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He hadn't, of course. His copy of Hutchinson's devoted almost 300 pages to discussing the Wizengamot, the families who ruled it, and the thousand-year-old laws governing succession to a seat in it, particularly to an Ancient and Noble Seat like that of the Potters. Harry was first born, and indisputably a wizard. Ergo, he was automatically the Heir Presumptive for House Potter and would be elevated to Heir Apparent once he'd come of age and passed enough OWLs. Before then, James could theoretically disinherit him personally from any assets that were his and not entailed to the family and maybe deprive him of spending money during his Hogwarts years. But his education and living expenses were paid for through graduation plus a mastery if he wanted it, and at seventeen, he was guaranteed a sizeable monthly stipend from the family trust for life. And, he was guaranteed the Potter Seat and all the entailed properties and assets someday provided he outlived James and avoided a surprisingly short list of sins that legally justified disinheriting an Heir. Even a felony conviction couldn't deprive him of protected status unless the sentence exceeded five years.
Lily and Jim, neither of whom seemed to know about such things, just looked back and forth between James and Harry inquisitively, as James hesitantly admitted the truth. "Yes, Harry. You are the oldest so technically that makes you the Heir Presumptive. Honestly, I hadn't give it much thought. I hope to live to a ripe old age before I have to worry about turning things over to an heir, after all."
"Oh, I do too, Dad," said Harry cheerfully. Then, he turned to his brother. "From what I read, it seems like the Wizengamot is kinda boring. I bet your happy that you have an older brother who can take care of all it – business management, estate planning, and other legal stuff like that – while you go do ... Boy-Who-Lived things."
Jim laughed. "Ha, ha. Fair enough, Harry. You handle all the boring family business stuff and I'll go out and fight the bad guys."
Lily clucked her tongue and admonished Jim for such foolish ideas, while James just stared at Harry quietly with a strange look on his face, an odd mixture of embarrassment, guilt and ... anger? And then, Harry realized. He simply knew somehow that James had actually tried to disinherit Harry in favor of Jim and then found out he lacked the legal power to do so. Harry broke his eye contact with his father and turned to look out the car window as the London streets flew by. He couldn't show anger, not now. And he wouldn't cry!
After regaining control of his emotions, Harry turned back to his family, his mask firmly back in place. The rest of the trip was spent making idle chitchat with his parents, especially his mother. What was it like as a muggleborn student? Should Harry expect the same treatment as a half-blood who was muggle-raised? Where do muggleborns get their magic from anyway? Harry already had a few ideas on that last question, and he'd spent some of his time between his birthday and today wheedling family history out of Petunia, but he was curious as to what a Muggle Studies professor might think. Her response – which boiled down to "nobody likes to talk very much about that" – was not reassuring, particularly in light of the mild condescension his father seemed to have for what his mother went through as a brilliant but prickly Muggleborn. Oh, and he had a lot of bad things to say about someone named "Snivellus" about whom Lily would say nothing, though the mention of his name seemed to make her sad.
"Oh well," thought Harry. "If someone like James Potter has gone to all the trouble of giving this 'Snivellus' an insulting nickname, he can't be too bad."
Updated 8/28/16. Mainly tweaked dialogue, though I did decide that Harry's owl would be called Hedwig. I don't use the owl enough for it to be a big deal, but calling it "Nemesis" as the earlier draft did seems kind of silly and over the top now. He might as well have named it "I Hate the Potters," and Slytherin!Harry is way too smart for that.
AN 1: If you haven't noticed by now, this Harry is very smart and very articulate compared to most 11-year-olds. Actually, most of these kids are well-spoken for eleven-year-olds, and the in-setting reason for that will be revealed in an upcoming chapter. The REAL reason is that I can't convincingly write dialogue for an 11-year-old to save my life. That said, both Harry and Hermione are exceptionally intelligent even by the standards of their peers. Harry, in particular, while not quite as smart as super-genius Harry Potter-Evans-Verres from Methods of Rationality, very clever and articulate (not to mention a deadpan snarker) compared to canon!Harry as well as the average 11-year-old child. This is a plot point that will become very important later. For right now, just go with it.
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