Faery Heroes

Chapter 12: Potter Manor

It's that sad time, my friends. This is the last pre-written chapter of Faery Heroes, so there will be a bit of a lag as I try to balance publishing all three of my stories. I'm hoping — hoping — to get one chapter done a week, but doing well in my classes comes first.

Disclaimer: Did Harry only try to run away from the Dursleys once? If so, I don't own the Harry Potter franchise; it belongs to J.K. Rowling, Scholastic Press, Warner Bros., and whoever else she sold the rights to.
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Harry appeared in a dense forest, standing in the middle of a path. He slowly glanced around, trying to match the trees and rocks with the landmarks of the Manor's Apparation point. Satisfied he was in the right place, he twisted around at his waist as best he could, taking special care not to move his feet. When he had tried to enter the property for the first time after learning of its existence, he had Apparated in, only to find himself walking down the path he was on towards Nottingham proper. Several hours and too many attempts to count later, he had at last discovered the key to bypassing the avoidance ward.

With a swish and flick, he levitated a seemingly random stone in his immediate surroundings, one that was part of a small cairn. Placing it next to the pile, he cast a Finite into the depression he had revealed and felt the barely noticeable pressure on his shoulders fall off. He smirked as he replaced the rock; this was the perfect example of the strategy the Potters had relied on when they were thieves. Easy to remember, quick to set into motion, and designed to take advantage of the average wizard's lack of common sense.

It also showed their expertise with wards, the reason the Hooded Foxes were so terrifying to the Purebloods in their fancy homes. Accepted fact among wardmasters was that there were open wards and closed wards, but while they could be used on the same area, they could never be joined. Raphael Potter, the man who started the family business, did not take this at face value, however; he had never cared what people told him could or couldn't be done; only what truly could or couldn't be done. With his wife, a Muggleborn spellcrafter, he had created a runic script that used the input from an open ward to trigger a closed ward. It wasn't perfect — it couldn't handle more than two wards, and the script only worked if it was written in a combination of Norse and Sumerian runes — but because it was 'impossible', it provided an excellent defense.

Whistling as he walked, Harry traveled along the overgrown trail; the occasional cutting or vanishing charm flew from his wand as he cleared out the worst of the underbrush. The peaceful path from the Apparation point to the Manor's front gates always calmed him when he was angry or distressed, and it now served as a balm to his war-wounded mind. He arrived at the wrought-iron gates, opened them, and looked in sorrow at the sight in front of him.

Potter Manor was a relatively new building for the mansion of a Pureblood Noble House, completed in the early eighteenth century. It was a three-story home sitting on sixty acres of property and totally inaccessible to Muggles and uninvited guests. The house itself was reminiscent in style of a Gothic cathedral with its high spires and tall windows, delicate reliefs of ivy climbing up the walls. It had its own gargoyles, as well, in the forms of manticores, three-headed hellhounds, and even a winged occamy poised to strike over the front entrance. The only force to ever lay siege to the property — led by a member of the family who was angry over his younger brother being chosen as the family's head — had being given the 'honor' of discovering for themselves that the statues could be animated like Hogwarts' suits of armor.

At least, that was how the Manor had looked. Contrary to popular belief, Voldemort had feared Harry's great-grandfather Timothy almost as much as Dumbledore. The two men were both extremely powerful for their ages and lacked any fashion sense whatsoever, but where Dumbledore fought in the political arena, Timothy preferred to battle with his magic; a professional duelist, his record number of consecutive wins stood unchallenged until the arrival of a young upstart named Filius Flitwick. Even in his late eighties, Timothy Potter had been a force to be reckoned with, so rather than make the mistake of attacking him directly, the Dark Lord had placed one of his friends under the Imperius and ordered the man to carry a large cauldron full of a highly unstable potion into the house and make it explode. The blast had killed Timothy, his friend, and both of Harry's grandparents, as well as destroyed the Manor's second floor. Only James being at school prevented the Potter line from dying out that night.