Chapter 37

"Hmmm....So squishy..." Harry mumbled in his sleep as his hands made fondling motions.

"Mr. Potter!" Snape's surprised tone made the sleepy Harry pause. "The impropriety of this!"

"Five more minutes..." Harry mumbled, sleepily thinking Severus wanted him to get up because he slept in late again. He couldn't help it, it was the most comfortable bed in the world after sleeping for three decades on a stone floor.

"There will be no five more minutes of fondling my chest!" Severus' voice actually rose an octave. Harry blearily opened his eyes to notice that in his sleep he had spooned against Snape and his sleep self was apparently getting bolder too, judging by where his hands were. A faint flush could be seen on Severus' cheeks as the man managed to extricate himself... finally.

Harry pouted as he watched Severus shimmy out of the bed. The whole thing just had an air of domesticity in it. Normally, people start a relationship first before sleeping in the same bed, though Harry was grateful. He now liked to cuddle after not having human warmth for 30 years. Snape had called him touch-starved a few times but hadn't forbidden him from his bed even after they moved into the Chateau. "At least I didn't hog the blankets tonight," He said to which Snape just rolled his eyes.

"Are you still grumpy that we didn't get to our snogging session last night?"

"Partially," Severus admitted. "I was looking forward to making you speechless again." Harry flushed like a tomato as he remembered their kiss in the cave.

"You are such a tease!" Harry exclaimed upon seeing Severus' smirk.

"I am more annoyed with the fact that I have to deal with last night's situation today as fast as possible," Severus admitted. "The entire reason I took this position was to be a thorn in Albus's side,"

"Oh but you are," Harry laughed as he lounged on the bed. "You and I ran away together, which confounded his plans, and then you managed to convince Skeeter to defame Dumbledore, Hogwarts is getting audited which I'm sure is going to bring up a whole lot of interesting issues. That in turn will affect his standing with the International Confederation of Wizards and make his position as Supreme Mugwump precarious at best. They are very particular about their Supreme Mugwumps being involved in scandals. The only other thing that needs to be done is remove him as Chief Warlock." Harry muttered as he shrugged off more of the blanket to give Severus an enticing view. Snape raised an eyebrow at Harry's smirk.

"Minx," The Potion Master muttered.

"You know I had planned to get you some allies in the Wizengamot to oust Dumbles with a vote of no confidence but the man might actually do that himself considering what Kingsley was alluding to," Harry remarked. "The Prince seat has been notoriously Neutral for decades now. Augusta Longbottom would probably support you with the vote of no confidence given that she has no love for Dumbledore. The rest of the Neutral party would follow. If the Malfoy seat supports the claim as well the Dark faction would fall behind them. It would have been amazing if there was a seat from the light faction offering support but good 'ole Dumbly is the proxy for many of those given who are in the Order. If I had the Potter seat or even the Peverel seat then it could bury him,"

"You've put a lot of thought into it," Severus remarked.

"I've had three decades to plot," Harry sighed. "Just killing the man outright didn't seem as fun as taking everything he worked for away,"

"Me not being able to claim the Peverel seat was a pretty big blow to the plan," He muttered before he stilled.

"I know that look... what are you plotting?"

"It's an odd idea but I'll need to confirm it with the Goblins," Harry uttered as he jumped out of bed.

"Potter, what are you plotting?!?!"

"It's Evans remember! And it's about time I make use of that last name!" Harry grinned from ear to ear.

Harry whistled innocently as Severus, Deidric, and himself sat waiting in a luxurious waiting room for their account managers. The whistling was mostly to distract him from all the interesting tidbits about Severus's family that had come to light at breakfast. Alexander, now feeling much better as Severus had given him something to flush his system of toxins, had joined them for breakfast once more. The old man still gave Harry and his grandson the side-eye but the most interesting part was that Alexander had mistaken Deidric for his younger brother Robert.

Alexander's memory had been coming back in fragments and he wasn't all there yet but boy did he go off on Deidric for trying to seduce his wife.

The old man had to be sent back upstairs and Tibsby had informed Snape and the others of the whole sequence of events decades past. Turns out, Robert had been born in 1927 as the spare. Their parents had been trying for years after Alexander but to no avail. So there was a remarkable age difference between the brothers, even by wizarding standards. Of course, Alexander ended up marrying a lovely girl from a proper pureblood family and they had Eileen together.

Robert, who as the spare, had lived perpetually in his brother's shadow. He seemed to crave whatever Alexander had. It was during the London Blitz in 1941 that Robert made a move on Alexander's wife while they hunkered down. This caused a rift between the brothers. Alexander's wife died in 1942 due to lung problems from the war. In 1967, even though Alexander was already Lord Prince by then, his parents thought he might become lonely and tried to persuade him to agree to a marriage with Agnes Rosier. The girl had just barely graduated Hogwarts when her parents tried to bethroth her. Alexander rejected the match but as the Rosiers wanted a connection to the elusive Prince family they approached Robert.

"Harry cease that incessant offkey whistling or so help me, Merlin," Severus grit his teeth but even Deidric couldn't fault the man. Harry seemed to be good at a lot of things however he was not musically inclined.... At all...

"All this waiting is making me nervous!" Harry responded.

"Then you shouldn't have asked the Goblins such a weird question!" Snape shot back.

"It was a valid question!"

"Harry, you asked the Goblin Prince if you could claim the Peverel lordship if you off the Dark Lord once,"

"Again, it's a valid question. He'd technically be dead at the time and ineligible for the title!" Harry defended. "The diary took nearly a whole schoolyear to form any tangible body. By the time he revives, it will already be over and done with!"

"Potter, it's the most insane... idea you have ever come up with and it just might work," Snape muttered.

"See, I'm smart!"

"That is still debatable," Severus muttered.

"Should I even be hearing all of this?" Deidric asked hesitantly.

"You're fine," Harry responded while waving the guy's worry off.

"You will be walking right into the Headmaster's scheme though if you choose to fight the Dark Lord," Severus pointed out.

"I'm only going to off one version of him," Harry responded. "No one really has to know. In the meantime, I can just hand over the locations of any Horcruxes we find to the Aurors and Madam Bones. Let them deal with the rest of that sod's soul,"

The doors to the waiting room opened to reveal a haggard-looking Goblin Prince as well as the Potter and Prince account managers. "You really know how to surprise us, Mr. Evans. Your question got me pulled into an hourlong debate with three of our Ritual masters, two of which ended up in a fistfight."

Harry grimaced at that but still asked "So what's the verdict,"

"It is a yes from us Mr. Evans. The Peverel charter will allow you to claim the Lordship if the first heir is dead at that moment. Our Ritual masters have finally concluded that while a Horcrux does contain a piece of a person's soul it is not considered a living entity at the time as it will need to feed off of an external life force to start the revival process."

"Now onto the other matter," Prince Laggoff muttered. "I will take my leave gentlemen and leave you in the hands of your account managers as you get this sorted out."

"Master Snape, this matter pertains to Mr. Deidric Prince wanting to be expelled from the family is that correct?" Suffet asked.

"Indeed, though I was hoping that there would be an easier way to get him out of his parents' control. Expulsion is rather harsh as it would strip the family magic from said person." Severus stated.

"According to these records, Mr. Prince has no account with us. No vault was ever opened in his name,"

"That's because...." Deidric started to explain. "Once I had received my NEWT scores from the Ministry my father put me to work in his firm. My pay was to be deposited back into the family vault as it covered my room and board at the house now that I was an adult. And it's not as if I could work anywhere else. Father is pretty well known in his chosen field and he made it known that he would blacklist me everywhere should I choose to leave."

"And you can't leave either because you don't have a knut to your name. No one would rent you a place," Harry frowned. "He might even have been keeping you under his thumb until he could make you Lord Prince."

"If I might make a suggestion," Suffet stated while placing a large parchment on the table between them as well as an athame. "I will need three drops of blood on this parchment Mr. Prince. If your biological mother was a squib there might be a hidden bloodline in there that you could claim. If you magically disown your parents afterward then you will have no claim over the Prince Lordship in the future."

"It's that easy?" Deidric questioned.

"We shall see once we know what family your birth mother was related to,"

Deidric grabbed the athame and pricked his finger. As the three drops splattered on the parchment lines began to form. Snape's brows weren't the only ones shooting up. Harry stared openmouthed while Suffet just gave a toothy smirk.

"Well this is certainly unexpected," Suffet stated as he stared from the parchment to Deidric. "I bid the future Lord Black a hearty welcome,"