Official Fine Print: Nope. Not mine. The brainchildren of the mighty pen of JK Rowling. Just playing with them.
Fixing Harry
Chapter 18
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They apparated to a point midway between Hogwarts and Hogsmeade and cautiously approached their former school. Sure enough there were two bored Aurors just outside the gates, sitting beneath one of the larger trees and reading. One had a newspaper; the other's reading material required tilting the magazine to one side and unfolding pages. Harry doubted somehow it was a Quibbler quiz.
"What's our plan for getting past them?" Ron asked.
"Other than walking right on by while he's ogling his centerfold?" Hermione replied pointedly. "Do we really need a plan?"
"I think we do," Harry sighed. "It's my good friend Leonard, and I'm sure than in his tiny excuse for a mind it's my fault he's stuck sitting in front of a school on guard duty. I thought it was meant to be difficult to become an Auror."
Hermione had made sure Harry's healing arm was well secured in a tightly knotted sling according to Madam Pomfrey's instructions. She'd anticipated something like this and actually had several possible options in mind for getting round guards or observers. She'd just begun considering them when the faint noise down the lane behind them began to get considerably louder and they faded back into the stand of trees they'd chosen as cover for their apparition in.
After a moment Hagrid hove into view around the bend, walking beside a creaking, well loaded cart being pulled by a creature that looked like a very large, very cross mule, though it had the horns of an ox, the wide flat paws of a lion and the feathery tail of something resembling a turkey vulture.
Ron looked at Harry, who shrugged helplessly. Hermione squinted and diagnosed the creature as Humbata "although those are meant to have the talons of a vulture, not the tail."
"Hagrid's always liked the more unusual specimens of a species," Harry whispered. "But since the three headed dog's tied up Fluffy, you just know this one has to sharpen its claws and neigh to `Beauty'. Right before it runs you through with those horns."
Harry shifted slightly between the trees so that Hagrid's eyes, used to the movement of all sorts of creatures in the Forbidden Forest, might spot them. Hagrid nodded ever so slightly their way and then rather deliberately tipped a crate of some strange, football-sized yellow fruit so that several rolled off the cart and into the verge.
"Whoa there, Beauty," he growled, and Ron and Harry both just managed to cover their barks of laughter. He made a great show of collecting the fruit one by one, edging ever closer to the trees.
"'Lo there `Arry. And `ermione and Ron, too. Good. McGonagall said twas to be the three of yeh. `aven't see yeh in dog's years, bout time it is, too," he whispered.
"Can you help us get past those Aurors, Hagrid?" Hermione asked. "We can't fit all three of us under Harry's cloak any longer. If you tell Professor McGonagall we've come, can she call them off?"
"They put `em up there in pairs almost soon as it `appened, `ermione, an' they won't be budged for love nor money. No, the three of yeh'll have ta hunker down in the cart for a bit `til Beauty an' I can get yer through the gates. Been stockin' up for ter last few days so's they'd get used to us comin' an' going, like. In yeh get. Oh, an' Madam Pomfrey says ter watch yer arm there, `arry."
The three of them slunk behind the cart under the invisibility cloak. There was small hollow running down the middle where the crates had been shoved against the sides of cart; clearly Hagrid meant for them to fit themselves in and to throw the invisibility cloak over them.
Clearly Hagrid had also forgotten they weren't twelve any longer.
"In yer get, hop to it," Hagrid ordered nervously, making a show of repacking the recovered fruit. "Don' want `em getting surspicious."
Ron looked at Harry and Hermione. "Even the two of you'd have a hard time fitting in there, and I've seen how, erm, compressed you can manage. Where the hell will I go?"
Harry climbed one-handedly into the wagon, ducking low and squeezing against the very front side behind Beauty's less than handsome hind end. He held out his hand to Hermione and she followed him, turning and flattening her back to his chest, settling between his legs. They both drew up their knees, leaving as much of the back space as they could for Ron.
"Stretch the blanket there over us," Harry whispered, "and you take the cloak. You can stretch out a bit more under that."
"Right. Thanks you two." Ron whispered back, and the blanket descended over their heads, scratchy and pierced here and there by bits of straw. It smelled strongly of Buckbeak.
"Just how I wanted to meet up with Snape again," Harry said quietly. "Covered in straw and reeking of Hippogriff."
"There's no good way to meet up with Snape again," Hermione pointed out softly. "You do realize one of the reasons he resents you so is he's always been a greasy-haired git, and you're… well, not that at all. It can't be easy for him after feeling the same about your Dad. It just feeds the resentment that's already there. You could go in there entirely covered in stinksap and still be more … erm, physically approachable than he ever was or will be, and he knows it."
"Your faith in me is heartening, even if your judgment seems to have become a small bit compromised since we started … being us," Harry muttered into her ear, shifting his useful arm more closely around her. "I was probably the scrawniest, most pathetic and clueless first year ever to cross the Black Lake, never mind the hair issue and the perpetually broken glasses. He didn't even feel pity for me then, and Merlin knows I was a pitiful enough creature. It's not like all that much has changed as far as he's concerned; I'm just bigger now and there's more of me to hate. He seems perfectly well up to the job. Thanks for trying, though."
Hermione gave a muted laugh. "Come on, Harry, even you have to admit you're preferable to Snape. You ought to be far more worried what Elspeth will think."
Whether or not Harry did or would admit it became moot as they heard raised voices over the creak of the cart wheels.
"'Just `nother load o' serplies," Hagrid was saying. "Same's ter last one."
"Fine, go on," said one of the Aurors, Leonard from the sound of it.
"We're supposed to check everything today," the other one said. "You know what the intelligence said."
Intelligence? Damn. Who was betraying them now?
And before Hagrid could make any excuses or Ron could even move the second Auror poked into the back of the cart to pull aside the blanket. His hand struck Ron where no Ron should be, and the cloak was pulled aside instead.
"Weasley!" he said triumphantly.
Hermione could feel Harry surging forward behind her and gripped his knee, hard. "Wait. Let Ron handle it."
They could hear the sounds of Ron being dragged from the cart rather roughly; there was a brief tussle and a shouted Expelliarmus over Hagrid's protests.
"'e's don nothin' wrong; `e's just `ere teh see ther `eadmistress. Givin' `im a ride is all. Git off `im!" Hagrid bellowed.
"Under an invisibility cloak? He's a wanted accomplice to Harry Potter. We've been looking for you, Weasley, you do know that? Where's Potter?" the second Auror asked.
"Somewhere you'll never find him," Ron informed him, sounding utterly cocksure and unafraid. And bravely stupid. Hermione thought there were definitely times he would have benefited from having more of a Slytherin side as well.
"He's done nothing wrong, either," he continued, "he's only in hiding because the Ministry's trying to illegally suppress his magic now that's he's defeated Voldemort for them. They're the criminals; it's all a setup."
Hermione's heart swelled for him even as she willed him some basic survival instincts. The boys had prepared to do battle with the Death Eaters; it would have been a perfect speech to Lucius Malfoy, for example. A good bit more subtly was necessary to survive the turning of your own side.
"Yeah, sure. The Ministry's acting illegally. They make the laws. You're the one breaking them. You and your snotty mate. Using an unforgivable doesn't make you a hero; it makes you a criminal like everyone else." Leonard's voice carried clearly and Hermione felt herself put firmly aside even as the other Auror said "Flargemore!" quite sharply.
Perhaps it was time for Hogwarts to start running a separate government class; too many people trolled History of Magic to include it all there. The Ministry didn't make the laws, the Wizengamot did that, and there was no law to support what…although on second thought perhaps it was time to be terrified for Harry first, because he'd just slid out from under the blanket.
"No matter what they told you, I haven't used one yet." Harry said, drawing himself up on the edge of the cart. Hermione struggled free of the blanket in time to see the triumph in Flargemore's eyes. She saw that he'd known it was a lie, but that what he was saying would bring Harry out if he was there. He apparently wasn't half as stupid as he seemed.
Both Aurors quickly fired off a wordless spell his way. Harry managed to leap up and over it from the edge of the cart, landing near Ron. Hermione ducked quickly and felt the faint tingle of magic as the combined spell sped over her head. She heard a single surprised honking bray as it struck Beauty instead. Turning behind her she saw it had brought the enormous beast down between the shafts; it laid twitching, eyes open and drooling, not fully paralyzed but clearly incapacitated. They weren't fooling around if they'd meant to hit Harry with that.
Her eyes swiveled in a panic to where he'd landed, but he'd had the presence of mind to play to their expectations. His own spell was wandless, of course, but hissed as well in parseltongue. Both Aurors' reactions slowed as their brains attempted to process these two facts. They keeled over one after the other, petrified. Harry slunk forward and reclaimed Ron's wand, tossing it to him, and she watched in fascination as he crouched down over them and began to modify their memories.
It wasn't the sort of magic they could have done a year or two ago, and even though she knew the technicalities of it, it wasn't the sort she'd be comfortable doing now. It frightened her that he had become hard - or scared - enough to do it without hesitation. She had a sneaking suspicion then that much as Lily's magic might be still striving to protect her son, Harry's own magic or will was shifting now as well; that perhaps he'd begun feeling responsible himself in a different way. For her. Things were changing quickly now. They weren't children, weren't students, weren't anything they knew how to be any longer. If he was feeling anything like she was, she would be his one constant in a sea of uncertainty.
Voldemort had been at least superficially right in his assumption that love made you weak; it certainly made you feel vulnerable in whole new ways. She suspected, however, that it could also drive you to lengths you might never else have gone to for yourself. Whether that was good or not seemed up for grabs. Harry would always have done his best to protect her and Ron, but she understood only too well after the day before how the involuntary reflexes of his heart where she was concerned might have changed, even in the short time they had been together. Hers certainly had.
"They're Aurors, Harry. They'll know you've obliviated them and break it," she warned.
"No they won't," he said grimly, and she shivered at the sound of him. His eyes found to hers, then Hagrid's and Ron's. "Sorry about that," he told them, "but you should know that now they think they were attacked by left over Death Eaters on the prowl. It'll seem real enough; I gave them some of my own memories. And they think that you three were here, and you saved them. They'll testify to that if asked. I'm pretty confident no one short of Snape could break them. It might help things if they catch any of us again."
"Yeh'd best get in the gates quick-like then," Hagrid told them from where he crouched beside Beauty. "There'll be tothers comin'. I'll wait for `em ter explain." Ron helped Hermione down from the back of the cart while Harry went and dropped down beside Hagrid.
"Will it, erm, she be okay, Hagrid? I'm sorry they hurt her."
"Don' rightly know what they hit `er with," Hagrid said regretfully, stroking the creatures neck. "D'yer mind, Harry? I didn't like ter carry my… embrella wi' me, wi' so many of `em around lately."
Harry realized then as he cast the Finite to end the spell that Hagrid had had his magic stolen as well. He had no wandless magic to fall back on and deserved far more than the pieces of his broken wand hidden in an old umbrella. Voldemort had framed him, surely as he had Harry. He found himself hugging the old giant fiercely, sorely angry with himself for not realizing until now that Hagrid should have been one of first among those he'd meant to champion at the Order of Merlin affair. Not that he'd managed to do anything for anyone, mind, but still. He'd been Harry's very first friend in a strange new world, how had he lost touch with that?
Hagrid's responding hug was redoubled when Beauty struggled to its paws, snorting dazedly, and Harry's arm began to feel nearly severed again. He couldn't find it in him to mind.
"Off yeh go, off yeh go," Hagrid told them, releasing Harry with an enormous sniff and pointing to the gates. "There'll be more of `em any moment now."
The gates parted at Hermione's touch, clearly expecting them, and with a last, quick wave to Hagrid they set off for the castle at a run.
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Harry was thoroughly exhausted and thoroughly disgusted at his own weakness by the time they reached the doors. He felt shaky and worn through, not at all ready for what he was meant to hear inside. Although what should yet more bad news really mean in this bad joke of a life? Alas, the doors were not inclined to provide him any excuses. They, too, opened at Hermione's touch and closed again behind them with fortress-like finality, echoing in the almost empty hallway. The school was even quieter in summer than it had been all those years over Christmas.
Professor McGonagall swept down the stairs toward them, her characteristically stern expression softening ever so slightly round the edges into a fond smile as she did. Hermione quickly related what had occurred at the gates as they made their way in to the Great Hall and her relaxed visage grew stormy and forbidding again. Ron and Harry exchanged glances, both glad they weren't still in a position to be entirely on the receiving end of that. Although perhaps one of them had been premature…
"And just where did you learn memory modification, Harry Potter?" she asked him. "The last time I checked that wasn't offered here at Hogwarts."
"It's been a while since I've been here at Hogwarts," Harry said defensively. "And none of the stuff I had to do last year was exactly curriculum-worthy, anyway."
"No," she said. "But Voldemort has fallen, Harry, by your own hand. Take care where your magic leads you. Just because you can doesn't mean you should."
Harry's flare of anger burnt out quickly. She was his Head of House and always would be; he knew she worried about him and only meant him well.
Elspeth and Snape were already in the Great Hall and awaiting them; Elspeth sitting unusually demurely at the table usually reserved for teaching staff and Snape hovering huffily over near the empty Slytherin side. They did not exactly exude friendliness towards each other, and Harry found himself feeling remarkably more cheerful about things, seeing that. He really didn't want to believe she'd betray him.
She stood up as they approached the table but he couldn't read her expression except to think that she seemed rather quiet and guarded. Hermione greeted her quite normally to Harry's eyes, Ron a bit more coolly. When it was his turn she extended her hand and he took it hesitantly, worried at once about her unusual formality until he felt her other hand close his between them and she leaned forward, touching her cheek to his. Her long hair was loosed from its usual knot and swung forward like a convenient curtain.
"Cast a Legilimens on me, or whatever it is you do," she whispered swiftly in his ear, "there's something you need to know now, and I was afraid to try it the other way round." She moved back smoothly and smiled, saying "I was glad to hear from Madam Pomfrey you were healing so well," loud enough for all to hear.
His heart leapt; with any luck she meant to show him the meeting Ginny and Luna had observed. But why couldn't she wait until later and just tell him? He hated Legilimency even when he had permission to try it. It just seemed so personal, traipsing around in someone else's head, always having to be prepared for the ever present danger of taking a wrong turn and ending up in a horrific nightmare or their first time, or their most embarrassing moment. Or all three.
"Potter," came the silky voice of his own second-to-worst nightmares, and he turned from Elspeth with a snarl to greet… "Snape."
Piercing black eyes met his, only now for some reason he could actually feel the cold fingers probing at the edges of his consciousness quite clearly, something he had barely sensed before. He struggled with and mastered the urge to shock that plundering force with something that would send Snape to his knees. "Get out," he said instead, softly as he could, surprised at the amount of menace he could generate now if he tried. "And stay out. If I feel you again, I'll…"
"You'll what?" Snape said aloud with his customary derision, but he had, in fact, taken a step back. Harry had never really succeeded in making Snape back off before. "I am doing you the favor of wasting precious time attending this ill-conceived gathering."
"Because I've never done you any favors? What a short memory you have, Snape. But then I knew you would," Harry said, loud enough for the others to hear as well. If that was the way he wanted to play it, so be it.
"Let us all sit down," Professor McGonagall interjected quickly and firmly, "and conduct our business here with civility."
Harry cast the Legilimens while they were seating themselves at the teacher's usual table; neutral territory, he supposed. Elspeth's mind was wide open to him, but he got the distinct impression that was not the usual case and he would likely have had quite a battle getting in if she hadn't wanted him to. He tried to feel his way gently toward the memory she wanted him to see, looking for an open mental door. He could feel by her unconscious urgency when he'd reached the right spot.
It was difficult - not to mention surreal - to attempt to monitor what was going on around him and still immerse himself in Elspeth's thoughts. He hated to admit it but Snape's mastery became all the more impressive as he tried.
He found himself with impressions of a dimly lit back room at the Leaky Cauldron, just as he'd hoped and expected. Smeggall was there, and Umbridge and Snape, as Ginny and Luna had indicated. There was a fifth person, though, someone he did not recognize and that they hadn't mentioned. Whoever it was wore dark robes and a hooded cloak quite heavy for summertime, although they did not appear to notice or mind the feeble cooling charms of the Cauldron. He or she seemed almost outside the little group, as unacknowledged as Harry's own non-presence, and Harry found himself wondering why. He realized Ginny (and Luna, although with her you could never be sure) likely wouldn't have recognized the voice anyway, and so far whoever it was had remained quite silent. Snape's eyes flickered repeatedly in the newcomer's direction, although whether it was with recognition or attempts at legilemency Harry could not be sure.
The memory ran quite closely to Ginny and Luna's recollection of it, although through Elspeth's eyes Harry had the benefit of seeing their faces and reading expressions as well. It was a chilling experience when it came to Umbridge; not that she'd been exactly fond of him before, but she evidently truly hated him now. It was fear rather than dislike or disdain that drove her; Harry realized she was probably quite frightened of him. As well she might be, the bloody hag. Snape was a tough read, but Harry got the distinct impression that Snape's need to push him into defending himself had not finished with Voldemort. This was a most intriguing concept, as Harry had always credited it to Snape's own reluctant self-preservation. What more could Snape want with him now?
He could vaguely hear the sound of Professor McGonagall saying something with more vigor than usual and knew he needed to hurry and pay attention to what was happening at the table. He searched desperately for the reason Elspeth seemed to think he needed the details sooner rather than later. Was it the fifth person? Some other threat? Or just the meeting itself… she had no way of knowing Ginny and Luna had already told him after all…
Harry saw the dark figure suddenly cast a wordless spell. His wand looked especially gnarled and twisted, more like an old stick simply plucked up from the ground for the purpose than a wand. Harry realized he was recognizing the spell through Elspeth's senses rather than his own, and marveled at the differences. The impression was far, far fainter for her, more of a tickle or a twitch than the Snape-style head-thumping technique his own magic employed, but the diagnostic depth of Elspeth's mind and the speed with which she pinpointed the spell staggered him. She knew a lot of stuff.
"Two witches listen to us," the unknown one said in a faint, whispered aside to Umbridge. They were the first words spoken, and the voice was unfamiliar and yet still menacing despite its softness.
"I assure you, the full range of Ministry developed counter-listening spells have been cast," Umbridge replied confidently in equally private tones. "We're quite protected."
Harry rationally knew that Ginny and Luna had not been caught; they'd come immediately to Grimmauld Place to tell what they had heard. Even forearmed with that knowledge, however, he felt himself anxious for them then and wanted desperately to move round or through the memory to alert them somehow. He reckoned he must be sensing Elspeth's emotions there, but then found himself wondering just what Elspeth had done to hear the subtle whispers so clearly, whether she had managed it at the time or gone back and enhanced the memory somehow to find out later. If it was her panic he was feeling, she must have been listening in as it happened, but how had she without betraying herself as well?
"You are a fool! They use a device, not a spell," the hooded man - for it seemed to Harry now he must be a man - hissed at Umbridge. "And one of them has known the touch of the Dark Lord."
Harry felt another pulse of panic and then realized that he meant Ginny. Harry had never sensed any lingering aura of Voldemort's possession of her himself, but then again having been through the worst of it with her he'd hardly have noticed what he already knew, would he?
Umbridge rose frantically, as if to make for the door, and Smeggall turned to her curiously.
"What is it?"
"My... Mr. erm. Nothing. Nothing at all." Umbridge said, and sat down quickly again, looking distinctly flustered.
The connection between Elspeth and himself abruptly cut off and Harry found himself being nudged under the table by Hermione. He looked up to see them all staring at him and knew his usual flare of shame and anger to be caught not paying attention once more. At least they ought to expect in from him now. No one else had quite as much to worry about, did they? No wonder he was always the one bloody left out.
"I'm sorry," he said, meeting Elspeth's anxious eyes. "I was… I have no idea what you were saying." Or what I'm supposed to understand… was she trying to warn him that they somehow knew that it was Ginny and Luna who had overheard the conversation? Were the two in danger now? He'd have to ask after. He made to send her his own memories of the two at Grimmauld Place so she'd now they were okay, but…
"Slaying the Dark Lord has changed you little then," Snape intoned, scattering his thoughts. "Unless you actually wish to spend what's left of your life as a squib, you might care to join us as we while away our time worrying about what you so obviously do not."
Harry brain provided several swift responses to sling Snape's way, but he bit his lip and inclined his head as politely as he could, almost shaking with the effort of it.
"The Minister's aides have been actively looking for a reliable method to control another's magic since very shortly after Voldemort's demise was publicly announced," Snape went on after a moment. "They approached me along with many other leaders in their fields…"
"And backdoor potion brewers and illegal artifact handlers and any other number of other `reputable' sources," Elspeth added. Snape's eyes flashed. Harry was fascinated to see the look he'd so long believed to be reserved just for him turned on another.
"…with offers for development of such a method," Snape continued. "I encouraged them to believe it could be done, although the Dark Lord too sought such a thing and was never satisfied with what he uncovered."
"Why would Voldemort have cared about anything like that? He just killed anyone powerful enough to get in his way," Harry said. "He wasn't exactly much of a negotiator. It doesn't make sense."
"For you, Potter. He wanted it for you. After your abrupt departure from what was meant to be a decisively one-sided duel in the graveyard once he got his body back, Voldemort became convinced there was something more to you than met the eye, more than just your mother's protection or your brother wand. He wished for some time to find a way to claim whatever magic you had that he did not. He never, as you will remember, managed to learn the balance of the prophecy you shared. Had he heard that `either must die at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives' he would surely have abandoned his interest in keeping you alive."
"Surely," Harry agreed bitterly. McGonagall pinned him with one of her more wintry expressions but he turned stubbornly away. Propriety be damned; he hated the way Snape so coldly dissected his very life, as if he were no more than a mildly interesting but annoying species of pest that happened to have stumbled into his web of lies.
"It mattered not in the slightest to me, I assure you, but it might have been what kept you alive. It was the reason the Death Eaters were instructed that no one but the Dark Lord himself might keep you or kill you. You may as well know now it occurred to the brighter ones; those less personally impressed by the Dark Lord himself or those who'd grown impatient with his obsessions, that if you somehow survived the conflict you would make a potent spoil of war. The Order simply thought the odds too slim to agonize over…"
"Severus!" McGonagall cut him off.
"Oh, and you alone thought the boy might survive? Even Dumbledore himself did not truly believe so. There is one reason and one reason only he did, and you know it well as I!"
Harry felt Hermione and Ron's eyes assessing how he was taking Snape's assertion about Dumbledore and the Order. He found that it did not bother him greatly. It was easy to re-write history now; at the time he could hardly have blamed them. He'd hoped, but never entirely believed in his own chances for survival.
"What does any of this have to do with what the Ministry wants to do with Harry now?" Hermione asked sharply, attempting to refocus them on the task at hand.
"Only everything, Miss Granger. But it takes deductive powers to get there rather than rote memorization, so you'll have to listen especially closely," Snape sniped her way.
One of the enormous flaming sconces, thankfully unlit under the dappled August sunlight of the enchanted ceiling, abruptly flew from the mouth of its supporting gargoyle and dropped with a echoing clang inches from Snape's seat at the table, raising fine chips of stone dust from the floor. He jumped, and then seemed to go into the same corrective action a cat will when embarrassed or caught out, moving with great nonchalance to pretend he meant to do that because…well, just because.
"Oops," said Harry. "Bad magic. Shame on you, I think you scared the… nice professor."
Elspeth and Ron both started to snicker and attempted to cover it by coughing at the same time in sharp staccato bursts.
"You think you are amusing, and yet you are only offering up further proof of what an uncontrolled and ill-mannered little menace you are," Snape said coolly.
"Only if you really think it's all uncontrolled," Harry told him. "Otherwise I'm just an ill-mannered menace who thinks that was over the top and uncalled for. I think you can drop the little though. I'm not your student any longer. Nor is Hermione, and I won't stand for you talking to her like that."
He met Snape glare for glare, saw the flare of triumph there when Snape thought he'd discovered something and saw it burn itself out when Harry reached for her hand and acknowledged it candidly. He pushed thoughts of himself recently with Hermione at his former Professor; nothing explicit, just enough that it became clear there was no secret or shame to be found there.
"Once a Gryffindor, always a Gryffindor," Professor McGonagall told him, interrupting their stare down with the raise of a regal eyebrow. He saw she'd noticed their entwined grip now as well and seemed slightly puzzled. "And in the name of Gryffindor, Mr. Potter, you will clean up your … accident and comport yourself in a manner becoming a graduate of Hogwarts."
"She means next time out, Harry, uphold your house honor and don't miss," Elspeth gave a little grin as she took out her wand, carefully returning the heavy metal brazier to its anxious gargoyle for him.
"I meant that we do not act like snakes in the grass even when they are all around us, insinuating perfectly ridiculous things just because they find the fact that Gryffindors can use their superior intellects without the need to resort to doublespeak and base trickery to be threatening to their… househood." McGonagall clarified, glaring at Elspeth.
The urge to stick her tongue out at Snape was almost overwhelming; Hermione only just managed not to. She was quite sure Professor McGonagall was thinking of an altogether different kind of `hood'. "You were saying, Professor Snape?" she inquired instead, adding with utmost sincerity, "I promise to do my very best to follow your… logic."
Snape stopped trying to burn holes right through Harry's glasses and glared at her instead. He seemed to be about to take particular pleasure in revealing the next bit.
"The Minister had requested a visible element or symbol of the magical reduction he seeks, as a constant reminder to others of the Ministry's position on the enforcement of magical limitation for those who threatened Wizarding society," Snape told them silkily. "I had thought to provide them with a potion developed during the Dark Lord's… administration, I suppose, that they could have used in conjunction with a placebo device. A collar or wrist cuffs, or some such nonsense."
Or some such nonsense… right. Fine. YOU wear them, you slimy bat dropping. Because hell will freeze over with you in it before I do! Harry thought furiously.
His flat black eyes shifted to Harry, almost as if he could hear. Oh yeah, he could! Harry pictured Snape in the brightest, reddest dog collar he could imagine, with a little tag spelling out `Severus' dangling from it, and grinned.
"The potion would have reduced your ability to utilize naturally-occurring magic long enough for them to be satisfied by their tests," he continued with a glare, "and then worn off gradually over the period of a month or so. It could, of course, be reapplied as needed. The danger in such a plan was, as it has always been, you. I sincerely doubted your ability to stay out of trouble and not use your retained magic in public situations. There was also the troubling little fact that you still have not managed to get a sufficient rein on it, and it has a way of emanating around you in a painfully obvious way to even the most magically oblivious. I deemed that you were in no way ready yet for such a plan and attempted to hold them off with details of the development of the potion. Clearly I was correct in my assessment, and that same coddled immaturity has now cost you your one chance."
"What you're telling us," Ron said furiously, "is you're bloody doing it again. How much were they going to pay you to make a squib of him? And what makes you think we'd believe that for a sickle extra you wouldn't have made it permanent if you could have?"
He seemed to realize after he was done what he had just said, and to whom. Hermione saw a flash of panic chase over his face, but when it had completed its rounds he drew himself up straighter in his chair and fixed Snape in a wintry blue glare that she had never seen him use before. Except maybe once on Harry their fourth year… Yikes.
"Here's the question, though," Harry said, meeting him glare for glare. "Were you going to tell me before hand, or just let me go on believing you were doing what they asked? Or would you offer to cure me later, to indebt me to you as well? Do you ever actually pick a side?"
"Such a potion might as well also be classified as a form of poison. It should be unquestionably illegal under any circumstances. How can it be that the Minister for Magic could have the authority to allow its administration to a young wizard never convicted of the slightest wrongdoing, not to mention one who saved the Ministry and the Wizengamot from the chaos and venom that was Voldemort? It's unconscionable!" Professor McGonagall declared firmly.
"What it is now is moot," Snape intoned. "They have found another way. A far more painful and permanent method. I believe it to be in Potter's best interest to stop running immediately and negotiate." He turned back on Harry. "You might still manage to get them to accept the potion idea if you turn yourself in sooner rather than later. If you do not and you are caught, you will be receiving a magical tattoo that marks you for the rest of your life as an identified dark wizard, while its toxic ink makes you poisonous to naturally occurring magic. You will feel it surging just as you do now, only it will be away from you as it desperately flees your presence. Not only will you be a squib, but strong as you are to begin with your effect will most likely be to render the magic of those around you unpredictable or negligible as well. You will be thoroughly shunned by magical folk and creatures of all kinds, and make those you … love into squibs with you if they remain by your side. Still feeling clever with your `bad magic' now, Potter?"
But Harry was utterly unconcerned with Snape then, because at that moment Snape was by far the least of his problems. His rush of terror at Snape's words had called into play all the feelings of despair that prefaced his previous brushes with disappearing and Harry was desperately trying to find his way through the terrible maze of his thoughts without fading out again. It was his worst nightmare all too succinctly brought to life. Not only would he be punished, but Hermione and Ron as well if they tried to remain with him. It was worse than dying; he would have chosen death first because while he might convince Ron to stay away, if only in the name of helping him, he knew now that Hermione would never go. He could not catch his breath. The enchanted sky grew suddenly dark above them. Lightening flashed, and thunder rumbled.
Elspeth's head snapped up suddenly, eyes wide, and turned to McGonagall. "It only does that in the presence of a dark spell, doesn't it? It changed too fast for it to be mirroring the real sky now."
"But what could have…" Professor McGonagall asked, providing the answer in the way she scanned the room beyond Harry, wand drawn.
Hermione's hands fumbled their way back into his. "Breathe, Harry," she coached him, starting with the most evident worry. He heard her and managed a deep, shuddering breath.
"I can't take anymore," he told her on the tail of it, gasping. "I can't. Not one more bloody thing. I gave everything I had to killing Voldemort and it wasn't enough. It'll never be enough."
It was Ron, surprisingly enough, that took the response to that.
"Stop it, mate. Think. You don't have to take it. Of course Snape wants you to sell them on the potion idea for him, ask him how much he's getting for that. You know Hermione and I would never let them do something like that. It's time for us sit down at the board and put together a strategy that'll cut them right off at the knees. We've just been reacting so far. It's time to take control of this game."
"I think it's too late for that…"
They all saw it then. It was different than the last time, and even more frightening. It was as if a wave hit him and simple drew part of him away with it, going from solid substance and color to grainy semitransparency. What was left seized up in convulsions, wracking himself off the chair and on to the floor. Hermione clung for dear life; she could feel the whirling, sucking sensation through him although it was having absolutely no effect on her and she knew he would be wrestled from her grasp rather than taking her with him.
"Please, Harry, don't let this turn into something it's not. Focus on us. Listen to us. Ron's right, you know he is," Hermione begged him. "We've gotten through worse than this before. Just stay with us, help us to help you."
Elspeth dropped down beside her, wand extended. She cast some sort of diagnostic charm that caused her wand tip to dive for the area of Harry's chest roughly above his heart even as she snarled at Snape.
"Do it!"
He glared at her and Hermione heard herself howl, "Just do it! Whatever she wants you to do just bloody do it for once, you pitiful excuse for a man!"
She saw Snape's affronted eyes shift to Elspeth. "His mum would be best," she hissed. "You knew her. Go on."
"I can not. I believe I know what you wish me to do, and I… can not. He has to initiate the contact. I have broken into his mind in the past, but I can not give him my own memories. I never managed to master that, with anyone."
"Well, shit! Now's a great time to admit that little truth," Elspeth moaned. She cast a legilmency spell herself and Hermione watched in with bated breath as she seemed to try and connect with Harry.
"There's not enough of him here! I can't find him. Merlin, he's almost gone, he's got to be aware of where he is this time…"
"This time?" Professor McGonagall repeated. "Surely this hasn't happened before!"
Harry was gray now, his physical presence left among them was bucking violently; for the first time since Hermione had seen it begin to happen his clothes were starting to bag and sag, not entirely enough a part of him to be taken. The thought of being left holding his empty robes struck straight to Hermione's heart. She reached one hand into his deflating clothing, tearing his t shirt free of the top of his jeans and thrusting beneath it. She didn't expect the smooth, warm skin she'd come to know, but the feeling was more akin to burying her hand in freezing cold sand. Still she moved it through him, wincing, until she found the faint warmth that should have been his heart, directly beneath Elspeth's wand.
`Oh, merciful Merlin…. I've got my hand inside Harry's chest,' she thought, and then she resolutely called on the magic he'd left her, the bit strong enough to do that first wandless magic, and tried rather desperately to do back what he had done to her. She willed it with all her might to flow back to him, hoping the feeling of it would either help him to realize they were still clinging to him or give him whatever extra strength he might need to fight off whoever or whatever was drawing him away.
`There's the joke,' she thought. `I'm trying to give Harry more magic.'
For the briefest of moments she felt bitter cold, smelled the stench he had spoken of, had a distinct vision of something wild-haired and filthy and barely human, a hag with bird-like claws clinging to him and cawing victoriously, `Mine this time! Mine! I will have him!'
And then, as if Harry had suddenly been empowered either by the magic she had sent him or somehow realized she was there seeing and feeling what he did, he managed to jerk up and free of the creature's grasp. He was thrust back across space and time into the shadow of himself left at Hogwarts like water poured back into a balloon, rapidly filling out his deflated clothing. Hermione's hand was pushed through his chest to the surface once more; she had the distinctly horrifying impression of muscle, blood and bone forcing it out, and though his skin closed around her expelled hand, her fingers ran red with blood. Right before she passed out cold.
He gasped beneath her and began coughing violently; they hauled him to sit upright to try and ease his struggle for breath and Hermione fell limply into his lap.
"It's Bellatrix!" he hacked out. "In Azkaban. Bellatrix was trying to get us into Azkaban with her."
He saw Hermione and reached for her, seemingly trying to reassure himself she was solid and breathing before his eyes rolled back and he slumped against Ron.
Solid once more. But for how long?
`That whole passing out thing,' thought Ron, `is starting to look really, really good.'
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Hermione knew how heartily sick Harry must be of waking up in the Hogwarts hospital wing, but there was a strange kind of comfort there for her. She felt safe again somehow. Madam Pomfrey had never failed her; Harry had always been alright after a stay in one of those beds. It wasn't the same without Professor Dumbledore's arrival to check on him and pilfer a sweet or two, but there were several visitors who had arrived bearing good news she could not wait for him to see.
Luna had come waving the next edition of the Quibbler. Though she had promptly wondered off somewhere with Ron, she'd left the paper behind. Evidently her father had been sufficiently convinced by what she and Ginny had overheard to go out on a limb. The headline read: "Ministry Position on Magical Limitation Now Conclusive, Methods Determined. Harry Potter Likely Only First of Many!"
The article was a masterpiece. Its message was abundantly clear without ever quite crossing the line into revealing exactly what they knew. It painted a distinct picture of a Ministry more concerned with trying to control Harry than chasing down known Death Eaters or the Dark Lord's rivals; those who had a far greater chance of (and might actually be interested in) gathering his followers into a force following his death. It named names; wizards and witches Mr. Lovegood believed to be among those Ministry officials had actually dealt with looking for usable methods of limitation, who were wanted criminals or known consorts of Voldemort at one time or another. It even reported the little known fact that his wand had been confiscated.
Best of all, it asked the question loud and clear. How much magic was too much? How did they decide? Were they playing with the balance of nature and magic itself in ways that guaranteed another Dark Lord rather than staving one off? What right did they have to interfere with Harry's magic after what he had gone through for them? Mr. Lovegood replayed the history of Harry's years at Hogwarts, reminding his readers that Harry had ultimately developed his magic in response to the Dark Lord's repeated attempts to kill him. If any of their children had survived the Tri Wizard Tournament and the night in the Little Hangleton graveyard that Harry had, would they ever approve any limitation of their magic whatsoever? Harry had survived to warn them all that Voldemort was back. They had failed to listen at the time and look what had come of it! They could not fail to take heed of the impending disaster (however well meaning) the Ministry was about to embark on.
Compared to the Daily Prophet's canned Harry Potter Still Sought!, it was an arresting read. There was no word of any occurrence outside Hogwarts' gates in the Prophet. Harry's modification of the Auror's memories must have worked, for the article implied that while Ron and Hermione too were being sought for questioning, the fact that they had not been located yet was probably due to their own concurrent search for their friend.
Equally hopeful in Hermione's eyes was the presence of Griselda Marchbanks at Hogwarts. Marchbanks was an Elder of the Wizengamot (though she had briefly resigned in protest of Umbridge's appointment as Hogwarts' High Inquisitor) and an old and dear friend of Albus Dumbledore's. She was there nominally to visit with Dumbledore's portrait, but she had spent almost an hour sitting by Harry's bedside and talking to Elspeth and Hermione about his situation. Despite her tiny, stooped stature and deeply lined skin her eyes were bright and occasionally snapped with impatience and irritation while she listened. Hermione remembered then that she was (or simply appeared to be for her own reasons) rather hard of hearing.
Her voice, when she spoke, was overloud, although it appeared not to rouse Harry in the slightest.
"How like Rufus to believe that he can control the future. Ridiculous! There have always been Dark Wizards, and always will be. Life is not without risks, nor is it ever without opportunities to prove oneself worthy of the privilege of living it! If there were no deep decisions to be made in this world, where would we be? Bored as nifflers in a sand pit. No one has ever successfully promised their child a safe and uneventful life. Great love, great deeds, great magic and great wizards only come from great challenges."
Her eyes grew a little misty, then, looking over Harry. "I remember giving this one some of his O.W.L. exams. Absolute rubbish at Divination, told me I was going to meet a round, dark soggy stranger. Hah! But he pulled out a lovely corporeal patronus for an extra point with Tofty for his Defense Practical as I recall. Had his priorities straight then. Lovely boy. Lots of promise, but not a bit of what's in him now. Doesn't take an idiot to sense he's powerful, but what's wrong with that? Dumbledore thought the world of him, and that ought to be good enough for anyone."
"Exactly what the Wizengamot needs to hear, Professor Marchbanks," Elspeth said loudly and clearly. "Are they aware of what the Ministry is trying to do there? Can't anything be done to legislate against that kind of violation of a fully qualified wizard's freedom?
"The problem is that there's been nothing to rule against," the elderly witch said, shaking her head at the memory. "Rufus hasn't had to come to us for this at all, there's nothing specific to actually stop him from doing what he intends. Nothing of the kind. I believe he had something of a problem getting the galleons to pay for it approved from the budget, but that wasn't up to us in the end."
"Just because there's nothing in Wizarding Law to stop it now doesn't mean it should be permitted with out a chance for ordinary wizards to oppose," Hermione said. "Isn't there some way for us to request a special hearing?"
"Of course you can, dearie," Professor Marchbanks said. "Usually only takes a year or two to get on the Order of Business."
"I meant a special hearing, an emergency session of the court, since he's in immediate danger."
"So do I," Professor Marchbanks said ruefully. "Things just haven't been the same since Dumbledore stepped down as Chief Mugwump. Bunch of old fools."
"But we haven't got a year or two," Hermione told her, and she guessed something of her urgency must have transcended the sound barrier, for the older witch's eyes bored into her formidably. She was expecting a rebuke on the impatience of the young, not at all what she received.
"If magic has seen fit to assist him to survive so far, it seems unlikely to abandon him now. Nor should we. Albus often spoke of young Potter in terms of trying to provide him what he needed to make his way through the maze that lay before him. What he meant was knowledge, friendship, compassion. Never once was he more concerned with teaching him a specific spell than in keeping him with his classmates and amongst his peers. Dumbledore was a wise wizard, my dear, and gave his life to this very cause. Why rethink his course?"
"But what does that mean?" said Hermione, for once not at all concerned with appearing smart or puzzling it out for herself. "What can we do?"
"Just what you are doing. Only do not neglect your friends. You, I think, have found a place by Potter's side that can not be easily filled. Yet surely you know someone else who has the time and skills to advance your case to the Wizengamot, someone young enough and brash enough to catch their attention. And you are forgetting the Order. Albus created it to fight Voldemort, but in it you have witches and wizards young and old, all or most of whom would surely recommit themselves to assist Potter if you but asked. They are all war weary, but the battle has not ended and they will find what it takes to see you through. You three have made a start with finding someone inside the Ministry to assist you." She nodded knowingly at Elspeth. "And from the look of the papers this morning, you have found a friend in the press as well. Now call on your other friends to step forward and speak out in all their walks of life. Each may be but one voice, but together they'll be too loud for the Ministry to ignore."
Professor Marchbanks levered herself up out of her chair and took her leave, wishing Hermione and Elspeth both well and promising to pass their regards along to Dumbledore's portrait.
Hermione settled back against her pillows. It sounded so straight forward and logical when the old witch put it that way. Harry knew Dumbledore far better than Hermione, but it certainly sounded like what he would have told them. She knew that she found the idea that her place at Harry's side couldn't be easily filled flattering, but it was also true that she didn't feel she could leave him to try and tackle the next Wizengamot session while he was in this frame of mind.
"Can it really be Belatrix?" she asked Elspeth. "She is in Azkaban, isn't she? Or did they get the wrong witch?"
"You saw what he saw," Elspeth told her quietly. "What do you think?"
"I saw something that barely looked human. It did have black hair, but I couldn't tell you much more that. It was cold there, and it smelled horrible, just like he told us. Grim and gloomy."
"Azkaban could do that to you. And that sounds a lot like Azkaban."
Hermione realized the second voice that Harry had heard, the one that confused him, could well have been Lily's. Exposure to the Dementors had long had the effect of jarring loose those memories from the depths of his consciousness; he simply hadn't had any reason to believe there would have been Dementors where he was being drawn.
"The sort of spell she's using doesn't show up on the person it's used on. It's dark, nasty stuff you do with magical and physical essences instead of the person themselves. When we first met that day, Ron told me how Bellatrix attacked Harry after Voldemort's corpse shriveled, using her `fingers, teeth, anything she could use.' He said she was covered in blood when they hauled her off him and that she still had a handful of his hair. She didn't have a trial; none of those that were caught with him did. She was shipped straight to Azkaban. It's not like a muggle prison; the Dementors wouldn't have cared if she was covered in blood and clutching a clump of hair. They're blind, you know. I didn't take it seriously until now, but it's… possible that she could be behind it. But Hermione, we'll never get anyone to believe us. It's so out there… if you hadn't seen and felt Harry starting to insubstantiate you'd never believe it either. I get out to Azkaban occasionally for work, but even I just can't go there until they call me, and they wouldn't let me see her while I was there, anyway."
"How else would we break the spell? Can we just work it backwards, assume the spell is hers and try to break it that way?" Hermione asked hopefully.
Elspeth shook her head. "No. For whatever reason, the spell is only set off by Harry's mental or emotional state. We don't know if that lowers his resistance to it, or in fact triggers an occurrence of it. It's too risky to try and work backwards through him. We could probably do some really serious damage to him that way. Erm… more damage. What we need to do is destroy her occulto phasmatis. If it is Bellatrix, she has the physical material she's using to hold the spell together hidden somewhere in her cell in Azkaban. We need to get that away from her."
"It seems so simple. He's the good guy, the innocent one who killed a dark wizard who threatened us all. We should be able to go to the authorities and explain and be rushed to Azkaban where we could find and destroy the spell and live happily ever after. Instead he's wanted by the Ministry and she's got more rights and protection in prison than he does! If he tries to defend himself against her and gets caught, he'll end up with something worse than the dark mark ever was, and we'll both end up as squibs. It's just so stupid, so frustrating, so…"
"Wrong," Elspeth finished for her. "Professor Marchbanks was right. You get started on that. Call on your friends from the Order, from school, anywhere you can think of. The time for secrecy is over. Spread the word. I'll take care of finding out everything I can about Bellatrix and her sentence, and try and get myself in to Azkaban to see if I can find any evidence she's the one pulling on Harry. I swore I'd fix his bad spell, and I keep on missing it. I'd still have sworn it was something else. It's the least I can do."
tbc…
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A/N: Well, it was a long time coming, but it wasn't a short one! Sorry about the wait. Real life, yadda, yadda, yadda. Just FYI, for those of you who are enjoying Elspeth, what should be the next chapter up will also be a longish one, because it delves (finally) into her past and answers most of those unanswered questions. For those of you that don't, this is just a heads up for what's coming. The chapter after that reverts back to a more integrated story line, with Harry, Hermione and Ron taking on the Ministry. Thanks so much for your patience, for reading, and for all your awesome reviews. You guys are the best! ~Lynney
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