studiobondurri 66 The Presence of Presents
66 The Presence of Presents
66 The Presence of Presents
It was the best Christmas eve I had ever experienced. The happy atmosphere made everything better. The joy on Petunia's and Dudley's faces as they opened their surprise gifts from me was worth surprising them. Petunia had a very expensive handbag that I had enchanted to be huge inside and she could summon anything she wanted from it, rather than root around.
Dudley got a gigantic toybox that would hold everything he would ever get for the rest of his life. He could throw anything inside and it wouldn't break and he could summon it out as well. He laughed and laughed as he threw one of his large rattles inside, it loudly echoed in the trunk, and he called it back to his hand to throw it again.
Vernon looked impressed when he opened his gift, because it was a Never-Ending Wallet that I had enchanted to hold as much money inside as he wanted and it already had a thousand pounds in it. It could hold coins, too. He could summon whatever denomination of bills he wanted, because I had made sure to give him an even mix.
I happily accepted the gifts of baby toys and made sure I played with them for an appropriate amount of time before moving on to the next gift. We ate a huge turkey dinner with all the trimmings that Cookie had outdone herself with. It was a wonderful meal with everything and Dudley and I enjoyed our mulch.
With my family pretty much tired out from the exciting day, I sneaked off to go to the mail room. Not surprisingly, I received a lot of fan mail for the holiday and the mail room was almost full. Most of it was Yuletide cards and well wishes, with a few gifts thrown in, and quite a bit of money. It had all been checked by the elves first and any obviously bad things were boxed up and sent off to the DMLE.
I received a package from the Weasleys with tiny knitted sweater inside with a large 'H' on it. It also had several compulsions cast on it and I shook my head at it. The tin of fudge had more potions in it that were keyed to the Weasleys, which told me Amelia hadn't had much luck finding support for the idea I proposed. I packed them back up in the box and added a note about the repeat offender.
I did up a form letter for the thank yous that didn't need a personal touch and Butter popped in with the large box of Christmas cards I had created. He handed me a stack of animated photos of me wearing my Harry Potter costume and a Santa Claus hat. It was me waving from in front of the North Pole sign and behind that were several tables with the house elves pretending to make toys.
It was a great fake scene and I stuck them to the front of the cards and added Happy Yule in crayon inside and signed the form letter before I folded it and put that and the card in an envelope. Thanks to magic and Butter's help, we were done in just under an hour and all five of the house elves popped into the room, grabbed a stack to deliver them, and disappeared.
I worked on the more personal responses while they were busy delivering the cards. A few of them needed me to show up personally, like with Amelia wanting an outfit like mine for her niece, Susan. I wasn't going to deny her request, not after all the extra work I had been sending her way. I even made her an expanded briefcase for her to take to work and included the instructions.
I also made Susan a female version of my outfit and transfigured a real monster crystal for the cape clasp. I also added the velvet inside the cape like Louise's, just so the outfit looked more expensive. After another minute of thinking about it, I included a copy of the Tristain Academy of Magic's schoolbook on elemental conjuration. It would probably blow Amelia's mind to get a new perspective on magic.
For Neville, I gave him some of the fruits and vegetables I had saved from the last world and a note for him to listen to his passion and see what he could do with them. It was a blatant hint for him to try growing things and I didn't care. I would keep the food under stasis for as long as possible and would have Floppy check on him to see if he was playing in the greenhouses with the elves.
I also did up a smaller book about safety protocols and emergency ward shields to send to Pandora Lovegood, Luna's mother. Yes, I knew it was seven years early. No, I didn't care. The sooner the woman starts thinking about her family's safety, the sooner she can head off blowing herself up in front of her daughter, Luna. That girl desperately needed to keep her mother alive for as long as possible.
I conjured up a pile of blankets, gloves, and wool socks, then charmed them to be warm, waterproof, and to never wear out. I had counted the prisoners in Azkaban the last time I was there and would distribute the Yule gifts and warn the prisoners about hiding them from the guards, then laughed. I quickly changed their color to resemble the same dark and dingy stone that Azkaban was made from and they were perfectly camouflaged.
There were a few other expensive gifts from people that I didn't know and had given to me, so their response gifts still needed a personal touch. I created a few things, like the ever-glowing lights from Danmachi, and slotted monster crystals inside and sealed them permanently. Breaking them open would destroy the crystal, which was perfect. No one was stealing that idea.
The last thing I did was create another cape in the shape of a swaddling blanket, a real magical stone included as the clasp, and added a card for Astoria Greengrass to let her family know I was considering their proposal. I doubted I would accept it until I was at least 17, because I had plans to complete long before then. The expensive watch they sent me was really nice, too.
I created a life-size Harry Potter plushie doll for Daphne, just because I could. That made me realize I could add one for Susan as well and reopened Amelia's gift and put one in there, too. I would have to either find a muggle manufacturer to make more or I could start my own business producing Harry Potter merchandise.
Should I wait for my first adventure book to be published? I asked myself as I stored everything in my inventory. If I did, I would lose three and a half years of sales. The first book doesn't come out until I'm five years old, according to the publishing date.
I wasn't sure how I was getting to Africa to confront a rampaging Nundu, which was a gigantic magical lion that breathed poison breath. That wasn't for years, so I had some time to figure things out, like finding the author and arranging for them to be the author in the first place.
Or do I have to? I asked myself. I took out the first book and I had another wonderfully funny idea. I already had the book and assumed the author's name was a pseudonym, which meant the real person might not want to be found and would write the books in secret. If I produced them myself and assumed the identity of the author, all that profit would come right to me.
That gave me another idea. All of that money could be used to pay the tuition of the students of Hogwarts, especially the muggleborns and muggle-raised that couldn't afford it. Even some of the pure bloods didn't have that much money to afford sending their children through school, which was why they usually held to a single child if it was a boy and sometimes had a spare if the first was a girl.
Nymphadora made a sad sound and let me go. I dropped down onto my feet, which didn't want to hold me up, so I plopped right down onto my butt and fell backwards onto the step. Thankfully, it was made of wood and my head only bounced instead of cracking open. The thunk sound it made was fairly loud, though.
“NO!” Two gasps came from inside the house and Nymphadora was suddenly yanked out of the way and I was being carefully picked up in Andromeda's arms and the back of my head was examined by her husband.
“I don't see anything starting to bruise or swell.” Ted Tonks said and waved his wand over me. “No concussion, either.”
“Oh, thank Merlin.” Andromeda whispered and cradled me against her considerable chest and rested my cheek on her shoulder.
“M'Harry.” I mumbled into her neck. “Not Merlin.”
Ted chuckled. “Well, he's joking around, so he'll be fine.”
Andromeda nodded and pet my head. It was so soothing to be held like that, I fell right to sleep.
*
“The poor boy must be exhausted.” Ted said.
“Are you sure we should let him sleep like this after banging his head that hard?” Andromeda asked him and Ted waved his wand at Harry's head again.
“The diagnostic spell just says he's tired. There's no other damage.” Ted told her.
Andromeda nodded and turned to stare at her daughter with squinted eyes. “As for you...”
“You said to let him go.” Nymphadora said with tears in her eyes as she rubbed her arm.
Ted sighed and waved his wand at her arm. “You need some bruise creme for that.”
It was Andromeda's turn to sigh. “I'm sorry I grabbed you so hard, Nymphadora. I had to check on Harry right away. If anything happened to the savior of the wizarding world on our doorstep...”
Nymphadora let the tears roll down her cheeks. “I'm sorry.”
“We know you are, dear.” Ted said and gave her a hug. “Come on up to the bathroom. I'll get that creme and your arm won't feel so sore.”
Nymphadora nodded and followed her dad upstairs.
Andromeda closed the back door and went through the kitchen and into the living room. She walked over to the couch and carefully sat down on it and reclined a bit more than she usually did, because of the bundle of joy clinging to her.
It was surprisingly nice to have a baby to hold like that again and she decided to stay there for as long as necessary for Harry to wake up on his own. Getting to pet his soft messy hair was a good reason, too. She could wait for a little while longer to bring Sirius some Christmas turkey and to ask him if he was finally done feeling sorry for himself. The idiot would not be going anywhere for a very long time.