Chapter 4

Harry and Dobby landed in an ancient looking forest. The trees looked to be about 60' high and there was almost no underbrush. Harry looked around and turned to look at Dobby. "Where is the castle?"

Dobby looked at him and said "the castle is being is behind a veil master Harry. Follow me."

Harry followed him and stepped through something that resembled heat mirage. When he had stepped through he immediately stopped in awe at the sight of the castle and the surrounding grounds. The castle walls were about five stories tall and had three towers placed in a triangle around it. The castle and the walls surrounding it were constructed of some sort of smooth jet black stone which had gold looking streaks running through it. Harry walked forward into the castle through the only opening in the walls and onto the drawbridge. When he passed the gate he saw a clear field about fifty feet ahead of him with the castle proper beyond that. The castle was about four stories tall and made of the same stone. Before the entrance to the castle were two statues flanking the entrance; one was a representation of a dragon and the other was a representation of a phoenix. The dragon looked to be a Swedish short snout, and the phoenix was gray. Having only seen one phoenix in his life Harry had no idea what a gray phoenix represented, for that matter he had no idea if there was significance to having the dragon there either. He resolved to look and hopefully find out if there was some information he could find to see what if any significance for the statues. He walked on and finally entered the foyer. The room was as large as the house his Uncle and Aunt lived in, it had a sweeping staircase leading up to the second floor. The floor was wooden and slightly dusty, and the chandelier had cobwebs strung between the lights.

Awed at the sight before him Harry looked around the foyer for awhile. His examination done he looked at Dobby and asked "well Dobby what do you think? How long do you think it would take to clean the place? Will you need some help? Should I bond with some more elves?"

Dobby looked around at the mess the room was in and closed his eyes and seemed to go into a trance for a few seconds. He then opened his eyes and looked up at Harry. "Master Harry I is needing about five other house elves to help clean and keep up this place. You should also consider bonding four other house elves for keeping up the grounds. That should be all that is necessary."

Harry closed his eyes and thought for a few seconds. He opened them in a show of some surprise, and decided to tell them to Dobby. "Dobby I need to tell you some of my plans and aspirations that I hope to accomplish in the future. That way you could help me with planning some of the details and behind the scenes work. I will be meeting with Bill tomorrow and going to Egypt with him and retrieving some lost artifacts. One of these artifacts is a time compression device. I believe it is a 30 to 1 compression; however I am not entirely certain. After I come back and set up the device I will be shopping in Diagon and Knockturn Alley's for books, potion supplies, ritual paraphernalia and supplies for rune work. If you could get some food and store it in the castle that would be a huge help. Remember that there will be at least three people here for thirty days, while there might be one other person. So that would work out to 270 to 360 meals. Don't forget drinks as well. If you could get a variety of foods notably Italian, Mexican and American style Pizza that would be perfect, just no seafood.

Now remember that there may be more people than that. I just thought of a potential complication in that none of the people I have planned on are really teachers. So I will probably contact Griphook and ask that, if at all possible, Gringotts would be able to contact professionals willing to teach for a suitable fee. I won't be asking any of the Order of the Phoenix members due to trust issues so they will probably be coming from the rest of Europe or the world for that matter. I will also be asking for a trainer in Krav Maga. Hopefully they will also be able to find a trainer in the use of swords as well. Hopefully they will be able to find trainers on short notice in that I hope to have them starting here in a weeks' time."

For the immediate future I will be staying here a week under compression time so I can catch up on all the raining that I have neglected, as well as studying Runes, Arthimatcy and the rituals that should be stored here. In addition to that I will ask Bill to study the wards here and ask that he recommend the services of someone trustworthy from Gringotts to update the wards. Hopefully he will consent to come here and be under the compression as well so I could avail myself of his services in studying the basics under him. So that would be me, you, possibly Bill and however many elves you think would be suitable, as well as Luna Lovegood."

Dobby had listened in awe of the plans that Harry had given him and thought for a few seconds. "Master I would be asking about nine elves as I said to come here. All of them can be put on cleaning and keeping up this place under the time compression and would be faithful to you. That way we could take care of you and your guests."

"How will you call them? Do you need to go outside the wards?" Harry asked.

"Yes we will have to go outside the wards. Wards here are very powerful and ancient."

Dobby then turned around and walked outside with Harry following him with a questioning air on his face pondering on how Dobby would call the elves as he knew of no spell that would be able to call so many people that wizards knew of. Dobby stopped outside of the veil and closed his eyes as an expression of concentration came over his face. As he did so Harry could almost feel the magic that came of Dobby as he did this. He then jumped in startlement as nine house elves appeared in sudden crack. As Harry looked at them he was shocked to his core at the pitiful sight that they made compared to his transformed friend. They wore ragged clothes and looked to have been beaten their entire lives. Several were sporting bruises and ill healed broken bones. Two of them were missing an eye, and three of them had their ears cropped. At the sight of them Harry resolved to himself to bond them in the same way he had bonded with Dobby. Hopefully the transformation would be able to handle healing all of them as he didn't know of a convenient place to handle healing them. Missing the sight of Harry who was standing in the shadows the nine house elves stared with expressions of absolute awe at Dobby. They then began bursting out questions in an unknown language at Dobby.

Dobby raised his hands and gestured placatingly at them in an effort to calm them down. He succeeded in a few minutes and turned to Harry. "Master these being the house elves that I called. Their names are Tristy, Bessie, Kaney, Venty, Wenty, Benty, Lenty, Digda and Winky. Bessie, Tristy, Winky and I will take care of the house and the others will take care of the grounds, if that is ok with you master?"

Harry nodded and directed his gaze toward the group of elves. "As you can see I am Harry Potter and I have asked Dobby here to find some help for my upcoming tasks. I would like all of you to know that in my service I have very few rules. One is that no one is to punish themselves without my specific approval, if you feel that you have done something worthy of being punished I will decided if it is or not, is that understood?" Seeing their grudging nods of acceptance "I will be bonding you in the same manner that I have bonded with Dobby here. It is the ancient bonding that up until now has been lost over the years. Are all of you willing to take this oath?" Seeing their joyous nods Harry took out the knife that he had kept from the bonding ritual with Dobby and performed the ritual on all of his new elves. The transformation that each one went through was nothing short of miraculous. Each one was healed almost instantly into a form that was a picture perfect semblance of health. Once the bonding had taken place on the last one Harry turned and went through the veil. He then went into the foyer and turned to Dobby who had followed instead of popping out like the rest of the group. "Dobby do you know the layout of the house now" he asked.

Dobby nodded his head and spoke up "yes I do be knowing then layout of the house master Harry. Which room will you be needing to go to?"

"I need to go to the library" Harry explained. Dobby turned and walked off with Harry following the elf. They passed through the foyer and down a long hallway till they got to a massive door on their right. At Dobby's gesture Harry opened the doors and walked into the largest and most massive library he had ever seen. His jaw dropped at the sight of the massive room and looked around. The bookcases were ten feet high and made of some dark wood. The front of the room had two desks side by side and there were three overstuffed couches sitting around a low table. The roof like the rest of the house gave off a light that was neither bright nor dim and perfect for seeing things yet didn't allow shadows to exist. As he was looking around Harry spotted a portrait of a man on the wall to the right. He walked over and saw a man dressed in armor seated on the ground asleep. He cleared his throat to wake up the man.

The man was startled awake and looking out at Harry he burst out "Hello who is that?" Who are you? What are you doing here?"

"My name is Harry Potter and I am the heir and owner of the castle. Who are you?"

"Hello good sir my name is Godricson Potter. I am the son of Godric Gryffindor. I happen to be your distant ancestor and the founder of the Potter line of which you are the descendant. How did you arrive here? As far as I know no Potter has come here in over 200 years."

Over the next hour Harry then explained the circumstances that had brought him here and the tasks that he was planning to do, as well as the current situation in the wizarding world that he had been dealing with. "So that is basically what I am facing now. So now that's out of the way, can you possibly help me in finding the ritual that I was told that was located here?"

"The ritual that you will need is located in my memories and is not written down in any book. So grab a piece of parchment and I will give you the details that you will need to carry it out."

Harry grabbed the parchment that was on a nearby table and quill and wrote down the ritual that he needed. Once that it was written down he looked at the painting and asked "Is there anything else that you could help me with?"

"Yes there is. On the pedestal behind you there is a book. Now to use this book you will need to go up to it and ask for book in a subject that you wish to study. The more detailed the request the better the results will be. You have told me the research and training that you have planned on, in my opinion I would suggest to study and undertake the blood rituals and wandless movement of objects that is essential in carrying out the rituals. These rituals will allow you to increase your balance, sight, agility, stamina, strength and magic control. In my day they were an essential part of becoming a true master of magic. From what I have gathered down through the ages is that your ministry has outlawed the practice of the rituals because of the drawbacks. The drawback in using these rituals is that if you mess up you may die or hurt your magical core so much you may become a squib. However the benefits far outweigh the risks in my opinion as long as you are carful and don't push beyond your limits. One of the hereditary traits in the Potter bloodline is the fact that blood rituals will come easier as well as the effects will be more powerful than is normally the case. The hereditary traits will also be accessible to your wives as well if you marry them under the ancient bonding ritual which I will also give you. From what I understand the Longbottoms also have an affinity to the blood rituals."

"Now I can also control the wads from here. The wards are not as strong as they once were, and it is an extremely good thing in planning on your friend Bill to come here right away to upgrade and strengthen them. One of the things that you will want to consider is going to the basement and retrieving some seeds placed in stasis down there. Those seeds are to a plant called blood wood. This wood is extremely rare and banned by almost every government in the world. The reason for this ban is because the tree does not require minerals in the soil or water; what they do require is blood to grow. Now the reason that I suggested this is; once the wood has grown to a sufficient size and bonded with you by growing with your blood; you will be able to harvest the wood. You will then be able to use the harvested wood and combine it with some samples also stored down there and use the materials and create a wand that only you could use. The entire process for crafting this wand is stored in a book in this library. There are enough seeds for the entire group that you have planned on having here. One of the next things that you should do is find one of the elves that are knowledgeable in harvesting creatures; then you and he should go to the chamber of secrets and harvest the Basilisk down there. The hide is important for you because it will make the strongest armor possible. The rest of the materials are also important as they are extremely useful in all sorts of things."

"Now the nest thing that you should research immediately is a book stored here in the library on the research that one of your ancestors came across in enhancing time compression devices. With that research you should be able to enhance the device you will acquire to not only stop the prematurely aging process that you might encounter, but will allow your magical core to mature at the enhanced rate to full maturity."

Harry with a quizzical expression on his face interrupted his ancestor "sir what do you mean about my core reaching full maturity? Isn't the core a fixed size your entire life?"

"No. our core goes through four stages. The first stage happens in all living things. Magic is inherent in all things in this universe Harry, from the smallest thing possible, to the world itself, magic is in everything. For magical beings the core is partially unlocked which is where the dragons and various creatures get their powers and abilities. Simple physics says that dragons are way too heavy for flying, yet they do. Phoenix's should not be able to do what they do yet they exist. All magical creatures from the smallest plant to the largest creature are in this second stage. Now wizards and various other races have a third stage in that the magic is controllable to them. They can direct and control magic and magic responds to them. Witches and wizards fall into this category. Now as I said earlier there are four stages. The fourth stage is the one where the witch and wizard acknowledge and consciously connect with magic in the most intimate way possible and swear to cleave to no other force. This is the reason that witches and wizards do not use firearms Harry as it is an insult to the extreme to magic. Now if you connect to magic in this manner Harry there are going to be drawbacks. One of them is that once you do this you will not be able to use any form of transportation that does not use magic, or is not in balance with the universe. This means you cannot use cars or planes or ship as well. As long as they use coal, fuel, gasoline or oil distillates if you use them magic itself will punish you. Now this punishment will take various forms, but at the extreme end of the punishments magic itself will leave you. So be extremely careful in what you do young Harry as the connection is not something you should do if you plan on leaving the magical society. Now onto the benefits; the greatest benefit is in that when you do connect your core and power will be increased dramatically. This means you will not tire out so quickly and you will recover even quicker. However like all things you will need to exercise your core constantly to receive the most out of this benefit."