I want to thank everyone that comments and supports my story. It does get a bit discouraging to write when I see stories clearly written by AI do so well, with far more engagement then my own stories. So to all of you supporting me, especially my patrons, thank you. You guys motivate me.
(Word Count: 1,339)
"Master Harry, sir! You must be waking up now," Tripsy gently shook Harry awake.
He sat up groggily. "Thank you, Tripsy. I'm up."
They were in Grimmauld place once again, having returned home yesterday.
Harry came downstairs to the smell of toast, eggs, tea, and coffee. The dining room was bright and happy, despite the early hour. Grimmauld Place had long since lost its haunted and dark feeling over the years with all of the work they had put into it. Sirius was at the table already, hair sticking in every direction, half-awake over a newspaper and a cup of tea.
"Mornin', pup," Sirius yawned, sipping at his tea and smacking his lips in satisfaction.
"Morning." Harry slid into the seat across from him and grabbed a slice of toast.
Sirius blinked blearily at him. "Wait a minute. What are you doing up? You just won a tournament! Sleep in a bit!"
Harry bit into the toast before answering. "I'm meeting Draco in an hour. We're going to look around Muggle London before heading to Diagon Alley for school supplies. "
Sirius snorted. "You're sure the little ferret won't combust the instant he steps outside of Diagon?"
"He managed last time," Harry said, a small grin crept in as he remembered Draco's feigned nonchalance. Now that he thought about it, wasn't he a bit tsundere? "He wants more comics. He was quite taken by the X-Men series."
"Ha!" Sirius guffawed, "Imagine that! Our dear Lucy's own son is a fan of muggle comics!"
"I think this time, I'll take him to a music shop and have him listen to some actually good music. The only music the wizarding world has that's not classical are the Weird Sisters. He needs some variety."
"I don't know, you think he'd like your metal bands? It may be too much for him," Sirius said.
"We'll find something he likes," Harry said. "By the way, where is everyone?"
"Back to their jobs. They could only get the two days off to come see the finals," Sirius said. "Nymphadora's back to her academy."
"Remus couldn't get a day off?"
"No, the wolfsbane project is keeping him too busy. But the business is now officially up and running, so that's good. And he seems a lot happier now," Sirius said with a smile.
"Yeah, he never did like to just live here off of us no matter how we said it was nothing," Harry said.
For the past few years, Remus had been working on building a series of greenhouses and a ranch dedicated to growing only the ingredients to the Wolfsbane potion. The greenhouses grew wolfsbane, hellebore, sopophorous, and mandrakes. The ranch took care of several occamy that they could get their hands on. The only ingredients they couldn't directly produce themselves were dragons blood—dragons were too dangerous to be domesticated and needed dedicated reserves—and moonstone which had to be mined. But the goal was to eventually buy a dragon reserve and a moonstone mine, that way they would have complete vertical integration and wouldn't have to source any materials anywhere else.
The work had been good for Remus. It was always hard on him that he could never get a stable job because of his condition, and it made him feel worthless. Ever since Harry had gotten in touch with him he had been living off of his money, but that just made him feel even worse. Though the funding for the business still came from Sirius and Harry and they technically owned everything, this was a different situation entirely. He was able to support himself and even help many other werewolves in the same situation. That gave Remus a confidence that he never had before, and it was good to see him so happy.
Unfortunately, it also meant Remus had moved out. He now had his own place that was closer to the business, so Harry didn't see him nearly as often as before.
After finishing breakfast, Harry went back upstairs to get ready for the day and soon he was waiting in the sitting room for Draco to show up. Since last time Harry was the one to go over to Draco's house, it was his turn to come over.
He sat down on the couch and pulled out a copy of Terry Pratchett's "The Colour of Magic," the first book to his Discworld series, to read as he waited. He had a couple of minutes to kill before they were supposed to show up.
A few minutes later, right on time, the fireplace flared to life and the faces of Draco, Narcissa, and Lucius appeared in the fire. With a flick of his hand, Harry opened up the floo for them to step through before they could ask.
Lucius stepped through first, followed by Narcissa and lastly Draco. They strode into the room, heads held high.
Harry stood up to greet them. "Lord and Lady Malfoy, Draco, good morning."
Lucius looked down at him with a tight smile."Potter. Good morning." He gestured to his son with his cane. "I'll leave Draco to you. Do take care of yourselves. We'll meet the both of you at Diagon Alley just before lunch. In the meantime, I have some business with Arcturus. If you would excuse me. Come along, Narcissa."
Lucius walked past him, to head upstairs to Arcturus' office.
Narcissa lingered a moment to kiss Draco on the cheek. "Be safe, Draco." And she followed after her husband, not even glancing at Harry.
The two young boys were now alone in the sitting room. Draco looked at him. "Congratulations on winning, I suppose."
"Thanks," Harry grinned.
"Don't get a big head. I could have won as well, if I wanted to. I just didn't think dueling was worth my time," Draco huffed.
"Uh-huh. You know, if you learn the shield charm and point-casting, you're basically guaranteed a spot in the top 10. The skill level for the U-15 isn't that high," Harry said.
"Hmph, the shield charm is nothing. I can cast that in my sleep!" Draco boasted.
'That's a lie,' Harry thought.
'Shield charm and point casting, huh? I'll have to practice those when I can. Maybe I can get Professor Flitwick to teach me. He taught Harry after all, he wouldn't deny a Malfoy,' Harry read Draco's thoughts passively.
"Good, maybe you can help out. Professor Flitwick and I were thinking of restarting Hogwarts's dueling club. If you can already point cast and use the shield charm, you can help teach the other students."
Draco flushed red, "A-as if I would waste my time teaching anyone!"
Eager to change the topic, Draco's eyes landed on the book in Harry's hand. "The Colour of Magic? Are you studying during summer break?"
"This? No, this isn't a spellbook. This is just a fantasy story."
"Fantasy? Isn't it about magic? What's fantasy about it?" Draco asked.
"Heh, it's fantasy because it was written by a muggle. He doesn't know magic is actually real. It's an interesting perspective, reading them as a wizard," Harry grinned.
"Written by a muggle? I thought they didn't know about magic?"
"Muggles still have plenty of stories carried over from before the statute of secrecy, though they think of them as mere myth and fairy tales. It gave rise to some interesting stories. Want to read it?"
"Hmph, why would I waste my time reading about what muggles think about magic?"
"Because they're fun stories. Didn't you enjoy reading those comics we bought last—"
"Sshh!" Draco shushed him in a panic. "Shut it, you git! Do you want my parents to hear!?" He said in a harsh whisper.
"Alright, alright," Harry whispered back. Then in a normal voice, "Come on, we don't have time to waste!"
Harry went to the front door. Draco glanced back to the floo. "Where are we going?"
"Out to London. There's a cool music store I want to show you, just follow me!"
They left out the front door, out to the streets of London.