The Necromancer

Chapter 23

Harry was rather distracted while the next few new residents arrived, though he wasn’t sure what was bugging him. He did have a lot on his mind, with a mile-long to-do list that was filled with urgent tasks, so perhaps it was simply that.

The arrival of Mildred Fletcher shook Harry out of whatever was keeping his mind occupied. Mildred was a short woman in her late fifties, with curly brown hair streaked with grey, who was accompanied by her son Frank, a fairly newly infected werewolf who was in his twenties.

“Is there a post office?” Mildred asked while Frank read through all the paperwork. “It’s just that our screech owl Dumpy died just last month. She was an old gal, such a lovely bird. We haven’t gotten around to getting a new owl yet, but I do send weekly letters to my sister in Oakmoore on Wye, and she’ll get awfully worried if I stopped corresponding with her all of a sudden.”

Harry blinked a few times to process that sudden stream of information. “I’ll make a post office, that’s no problem. But if your sister is magical, wouldn’t it be easier for her to move here?”

Mildred gave Harry a sad little smile. “My sister’s magical, yes, but she’s married to a muggle, a very nice man, Herbert Nieves. My sister lives mostly as a muggle, to be honest, she prefers that, and she’s very active with the Oakmoore on Wye Woman’s Institute, she’d never leave that behind.”

“Alright!” Harry said quickly, to cut her off. Mildred seemed like a lovely lady but Harry’s ears were practically ringing at that point. “Post office it is!”

“I’d like to try farming,” Frank Fletcher replied when Remus asked him what he’d like to do. “My muggle grandfather was a farmer, and I always enjoyed spending my childhood holidays there, riding on the tractor with him.”

“We need farmers desperately,” Harry said, giving Frank an encouraging smile. “I can lease you for free, say 100 acres to grow wheat, to start with. You can work the land and after the harvest you have to pay 20 percent of any earnings back to Magica.”

Frank gave Harry a thoughtful nod. “Yeah, that seems like something I could do.”

“I’m glad to hear that.” And Harry was very glad to hear that because while people could easily grow a lot of fruit and vegetables themselves around their homes, crops like wheat and other grains could really only be grown on a much larger scale to make it worthwhile.

Remus sent the new residents to Chestnut Drive, to occupy the last available house there after Frank signed the lease for the agricultural land.

The last new resident for that day was a young man in his late twenties with short blond hair and bright blue eyes. “Billy Malone,” he said in a thick Irish accent. “I’m not a werewolf, but me mate Shaun is, and he told me to move here.” Billy gave Harry a cheeky wink. “I’m a muggleborn and openly gay, and as it turns out lots of the conservative folk in magical Britain don’t like to hire people like me. I’ve been bartending in muggle pubs in Kilkenny since finishing Hogwarts.”

“You are more than welcome here,” Remus assured him with a warm smile, handing over the necessary paperwork.

“Is there a bank here or something?” Billy asked once he’d read and signed the contracts. “I’d like to get a loan to open a pub. Shaun said anyone could open a business here, and that you didn’t have a pub yet.”