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Harry Potter and the Skittering Spouse

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Windborne said:
Oh that's very true that it'd be a waste of Taylor's time and energy, but that's because she's now filthy rich. Disregarding the Potter Vaults, Harry just inherited the entire fortune of the Black Family, who were obscenely rich even by Wizarding standards. Wizard fortunes seem to generally be pretty large if they're part of an older family simply because compound interest is a thing. The Weasley's dire straits seems to be the exception to the rule.

As for why I said Potter Vaults, it's because no sane parent would leave their family's entire ancestral fortune to a toddler if they were to unfortunately die. Lily at the very least wouldn't have allowed it. The vault we see Harry access in Years One and Two is very likely a trust vault and is just a small fraction of the total wealth in the main Potter vault. The Potters were likely just as wealthy as the Blacks, potentially more since they are descended from the Peverells who were around a long, long time ago.
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Compound interest is possible... But keep in mind that those families were using that money. They may have spent the interest. And as pointed out that is assuming there is interest at all.

That said I do suspect there is more than one Potter vault. Because Harry's vault contains only money and no items unlike Bellatrix's vault IIRC. You'd expect the Potters to be storing at least something valuable in the bank given their situation. And if it isn't in the vault Harry accessed then it is probably in another.

But in the end my point was that spending time finding good investments was not a good idea was not based on how much money they have. Because small or large investments take time to grow your money. And the war is on right now. So regardless of amount the money they have is probably the money they can practically use now and investing would just cut into what they can spend now.
 
Did some digging about the Potter family and found this. Basically they had an ancestor that invented a bunch of remedies, in particular it notes they eventually evolved into stuff like Pepper-Up and Skele-gro potions. That ancestor made lots of money off that and all his kids inherited piles of gold. It notes that down the family line the descendants go on to do the same, working hard and inherited their ancestor's 'quiet brand of ingenuity', letting them make money and add to the family fortune. Harry's grandfather, Fleamont Potter, invented Sleekeazy's Hair Potion and sold the company when he retired for a profit, quadrupling the family fortune.

Presumably Fleamont was not a spendthrift if he managed to make such a profit. James was an only child and his parents died about when he got married to Lily. He didn't seem like a spendthrift either, but there's not much about him beyond being a dick in school and fighting Moldy-shorts. Even if he was, he inherited either just before or with a war going on alongside Moldy-shorts being after him and his family. He couldn't exactly toss gold around. Very little spending unless he helped fund the Order of the Phoenix, and either way he died young and not long after inheriting.

So the Potters should have plenty of money, even if Wizarding doesn't have stuff like royalties, compound interest, or what not. You could point at canon and there only ever being one vault mentioned but with all the money they theoretically should have, though it might be my memory being faulty, while the room was described as stacked full of coins, little first year Harry described the vault as small, which doesn't fit the amount mentioned in the Potter family description. Of course this is WoG versus canon material so, take with salt and all that jazz.

Still, why couldn't there be more than one Potter vault with Harry only having access to a trust vault until he reached his majority? Fanfiction is pretty much by default AU to some degree or other. Between that and the huge holes in Rowling's world-building, you sort of have to make assumptions and extrapolate from the canon material rather than strap yourself tightly to it.

The Potters are however, according to the article, not part of the Sacred 28. I double-checked and they aren't listed. They had intermarried with muggles before and were 'tainted' by it, nevermind most other families also having muggle ancestors. Between that, their common muggle-like surname, and them being pro-muggle, despite their old bloodline they never got added in. However it never mentions if all the Sacred 28 were nobles or anything. Even the Black family only had mentions on things they created or their zealot house elf, who knows if they were actually noble?

Of course, this is fanfiction so whatever Author says goes, if they say it's so, they're the Most Ancient and Noble House of Potter. But if nothing else the Potters might have only been considered purebloods because they likely didn't have a recent muggle in the family tree before Lily. Especially considering Dorea Potter nee Black was Harry's grandmother and she wasn't disowned over the marriage.

Edit: This of course doesn't even consider what Harry inherited from Sirius. But yeah Harry's rich and Taylor has access to all that as his wife unless Harry blocks her for some reason.

TLDR - Family has been building money for a long time and his grandpa hit it big so they should be loaded. If contested by canon... not to be flippant but then its up to the Author to decide whether they'll use that bit of canon or not.
 
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Ravenwood240 said:
If you buy anything under contract without reading the fine print, asking questions about anything you don't understand and knowing exactly what you're signing, you are an idiot.
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So you fully understand those EULAs that companies like Steam or even Microsoft make you click "I agree" before you can install or download the software?
Good luck asking questions. Those are contracts of adhesion.
Heck, I got one that had stuff that was in incomprehensible legalese written in teeny tiny text that I struggled to make out with my reading glasses on (which I do NOT wear when driving for very good reasons) when parking in a paid parking lot. You don't even get a real chance to decline or read it in advance due to the fact that you get the contract of adhesion when pulling into the entrance that has a gate barring entry until you accept the contract and there's no way to turn around and back out. Plus the pressure from the people behind you waiting to get in not to sit there, pull out your glasses and try to read it.

Aineko said:
Oh yes, the goblins do do seem to do loans as well as vaults. But moneylending greatly predates depository banking, so that's not actually weird either.


Though one could imagine a scenario where Gringotts is actually running a fractional-reserve depository banking strategy, and hiding that fact by shuffling gold into whichever vaults wizards are looking at right now. (Further, perhaps that's why they have the bizarre lengthy transit to the vaults - to buy time for the stocking team in case of an unexpected viisit.)
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Does anybody recall a fic where Harry got into a lot of trouble for exposing the fact that the goblins were doing something exactly like this, but not telling the wizards that they were routinely removing gold from some of the larger or less used vaults for those loans? Effectively the wizards were making interest-free loans to the goblins while still paying them for the vaults.
 
SlickRCBD said:
So you fully understand those EULAs that companies like Steam or even Microsoft make you click "I agree" before you can install or download the software?
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Um, yes? They're not really hard to understand, even if reading them over and over gets boring.

SlickRCBD said:
You don't even get a real chance to decline or read it in advance due to the fact that you get the contract of adhesion when pulling into the entrance that has a gate barring entry until you accept the contract and there's no way to turn around and back out. Plus the pressure from the people behind you waiting to get in not to sit there, pull out your glasses and try to read it.
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See, you and I differ here. If some idiot hands me legal paperwork in a line, he'd best be prepared for me to sit there and read it all before I agree to do it by pulling into his parking garage. And if they don't supply a way for the other people to get around me, or for me to pull off to the side until I've read that paperwork, sucks to be everyone else.

Once, back when I was young and foolish, you see, I signed a contract without understanding it completely. That mistake cost me 14,687.43US over four years when I was only making 18,000 a year. After four years of ramen noodles, oatmeal sandwiches and a one room crappy flat, I've never signed or agreed to anything without understanding it.
 
Aineko said:
But it doesn't help, because you are under duress and will agree to the EULA for your computer's operating system or whatever no matter what grotesque liberties it takes.

Unless you're a rather extreme outlier.
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Yes. Obviously. But you are missing my point: most legal systems are rigged in favor of the EULA distributor, not the reader. It takes Herculean efforts to win a case against them since you have to prove duress to specific legal standards, which "I couldn't edit the photo if I didn't accept" (or similar) doesn't generally meet.
 
kaosisreality said:
Yes. Obviously. But you are missing my point: most legal systems are rigged in favor of the EULA distributor, not the reader. It takes Herculean efforts to win a case against them since you have to prove duress to specific legal standards, which "I couldn't edit the photo if I didn't accept" (or similar) doesn't generally meet.
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I'm missing what bearing that point has, since that is equally true whether you read the EULA, don't read the EULA, or print out the EULA and eat it.
 
I would like to point out that in certain jurisdictions, certain clauses in Contracts of Adhesion, particularly those related to certain rights that the signee might have under statute law or otherwise, are unenforceable. In addition, any clauses that are considered "unreasonable" or "extreme" may also be thrown out on a case-by-case basis.


However, this is very much off-topic and I will not be drawn further into the debate of contract law.

To bring this back on-topic, I wonder what Taylor's first impression of Diagon Alley will be. I know people have discussed her reaction to Hogwarts, but not really anywhere else.

I think she'll be somewhat impressed with Gringott's security standards, although I suspect that she'll still be able to pick holes in the defences.
 
Can I just say these are some of the weirder tangents I've seen? I'm not annoyed or anything just honestly bemused at how this discussion wanders. And how it seems to die down then spark up again after … (a few?) Days.

Honestly I hadn't given a great deal of thought to things like inheritances, and war chests, or compound interest, beyond the obvious which is to say they have sufficient money for most things short of hiring mercenaries… and frankly that might not be out of the question with the black inheritance, but Taylor would probably be leery of bringing in that kind of support when it could be bought out from under them by the other side. Which could be negated with magical vows, but I doubt most mercenary crews would be thrilled about that because depending on wording it might prevent them from abandoning a lost cause. Also be a smidge hard to send them after targets when Taylor doesn't have a list of targets yet.

I say they have a decent fund on hand because even if all Harry has is his trust vault, he gets all his school supplies with a small sack of money. Not even a magically expanded sack. Then he has spending money left over for the snack car on the train and hogsmead weekends. And the trust vault is supposed to have stacks. And then Taylor might be ready to flood the market with giant spider products in the near future, as a starting point. So no they won't be outfitting an army, but a small strike team isn't out of the question.
 
If your mercs can be bought out from under you, than that is your fault for not getting good mercs.

Good mercs stay bought (to the limits of the contract). Wouldn't do for them to get the reputation for back stabbing a client.
 
Can you even reasonably hire mercs in conflicts involving big players in the magical world? From the point of view of many magicals, numbers isn't a counter to magicals on the level of Voldemort or Dumbledore. Mercs likely will be reluctant to get involved in such a fight no matter how well paid they are, simply because they can't be sure which side wins and how badly they get shut down if they lose, or even if their side doesn't lose, how badly they personally and their friends and family can be screwed. Plus someone willing to fight just for money might be particularly vulnerable to something like the imperius curse, making them unreliable to keep around or allow to know any intel against enemies who use the unforgiveables. You need unusually self-aware and truly motivated people who are true believers if you want to fight the likes of Voldemort and Death Eaters, and you need figures on the level of Dumbledore or very weird exceptional circumstances like those of canon Harry to fight figures like Voldemort. Hiring mercs when there isn't anyone on the level of Voldemort or Dumbledore on the opposing side is likely viable, but even a single figure on the opposing side that hits that power level and you'll likely find willingness to accept such a job drops heavily, especially if the opposing side is willing to kill and use dark magic.

Also, Voldemort's forces are so infamous for imperius use, that mercs can be bought out and just claim that they were imperiused without ruining their reputation as much.
 
If mercs aren't an option maybe assassins are? They don't need to stick around and fight it out. Just kill their target and get paid. Probably wouldn't work on someone like Voldemort but targeting other known Death Eaters might.
 
Fencer said:
And then Taylor might be ready to flood the market with giant spider products in the near future, as a starting point. So no they won't be outfitting an army, but a small strike team isn't out of the question.
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Considering that the giant spiders are magical giant spiders, can one of them cast spells if Taylor makes it hold a wand and recite an incantation?

A small strike team of wand wielding, spell casting, magical spiders is going to strike fear into almost everyone they come across, I expect.

Alternatively, I wonder if the spiders could be compelled to ride on flying brooms.

If there exist magics which are analogous to Vista's space warping, then Taylor herself might not even need to be nearby the spiders to make this work. The so called "barrier" between King's Cross and Platform 9¾ comes to mind, as does the Floo Network.
 
Avalon Aurora said:
Also, Voldemort's forces are so infamous for imperius use, that mercs can be bought out and just claim that they were imperiused without ruining their reputation as much.
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I mean, it makes them look clearly incompetent to participate in wizarding warfare.

And would raise big questions if they proceeded to abandon the job rather than go back to it once the alleged imperius is past tense.
 
So if he's terrified, he can repeatedly prove his cowardice much faster than a normal person.

Taylor: "It's almost like it's adrenaline, and he doesn't actually have any powers at all."
 
Avalon Aurora said:
Also, Voldemort's forces are so infamous for imperius use, that mercs can be bought out and just claim that they were imperiused without ruining their reputation as much.
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I doubt this would work out for them. Canon shows someone who blatantly was imperiused get chucked into Azkaban while people who were guilty as hell get off on an imperious defense. Managing to get off on an imperius defense seems far more based on bribes and influence than it does facts and claims. Mercs are unlikely to have the pull needed to get off by means of the imperius defense even if it were true, maybe even especially if it were true.
 
My muse rebelled have maybe a third of an update for this written and only a rough outline for an Archer update. Will try to finish writing it before I have to go back to work on Tuesday.
 
don't push it, things will come as they come. I've got three stories i should be working on but my muse has decided to start a fourth. Gods help me.
 
Fencer said:
My muse rebelled have maybe a third of an update for this written and only a rough outline for an Archer update. Will try to finish writing it before I have to go back to work on Tuesday.
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My good sir as many a masters of their craft had said before "you can't rush art" and your story counts. Please take your time and write what you feel good about writing so the stories may flow and keep going and you never come to hate what you have made.

You are giving us the perfect storm of the queen of escalation in a potterverse and it's beautiful so take all the time you need and those why try to rush you can shove it. That or write a omake. In any case I look forward to your next update.
 
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