Starstruck

12. The Vault

Albus felt like he was going to throw up- his stomach was heaving and his head spun and throbbing like a whirlpool! The cart whizzed along the rusty tracks, plunging and twisting deeper and deeper underground, looping around and making Albus’ hair stand on end quite literally. It was almost unbearable. Cold air rushed past them and his eyes stung with the ferocious iciness of it. And then suddenly, quite as quickly as it had started, the cart came to an abrupt halt in front of a small and patterned vault door.  It was over.

Albus stood up shakily and took a few gulps of air to clear his muddled head, whilst Griphook took the small golden key and pushed it firmly into the lock. It turned smoothly. The door opened, and the sight inside made Albus almost cry out in amazement. His eyes lit up with glee as he gazed at the heaped piles of fat, shining galleons, mounds of thin, sparkling silver sickles and bagful’s of small rounded knuts. It was more money than he had ever seen, let alone received.

Albus picked up a huge golden galleon between his thumb and forefinger and ran his finger over the engraved patterns. It felt smooth, cold and heavy like lead in his hand, a gorgeous rich golden colour and he stood in disbelief. He ran up to his father in delight and hugged him tighter than he ever had before, shaking with grateful happiness. So this explained why he had never received pocket money before! He knew his father was famous, but rich as well? He'd had no idea.

"You remind me of myself at your age" Harry grinned "the Dursleys never gave me so much as a rusty penny in  my life, so when I found a huge inheritance from my parents, I couldn't believe I could ever be so rich. I spent most of it on rubbish though, mind you but fame does have it's advantages. Oh great I'm starting to sound like Lockheart." Lockheart? Albus wondered but then it came to him. Gilderoy Lockheart, an old teacher of Harry's, had never quite recovered from memory loss but now out of St.  Mungos visited Harry on a regular basis and quite refused to go until he had handed out signed photos to everyone in the family.  (They found out Lily had been stashing them at the age of six, and James almost died of laughter one day when he entered to find Lily plastering her walls with a blonde grinning wizard.)

Albus laughed at the thought, and began to help his father to shovel coins into thick woollen bags. He absentmindedly glanced back at Griphook who was leaning casually against the wall inspecting his own long, grimy fingernails. Griphook bore war scars and wounds that distorted his face oddly. Harry had told Albus that everyone presumed Griphook dead but he survived and apologised profusely to Harry for his cruel trick in Gringotts and they had made up once more. But Albus couldn't bring himself to ever trut the goblin. It was something about the look in his eyes.

They continued collecting, until Albus looked back at his father who had finally finished and now carried 3 small but heaving sacks on his back. Father and son smiled, gulped and stepped into the out of the vault for another nightmarish journey back to the bank together. All they could hope was that it may go slower this time but alas, the cart was 'one speed only.' Vomit inducing.