Chapter Text
Albus arrived at his office feeling quite exhausted. It had been a long couple of days. Filled with much heartache, joy, and satisfaction for a plan working out perfectly.
He fell onto his chair behind his desk, which was enchanted to give him maximum comfort.
He had gotten rid of Minerva, at least. She had been very disgusted by Petunia Evan’s - no Petunia Dursley’s - behaviour, much to Albus’s internal delight. Petunia would do beautifully.
It was such a pleasure when pawns behaved as he had predicted.
He popped one of his lemon drops into his mouth. It was of a new brand that Lily had recommended to him. They were even more sour than the ones he’d had before.
While sucking on the hard and so pleasantly sweet-sour candy his gaze went through his office and landed on the small apparatus, he had enchanted to start reporting on the blood wards he had painstakingly built around No. 4 Privet Drive in Little Whinging. It should start working as soon as Petunia took the child inside the house, trapping her as much as her new charge.
Albus’s eyes twinkled.
Well, he’d better go to bed now. He had a long day planned for tomorrow. He needed to ensure Sirius stayed in Azkaban where he had been chucked in, just this afternoon. Or was that yesterday? Huh. It was more early morning now than the night between November 1 st and 2 nd . He also needed to establish his guardianship of the child and finish sealing the Potters’ wills.
And look through their vaults.
He grinned tiredly. He had wanted to do so ever since he had learned of the Potter’s connection with the Peverells from Charlus Potter back in the thirties when the man had still been a student at Hogwarts and Albus his teacher.
The next morning Albus dressed in one of his more respectable robes as he didn’t want to look like a doddering old fool at the Ministry and Gringotts today. Then he went into his office to check on his most prized new device.
Why wasn’t it running? Hadn’t they found the child on their doorstep, yet? How strange.
He had thought Muggles got their milk delivered early each morning. And it was Monday today, right?
He glanced at his calendar and nodded. Yes. It was.
His gaze went to his magical clock, but it only told him it was time for his morning tea. Not very helpful when he needed the actual time.
He cast a Tempus and saw it was 9:30 already.
What was happening?
Flopsy, his personal house-elf, was laying out breakfast for him. Albus sighed and sat down to eat. Another ten minutes wouldn’t hurt, and Flopsy had brought the lemon marmalade he loved so much.
Half an hour later the little apparatus still hadn’t started to huff and puff like Albus had envisioned. He cast a few diagnostic charms on it and frowned. It should work, his enchantments were perfect!
Albus sighed and thought about whom he could send to check on the boy, but Minerva and Severus were teaching right now. At least, he hoped so. Severus had been devastated by his childhood friend’s death, unfortunately. So, he wouldn’t be a good choice to send anyway. And Minerva would only say ‘I told you so, Albus’ and purse her lips. And that would only be the beginning of her rant.
Albus shuddered.
Hagrid?
Nah. He was too obvious and had little delicacy in handling a situation like this one. He probably would break down the Dursley’s door and demand to see Harry in his booming voice.
And Arabella hadn’t yet moved into the house Albus wanted to buy her. After all, he hadn’t had a chance to get into the boy’s vault.
It couldn’t be helped, he had to go himself. He sighed and started to transfigure his robes into a Muggle suit.
The last decade had been delightfully colourful, he had learned. So, his clothes were lime-green with pink trim, and the trousers were very wide at the bottom but still showed his steel-blue heeled boots, making him even taller than he already was.
He conjured a mirror and mustered his dashing appearance with satisfaction. Perfect. He would fit right in.
With this thought, he Apparated to the secluded little Apparition spot he had established yesterday close to the Dursleys home.
A few houses along the street a uniformed man with a strange, pot-like helmet with a big silver star adorning it was questioning a resident. But Albus paid it no further attention. His sight was on Petunia Dursley who was pushing a contraption with her chubby child sitting in it and wailing loudly. No sign of the Potter boy anywhere.
Albus walked up to the woman, who was desperately placating her loud offspring, promising ice cream, and other delicacies if he just was quiet. She didn’t succeed, but the sight of Albus did, much to his delight.
She looked up and reared back in shock, pushing the contraption in the other direction causing the gaping toddler to complain loudly again.
“Petunia, my dear, where is Harry?”
She walked quicker and gasped, “Get away from me, freak!”
Albus easily followed her with his long legs and tried to placate her, “Petunia, stop running. I just want to ask you about Harry!”
“How do you know my name, freak? I don’t have money for drugs with me! Leave me alone!” She didn’t look back but was moving even faster making her son squeal in delight.
“Petunia, stop! I knew your sister Lily. I was her Headmaster. We exchanged letters.”
Albus considered pulling his wand, but they had quite the audience by now and he wasn’t sure he could obliviate everyone in time.
“I don’t have a sister! Leave me alone! Police!”
“Pet-”
“Sir, I need you to stand down and leave the good woman alone!”
An authoritative voice sounded behind Albus, who started and turned his head, seeing the uniformed man with the strange helmet having a fat wand in his right hand.
Albus quickly pulled his wand too and the Muggle had the audacity to beat that fat wand onto Albus’s hand, making him drop the Elder Wand.
“A stick? What’s this? No! don’t pick it up!” the man stepped onto Albus’s wand and looked grim. “What is your name, sir?”
“This doesn’t concern you, good man. I just wanted to ask Petunia a question,” Albus said, making his eyes twinkle, and trying to delve into the Muggle man’s mind.
Unfortunately, the man looked to the Dursley house which Petunia had rushed into, by now.
“She doesn’t seem to want to talk to you, sir. Please leave this street. You look like you better return to the circus you came from. Or is it a fun fair?”
“I cannot do that, good sir. You see, she was supposed to take care of Harry Potter and I need to ask her where the boy is?”
“Boy? Are you responsible for leaving a toddler outside last night?” The man took a step forward, threateningly.
“Yes! Do you know where he is?” Albus was very happy to have found a clue to Harry’s whereabouts.
A crack sounded like a stick breaking.
“No! You imbecile! You destroyed the Death Stick!”
The next thing Albus knew was that his hands were somehow tied behind his back, and he was marched towards a white Muggle car with ‘Police’ written on it in blue and an orange stripe and a blue something on its top.
It took Albus quite some time to escape the Police station, and he still didn’t know anything helpful. Just that someone had found a toddler toddling on the sidewalk crying while dragging a blue baby blanket.
They had questioned Albus extensively and after he had said he wasn’t related to the child but had known his parents, who had died a night before, the Muggles had become even more guarded with him, and had called in some higher-ups, it seemed.
Albus decided to alert the Aurors and started dropping the codewords that would soon bring attention to his plight to the Ministry.
It took longer than expected and very unfortunately for him, it was one of those incorruptible Aurors, who also was not one of Albus’s men, who answered in the end.
Auror Brian Macmillan, dressed in a brown, chequered Muggle suit, steered the Headmaster of Hogwarts into the next tearoom and cast a discreet silencing ward only the waitress could enter without disturbing it.
As soon as he had ordered, he asked, “What was this about? Why are you looking for Harry Potter in a Muggle street in Little Whinging, Surry?”
“I cannot tell you, dear boy,” Albus hedged. “But thank you for helping me out. My clothes seemed to have been too fashionable for their taste, there was much distrust from the beginning.”
“Your clothes are ridiculous. No one wears something like that in London’s suburbs. Or anywhere outside of a cult or the circus.”
“What is a circus? The uniformed man said I looked like I came from one, as well?”
“Maybe you should attend some of the Muggle Studies lessons. – But this is irrelevant. Now tell me about the boy. Why did you look for him there?”
“My dear boy, I cannot tell you. For safety reasons. I hope you understand,” Albus very gently brushed a Legilimency probe at the mind of the man sitting on the other side of the small table but encountered very strong Occlumency shields. So, he quickly retreated and hoped his little test hadn’t been noticed. Annoying pure-blood upbringing!
“You think I am a danger to Harry Potter?”
“No, I wouldn’t go that far. But I don’t wish for anyone from the Ministry to know about his whereabouts, you see?”
“So, you made sure you lost him as well?”
“What? No! I need to watch out for him. You see, I am in the process of becoming his magical guardian.”
“Are you now? Did his parents appoint you as such?”
“No, you see. I needed to seal their wills, also for safety reasons.”
“So, you seal the Potter’s wills and then appoint yourself as Harry Potter’s magical guardian?” Auror Macmillan leaned back in his chair. “How convenient, if one is the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot and the defeater of Grindelwald.”
“My dear boy–”
“Auror Macmillan.”
“There is certainly no nefarious reason for my decisions. You can trust me,” Albus tried to look regal, but his suit made that rather impossible. He looked more like a court jester than a hero or a Ministry official.
“We will see. Now tell me, why did you leave the boy at that Muggle place?”
“I cannot tell you that! I already told you. Now I am needed back at Hogwarts!” Albus activated his Portkey back to his office. Lucky for him he always had a second and third escape route. The ward the Auror had cast, hid departure from the Muggles so he was able to do so.
He needed to get his former wand, change Auror Macmillan’s memory, and find the boy quickly!