Seek

The price of travel was less exorbitant now than it had been before the war, due in no small part to the efforts of the new Traveling branch of Wizarding Foreign Affairs, and Harry would never want for money. But he still felt as though his two sickles ought to be pressed over his eyelids as he waited in the dark on the misty, miserable stretch of what passed for beach in Suffolk.

The three others waiting a short distance away, a young witch and her two children, were murmuring quietly. The youngest child had drifted off to sleep in her mother's arms and the boy, who was perhaps six years old, was questioning his mother relentlessly, wide awake despite it being eleven and some change late. "How much longer till the boat mommy?"

"Any minute now Neil." The witch made as if to check her wristwatch, then simply shifted her grip on her sleeping child. "Any minute."

"Will dad be there when we get to America?" The boy toed the sand nervously, "I mean, will he be waiting to see us?"

"Of course he will. Your father can't wait to see you two. He's to pick us up at the station."

"Oh." after a pause, "Have I grown too much? Will he know who I am?"

"Certainly. I told him to find the handsomest young Wizard at the gate."

The boy grinned proudly over his woolly muffler and Harry saw that he was missing a canine tooth. "Mum! Look! The boat's here."

Harry's green gaze flitted outward into the mist and he saw that the boat was indeed coming. He quelled the rush of unease at the way the prow cut soundlessly through the dark water with a deep breath and stepped forward as the boatman led his craft crunching up onto shore. Neil darted toward the boat and was abruptly checked by some invisible force. "Aw, Mum!"

"Told you not to go larking off, didn't I?" His mother approached the boat then too, and Neil advanced at the edge of the six or so feet his mother's restraining spell allowed him to be away from her. The boatman's cowled hood was raised against the cool breeze, and he stepped out to scan Neil briefly with his security wand, before lifting the squirming boy into the boat. His mother handed over four Sickles, two for herself and one for each child, then submitted to the security scan, holding her sleeping daughter slightly away from her body for the wand to be passed between them. "Apologies, captain. It's his first trip you know."

"No harm missus," the hooded man's smile sounded clear in his words, "I was excited too, first time I went out to Sealand." She smiled at him and stepped into the boat as Harry approached. He handed his sickles over but forstalled his security scan, raising a slim bound document brandished with the Ministry's seal. The boatman stared for a long moment , in which Harry became conscious that the wind had pushed his hair back off his forhead, then tapped the seal once to verify authenticity and again to modify it's parameters to Harry's legal allowances. He could not know that Harry was legally carrying several things most witches and wizards would not be allowed to take off continent, and the security wand would revert to it's original specifications after Harry was scanned.

The scan went smoothly and Harry congratulated himself as he stepped into the boat and took his seat behind the family. With two passes of a Ministry issued task wand the boatman cast them off from shore and they were soon passing swiftly over the smooth dark water into the sea.

Twenty minutes and six miles later Harry boarded the dock lift to Sealand's deck and submitted to his second security scan, this one performed by a bored looking witch who popped her gum idly and waved him through a pitted steel door into the station's platform proper where he took a seat on a semi-circular leather bench with a high back and much-battered springs across from Neil and his family and began pulling off his gloves.

Harry had flown to the Suffolk coast and shrunk his Firebolt into his luggage, and had to undo several of the buttons of his tight fitting cuffs to free to last of the dragonhide gloves, and when he had hidden them away in his pockets he loosened the buckles at the top of his cloak and pulled the zip for the rest, exposing the black trousers and pale blue button-up he wore beneath it. He felt rather than heard the scruff of his boots against the mat around the bench as he scraped away the last of the beach sand from their soles and he was pleased yet again with the muffling charm he had got from Charlie Weasly at his send-off-come-birthday celebration that afternoon.

"Evening folks!" A trio of witches entered the room through a rear door looking unreasonably cheery, and Harry mentally grimaced. He hated TransAtlantics, and tuned out the sunny babble of the first witch about procedure and precautions, then began listening as the second continued, "Those of you moving on from Los Angeles this evening will be transfered without delay, so there will be no need for a second dose when you arrive in the States." The third witch was handing out premeasured portions of travel grade Sleeping Solution and Harry downed his. It had a pleasant minty taste and he felt a brief nostalgic pain for the bitter potions of his childhood before lethargy stole over him. He saw the witches take their places in triangular array around the cluster of benches and imagined he could hear them begin the chant that would send him across the ocean. Then sleep overtook him.

---

Harry awoke with his hand around the wand wrist of a twenty-something wizard, who looked utterly startled in a brightly sun lit room carpeted all in nauseating shades of green and blue. He had woken abruptly from his potioned sleep when the steward had begun gathering energy to ennervate him. "Sorry." He gave the younger man an embarrassed smile. "Long standing aversion to surprise spells."

"Understood." The steward backed away when Harry released his wrist and forced a smile over his face. "Welcome to Seattle, Mr. Potter. The time is eight thirty-seven a.m. and the weather is outstanding. If you'll proceed through the marked door to your left you will find the customs desk prepared for your arrival."

Harry nodded and the steward scampered through an unmarked door to his right. Another poor bloke scared away by my uncanny sense of ... paranoia. Harry grimaced and stood, shucking his robes entirely and draping them over his left arm. He checked he pockets for his luggage and found the shrunken trunks and cases all accounted for. He paused, stretching, and looked out the window at the muggle runways with their slow moving airplanes. It was an unknown luxury to have Wizarding space at an airport in Britain, such comings and goings could never be overlooked at Heathrow and he marveled for a long moment at the vast anonymity of American airports. He had been stateside on the east coast for several conferences and there was something deeply delightful about the attitude of American travelers. With a final glance out at the sun-bright planes and pavement Harry turned and stepped through the left-hand door.