The idea for this story has been in my head for a very long time, and was consolidated by the Role Play thread at the Teachers' Lounge Forum.

It's dedicated to all my friends at the TL, with particular thanks to Debbie (Snarky64) for her encouragement, ideas and nagging, and to Fred (Intervigilium) for playing such an awesome Bill in the RP.

I

"I don't understand." Bill Weasley regarded the goblin before him with a puzzled expression. "There must be a mistake."

Haglun glowered at him. "We do not make mistakes, Mr Weasley," he said. "You know that. If there is a mistake, it is not of Gringotts' making."

Bill shook his head, and pulled out his wand for another try at getting through the wards on the thick document lying in front of them on the desk. As before, he penetrated the outer wards with no trouble, but the last one – the one related not to the date or to his age, but to his family, remained impenetrable.

"It doesn't make sense!" he said, his tone raised in exasperation. "The date and my age are right; I can get through those wards easily enough, but the Weasley family one…."

Haglun regarded him impassively. Inwardly, he was thinking that he obviously knew more of the intrigues and secrets of wizarding families than the increasingly angry young man in front of him. The obvious solution had clearly not yet occurred to Bill Weasley. When he spoke, however, his voice was silky and completely neutral.

"I could get another Curse Breaker to check the wards if you like," he said, but Bill shook his head.

"No. I don't want to be the object of office gossip thank you very much. Besides," he grinned wryly. "I'm the best you've got and you know it. If I can't find a problem with the wards themselves, it means there isn't one. The problem isn't the wards, it's – it's me."

He swallowed hard, as he finally realised the implications of what he had just said.

Until less than an hour ago, when Haglun had called him into his office, he had not known of the existence of the document. Haglun had explained, concisely as was the way of the Gringotts goblins, that the document was the deeds to a number of small parcels of land in the north of England, now administered by Muggle lawyers. Although the lawyers were unaware of it, the land actually belonged to the Weasley family, and (once the Muggles' administrative expenses were deducted) brought in a small but not insignificant income.

Bill had interrupted him at this point, half amused.

"Hang on, Haglun," he said. "Are you telling me my family actually has some income that they haven't earned for themselves? Because my family never had a Sickle we didn't work for. If these properties are ours, how come I've never heard of them?"

Haglun lifted a hand. "If you'll just let me finish, Mr Weasley. The charter attached to the deeds was drawn up in the early nineteenth century to satisfy one of your ancestors. The gentlemen in question had no sons. He also had no love for his younger brothers, and no faith that his nephews would escape what he saw as their bad influence until they were well into adulthood. The charter therefore states that the deeds and the properties they relate to can only be passed on between generations, not between brothers or cousins of the same generation, and only when the heir in the subsequent generation reaches the age of thirty." He inclined his head slightly. "As you just have. When your Uncle Bilius Weasley died, the deeds could not pass to your father as he is of the same generation. They come to you as his eldest relative in the next generation." He regarded Bill slyly. "I – ah – had the impression that Mr Bilius Weasley was not the kind of man who would share his private monetary affairs with others, even his own family. Which would account for you never having heard of this before."

Bill had grinned at that. He remembered his Uncle Bilius as being eccentric and irascible, good-natured one moment, and looking for a quarrel the next. No, he was not the type to share his business; and he certainly had never been generous enough to share any extra income with a younger brother with small means and a large family.

He had nodded. "That makes sense," he conceded. "So you're saying these properties are mine now?"

Haglun bent his head in agreement. "You must be able to get through the wards on the document, put in place to ensure that only the rightful Weasley heir can claim the deeds and the properties, and only when he reaches the correct age to do so. That, of course, should be no problem at all."

But it had been. With his training as a Curse Breaker, Bill was able to recognise the exact point where the document's wards refused to yield to him. To an untrained wizard, it would just appear that he could not open the document. To a Curse Breaker, used to dealing with layers of protection, the exact point of the problem was obvious. The layer that Bill could not penetrate was the one relating to the Weasley family, the layer that could only be penetrated by the rightful Weasley heir.

Which led to one obvious – if incredible – conclusion. That he, Bill Weasley, was not in fact who he thought he was.