Liquidating Lucius

Summary: One responsible - and ruthless - adult does not like mysteries in his own field of expertise, specifically the one left unsolved at the end of a near-fatal Quidditch match. And when he eventually finds the answer, it makes him even more angry, and he brings in an even more ruthless - and greedy - group in on the game.

Thank you: to all who reviewed my previous works. In response to some very valid points brought up in reviews, I have updated my profile to describe some limitations in my writing, which are likely to continue for some time.

Legal Disclaimer: anything you recognise in this story belongs to someone else, most likely to JK Rowling and/or her business partners. Any characters you don't recognise are mine. The specific plot in this fic may be mine; I say "may be" because fanfiction is vast, and one can never be sure there isn't a very similar one elsewhere. I'm not getting anything out of writing this except the pleasure of seeing how many ways JKR's Rube Goldberg machine could have been jammed in a sensible world.

"I hate Dumbledore with the heat of a thousand suns"-related disclaimers: I decided Dumbledore would have no role to play in this fic; the price for that was to make him half-decent. Went against the grain but wanted to see if I could do it - rather proud of myself for having done so too!

Filius Flitwick was not someone who would easily admit defeat, but this time he was forced to that conclusion. In almost all of the British magical world, he was unique in that he was the only one able to wield wizard magic as well as goblin magic, and, in desperation, he had even tested for goblin magic, but no luck. There was no trace of any magic, of any kind, on the pieces of bludger that Ms Granger had shot to pieces to protect her friend, Mr Potter.

He would have to tell the boy. Perhaps tomorrow morning, because right now the boy would be sure to be under some sort of sleep potion, courtesy Madam Pomfrey.

The next morning, he walked toward the hospital wing, still without the usual spring in his step or the broad, friendly, smile he always wore. His cogitations over the night had not helped him come any closer to a solution.

Sure, for now, he was more puzzled than worried, but there was cause for concern too - if you didn't know why something happened, how could you be sure it wouldn't happen again, leave alone prevent it if it did?

As he reached the bed on which the young Gryffindor seeker was lying, he noticed that Harry was awake, and Ms Granger was sitting by his bed.

"Good morning, Mr Potter, Ms Granger", he said, in his baritone. (One would think that a person of such a small stature would have a more high-pitched voice, but that was not so).

"Good morning, professor", said both the kids in unison.

Having made himself comfortable, Filius considered the two for a moment. What he had to say was not a secret anyway, and besides, these two were best friends. Best to plunge ahead.

"Mr Potter, as you know, Quidditch equipment is subject to some of the most complex sets of charms known to wizardkind. As the charms master at Hogwarts, I took it upon myself - both as a duty and for my own curiosity - to investigate the bludger that attacked you yesterday, and to see if I could figure out who had jinxed it to come after you in such a fashion. In fact, all three captains also came and asked me the same thing, because no one wants something like this affecting their game." (It was left unsaid which captain did not come to the charms professor.)

Hermione squeezed Harry's hand in a signal to not interrupt. She wanted to see what Prof Flitwick had found, before revealing to him what they knew.

"I regret to say that I was unable to detect any magic on it. The only wizard magic on it was the original charms that let it fly, hover, etc., but nothing more. This worries me greatly, because it would seem we are now left with no option but to wait for this to happen again, and at that time attempt to capture the object without" - and here he looked at Hermione with a grin - "completely destroying it".

Hermione looked down at her shoes for a second, but then looked up with a grin when she saw the professor was not really blaming her.

"I also", continued Prof Flitwick, "tested for goblin magic - since, as a half-goblin - I have access to that also. Again, nothing".

The two children looked at each other for a fraction of a second. Hermione nodded briefly, and Harry then said, to Prof Flitwick's surprise, "we know who did this, sir".

"Oh! Who was it?"

"It was a house-elf called Dobby. He claims his only aim is to see me leave Hogwarts, because some great evil is about to happen here and he does not want me dead. A bit silly, I think, not to mention creepy - why only me? Why not the rest of the school?"

"Aah, of course, that would explain why I could not detect it. How did it know something would happen?"

"It was her master who had hatched the plot, but he can't tell me who this master is. And by the way he was here a few hours ago." Harry then narrated the experience of last night, and how Dobby had disappeared when he saw people entering the room. He had also tried to call him back when he was alone again, but had no luck - the elf stayed away, or at least did not reveal himself.

"Interesting", said Prof Flitwick. "And you say he looked badly beaten?"

"Yes professor. He said he receives death threats three times a day", said Harry.

"Must be a pureblood family, very likely the Malfoys or Notts then. Flint is another likely one, and maybe a few others", said Flitwick. "We need some way to flush him out. Let me think about it and if I come up with something I'll contact you again."

Hermione was thinking fast. "Harry," she said, "technically, Dobby has - so far - only tried to harm you, right?"

At lunch time in the great hall, everyone stared as Harry Potter stood on the bench he was previously sitting at, so that everyone could see him.

Facing the Slytherin table, he said in a clear voice, "Oy you lot, which one of you owns a house-elf called Dobby?"

No one spoke for a second. Then - not unsurprisingly - Draco Malfoy said (still sitting), "what's it to you, scarface?"

Again, as planned, Prof Flitwick stepped in. "While I did not expect Mr Potter to announce this in the hall, and would have preferred more discreet methods to find out," - pure fabrication of course, since the three had planned all this - "the fact is that I found traces of house-elf magic on the bludger," - another fabrication - "and when I asked the Hogwarts elves, they said it was some elf called Dobby that does not belong to Hogwarts" - a hat trick of lies from the half-goblin.

Draco went white. He hurriedly left the great hall, going straight to the owlery. This was way above his pay grade, so to speak.

He didn't get far. Hermione was waiting just around the corner, as they had planned, and she silently fell in behind him. Malfoy was in such an agitated state of mind he did not realise he was being followed.

When they reached the last turning in the corridor before the owlery, Hermione hit Malfoy with a stunner, then quickly levitated him into a classroom that they had already settled on. Placing him on the ground - not too gently though - she left for the great hall.

About a quarter of an hour later, a diminutive professor came quietly into the room. He closed and silenced the door, then revived Draco.

"Mr Malfoy," he said, "as you are the owner of Dobby, I will have to inform the DMLE and have you charged with attempted murder on a student. House-elves, as you know, are considered property, and their master is held responsible for anything they do."

Just to rub it in, he continued, "make no mistake, Mr Malfoy - if it weren't for Mr Potter's skill on a broom this would have been a murder."

"But- but-", Draco was stuttering in his panic. "I did not order him to do anything of the sort."

"That may or may not be true."

Draco was panicking. "You can ask Dobby!" he said breathlessly.

"The word of a house-elf, who is basically considered a slave, is meaningless. Dobby will do what you tell him to. However, if you were to free him, and then he says the same thing, that would be acceptable."

"I- I- I don't know, professor", said Malfoy in a pitiable voice. "My fa- fa- father-". And then he stopped.

"Please continue, Mr Malfoy, clearly you want to say something. Please understand that only by being upfront can you hope to escape the worst punishment imaginable for what happened at the match."

Draco suddenly seemed to get some courage. "I am a minor, you cannot interrogate me without some adult who is responsible for me, and since my godfather is present in the castle, I demand that he be present."

"Who is your godfather?", asked Flitwick, though knowing full well who it was.

"Professor Snape, of course", sneered Draco.

"Aah, I suspected as much. I regret to say I cannot allow that, since Severus is a death-eater. I simply do not trust him enough."

"I can offer you just this one way out, Mr Malfoy", continued Flitwick. "First, tell me what your father is planning - I did hear that he was planning something nasty. Next, order your elf to come here, and free him. You are Heir Malfoy, so you can, indeed, free him. After that, we will ask him any questions we want to, and if his answers exonerate you, you are free to go."

Draco seemed to hesitate. He really wanted his father here, but he was being railroaded. "You will not get away with this, professor!", he screamed at the half-goblin. "When my father hears of this, he will extr-"

"He will do nothing", interrupted Flitwick in a harsh and guttural voice - the voice of a goblin warrior. "Gringotts has dozens of ways in which we can break a wizard if we choose to, and, while I am but a lowly professor at Hogwarts, the rest of my clan isn't."

He laughed, and continued. "I dare say, if any other professor at Hogwarts were here, your threat may have had some impact, but on me it is literally a laughing matter".

"My father will kill me if I do this."

"And the goblins will kill you if you don't. You may not realise it, but Mr Potter is our wealthiest customer" - another bluff, though perhaps not that far from the truth - "and we do not take attempts at his life lightly."

Draco shuddered. He was tied down, only his head was free, and he had - it seemed - no choices.

"My father planted a dark artifact, a diary, on the Weasley girl. I have no idea what it is supposed to do, and I think even my father does not quite know. All we know is it was a gift from the Dark Lord."

(Here was another aspect of the constant one-upmanship that the death eaters indulged in; Lucius Malfoy would not tell the truth, that it was an object entrusted to him for safekeeping, even to his own wife and son. If he had, perhaps his wife may have stopped him from using it as Weasley-bait.)

"What else do you know about it?"

"Nothing".

"Alright, now call your elf."

In a few seconds, on Draco's call, the elf was in the room, staring with fear-filled eyes at the tableau in the room.

"Now free him. Here is a handkerchief. Give it to Dobby."

Draco did so, whimpering all the while at the thought of his father's reaction when he learned of this.

Flitwick told the elf to step to the side of the room and wait for him there.

Turning to Malfoy, he looked him straight in the eye and coolly obliviated him, before sending him packing. All Draco would remember of the entire afternoon was that he was angry at Dobby for exposing his family, and had summoned him, and freed him. That way, the elf's actions - even past ones, since there was no record anywhere of when he was freed - would not accrue to him or his family, so no one could accuse them of attempting to murder the Boy-Who-Lived.

Along with these memories was also a smug feeling of self-congratulation at having solved the problem so neatly. Really, he surprised himself with how smart he was, sometimes! He would never have imagined that such a simple solution would have occurred to him, and yet - by all evidence - it had, and he had executed it flawlessly!

Draco left the room a happy boy.

Flitwick then turned to Dobby.

"Dobby, I know you were trying to save Mr Potter's life, but in actual fact, you almost killed him. Mr Potter is a notoriously stubborn person, and the more you try to get him to leave, the more he will dig in, and in the end you may really end up killing him. I assume you do not want that?"

Dobby hung his head and shook it despondently.

"You are now free. As a goblin, even a part-goblin, I cannot take elves - our magic isn't compatible, as you probably know - but after this mess is sorted out, I will ask Mr Potter to take you as his personal elf. Until then, please stay in the kitchens and help out. Will you hear if your old master or his family calls?"

"Yes professor sir".

"Well then don't answer. Listen to and answer only myself and Mr Potter. Oh and I suppose Ms Granger as well."

Just before they parted, he had a final reminder for the elf. "Remember, do not try anything to get Mr Potter out; leave that problem to me".

At the next charms lesson for first years, Ginny Weasley found herself being asked to stay back.

Prof Flitwick had thought long and hard about this. His first impulse was to confiscate the diary, but that would only treat the symptom, not the disease. Sure, there would be no more petrifactions, but they would also be clueless as to what was causing them, and no better prepared should the problem rear its head again later.

Anyway, leaving a potential enemy lying around was not the goblin way. Besides, what was the point of being a charms master if you couldn't charm an object to spy for you?

"Ms Weasley, I notice your wand work is not up to the same standard I have seen from your brothers. May I examine it please?"

Ginny mutely gave her wand to the professor. She watched the professor examined the piece of wood, muttering under his breath. Eventually she got bored and started looking around the classroom.

Flitwick, evidently satisfied, gave her her wand back. "Your wand seems fine, Ms Weasley, but it wasn't yours to start with, it seems".

When the young girl hung her head in mortification, he changed his tone somewhat. "Ms Weasley, that is nothing to be ashamed of. However, for the next 6 months, I suggest you keep the wand as close to you as possible. I have heard it said that it can help in cases like this, basically by getting you and the wand used to each other. Of course, I have no way of knowing if that is true, perhaps Mr Ollivander can tell us, but there is certainly no harm in doing this."

"Norius, I need to speak to director Ragnok", said Filius. "There is a lot of gold to be made if we play our cards right, and an enemy to defeat too - a big one!"

"I assumed that it must be something big when you called me earlier, Filius, so I have already informed the Director. He has given us a 15-minute slot from 11am, so you are just in time. Let's go."

A short while later found the two being ushered into the august presence of the director of the bank, and de facto goblin chieftain for the British Isles. They bowed, sat down, and exchanged pleasantries. Filius was a well-liked figure, because he was a really nice person, and because of him, humans who went through Hogwarts ended up underestimating goblins, or what a goblin would do when gold was involved. They were certainly honourable beings, but they knew how to drive a hard bargain, and how to use every kind of legal trick in the book to extract the maximum profit out of any situation.

"What brings you here, Filius?" asked the director after a minute or so of pleasant chit-chat.

"There is a basilisk, at least 40-feet long, living under Hogwarts. At present it is hidden inside the legendary Chamber of Secrets, but we have a way to get it out. However, it has to be done today - before nightfall."

"Explain, and be as brief but accurate as you can", said the director, while signaling to an aide to move his next appointment back by fifteen minutes. He could not imagine any tale of a forty-foot basilisk being done in the time originally allotted.

"Voldemort made a horcrux, in the shape of a muggle diary. Lucius Malfoy foisted this horcrux onto a first year called Ginny Weasley. The girl began writing in the diary which then started to possess her. Her soul has been gradually eroding its grip on the body, and if we had not stepped in, would eventually lead to Voldemort gaining a body of some kind."

"What is the current status?"

"I have bound her body with a goblin spell - which no wizard knows - and left her inside the chamber. She was just about to call for the basilisk when I subdued her. There appeared to be no easy way out of the chamber, but luckily I noticed that the chamber was too deep for the Hogwarts wards themselves to penetrate. I simply made a goblin travel port and connected it to my clan's port in the branch to get out. We can travel the same way with no one the wiser."

"If the girl did not 'call' for the beast how do you know it's size?"

"There was a shed skin in the ante-chamber."

"How did you find out about this and get involved?"

"Mr Harry Potter, a second year, was injured in a mysterious quidditch incident. Investigating that led to the information about Malfoy, the diary, and the girl. After that I placed monitoring charms on the girl, but did not really know what I was looking for, so I simply monitored her every time she was out of her house tower and not in a class. When I realised she was speaking parseltongue, I rushed to where she was, and followed her down a set of stairs, at the bottom of which was the ante-chamber I spoke of. She was possessed, but whoever it was, was not strong enough to overcome my petrifaction spell. It turned out to be a 16-year old version of the so-called Voldemort - at that age, humans have not yet learnt discretion, and his rantings and ravings were quite informative."

"How do you plan to call the beast out? Don't you need someone who can speak parseltongue?"

"Mr Potter is a parselmouth. I am sure he will assist us."

"Hmmph", grumbled the director. "I suppose that means we have to give him a portion of the sale proceeds."

Finally, Ragnok gave them permission to proceed. He also authorised the immediate expansion of their beast-masters' holding area, and the construction of a special portal to receive the basilisk.

A little under an hour later, a team of about sixty goblins, and one wizard, entered via the portal that Filius had created in the chamber. Filius had carefully positioned the portal so that it would not be visible to the possessed girl, so the young Voldemort did not know how many had entered. Only Filius showed himself.

On a signal from Filius, Harry hissed Open in parseltongue, as quietly as possible. Filius then levitated the girl's body through the door, propping it up against a far wall. He extracted the diary from the girl's tight grasp, and laid it on the ground.

"Mr Riddle", he said (for that is how the boy had first introduced himself, before identifying himself as Voldemort, and besides, the diary had that name on it). "You have thirty seconds to call forth the beast before I destroy your horcrux. I am sure you know that goblins have several ways to destroy such artefacts."

Voldemort stayed silent. Filius waited for a bit and then started drawing runes around the diary on the ground.

It soon became clear to Voldemort what these were - fire protection runes, meant to withstand fiend-fyre. Despite his boasts, it seemed the goblin intended to use the same method that wizards would have used. It would be a shallow kind of victory though, and he was thinking furiously if there was any way he could escape his predicament. If the petrifaction was wizard magic, he still may have managed to overpower it, despite being only a partial possession, but goblin magic was too different.

Making a mental note to destroy the goblin nation completely at the first opportunity, Tom reluctantly hissed the phrase that would call the beast.

A young voice, which Riddle did not recognise, translated it for the benefit of the others, and that was when Tom realised exactly how many of these filthy beasts were in his ancestor's chamber, defiling it with their very presence, not to mention their attitude. His resolve to destroy goblinkind went from "in Britain" to "all over the world".

As the basilisk started to literally pour out of the hole in the wall, the entire goblin team hid themselves behind various rocky outcrops or conjured barriers. Once it was completely out, Riddle hissed at it, Kill all the goblins, they are hiding behind the rocks.

Unfortunately for him, Filius had placed a one-way silencing bubble around him as soon as the basilisk was called, so the basilisk did not hear him. All it could see was its master, who appeared to be sitting calmly on a chair (courtesy of a cheering charm cast by the charms master). So it simply sat there, without moving much, waiting for further instructions.

Filius meanwhile completed the rune circle and charged it, then quickly cast fiendfyre on the diary in the middle. Riddle had a betrayed look on his face, but it only lasted a second or so, before he was destroyed.

A second later, a conjured rooster made short work of the basilisk.

Before they could harvest it, however, there arose another question. The basilisk was huge, so there would be lots of money to be made. Could they make even more by liquidating the wealth of the death-eater who had orchestrated the events that saw its release and subsequent attacks?

One of the biggest reasons the pureblood-dominated Wizengamot rarely, if ever, found one of their own brethren guilty of really big crimes, was a very specific, long-standing, arrangement with Gringotts. At the end of the last "rebellion", the goblins lost heavily, and were forced to make many concessions to the wizards. Of the few they got in return, one was that, if a wizard were to ever be convicted of a capital crime, and Gringotts could prove harm, or potential harm, to their bank or to their business, by the same person, then Gringotts would have the right to confiscate the entire contents of their vault. The wizards knew this would rarely happen, because the second clause was quite subjective, so they didn't feel it was a big deal.

And it really wasn't. Until now.

A notice was sent out to Lucius Malfoy, charging him with crimes against the goblin nation, and for him to appear in front of a goblin tribunal the following day.

Malfoy, of course, was incensed. He knew he had not done anything against the goblin nation, so he - very unwisely - went to the bank to have it out with them.

Sadly, things didn't go as he thought they would - he was forced at sword-point into an interrogation room, force-fed veritaserum, and made to confess everything.

This was the goblins' version of a trial.

"Due process", for goblins, basically amounted to "whatever was needed to maintain our advantage"! As such, Malfoy was not given much of a chance to defend himself in any way. For example, he was not given a chance to categorically say that he did not really know what precisely the diary would do, except wreak havoc in the school. Anyone who read the trial transcript - which was accompanied by photographs of the beast, and the goblin team that recovered it, would come away with the conclusion that he did know of the basilisk.

The photographs were also doctored to look like they were taken in the forbidden forest - a no-mans land that was not out of bounds for goblin forces. The goblin team had found a little used tunnel from the chamber of secrets that led to a spot deep within the forest. They had cleaned it up just enough to look used, and claimed they had lured the beast out before killing it. Since it was no longer on Hogwarts grounds, it was theirs to do as they pleased. The report glossed over how they had known it was Malfoy, mentioning only that a house-elf had inadvertently revealed the connection.

This report was then submitted to the ministry, with a notice that Malfoy was in their holding cells and would be produced in court when a date was settled.

(Of course, this was after locking down the Malfoy vault, to prevent his wife or son from getting wind of events and attempting to clean them out.)

It should be mentioned that the Wizengamot had a very weird relationship with the goblins. They would not allow them inside the Wizengamot chambers, but the ministry liaison, a muggleborn called Dirk Cresswell, had the, sometimes unenviable, job of being the messenger, and it was this young man that was now carrying the evidence and presenting it to the Wizengamot.

The Wizengamot was duly horrified with the evidence supplied, and with Malfoy's responses to the judiciously worded questions (decided in advance with the goblins) put to Malfoy under veritaserum. By the end of this, no one in the Wizengamot, not even some of his erstwhile colleagues were willing to give him a chance - he was summarily condemned and sentenced to life in Azkaban, and the goblins got his vaults. There was no sympathy for someone who could have potentially caused the deaths of everyone in Hogwarts in one fell swoop.

And what was the damage to Gringotts that the goblins claimed? Why, it was simply because several of their biggest customers could have potentially lost their lives or heirs' lives, which would be bad for the economy in general, and thus to Gringotts.

Very few people realised this at the time it happened, because they were so shocked by how great a potential tragedy had been averted by the goblins that they weren't paying attention. The goblins had created a very important precedent: anything that affected the economy in general could be used to claim damage to Gringotts! Over the next few years, this would become very significant.

So now Lucius was screwed, with no one willing to help him or speak for him.

A side-effect was that Draco Malfoy lost all his clout in Slytherin house. If even his father did not care for his life, then he was clearly a non-entity.

The goblins, meanwhile, were getting greedier. Their dark magic experts had examined the diary, and realised what it was. What if there was another like it in their own vaults?

The first step was to see if any such artifact existed in any other vault, and, if so, destroy it and confiscate the vault contents. Thus they began a systematic search of all vaults, starting with the death-eaters.

They hit pay dirt with the Lestrange vault. Director Ragnok's first impulse was to use it to acquire all the Lestrange vaults (those three had already been sentenced by the wizard courts, and finding a horcrux in a vault was solid proof of potential harm to the goblin nation, so this would be easy).

On consultation with their dark magic experts, however, they decided to postpone that step. The cup that they removed from the vault - as long as they did not destroy it - gave them the ability to find other items of a similar nature, made by the same wizard.

Using this, they quickly found two more such items: one was a ring in a rundown shack outside a muggle village, and one was Ravenclaw's diadem. (That, in turn, was an interesting story in itself. They had gone to Hogwarts quietly, via Filius's personal floo, but, try as they might, they had not found the diadem. However, they had happened upon the Ravenclaw ghost, and - since she was duty bound to obey the current head of house - she had given them all the information they needed.)

They also found two more horcruxes: one was on a Black property, and one was literally walking around Hogwarts, in Harry Potter's scar. They decided to leave that alone for now, focusing instead on the one in the Black property.

The goblins then presented this evidence to the Wizengamot. They intentionally delinked it from Malfoy and the diary, starting instead with the cup found in one of their vaults. They did not name the family, nor did they mention that, because the family was all in prison, they had confiscated the contents. Instead, they declared that, using the dark artifact they found in the vault, they had been able to trace all other such artifacts made by the same person.

The goblins said that they did not know this wizard's real name (a lie; they knew of course) but were actively trying to find out what it was; all they knew from his magic was that he was a half-blood. They declared that he was now considered an "Enemy of the Goblin Nation", which was a special status reserved for those who had the potential to destroy their entire world.

No one in the Wizengamot made the connection between the information so far given and Lord Voldemort, so when the goblins declared that anyone who followed this wizard was also considered an "Enemy of the Goblin Nation", they all just nodded their heads and ratified the goblin nation's declaration.

The next day, the goblins dropped their biggest bombshell so far.

They sent word through Dirk Cresswell that Sirius Black had fallen afoul of their enmity with the same unnamed wizard, who by the way was called "Tom Marvolo Riddle", but the magic of their agreement with the Wizengamot was not letting them confiscate the Black vault. They wanted the trial transcripts of Sirius Black.

That put the cat among the pigeons, or rather, two cats!

First, the DMLE informed the Wizengamot that there was no record of a trial; it seemed he had been chucked into Azkaban without the benefit of one. That a pureblood lord could be treated so was a wakeup call to most of the privileged folks in the Wizengamot. Hurriedly, the Wizengamot ordered that Sirius Black be brought to their next session, if he was sane and sensible.

Next, the Chief Warlock, Albus Dumbledore, declared that Tom Marvolo Riddle was the birth name of Lord Voldemort, so the goblins had effectively put any Voldemort sympathisers on an "enemy" list.

Several members exited the chambers hurriedly, probably on their way to the bank to clean out their vaults. It would do them no good - the goblins detected them via their dark marks and shunted them off to a goblin mine somewhere. By the declaration ratified just yesterday, they did not need to wait for these people to be convicted of some crime by the Wizengamot - merely having the magic of Tom Riddle on you was enough.

The next session was dramatic in the extreme, resulting in Sirius Black being declared innocent of all charges he was ever suspected of, and being handed a handsome amount as compensation. He was also told he could assume guardianship of his godson when school let out.

Things changed significantly for Harry after that. His godfather doted on him, and was shocked and appalled to hear of the horcrux in his head from the goblins. When Harry heard that the goblins could remove it, but it would be expensive, he shrugged. "Is my share of the basilisk money sufficient?" he asked.

Clearly it was more than sufficient, going by the flash of greed in Ragnok's eyes.

With all horcruxes now gone, and all Voldemort's followers declared enemies of the goblin nation (some of them were stupid enough to attempt to grab their money by force; they of course died painful deaths, though no more painful than the deaths of various muggles, muggle-borns and half-bloods they had killed over the years), Voldemort's spirit drifted along for eternity - neither alive nor dead.

Britain was relatively peaceful, and would remain so for decades to come.

As promised, Prof Flitwick persuaded Harry to take on Dobby as his personal elf at the end of second year. Since he wasn't going back to his uncle, he felt good about agreeing. It was even better because Hermione was present when Prof Flitwick was telling him he needed to do this, and had heard all the explanations about house-elves and magic dependency.

Harry eventually graduated. He and Hermione had gotten closer since the incident with the bludger - Harry had seen pensieve replays of Hermione's anger and the power with which she destroyed it, and was mightily impressed that someone would do that for him. He had never left her side since, and it turned out to be a very good decision, not just for his school days, but for the rest of their lives together.

Sirius never married, but when he passed, the Black lordship came to Harry. By then, Harry and Hermione had adult children of their own, and one of them was easily able to take up the Black house's reins.

And finally, the goblins continued to make inroads into the decision making by the Wizengamot, using the "bad for the economy" card as often as they could get away with.

The End