ITW,H - Chapter 115 - Werewolves (1) (Patreon)

Sorry for the late chapter again. I'm done with school for the next two week until September starts, so I'll be focusing on getting as many chapters written as I can to build up a good backlog. Right now, as you can probably tell, I don't have any backlog right now which causes delays like this to happen. I should also be much busier during the Fall semester, which will be my last before I'm finally done with college. So the backlog will be for weeks where I'm unable to write as much.

Wish me luck.

(Word Count: 2,150)

That night, Harry couldn't sleep. He kept tossing and turning, thinking of how he could possibly help these werewolves. There was just too much to consider, and he couldn't take his mind off of it to sleep.

First, the werewolves needed to be moved out of centaur territory as soon as possible to avoid any bloodshed on either side. That meant he needed to find somewhere to move them to. It had to be somewhere spacious enough to accommodate about 30 people and safe.

Second, he needed somewhere safe for them to transform during the full moon only a week away. That wasn't much time. Hopefully, the solution could be the same for both of these problems, but it wasn't likely. Remus was making great progress with the Wolfsbane potion pipeline, but it still wasn't anywhere near being able to provide enough potions for the entire British werewolf population, the supply was just too limited, so he needed a space isolated enough for feral werewolves.

Lastly, those were just quick bandaid fixes. He needed to figure something out for a more permanent solution. He couldn't fund them forever, nor did he want to. That just wasn't feasible.

These people needed long-term employment so they could take care of themselves and have some independence, rather than be dependent on Harry for everything. That way, they would have their own freedom and maintain or even regain their personal dignity and self-respect. It was the same way with Remus. When he was just living with him and Sirius, he never had the best self-esteem. It was only when he began working on this Wolfsbane potion pipeline that he really began to shine again.

The problem was, he didn’t really have a business idea that could use so many people.

Unable to sleep, Harry sighed and pulled out a small board to make a lap desk, summoned some paper and a quill, and began brainstorming some ideas.

To solve the most immediate problem, where could he send these people? ‘Could I keep them in Grimmauld? No, that’s stupid.’  There may be enough room in Grimmauld for everyone, but it was too close personally, inviting a bunch of strangers into his own home, and it was in a city. If he couldn’t find somewhere else for them to transform safely, he would have to move them again, so it was a bit of a waste of time.

The land around the Potter Manor? No, the manor was in the middle of being rebuilt, and that would put the construction workers at risk. Not to mention that runs the risk of turning the group into his dependents, or at least having them feel like his dependents. That was something he didn’t want.

He could just send them out into some far away mountain range, with some muggle repellent charms to make sure no campers or hikers are out there beforehand. But that wasn’t really shelter. Not that they had much here in the forest to begin with. It was the simplest solution, minus how he would get everyone all the way out there, but laying down so many wards around a public trail in the muggle world could attract a lot of attention from the ministry, and he didn’t want to give them a reason to shut down the Wolfsbane project.

Harry pondered, running through locations that were relatively nearby, had enough space to house 30 people, somewhat isolated so they didn’t disrupt the locals with a bunch of werewolves showing up, and was relatively secure in case he couldn’t find someplace safer for them to transform,

Harry eventually landed on Rookwood Castle, from the Hogwarts Legacy game. He knew the events and locations of the game were real, because he had read a history book about Ranrock's rebellion. Though he would have to check whether it was in any condition he could repair quickly. More importantly, he would need to find out who owned it. After all, it was connected to the Rookwoods, a dark family who nowadays served Voldemort through Augustus Rookwood, who was now imprisoned. It may still be owned by that family and relatively recently in Augustus’s hands, meaning it could be full of dark curses and who knows what else.

Still, on paper, it was close to perfect. It was isolated enough—He remembered reading in that same history book that the small Feldcroft village had been abandoned after being destroyed in Ranrock's rebellion—that thirty werewolves would not threaten the nearby locals, but near enough to Hogwarts that he could reach it quickly. Its walls could provide security, its grounds could give people room to breathe, and its ruined state meant it might be cheap to acquire if someone still held the deed. If it was safe, it could be made into shelter before the full moon. If it was not, he would have to keep looking.

He circled “Rookwood Castle” a couple of times.

As for the next problem, where they could transform safely, Harry’s first thought was to find a suitcase like Newt Scamander’s that has a complete internal environment. Preferably it would have a forest but it didn’t have to be. The problem was that it would be extraordinarily expensive, and he didn’t even know if he could find one available in the week that he had. 

Unfortunately, the full moon was already seven days away, so it was too late to get them all on the wolfsbane potion. That needed to be taken every day leading up to the full moon. If there was even enough for all thirty of them at the moment. Not to mention it wasn’t something he could just hand out for free, despite how much he wanted to.

But if he got a suitcase or trunk, that would allow for any werewolf that couldn’t afford the potion to transform safely. 

That still left food, water, clothing, and jobs. Harry stared down at the list in front of him, the words blurring together as the night dragged on. With a somewhat feasible plan, he set it aside and laid back down to try to sleep. It didn't come easily, so he manually pulled himself into his dreamscape.

When he awoke in the morning, he immediately used the time turner to turn back a few hours, grabbed his trunk necklace from the bedside table, and flew out of their window directly as a crow.

He had a castle to inspect.

If he remembered right, and he always did, the Rookwood castle should be in the Feldcroft region south, southwest of Hogwarts.

It didn't take him long to find it. It was much bigger in person than he thought it would be. 

The castle had tall stone walls that surrounded a large courtyard. In the northwest corner, there was a large square tower, in the Southeast corner, there was a small keep. The front of it, facing inwards to the courtyard, had two square towers creating a flat face, with a large circular body coming out the back facing outwards. 

Then there was the main keep, which was a large squared off body with square towers at each of its corners. It was set halfway into the walls so half of it was inside the courtyard. There was also a low circular extension coming out the back roughly the same height as the surrounding walls. 

Connected to the main keep through a stone building that replaced that section of the wall, was the main gatehouse. It had two circular towers on either side of the main gate.

It would have been a majestic castle, if it weren't for the ruinous state it was in. The damage was even worse than it was in the game. The northwest tower was a mere outer shell, and had one of its walls completely fallen down. It was also much shorter than it was in the game with no roof, so the top portion of the tower had collapsed. The Southeast minor keep was the most intact, but it still had huge holes in the walls, and was missing the front door. The main keep had its entire front and ceiling missing as well, in much the same state as the tower. The gatehouse still had the circular towers, but the entire middle meant to hold the gate was rubble. And lastly, much of the walls had collapsed.

Harry sighed. This may take a lot more work than he hoped.

It might still work though.

He landed in the courtyard and transformed back. He looked around the place. Despite living in the Hogwarts castle nearly year-round, he never lost the sense of awe he felt towards ancient castles. This place was beautiful. It just needed to be fixed up a bit, he eyed a rotting wood pile that used to be some structure.

Harry took out his magic mirror and called his godfather. “Sirius!”

Sirius answered, appearing in the mirror. Sirius was still in bed, bare chested and groggily wiping his eyes to clear them. Behind him, Harry caught a glimpse of messy red hair and bare shoulders of a woman. She was asleep, and turned away from the mirror so he couldn't tell who it was. But the short red hair was familiar.

‘That red hair… Is that… Madam Bones?’ Harry thought in shock, before quickly turning the mirror away from him. He remembered Sirius talking about her quite a bit.

“Harry? Is that you?” Sirius asked sleepily.

“Merlin’s beard, Sirius! Don't answer if you're naked with someone!” Harry yelled.

“Huh? Ah!” Sirius cursed, “I'm sorry, pup. Hang on. I'll call you back in a moment.”

The mirror disconnected.

Harry sighed heavily. He really didn't need to know Sirius was having Madam Bones over. He really didn't want to picture that.

As Harry waited for Sirius to call him back, he went around the castle and started casting Reparo on every collapsed portion of the walls to see which portion could be easily fixed.

Large stone bricks ripped from the ground it was buried under and slowly assembled themselves neatly into the wall. Luckily for him, Reparo doesn't care about how long something had been broken for. Unfortunately, it seemed like not all of the bricks were still around to be fixed as, when the spell finished, there were clear gaps in the wall. Perhaps someone had taken some of the bricks for building materials elsewhere. He would have to transfigure some replacement bricks from the nearby stone to fill those in.

The mirror dinged and Harry answered, and Sirius appeared with a chagrin smile.

He gave Sirius a flat look. 

“cough Why did you call, Harry? What’s wrong?” Sirius said.

“Well, there’s a bit of a situation here,” Harry began to tell him everything about the centaurs and the new werewolves in the forest. He also explained his ideas on how to handle it. “I need you to talk to Ted, and both of you look into who owns Rookwood Castle so we can buy it. I also need you to find a trunk or suitcase that has its own internal environment, so werewolves can use it for a safe location to transform.”

Sirius nodded along throughout it all. “You’ve thought this through brilliantly, Harry. Fortunately, Remus and I have already been looking for that kind of trunk, and I believe we have a lead. There’s an old estate sale in four days that should have a trunk with the environment we need. I’ll do everything I can to claim it.”

“You were?” Harry asked.

“Well, of course! Remus and I have already discussed finding a safe place for transformations, especially considering it’ll be a long time before our wolfsbane potion project will take a long time before it grows big enough to handle the entire werewolf population. In the meantime, having a trunk like that would do wonders.”

“That’s great! Now we just need to get the castle. It’s in a pretty rough shape, but I’m thinking once we get it fixed up, it could be some sort of headquarters for our next business venture. We need to come up with something to get some actual jobs open. While you and Ted handle that, I’ll go actually talk to them, and see what they think of our plan. It feels kind of wrong to make plans about them when I haven’t even got their opinions. But, they’re in a bad spot, so it shouldn’t be too hard to convince them,” Harry said.

“Do you want me to tell Remus? I’m sure he’d be more than happy to go out there with you,” Sirius asked.

“No, it’s fine. I can handle talking to them myself,” Harry said.

“Alright, then. But be careful, Harry,” Sirius warned. “If we haven’t talked to them already, then there might be a chance they’re with Greyback. Tread carefully.”

“I’ll be careful,” Harry said.