Harry rubbed his jaw in contemplation. "You know, you have a point there. Despite everything you've done, I don't want to make things too easy for Voldemort either and if you are truly the only one still opposing him then... But on the other hand you've proven to me that your knowledge of my whereabouts is a clear and present danger so I'm afraid I have no choice but to obliv..."
"I'll sign another contract. You only need to add a few clauses to the last one and it will be absolutely iron clad. I... I'm willing to do whatever you say. Just don't..." said Dumbledore as he desperately tried to persuade his former student.
"Very well," said Harry, hiding his elation. This was precisely what he had been hoping that Dumbledore would suggest. Magical contracts worked best if they were signed voluntarily after all and obliviating Dumbledore was far too risky for the simple reason that he knew that Dumbledore possessed a pensieve. No doubt, Dumbledore had some of his memories backed up in there. He had stepped into one of Dumbledore's old memories way back in his fourth year after all.
"Let's write that contract now, shall we? This time, I'm also going to add in clauses to stop you from ever approaching former acquaintances of mine again," said Harry. He stopped and thought for a minute. "Unless, they're in imminent danger of being attacked and you need to warn them and we're going to specify exactly what we mean by imminent danger very, very carefully."
...
Harry was exhausted. Dealing with Dumbledore was very taxing and had left him feeling absolutely wrung out. Rewriting the contract had not taken that much time but this time he had wanted to be absolutely certain that there were no loopholes which meant that every single line, every single word had to be gone over again and again. Still, Dumbledore had signed and then Harry had let the sorry old bugger go. Surprisingly, the man had been muttering about needing a drink as he left. Hopefully, he had learned his lesson and would not bother Harry again but Harry would not be banking on that.
No, unfortunately he had no doubt that sooner or later Dumbledore would be back to convince him again. Perhaps he should move, he wondered. The only problem with moving were the wards. The wards at his current house were the product of years and years of work. Starting all over again on some other house was not something that Harry wanted to even contemplate doing.
Luna glided into the room and Harry's mood instantly lifted. Somehow, just the sight of Luna was enough to cheer him up immeasurably.
"So, what did you really do with Sirius and Hermione," she asked as she sat down on the couch and cuddled into his side.
Harry smirked, "What makes you think that I didn't do exactly what I said I did?" he asked.
"Oh please, you can fool Dumbledore but I know you. There's no way you would have obliviated either of them and let's not forget that you've been talking about visiting Brazil for weeks," said Luna.
"Fine, they're in the basement, Dobby's keeping an eye on them," admitted Harry.
"How did you fake the obliviation?" asked Luna.
"The wonderful thing about the obliviation charm is that the same charm is used whether you're wiping a years worth of memory or just a minute or two. Unless you run a full diagnosis you really can't tell how much memory the caster has wiped," said Harry.
So... you...?"
"Wiped about half a second of memory from both of them. Which means they only lost the memory of walking a few steps down our driveway," said Harry.
Luna cuddled deeper into Harry's side. "Why haven't you woken them up yet? I thought you'd be jumping at the chance to meet them again, as Harry Potter, that is."
Harry sighed - "I'm... well I'm a little nervous. They're probably going to be angry at me and... Hermione's got a pretty good right hook you know. She punched Malfoy once and..."
"Draco Malfoy? She punched him! Really? I wish I could have seen that," said Luna with a bit of a giggle.
"Well, technically it might have been closer to a slap but still, it nearly laid the ponce out cold, even then," said Harry.
"So, are we letting them into the secret, or not?" asked Luna.
Harry sighed. "We are," he said. His eyes flickered nervously towards the door as he gathered up his courage to do he needed to do. Finally, he got up and made his way towards the basement.
...
....
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