Chapter 154: CH 154
"Yes, Sir," Harry shrugged.
The Headmaster seemed to frown in thought for a few moments before he looked back at Harry and said, "I may have an answer to your dilemma for you, shortly."
"If you wish, Headmaster," sighed Harry. "But, I assure you, there is no dilemma. Myself and my bondmates will be spending the day with the Greengrasses and Grangers."
Dumbledore toddled off and Harry returned to the Ravenclaw table. "He try and force you to attend the Yule Ball?" asked Daphne with a slight smirk.
"He did," he shrugged. "But, I think I was successful in planting the idea in his head we plan on visiting the Greengrass and Granger residences during the day, only. I plan on letting him come up with the idea of portkeys."
With a smirk, Daphne said, "You're more and more letting that Slytherin side out now."
The very next evening, the Headmaster approached Harry, directly. "Mister Potter, I have an answer for your dilemma in being able to visit with the families of your bondmates on Christmas Day, and also your attendance at the Yule Ball."
"Headmaster, it was never a dilemma for me, as you put it," sighed Harry, as if exasperated by the man. "I was never going to go to the Ball."
"Well, yes," said Dumbledore. "However, I have created these two portkeys for you." The old man held out two small objects - an old sock and a short piece of rope. "The sock is a portkey to take you to the Greengrass Farm on the morning of Christmas Day at 9:00am sharp. The rope will return you here, to the steps into the Entrance Hall, at 6:45pm sharp."
Harry held up his hand in a gesture to stop and sighed. "Sorry, Headmaster," he explained. "It appears I did not explain myself properly. My bondmates and I will be leaving on the Express for the Christmas break. We won't be returning until the Express returns with the students.
"However, I recognise the effort you've gone to seeing us attend the Ball without upsetting our plans. Therefore, we'll use the portkey made of the rope to return to the school for the night of the Ball. However, the portkey made of the sock will need to be reconfigured to return us to Greengrass Farm on or about midnight the same night, so we may return to our winter holiday. Sorry. Either that or we Floo."
With one of his grandfatherly sighs, Dumbledore said, "I'm sorry, my boy; but, I cannot allow you to leave the school for such an extended period of time. It is unsafe for you."
Harry snorted and said, "One: I am a fully emancipated minor. As such, I can come and go as I please; so long as I am here for classes and the two mandatory feasts. Two: As a competitor in the Tournament, I'm allowed to leave the grounds of the school, with my trainers, whenever I want; it's in the contract. And, that same competitor status also means I can skip classes, irrelevant of the aforementioned point one. Three: You seem to have forgotten my magical guardianship was stripped from you, irrelevant of point one.
"In other words, Headmaster, if you attempt to stop me or my bondmates... my trainers... from leaving, it's kidnapping. Plus, as per point two, you would be breaching the contract; thereby placing your magic at direct risk of being stripped by the Goblet.
"Now, I understand you are concerned for my well-being. I appreciate that. However, it's my choice, and you have no right or authority to go against it. You can advise; you cannot demand... or insist. If you cannot see yourself to providing a return portkey for the late evening of the Yule Ball, I understand. I'll then just use the Floo at the Three Broomsticks or not attend. Or, I'll ask Matthias Greengrass to create a portkey for us to use just outside the main gates."
"You only informed me you were planning on being away from the school on Christmas Day only, Mister Potter," the Headmaster stated a little angrily.
"No, Sir," disagreed Harry giving his head a shake. "I did no such thing. I informed you we had other plans for Christmas Day. I did not inform you we had no plans for the rest of the break. We were only discussing that particular day. I am not in the habit of telling all and sundry what my plans are for each and every day, especially when those days are part of my rightful time away from the school.
"I remind you, sir; you are only the Headmaster of the school I once attended as a student, the Chief Warlock and the Supreme Mugwump. None of those positions gives you any right to know my personal business, or what I intend to do over my Christmas break. I only informed you about my... sorry, our... plans for Christmas Day out of what little respect I still retain for the staff of this institution; and in understanding the staff need to be informed of my plans concerning the Ball, lest you refuse to accept it from the lips of another. By rights and by law, I didn't have to tell you squat."
"Harry, do you think so little of me to treat me like this?" asked Dumbledore, again laying on the disappointment mien.
"Yes," Harry firmly replied. Looking Dumbledore directly in the eye, he continued, "The more I learn about my place in the world... especially, what I've learned these past few months... the more I've come to understand just how much you've screwed me over, Headmaster."
Dumbledore almost visibly reeled back in shock. Never - at least, not in very many years - had he ever been spoken to the way Harry did with those few words.
"But, you're not the only one," sighed Harry, looking away again. "Molly Weasley has been hard at work manipulating things around me, too. Did you know she's been planning for over a decade to have me marry her daughter; so she can then get her hands on the Potter fortune? Do you know she's quite happy to admit it was with love potions she ensnared poor Arthur? She admitted exactly that to Hermione... to her face... only a few days before the first of September.
"She maliciously sent Ronald to befriend me to give her daughter a chance to get closer to me when she started, here, a year later. Of course, Ronald was also tasked with stopping me making friends with anyone else. She just didn't account for a young muggleborn witch by the name of Hermione Jean Granger seeing me as a potential friend, and to want to get closer to me. And Ron is too much of a stupid git to realise girls can be friends of a boy, too. Nor did she expect there to be latent soul bonds between Hermione and I, and Daphne and I.
"No, she was not going to let something like that slow down her determination to get her hands on the Potter fortune. So, starting this year, she then tasked both her youngest to begin a much stronger and effective regimen of potioning. As you now well know the first dose came from her own hands during breakfast of the morning we boarded the Express back on first of September. Hermione even saw her do it. It's funny, in a way, that it was that potioning... and finding out about it... that led to me taking the bull by the horns and approaching Daphne on the train; and the first soul bond occurring.
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