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Harry Potter was now a squib – or at least, he might as well be. He had defeated Voldemort a year ago and only now was he coming to terms with the fact that he no longer possessed magical powers. Technically, at least that was what Hermione said, he wasn’t an actual squib in that he was still an inherently magical being – he just couldn’t access his powers anymore.
At first he had been admitted to St. Mungos Hospital for Magical Maladies, but, when even the specialists there had expressed their regrets for the fate of the Wizarding World’s Saviour and after badgering from the Saviour himself and the surviving members of the Order of the Phoenix, had allowed him to leave.
He had settled in at Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place while waiting and hoping that his magic would come back. Even with admittedly bright minds like Hermione Granger, Severus Snape and Minerva McGonagall researching the matter no solution had been found and thus, nearly a year later, he was still living the life of a squib.
The Ministry of Magic had been in shambles after the confrontation between Voldemort and his Death Eaters and Harry and the Order. It was only recently that the Ministry had the resources and time to take care of things like the post mortem clearing of Sirius Black, Harry’s late godfather.
Now that Sirius’s name had been cleared his will would be read by the goblins of Gringotts and Harry was expected to attend the reading. Not keen to forfeit his inheritance to Draco Malfoy by default (he was the only living relative of Sirius Black), Harry had to find a way to traverse Diagon Alley and enter the wizarding bank unseen by his enemies.
Although he had defeated the Dark Lord not all the sympathizers had been caught and therefore having a defenceless Harry Potter wandering around would be the equivalent of painting a bull’s eye target on his forehead.
Discussing the problem with Hermione she immediately came up with the idea of brewing a batch of polyjuice, so that Harry could be incognito for the trip. When asked if they would approve of Harry using polyjuice inside their building the goblins, eager to avoid any unpleasantness happening to the young man (and his inheritance - he was, after all, the heir to two ancient bloodlines and their amassed fortunes), practically ordered Harry to implement the plan immediately.
Later that night Harry and Hermione had started the process of brewing an accelerated variant of polyjuice potion. Not having told anyone of the plan they were mightily surprised when the former Hogwarts Potions Master cornered Hermione in the library of Grimmauld Place and asked her what in the world she was thinking of making polyjuice with a squib, whereto she answered in righteous indignation: “I made polyjuice with a squib, because the goblins told me to!” Having delivered this message to the gobsmacked Potions Master she flounced out of the library to check on the brewing.
Later that week Harry Potter successfully entered Gringotts, using the polyjuice and inherited the entire Black estate with the exception of an old, cursed flowerpot, which was left to Draco Malfoy. But that is an entirely different story.
THE END