Official Fine Print: Nope. Not mine. The brainchildren of the mighty pen of JK Rowling. Just playing with them.
Fixing Harry
Chapter 6
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Subject: Harry James Potter
Interview Date: Monday, July 14, 1998
Interview #: Third
Observations: I'm an interfering old bat, just like my Mum. Or I think I'm about to be.
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Off the record once again. Way off. It was the official version that took me awhile this time round.
I think I started to get an idea of at least part of the problem today. Well, perhaps not the problem itself, but at least one of its most potent triggers. And we'll need to get right to work on it because I don't imagine it's an area of his life Harry really wants to share with the Ministry - or the Deadly Prophet for that matter.
Unfortunately, it happens to fall into one of life's categories in which I am both expert and totally at a loss.
He brought his two best friends with him, just as I asked. I know that he knows I could just have circumvented him entirely in approaching them, so I was hopeful that their presence was an indication he'd truly forgiven me for the cheering charm incident and begun to believe me when I said that I wanted to help, regardless of whatever the official Ministry intent turned out to be. Personally speaking, I was relieved to find I quite like them both.
Ron Weasley is as unalike Harry as it seems possible for friends to be. They are day and night, both physically and by their very natures. Ron's boldly ginger hair is bright to Harry's darkness; his fair, freckled skin is a healthy pink contrast to Harry's present pallor. He is quite tall but sturdily built and well muscled with it, whereas Harry seems to have only recently closed in on his maturing height, as if growth kicked in only after some inhibiting factor was removed. Harry is still whippet thin, his musculature evident but stretched to accommodate his new frame, so he looks both younger physically and years older emotionally than his friend. Ron could actually be really imposing if not for the openness of his expression, but if you were unaware he had recently disposed of Voldemort Harry's only possible intimidation factor would be his natural intensity; his face is as closed to a casual observer as Ron's is accessible.
Put it this way; they were utterly opposing types and in theory at least blessed as friends. It seemed unlikely they'd ever have to face off over appealing to the same girl.
I would not imagine that their differences were what drew them together; they seem altogether unaware of them and the interplay of their conversation throughout the interview emphasized their shared experiences more than anything. Ron, however, seems anxious to let the experience of that final battle with the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters slip from his mind like water on a duck's back; smoothly and without a trace. I don't think he can; it's a nice idea but that sort of thing has a tendency to bite you in the arse later even if you relegate it to the doghouse at the back of your mind with a really big stick. You can't just ignore it. He may be sick of Harry slaying demons, but life has taught me he'll likely be wishing he'd finished his off as well in the not too distant future. He is clearly excited now by the prospect of the Quidditch trials, although I think it's a tiny bit unusual he seems so unbothered by his old teammate's inability to join him. Perhaps he feels the need to remove himself from Harry's rather long shadow, and is finding this the perfect opportunity.
Now that I've given Ron his due, I have to admit my attention went first to Hermione Granger; my interest piqued by Harry's comments during our last interview. She's ordinary enough at first glance; of medium height and plain coloring and clearly a girl to whom thought takes precedence to fashion. They have all dressed in muggle clothes for our excursion, and she wears simple jeans, sandals and a plain, slogan-less lavender scoop neck tee shirt. Her hair is pulled back into a ponytail against the heat and humidity but small curling tendrils escape, giving away how much the weather affects it. She is otherwise unadorned, and wears no obvious jewelry of any kind.
You don't need to wait for her to speak, however, to see there is far more to her than a first glance can reveal; her frank brown eyes are busy assessing me even as I assess her and they give the impression of being every bit as sharp as mine are supposed to be. She is undoubtedly clever and that is the characteristic that seems most often used to describe her, but she is clearly kind and deeply concerned with the world around her in a way not entirely different from Harry. As the interview goes on I can see she is aware her brains are a gift, a burden even, as she seems to feel compelled to use them to help others. She appears tired now as well, as though she'd like to lay that burden down for awhile and just be a girl of eighteen but she can't, anymore than Harry can stop being the Boy Who Lived. It's likely small compensation, but her real beauty lies in the same place her troubles do. It's when she talks about the injustices and mysteries of the world that she comes alive; her plain brown eyes are so much more than plain when they are working out solutions and her empathy gives her features a kind of warmth beyond the ordinary.
The thing I find most intriguing, however, is the one thing she doesn't seem able to control. Before we even leave the office and sit down for our interview proper I can see it, and I watch for it throughout our time together.
She can't stop looking at Harry. There are a thousand different reasons for the glances. She listens closely to him, and you can see quite clearly when she is comparing his words to what she thinks he will say, and when he surprises her. It isn't often, apparently, that he does. If she senses he is becoming uncomfortable or agitated her own body language changes; either subtly confronting the confronter or moving soothingly toward him. I'd say it was an excellent defense mechanism in response to his recent habit of causing things to explode, but you can easily see the roots of it predate this problem. I'd bet good galleons it goes back to about their second or third year as friends at Hogwarts from the ingrained nature of it. She is clearly protective of him, just the way a good friend should be, and you can't help but think that he's either lucky in his friends or a good one as well.
And then she looks again, and there it is.
It's a glance women everywhere recognize only too well in others, beyond the barriers of language. We either sympathize when we see it, or our territorial instincts kick in hard. There is a rich mixture of longing, tenderness, love and regret in her eyes, and there is little doubt what she's thinking. The part that concerns me most is that there is but the merest trace of hope.
What's up with that?
I'd be kidding if I said I didn't want to interfere; I want to desperately. I just wasn't sure yet whether I should, or how. I needed to know way more before I should even consider it. It was a hell of snap judgment to make considering she'd so far said little more than 'hello' and 'nice to meet you,' after all. I had no idea whether either was seeing anyone else, or if Harry had ever been aware that the intensity of her feelings where he was concerned was likely more than friendly. Even being acquainted with him for as brief a period of time as I had, my guess would be he did not. Harry could probably pick up danger from around a blind corner, but love seemed an unexpected stranger he would likely crash into head on. If he was lucky.
We left the looming shadow of the Ministry and headed for a coffee shop I had used many a time when there was a compelling reason to avoid wizard territory. It was especially likely for these three; usually full of University students between classes catching up on work or socializing. They would blend in age wise, and it was noisy enough and in such a state of constant transition that a subtle muffliato would go unnoticed and ensure we were not heard as well. Armed with our cardboard cups of coffee (Harry and I) herbal tea (Hermione) and orange juice (Ron) we claimed a table and four chairs near the windows where we could enjoy the passersby or be on the lookout for enemies, as the case might be.
Harry chose the chair adjacent to mine, which I would have taken as a lowering of his defenses had I not been fully aware that he was fully aware that it made it easier to avoid my direct, head-on attention. That honor was given to Hermione, leaving the place opposite Harry for Ron.
"So," I began as pleasantly and unthreateningly as I could. "How long have you two known Harry?"
"I think that's been covered in the Daily Prophet, actually," Mr. Attitude-on-a-Stick informed me with a grumble. Just a little uncomfortable being dissected in front of his mates, then.
"Perhaps I didn't find you so fascinating at the time that I bothered to read it?" I suggested, daring to yank his chain a bit.
"We met on the train to Hogwarts," Hermione said, mimicking my pleasant approach. Harry shifted in his chair and swiftly sat up straighter, shoulders squaring. My first guess was he'd just been kicked under the table, and my second was it hadn't been Ron who did it. I could really like this girl.
"Friends ever since," Ron agreed, smiling faintly at Hermione.
Uh oh. Hang on. Were they? Or was it just him, unrequited? Or what?
Oh yeah, this was supposed to be business. Spell Damage. Find it and reverse it. Get it in gear, Elspeth.
"The reason I asked," I said, for Harry's benefit as Hermione surely knew and Ron came from a magical family, "was that being friends at Hogwarts actually exposes you pretty thoroughly to the nature of your friends' magic. You may not realize it until later unless you spend a good amount of time together in the summers out of range of the castle, but even second and third years can start to subconsciously recognize their friends' magical signatures. I'm interested in whether you two think his has changed at all around the two of you."
Ron immediately shook his head; Hermione looked thoughtful.
"You mean just since defeating Voldemort?" she asked.
Interesting. I'll bite. "Well, at any time, actually. It could still point us in a direction to help resolve the problem. Perhaps it was a preexisting curse and something during the battle touched it off."
"It seemed to me to, um, fluctuate quite a bit all last year. We did spend a fair amount of time outside Hogwarts, Harry wasn't actually attending classes and Ron and I helped him with a sort of extra credit project to make up for it," she said slowly.
She seemed a bit flustered, and it occurred to me that she was not a natural liar; I bet she could do it flawlessly to protect either of the two boys that sat beside her, but she was torn now between helping Harry and shielding him and unsure of where the line lay. I would have to somehow earn her trust as well. Although anyone that could come up with 'extra credit project' for destroying horcruxes in the plural and actually managing to spell a convincing fake of one was bound to take quite some convincing.
Harry had turned seventeen last year, a fairly big milestone in a Wizard's life and likely to play a bit of havoc with their magic, but not I would think to the extent she spoke of, and she would have had Ron for comparison, at that. Horcruxes were truly dark and not very well understood; their mere existence was a thing seldom referred to. I knew what they were in theory, had heard family tales of the consequences of one long, long ago, but nothing more than that. Exposure to them, especially repeated, could likely screw things up a good bit, but I had nothing to go on there but instinct. Best to eliminate what I knew before stumbling off into uncharted territory.
"By fluctuate, do you mean he had problems performing on occasion, or his results were unpredictable, or what?" I asked. I almost added 'magically speaking' but managed to bite my tongue.
"Hullo, still at the table," Harry said pointedly. "There was nothing wrong with my magic last year."
"Well, except the time that…" Ron started, and jumped. Back, so that trajectory pointed to Harry.
"There was nothing wrong with it, Harry," Hermione said placatingly. "But you've already said she knows about the wandless stuff, and you couldn't even manage a decent non-verbal most of sixth year. That changed, although that tendency could also be covered by your coming of age."
She'd done her research then. Unsurprising.
"There was one thing though, that actually might be relevant. Harry spent a good bit of time in a house full of dark artifacts that year. A fairly unfriendly house. There was a little incident there…"
I saw a flicker of something in Harry's eyes then. He seemed to know what she was talking about immediately, but perhaps not have made the same connection.
"Oops," was what he said. Succinct and to the point for a change.
Ron grinned, and it turned into an outright laugh. "That was a bloody good one, Harry, you have to admit it."
"The only good thing about it would have been the look on her face afterwards, if only she'd had one," Harry said darkly.
Now that didn't sound good. The only thing that had actually saved him from direct Ministry interference up to this point was there was no nice innocent victim to press charges. There might have been a couple of expensive dress robes ruined at the Order of Merlin affair, and thankfully everyone had already been wearing black at the funeral, but if he'd actually hurt someone and Scrimgeour could get a hold of them… Somehow I couldn't see Harry being quite that unconcerned about causing anyone injury though, he seemed to have such a hyperactive guilt complex.
Hermione picked up on my train of thought straight away and set about shunting it on to the right track.
"There was a truly awful portrait there. You ought to have to pass some sort of personality test to be preserved in magical paint, really. She was worst blood snob and she truly hated us. When she found out the house actually belonged to Harry she was just unbearable. There was a sheet over her and we'd all sneak past her to avoid the things she'd come out with. We got back from a… sort of field trip for Harry's project one night and were just trying to get some sleep before coping with the… um… what we'd found. She heard us going up the stairs and she said some really nasty things…"
"It was total rubbish, as usual," Ron said with a grin of recollection, "but I'd never seen you turn quite that shade of red before…" I was expecting him to say Harry, and truly surprised when he ended his comment with, "…Hermione."
Harry's eyes were a wonder to behold then; so dark they were almost black.
"The difference was that I actually wanted too see her go up in smoke even if I didn't say the words," he said. He had the careful sound of someone trying not to let a powerful urge overtake them. "Just like I wasn't exactly disappointed to see Vernon's sister inflate into the poisonous hot air balloon she was, even though at thirteen I didn't know the spell to do it. The other two were completely different, I never meant for anything to happen, there wasn't anything to be mad about when they did."
"Just to be sure I understand, this portrait said something rude about Hermione one time too many; and you accidentally incinerated it?"
"It was beyond rude, it was just… lies, hurtful lies and yeah. Up in smoke she went."
"Not a moment too soon, either. Right hag she was." Ron agreed.
Interestingly enough, whatever the portrait had said had bothered Harry and Hermione a good bit more than it evidently had Ron.
"Even Dumbledore couldn't get that portrait off the wall, though," Hermione said earnestly. "Lots of really powerful witches and wizards had tried to find a way to shut her up. She or her wretched house elf always managed to get round them. It took extraordinary magic to do it, really, especially if it was just intent without a spell to focus it."
"What about after that?" I asked curiously. "Did you notice anything different? There could have been a responsive curse on the portrait. Can I ask who she was, or is that some top security clearance secret as well? Does anybody but you three know Harry did it?"
"Do you even stop to breath between questions?" Harry grumbled. "Because I'd hate to say something really thought provoking and make you hyperventilate or anything."
"Not seeing any danger there so far," I told him with my sweetest smile. "Feel free to answer in the order they were asked or improvise. I'm nothing if not flexible."
Whatever he was going to say he thought better of it, but he was almost smiling. He really was a nice kid at heart; it was hard to mind the occasional attitude. It seemed to me he deserved some slack after it all.
"Nothing different as far as I could tell. Wouldn't be surprised if it was cursed, but she'd have come up with something way more personal and painful than this, probably involving my reproductive ability. I don't think the Ministry knows so I would guess your security clearance is fine. Walburga Black. The name says it all. And yes, lots of people knew, it was a safe house at the time. Friends of mine live there now. In order, just as asked. Do I get brownie points?"
"No, but I'll bake you some yummy brownies for next time. You need fattening up. It's a service provided free of charge by your friendly Ministry of Magic."
He blushed, and it was just a cute as the first time I noticed and much less painful. For me, anyway.
"So," I began, trying to wind things up. "What do you two think is going on with Harry? Do you think the Ministry has anything to worry about?"
"Other than the fact that Scrimgeour's leading it and it can't tell its head from its other end, she means," Harry cleared up helpfully.
"It's a disgrace, taking his wand and saying it's for his own good. They might as well paint a target on him and post a notice telling anyone who wants a chance to have at him. It's like they're actually trying to get him to do illegal stuff to defend himself," Ron said indignantly.
From his sudden shift in position and the slight sloshing of his drink I surmised someone had once again kicked him under the table. Swift computations taking in to account the angle of his retreat pointed to Hermione this time. They'd all be limping home at this rate.
"I mean, he's doing much better, isn't he, it's only plumbing really at this point, and the occasional window," he said hastily.
Harry groaned softly but I know he didn't see my look of glee, because I was really careful to hide it. I actually had to drop down beneath the table and pretend to be retrieving a napkin. God bless Ron Weasley. I'd been thinking I would have to do a bit of surveillance round their flat to see what was really going on.
"So the Ministry doesn't need to be overly concerned that Harry's exploding people's plumbing? Sounds like a busy time for some Department or other." I replied. "Does your Dad's group handle that sort of thing, Ron?"
"It's only ever been wizard plumbing, and it's always been cleaned right up. Perhaps we can move on," Harry suggested. "Do we get to ask you stuff as well?"
He was going to sic Hermione on me, I could tell.
"You can try. I'm the absolute bottom of the heap, though, so if you're looking for what the Minister's thinking or saying your guess is as good or better than mine," I told him.
"I don't mean to be impolite," Hermione began, "but have you ever wondered why it was you were the one chosen for Harry's case?"
Did I call that right, or what?
"You mean because I'm the bottom of the barrel and he's the Great Harry Potter?" I asked her.
Harry squirmed uncomfortably beside me.
"Well, erm… yes," she replied, not backing down an inch. The paltry feelings of the Ministry worker were clearly nothing when it came to Harry's welfare. "Have you?"
"There are two possible reasons that I can come up with. The first is that they've realized I've been hiding my light under a bushel all these years, and I'm really brilliant and all the dark arts stuff in my background that's kept me down so far is exactly what might be needed here. The second is that Scrimgeour was looking for the lowest of the low with the express hope of appearing to be trying to help Harry while actually doing nothing at all."
"Why would he do that?" she asked. "The second one, I mean. What's the point?"
I could tell they were used to sitting down and hashing out problems together; they'd probably done a lot of it last year alone. I though about Voldemort's horcruxes, guessing they must have worked out together how to neutralize them; no easy or ordinary task. They had risked their lives, but they had never had to play politics with their livelihoods on the mundane level us merely average adults did.
"As an actual employee of the Ministry," I said, "I've said too much just with items one and two. You, however, could definitely figure it out, being the smartest witch of your age and all."
Her eyes narrowed. "You can concede the possibility that the Ministry chose you as its least competent employee in a possible attempt to render Harry no real defense at all, but you can't comment on why Scrimgeour might have done it?"
"And keep my job if it ever comes to light? No, I can't. Not that I haven't said worse, but we both know the Ministry has ways of making anyone talk. The trick is to make them think you've got nothing interesting to say. I can suggest that it is possible that's why they chose me, yes. I can assure you that they would have been wrong in their assumption, though. I may not be a star employee and I definitely have a few black marks on my permanent record, but they aren't there because I'm not competent. They're there because I am and I refuse to withhold what I can do from someone who needs it. You may not want to believe that, but if you try you'll see why I'd like to stay below the direct notice of the powers that be. I'm more help to Harry from the inside than fired for speaking my mind."
Harry nodded once in agreement to this; I could see it had crossed his mind this might be an argument I would use, I just wasn't sure if he believed me. I could see Hermione's mental cogs churning away behind those brown eyes as well.
So it surprised the heck out me that it was Ron who spoke next.
"If you really want the truth about why Scrimgeour's afraid of Harry, all we need to do is invite Percy round and let Harry have at the plumbing. That prat'll spout out the whole of whatever he knows in fury the first minute he gets wet."
I'd forgotten about Percy Weasley, actually. It's easy to do, he's an annoying little piece of work, always sending stuff back marked up with petty changes before he'll pass it up the line or denying permissions on the few things he actually controls. He did an investigation in Spell Damage once, concluding we cost too much and it would be more efficient to just send everyone on to St. Mungo's. Clement had taken great pleasure in teaching him a thing or too about the differences between us and the Wards on the Fourth Floor.
Other than the long-termers of Ward 49, some of whom are ours but 'not yet cured' (Clement hates the defeatist attitude of 'incurable') St. Mungos handles accidental stuff. Say your wizard comes home drunk as a skunk and appearing just a tad happier about it than he ought to under the circumstances and you hit him with five or six highly emotionally charged hexes that just happen to produce an unusual result. That's a case for to St. Mungo's. If you disappoint Lucius Malfoy in a business deal (or are unfortunate enough to attend some upper echelon event wearing the same robes as his lovely wife Narcissa) and you end up with a horribly disfiguring unidentifiable hex, you come to us. One is an accident, assuming of course you didn't really mean all those hexes quite that way in the light of day. The other is a crime with intent. Of course, anything involving a Malfoy (such as how all three of them escaped Azkaban) is a crime, but intent changes everything; quite literally when it comes to jinxes, spells and hexes. For example, the jibbering jinx we put on Percy has remained unsolved unto this day. Ask him about the cost of cauldron counterfeiting one time and watch him go! It's a beauty to behold, just make sure you aren't drinking anything at the time.
It was hard to believe he and Ron were related, except of course for the hair. Still, if it came down to it Ron was right; there just might be a way to use the officious little brown noser, and he did work far closer to Scrimgeour than I ever got.
"One: it's not bloody illegal to blow up your own loo," Harry ticked off. "Two: I didn't use a wand to do it, so they can't track it and shouldn't be worried about it, anyway. Wandless magic wasn't illegal last time I looked. Three: I've refrained from using any magic at all in public places except for a disillusionment charm I've cast on myself, protecting wizards everywhere from whatever the hell is wrong with me, so point Four: Scrimgeour can go eff himself. I'm not doing anything wrong, and I'm frankly just trying to eat and sleep and use the loo like every other wizard in London. I'm cooperating like a good boy because I just want some bloody peace. If that's too much for the Ministry of Magic to cope with, then it's time to do a runner or else turn around and take over the whole rotten place and make Ron's Dad Minister. There, Elspeth. You've heard my wicked plan at last. File that."
Ron laughed, but Harry's eyes were angry even if his face was carefully passive. Hermione appeared thoughtful.
"You know, Harry," she said, "I wouldn't be surprised if that's not exactly what he's afraid of you doing."
Score one for Hermione. The thought, outlandish as it was once you knew him, had occurred to me as well.
Harry laughed then, until he saw that she was serious. "Hermione, why would anyone think I…"
"Because he doesn't know you. Because nobody knows you, Harry. They've had Rita Skeeter's lies and Fudge's lies and Scrimgeour's carefully worded statements, which are really just lies in fancier clothes. The one and only time you ever gave the Wizarding world a glimpse of who you were was when you gave that interview to Luna's father, and look what it did for The Quibbler. People believed you then, they'd believe you now if you told the truth and it would make it awfully hard for the Ministry to keep on after you if the average witch and wizard in the street thought they were harassing you without cause.
The problem with magic is that it's so easy for us to change things we get fatalistic about anything the wave of a wand won't cure. Like fear and ignorance and corruption. You don't like talking about yourself and no one blames you for that, but I swear you could really influence the balance of power if you wanted to."
"But I don't want to," Harry said almost plaintively. "I just want to be done with all of this and get on with my life."
It struck me that despite not liking the idea of what we were discussing he was far more relaxed hearing it from his friends. If it had been me throwing out notions about why Scrimgeour might be out to get him he would have been far fiercer and closed off to the concept. This could speed things along considerably.
"Not the point, mate," Ron told him. "You never wanted to be his poster boy back in sixth year when Percy let him at you at Christmas, but he kept on asking. He's going to get you back for being Dumbledore's man now."
Score one for Ron as well. There had always been an uneasy balance of power between Dumbledore and the Ministry, and it hadn't taken an idiot to figure out who could have called all the shots if they'd wanted to. I'd always thought Dumbledore a genius for choosing Hogwarts over politics and bureaucracy. You got to insinuate yourself in the impressionable minds of children there free of the baggage of apparating licenses and Underage Use of Magic warnings. It was way easier to feel faintly nostalgic and warm and fuzzy about your Headmaster, regardless of the trouble you'd got into, then the Minister of Magic.
"So what do I do then?" Harry asked. "Bend over?"
Now there was an image… Mental slap! Back to work.
"Look," Hermione said. "I think we're getting caught up with the symptoms rather than the cure. We need to resolve why Harry's having trouble controlling his magic in the first place. If we can identify the curse or hex at the root of it, we can eliminate the problem. And if we eliminate the problem, Scrimgeour will have nothing to harass Harry with, like him or not."
See what I mean? Cuts right to the heart of the problem, intentions good. Unfortunately, my feeling is even if we managed to clear up Harry's control issues, Scrimgeour's still going to want to magically neuter him to render him less of a threat to his own hold on things. Fudge might have been determinedly oblivious, but Scrimgeour's got a far tougher outlook, and he's nothing if not a man of action once his course is clear. Although he could never quite get himself a clear shot at Voldemort, come to that. I'm sure that little fact doesn't make Harry taking him down any easier to swallow.
The problem I think Harry will have to tackle at some point is that Scrimgeour truly thinks he's doing what he is for the best. He's not a bad person as far as I can see; he's just a good politician. (Something altogether different from a good bureaucrat, although neither is amongst my favorite creatures. I'd feel safer around an angry dragon than either of them.) His years as the Head of the Auror Office - and before that fighting dark wizards as an Auror himself - have given him a healthy respect and disdain for how seemingly unthinkable things can happen in the blink of an eye. Allegiances change, alliances are remade, friends become enemies; and anyone as young and powerful as Harry is a threat. Particularly without the leashing effect of an older and more experienced wizard, something Harry lost when Dumbledore died. Scrimgeour may not have cared for Dumbledore's methods, but he was a known factor. Harry himself, for all his declaration of being Dumbledore's man, was not. In Scrimgeour's defense, he had likely seen a lot of things throughout his career, things none of us knew the truth about. That was part of the problem - how could you really judge who was telling the truth when the whole truth was never told?
But in Harry's defense, Scrimgeour simply didn't know Harry. There was no way this kid was going dark, and it wasn't, as Snape had insinuated, due to lack of wits.
It was time to finish up our business for this particular meeting. I had some ideas to go test out now.
"I have to ask you two again, Ron, Hermione. You were both there at Hogwarts that night. I know they aren't pleasant memories, but I need you to think through them again in light of what's happening now to see if something doesn't stand out differently. Try it as if you were in a pensieve - which I would dearly love to use, but I'm imagining none of you would agree to…"
Stony looks all the way round at that particular idea. There's way too much paper work involved to try and force the issue though, because the memory becomes public record and has to be maintained indefinitely, blah, blah, blah. I frankly think it's too invasive in 99% of cases when Veritaserum will do just as well, but sometimes what someone didn't notice is more important than the truth about what they did. We're none of us deities, though, and that's getting into uncomfortable territory for me, calling those shots. We're magically capable of way more than we should ever morally use.
"Then just sort of think it through from a different perspective if you can. Who else was there that might have had a clear shot at Harry and a reason to want something like this? Was there much spellfire? Were there many instances when hexes and spells collided that you took notice of? Was anyone alone with him at any time? Did Voldemort ever hit Harry himself with anything that didn't seem to have an immediate effect?" I made a snap decision not to lie to Harry about talking to Snape then. I wasn't going to volunteer that I had, but if it got down to it and he asked I'd tell him the truth. "I've heard a bit about what went on, but I need to see it the way you did."
Ron gazed out the windows, but I didn't think for a moment his mind was back on the battle. I think he simply wanted out now. Harry was lost in the dregs of his coffee cup but his respiration had clearly picked up a good bit and though his hands were steady on his cup there was a muscle working convulsively along his jaw. I wasn't surprised (although I was glad I wasn't his dentist.) I'd expected him to be stressed and I was watching him as closely as I could without being hugely obvious for signs of imminent magical meltdown. So far, so good. Hermione's clear brown eyes were the only ones not to dodge away, and I was hugely relieved. To be honest, hers were the recollections I was most hoping for.
She spoke carefully, although I think it was more out of concern for Harry than anything she'd been told not to say. "Voldemort didn't appear himself until the fighting was mostly over; if it had gone the other way he might not have shown up at all. He definitely had a plan and he wanted to be in control. We'd given him reason to think he still was."
The fake horcrux, the one she'd managed to make appear real. He would have thought himself immortal still. Oh, how he would have gloried in that thought as he'd faced a very mortal Harry.
"We hadn't planned on the confrontation coming quite that soon though. We were close, but we weren't ready and he knew it. In the end there may have been less than dozen of us in the Chamber. The Aurors and the Or, um, others, were all in Hogsmeade fighting to save the town; the Death Eaters made sure of that. It was only teachers and children in the castle. So no, there wasn't much spellfire, or lots of haphazard hexes. It was very orderly and inevitable when it came down to it."
"Can you tell me who was there?" I probed gently. "Who he had with him?"
"Bellatrix, of course. Rabastan, but not Rodolphus. He must have been leading the Hogsmeade side of things. Rookwood, Nott, Mulciber, Avery, the Carrows, Alecto and Amycus, though they were really just guarding the door. And Antonin Dolohov."
"Did any of them use anything you didn't recognize? Even if it was wordless, a color or sound that was different than what you'd seen before? Dolohov is known for experimenting with new spells and…"
"Dolohov was known for it. Now he's known for being dead," Harry said listlessly. "It wasn't him. I didn't really give him time, I was a little… over enthusiastic when I saw he was there.'
Hermione's eyes literally tried to caress him even as her hands remained neatly folded on her lap. It was almost painful to see her.
"Was it like the portrait?" I asked curiously. "Or like it is now?"
He shook his head. "No, I… He was the one. He hurt Hermione in the Department of Mysteries our fifth year, he tried to kill her. He recognized her, and he got this look on his face, you could see… and I …"
"You killed him" Ron said calmly, not looking at him. I got the sense he might have envied Harry this one thing for some reason. "You did the bloody world a favor and cracked his bloody head open with one big angry-arse reducto. There was nothing weird about it and nothing to apologize for, Harry. And you missed one, Hermione. You forgot Snape."
I had wondered how he was going to show up, and when.
"Wouldn't have put it past him, you know," Ron snorted.
Come to think of it….
"Good for Hermione," Harry said darkly. "Wish I could forget Snape."
"Unlikely as it sounds to say when actually facing off with the embodiment of evil," Hermione said quietly, "nothing really strange happened until …"
Harry shifted uncomfortably and his bandaged hands disappeared under the table.
"Until… umm."
She was rethinking her words quickly, but not quickly enough. Ron's eyes were shifting between the two of them, but hadn't twigged it yet. I wondered if I should reveal what Snape had told me when Harry kicked into gear and diverted things nicely.
"Until he died, the bastard. It took him almost fifteen years to finally properly die. It wasn't even the body he was born with, but when he was truly dead it was like all that time in between just collapsed. He shriveled and dried up like a corpse. A long dead corpse, what he should have been."
Ron nodded suddenly, as if remembering despite himself. "That's when Bellatrix went nuts. They were so sure that…" he swallowed, thinking about it. "The death eaters were so sure Harry was done for. There just didn't seem any way out, and Voldemort was laughing and joking about the great Harry Potter taking his mark one way or the other."
Snape had said something about that. "He meant to mark Potter with a giant bloody "V" before killing him, so there could be no doubt, I suppose. Potter was perhaps less out of it than he'd seemed, or he finally managed to squeeze a thought out of his excuse for a brain. After the pain of the first stroke he recognized the spell and managed to cast a reflecting shield. The sectumsempra the Dark Lord meant to finish carving the second line in the "V" ended up severing his own carotid artery. Almost cut his head off, to be honest. He was dead before he even landed on Potter."
"He made the first cut," Ron continued, his eyes fleeing Harry again for the safety of the window, "and then there was just blood everywhere. It took a couple of minutes to figure it all out. When Bellatrix saw what happened to him she tried to take Harry apart." He glanced back at Harry then. "Good thing you were fairly well out of it, mate, because it was not pretty."
Harry frowned. Interesting that it wasn't ringing any bells with him. Hermione looked thoughtful but she seemed to be considering what Ron said rather than recognizing a memory of her own.
"What spell did she use?" I asked. I was getting really a bad feeling now, remembering Snape's other words.
"She said she would make sure that the world hated Potter and cast him aside. She said, 'And when they do, my Lord, I will recall you through him. When he is forgotten in Azkaban, he will know my kiss before the Dementors come, and you shall be reborn."
"No spell. Fingers, teeth, anything she could use. They'd most of them dropped their wands and started hoowling when their marks kicked in the news he was dead. She still had a handful of his hair when we pulled her off him and she was just covered in…" Light dawned slowly on Ron's face, and he ducked it as well. "No way. She's in Azkaban."
Hermione was all over it now. "They were caught fleeing Hogwarts, before they reached the apparition point. She could have passed it off to someone else. Rodolphus could have met her on the way from Hogsmeade. Has he ever been captured? Or a student, a Slytherin. She'd have had hair, blood, maybe even skin…"
"You can cast some pretty evil spells with that." I agreed, mentally categorizing those I knew. Although I'd like to think not at Azkaban itself. What were we keeping those Dementors for else? I hope they'd all got a giant pay cut for dancing off after Voldemort. No sucking souls on Sundays or something. I hated those creepy things.
"That gives me a lot to be going on with. I doubt there's anything to Bellatrix, honestly" I lied, "but I'll check it out as best I can, and where all the others ended up as well. I know none of them are due to be kissed or anything, because they're still being interrogated. The top of the heap I'm the bottom of have a part in that, and I'll see what I can learn there. In the mean time, Harry, I hate to say it, but you've just got to keep on keeping your nose clean. Stay at home, read a good book, eat lots of take away."
"Hermione's mate-sitting him while I'm at the Quidditch trials," Ron said with a grin of relief as we all began to collect our cups and trash and rise from the table. "And those are her three favorite things."
A flash of annoyance and something else I couldn't quite place crossed her features and was quickly gone.
Harry seemed resigned to his fate, although I sensed the more he recovered the more irksome he'd find it. "The prisoner of Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes," he said with a shrug.
Is that where they lived? Over the Weasley twin's place? Whose brilliant idea was that? Wasn't that suspiciously like having a fireworks shop over a match factory? Or vice versa. Merlin. Maybe it was time for a home visit.
But I had begun to wonder if with Ron away at Quidditch tryouts and Hermione safe where he could see her there would be any untoward magical incidences involving Harry Potter. For the next four days, at least.
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A/N: Thank you, Lady Starlight, for your punctuation correction. And to all of you who have pointed out the error of my ways and days, I have corrected all the dates I could find. I was an English Major, not a math genius. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it.