yet, Harry. I went to ask Dumbledore yesterday if we could find a better place for you to stay during the summer. I know I might have been overstepping my bounds again, but I was worried sick at the thought of you with those horrible relatives—especially after everything you'd been through—"

"Hermione—" Harry placed a hand on her shoulders, "—I'm not angry."

"You aren't?"

"Why would I be? This is the first time anyone's cared enough to try and stop me from going back to that hell hole. The first time anyone's even considered an alternative." He squeezed her shoulder gratefully. "Thank you."

Her expression turned crestfallen. "Well, I didn't manage to do much for you in the end. I was turned down. The headmaster seemed to think that the Dursleys were the only option for you. I asked him how he could say that considering how terribly you're treated there. And—he didn't even ask what I meant by that—he just launched into a speech about how he knew that when he left you on your aunt and uncle's doorstep, he knew he was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years. But that, due to your mother's blood protection, it was the best place for you to be safe."

"Safe? Safe?" Harry couldn't help but laugh. Flitwick and Hermione looked at him with concern but once he started, he couldn't stop. I was safe all right, he thought hysterically. Safe in that dark, small cupboard. So safe that no one would know whether I lived or died.

"If he sent me there to be safe," Harry said in a raspy voice once he could finally stop laughing, "then why did he never check for himself? Not once in ten years! He just—just resigned himself to the fact that I would be miserable there, as if there was nothing else to be done?"

Harry felt cold all over. He remembered the terrible pain of a child who had reached out for his aunt's hand only to be knocked backward to the ground as she yanked her hand away. He remembered primary school and coming home with grades better than Dudley, Uncle Vernon locking him in the darkness of the cupboard, and the emptiness in his stomach as he listened to the sounds of a boisterous dinner. His classmates snickering at his baggy, washed out clothes. Shoves and rough handling that were so frequent he should have grown used to them—not dreaded the pain they would bring, the overwhelming loneliness that always wanted to swallow him whole—he remembered it all. It was a dull sort of pain that never truly went away.

"Couldn't he at least have tried?" Harry asked, a lump in his throat. "Did my happiness mean so little? Or was it me—was I just not worth the extra effort in the end?"

What a waste! Aunt Petunia grumbled as four year old Harry ducked his head and quietly finished his meal.

You know what you are, boy? Uncle Vernon squinted at eight year old Harry. Useless. Unwanted. We didn't want you here. And neither did that miserable sod who dropped you on our doorstep.

"Oh, no—Harry, you mustn't think that!" Hermione sounded close to tears as she grabbed his hand, "I knew I shouldn't have told you! You're still not fully recovered—breathe, Harry. Listen to me."

"You deserved more than the pitiful amount of care shown to you. You deserved to be cherished and loved. To be happy." She took a deep breath. "I've tried my hardest to understand Dumbledore's actions and in a way, perhaps he was doing what he thought was right. Perhaps, the Dursleys really were the best option for you. But when he decided to put you in that household, he acquired the responsibility to look after your well being. The negligence to do so speaks of his failure as a guardian, not your worthiness.

"I can't think of a soul more deserving of happiness than you. Do you understand?"

He nodded numbly.

"I am sorry to have been the bearer of this distressing news." Flitwick sounded tired. "More sorry than I can say."

"No," Harry found his voice. "Thank you for telling me. Both of you."

It hurt. Despite his resentment and suspicions against the headmaster, there was still a small part of Harry that had yearned for his approval. Dumbledore was eccentric and strange at times, but he had seen Harry. Seemed to understand him even, read his deepest thoughts. Harry remembered waking up in the hospital bed after fighting Quirrell for the stone and feeling such enormous relief at the sight of the headmaster—a weight lifting from his chest. He had instinctively thought of Dumbledore as someone larger than life, someone who could keep them safe, someone he could rely on.

But it seemed Dumbledore, too, was only human. Someone who could cause pain.

"I deserve to know the truth," Harry said. "No more lies."

He was no longer that little boy in the cupboard.

He refused to be left in the dark.