ITW,H - Chapter 118 - Werewolves (4) (Patreon)

(Word Count: 2,417)

The next 2 days passed by quickly. The werewolves had the casserole, so they were set for those days. On the evening of the second day Remus and some of his employees at the wolfsbane project—the company was now officially named Moonrise Remedies—came to deliver some necessities like sleeping bags, tents, some more food, toiletries, etc. 

Progress was being made towards buying the Rookwood castle. Ted found out that it was sold off by the Rookwood family and the owner now was a real estate company, though they haven't been able to do anything with the property for decades.

The morning of the third day, a snake Harry had summoned and left at the castle had reported to him that one of the real estate agents had apparated and inspected the property. Likely to get an up-to-date estimate on the property. The wizard disappeared after inspecting the grounds.

Now that they had gotten their estimate, it was unlikely they would return before it was sold, so Harry made his way over to begin the repairs. 

Luckily, it was Saturday, so he didn't have to worry about classes.

For the next two hours, Harry walked around the castle casting Reparo everywhere there was damage, and conjuring temporary stone bricks to fill in all of the gaps in the walls. Conjured stone would be fine if he intended to leave the walls as-is, but if he wanted to enchant the walls with any sort of ward or spell he would need actual, real bricks. 

Conjured items didn’t take any spells very easily. Without trying to enchant them, conjured items would last as long as he liked. But if he did attempt it, it would destabilize the magic of the conjuring making the items far more temporary. That may be fine in certain situations—for example, the duplication curse in the Lestrange vault where the duplicates only needed to last long enough to keep duplicating until the intruders were crushed—but constructing long lasting housing was not one of them. Especially if he needed to charm the walls against feral werewolves trying to escape.

By the end of it, the outer walls of all the structures were at least put back together again, with a handful of some internal load-bearing walls that were also made of stone. The rest of the interiors would need a lot more work.

With the castle fixed back up for the most parts, Harry took a step back to admire his work, wiping the sweat off his brow. It really was a beautiful castle. 

He flew out to the mountain nearby, found a large boulder, and used a bit of free-form transfiguration to change the shape of the boulder into a neat pile of bricks.

He levitated as many of the bricks that could fit into his trunk as he could and flew back over to unload, taking several trips.

When finished getting all of the bricks,  he got to work replacing the conjured brick with the ones he just made. With his perfect memory, he had cut the bricks precisely the right shape so they slotted into each spot perfectly. Then he fixed them in place with a permanent sticking charm.

It took him the rest of the day to get all of the bricks in place.

The next day was Sunday, so he was also free. This time he tackled the wooden interiors.

He flew over to the trees nearby. He found several that grew tall and straight and, with a bit of magic, cut up a few of them into usable planks, including several thick beams for structural support. 

Unfortunately for him, the wooden beams were too long to fit into his trunk, so he had to levitate them, taking a substantial amount of focus for such a heavy load, and carefully walked them down the mountain and back up the hill to the castle. 

It was only after he set the wood down in the courtyard that he realized he could have just shrunken the wood. ‘Well, what's done is done,’ he thought, wiping his sweat off. Perhaps he should invest some skill points into Wingardium Leviosa. Getting that skill up to level 5 removes the upper limit of weight he could levitate, relying only on how much power he had, and once it's cast, it doesn't require any focus at all to maintain it. ‘Eh, I'll think about it.’ He wanted to see what he unlocked with some of the classes first before he used any more skill points.

He took a moment to sit down and drink some water before moving on to actually getting the floors in.

He started with the main keep. He shrunk the beams, so they could easily fit inside the doors, and levitated them into place, then unshrinking them and watched as they slotted neatly into place inside the slots cut into the walls. Now they weren't going anywhere. Now, for the flooring, he just set the planks of wood across the top and bottom to create a floor and ceiling, sticking the planks in place with the permanent sticking charm.

It took another full day of playing carpenter, but he finished getting all of the wood in, complete with some wooden staircases between the floors. The main keep had three main floors to it, plus a fourth for the small corner towers, while the northwestern tower had four, but the floor plan was much simpler and he finished that one quickly. The southwestern tower, which looked like a smaller keep in its own right, only had two levels to it, so he only had one floor to put in.

The floors may have been put in, but none of it was sanded, and didn't have any proper sealant or finish on it, so it did end up looking rather crude. Still, it was far better than nothing, and pretty good for a single day’s work. 

He took out his mirror and called Sirius.

“Hey, Harry!” Sirius greeted. It looked like he was in his office. He looked a bit tired, smiling wearily at the mirror. “What's up?”

“Hey, Sirius,” Harry grinned, “Don't tell the real-estate agent, but I went ahead and fixed up the castle as best I could. The stone walls are all restored, and I just finished putting in the wood flooring again. I think it might be ready for them to come here instead. Though, perhaps after we get them better situated into a more permanent solution, we might want to get a proper construction team down here to do all of the proper finishing touches on it.”

Sirius gaped, “What? You've fixed the castle already? That was so quick!”

“Yeah, see?” Harry aimed the mirror around the castle to show it off.

“Haha! That's amazing,” Sirius said. “You'll be glad to know that the papers were just signed and now the Black family owns one more castle! Well, Moonrise Remedies does. Thanks to your own survey of the castle, Ted was able to negotiate it down by quite a bit. It only cost us about 300,000 Galleons! A bit of a steal, really.”

They made arrangements for Harry to bring the werewolves over today, and then Remus and some of the other werewolf employees to bring some furnishings to fill out the castle tomorrow.

He said goodbye to Sirius and put the mirror away. Before he brought them over, he just had one last thing to do. He walked over to the courtyard walls, and began applying some wards. Protego Totalum, Fiato Duro, among others meant specifically for werewolves, as well as keeping things in as opposed to keeping things out. Then he took several steps to the side, and repeated all of the spells, continuing until he circled the whole courtyard.

 Now he was ready. 

He apparated just outside of the werewolf camp.

Harry appeared with a soft pop, but it was still loud enough to alert everyone within. They were all sitting around the campfire eating dinner, but they all jumped to their feet when he arrived.

Seeing it was him, they settled back down with a sigh of relief.

“Good news, everyone! I've acquired the castle, and it's ready for you to move in! Well, I fixed up the basic structure, but it's still barebones when it comes to furniture so you'll have to bring your sleeping bags. Maybe you can even bring along your log seating for something to sit on,” Harry said cheerfully. “If you're ready, you can go ahead and pack up your things, and I can bring you all over so you can sleep there. If not, I can come back in the morning.”

The werewolves cheered.

“You actually got it?”

“Let's go now!”

“Anything to get out of this forest!”

With so many of them eager to head over now, they immediately began breaking down their tents and packing up their things.

“So, how do you want to do this?” Harry asked Anaïs. “I can apparate them two at a time and put the luggage into my trunk necklace.”

The French woman looked at him in wonder. “You can apparate?”

“Yeah, I got my apparition license even before I went to Hogwarts,” Harry said. “It's really easy once you get the hang of it.”

“That's true, but the initial practice…” she shuddered. “I still remember when I first started learning it. I splinched my leg off. Are you sure you can handle apparating so many times? That would be thirty times in a row, there and back again. Half of those while bringing along two side-alongs. That's more than most adults can handle.”

“I'll be fine, don't worry. I can handle worse.  Besides, if you're up for it, once I bring you and some of the others, you can apparate back and bring some along yourselves,” Harry said.

“Ah, that's right,” Anaïs said sheepishly. 

It didn't take long for the camp to be completely broken down. Harry waved his wand and all of the luggage flew into his trunk.

Then he grabbed Anaïs and her son first. “You ready?” He asked.

They nodded, and he apparated, the three of them appearing in the courtyard.

Anaïs looked around in awe. “Wow!” She looked to her son. “Antione! Why don't you head inside? Mommy will be right back!”

Harry and Anaïs apparated back and grabbed more people, focusing on those that knew apparition well enough to help shuttle people. Soon, everyone was moved into the castle. 

Harry unloaded their luggage in the main hall of the keep.

“Alright, Anaïs, Remus and Sirius will be by tomorrow with some more supplies to get you all more comfortable. They should also have the suitcase by then, so you should be set. I'll leave the rest to their capable hands. They'll continue to help you from here on. I've got to focus on my studies still,” Harry said in goodbye.

Anaïs smiled warmly at him, and brought him into a big hug. “Thank you, Harry Potter. You have likely saved our lives. We are all in your debt.”

Harry patted her back, “Er, it was nothing, really.”

“It was everything! If there is anything you need in the future, you need only ask,” she said earnestly.

Harry waved goodbye to the rest of the group, and flew back to Hogwarts.

As he was leaving, he saw he had completed the quest. 

[Magic Quest: Centaurs

You have helped resolve the conflict between the centaurs and the werewolves. 

Reward: +1 Divination, Perk: Friend of the Forest]

[Perk Gained! Friend of the Forest: Both natural and magical forests recognize you as a welcome presence and will aid you as much as possible. While within a forest or similarly wild magical environment, you will have an instinctive awareness of unnatural disturbances, ecological imbalance, and nearby danger.

Forest-dwelling magical creatures are less likely to fear or attack you, and creatures you have aided may be more willing to offer aid, information, or safe passage.

Your charms, wards, and transfigurations intended to protect, restore, cultivate, or shelter living things are more efficient and endure longer when anchored in a natural environment.]

His Divination became level 6 now. Not much change there. However, this Perk was pretty good. He was now basically a druid. Harry couldn't help but chuckle at the thought. ‘I wonder how far this “aid” of the forest can go?’ If he was attacked while in a forest, will the trees come alive to defend him? Probably not. But he could see his enemies tripping over uneven ground and undergrowth.

Or perhaps he would always be able to find food to forage.

The last bit was interesting as well. Perhaps he should plant plenty of trees around his future Potter Manor, that way his wards would be more potent.

The next day, Harry awoke to some good news. It seems that the crows and the centaurs have been making good progress in hunting down the remaining acromantula.

[Magic Quest: Acromantula

You've successfully culled the acromantula numbers to below 100, even enlisting the help of the crows and centaurs! Well done.

Reward: +2 Levels.]

A straight forward reward.  He placed 5 stat points into Power and Control each. He played 1 class point into Arithmancy and Ancient Runes each, sticking to his plan as before. He left the skill points alone for now.

[Name: Harry James Potter-Black

Level: 41 72%

Stats:

Power: 162 => 171, [11]

Control: 121 => 127

Focus: 134 => 136

Classes: Mind Arts 15, Magizoology 15, Dueling 13, Divination 5 => 6, Curses 3, Alchemy 5, Charms 1, Transfiguration 1, Potions 1, Herbology 1, Astronomy 1, Arithmancy 1 => 2, Ancient Runes 1 => 2

Skills: Occlumency 5, Legilimency 5, Serpensortia 5, [+4]

Perks: Potter Family Magic, A Mother’s Love, Horcrux, Parselmouth, Black Family Magic, Animagus, Natural Occlumens, Magical Growth, Emotional Empowerment, Harvester, Empathetic Sensing, Insight, Seer, Wide Wormhole, Teamwork Makes the Dream Work, Spellchainer, Memory Infusion, Duelist, Purify, Third Eye Opened, Natural Legilimens, Nature Natural, Basilisk Slayer, Symbiotic Bond, Friend of the Forest]

Later in the morning he received word from Sirius that they had gotten the suitcase, and it had more than enough room for the werewolves at Rookwood Castle. It could comfortably fit 50 to 60. Maybe 70 if they didn't mind not having as much room to run around.

With that confirmation, Harry left everything dealing with the werewolves in their hands. As he told Anaïs, he had other things to worry about. 

They could handle things themselves just fine.