May 9th, 1998
Rain fell on SW1. Lamplight shone weakly across the black gates of a dead end street. No red buses drove past, no umbrellas craned for a view. Georgian buildings whispered among themselves memories of Empire.
In a large room, deep under Whitehall, a woman dressed all in black was speaking with frighteningly precise diction to a large man in purple robes.
" — eighth meeting in seven days, Kingsley. I understand you are busy; we are all busy. We are all dealing with more than we can handle." She did not turn to the red-haired man seated to her right. "How many funerals today, Arthur."
"Six."
"How many still left?"
Arthur Weasley shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Through the window, he could see the BBC tower in the distance and just a hint of the Thames off to the left. The sun was glinting on the water, even though it must have been well past midnight. The corners of his mouth edged down; he didn't like the Magical Maintenance Department taking liberties. Didn't they have anything better to do?
"Eight. They should be done — we should be finished by Monday."
Kingsley Shacklebolt breathed out heavily through his nose.
"I understand the delicacy of the situation, Arthur, but you've shut down the Ministry — don't interrupt, John; you know I'm right — during perhaps the most important week of its existence. We need to get things back to normal. We need to restore some semblance of order. Wasn't there a more, I don't want to say expeditious — ".
"Are you suggesting, Minister, a mass grave for the heroes of the Battle of Hogwarts?" Minerva McGonagall's voice was barely a whisper, yet it filled the room. "For Arthur's son? For Lavender Brown?"
"Of course not. I'm sorry, Arthur. Look, I've been in this office," here he nodded towards the open door that led from the conference room; Arthur could barely see a desk beneath the piles of papers, "for only a few days.
"But the Ministry is, well, we don't exactly have the trust of the people right now, do we. Rufus is dead. Pius is dead. All people see are the funerals, our failures. It's starting to look like chaos out there. Voldemort's dead, for real this time, finally, but I feel like we won the war only to be in danger of losing the peace."
"That is precisely why you need to let us get back to work! Let Arthur get through these next few days and back to keeping wizards from doing Merlin knows what with Muggle technology. Horace and I need to be at Hogwarts; if we cannot keep the peace between the houses, the school will not survive. And I will not allow that to happen. Kingsley, you are the Minister of Magic. Advice is one thing, but you need to start acting on your own."
There was a silence. Arthur looked slowly around the long, mahogany table. It was far too large for this meeting; only five of the two dozen or so heavy chairs were taken. The empty seats and the size of the room itself seemed to mock them, as though they were children playing at the grownups' table. But the adults were all dead. He could still see them, sitting in those empty seats, watching them with disapproval. Albus. Moody. Sirius. Severus. Remus. Men of action.
Kingsley adjusted his pillbox hat and looked embarrassed, but kept going.
"How are the Slytherins?"
"Most of them have returned to school." Horace Slughorn looked pleased at this. "But they aren't the problem. It's the other houses." He coughed nervously.
"Last week, students were fighting to kill each other. Now, we've trying to get them to go back to classes together. We've had to arrange for a rotation in the dining room. As for fights in the hallways — " Horace trailed off.
"And the surviving Death Eaters?"
"We have a problem there, sir, and no mistake." The well-built man to Kingsley's right spoke slowly. "You may have acted too hastily in dismissing the dementors from Azkaban."
"Two successful escapes, John. They couldn't be trusted. Besides, Mr. Potter insisted and, given the circumstances, I felt he deserved a request."
"I understand the emotion, sir, but did he think it through? I mean, the Death Eaters have to be kept somewhere. Exile is too dangerous. And we aren't about to execute them, are we." Auror John Dawlish let his tone convey his opinion of that decision.
Horace leaned forward as far as he could manage, gripping the arms of the leather-upholstered chair. "Yaxley. Rookwood. Rowle. Dolohov. Travers. Where exactly are they?"
Kingsley stepped over the Auror's reply.
"They're contained. We have them at one of the old manors. Wands have been destroyed; Ollivander saw to that personally. Anti-spell protections are in place. What we have left of the Aurors, almost, are on guard. The good news is, who's going to break them out."
"The Malfoys. The Carrows." Minerva answered the rhetorical question.
John shook his head slowly. "It's not them I worry about. The Malfoys surrendered their wands and have locked themselves into their home. Licking their wounds, sir, if I may presume to judge. And the Carrows, well, they're a nasty bit and no mistake, but harmless — unless you're in their power, that is. We haven't even bothered to hold them. Took their wands and placed them under house arrest. They aren't the kind to start trouble."
The Auror emphasized the "start" with a note of contempt. Kingsley turned to him.
"What about Macnair?"
"We're moving him there tonight." John caught the frown on Arthur's face and continued, although he had intended to stop there.
"It takes time, sir. After what happened to Aberforth, we don't want any mistakes. No. We move them one at a time. We move them at night and by different routes. Three Aurors present."
"Disbanding the dementors so quickly may have been a mistake," admitted Minerva. "I don't know what other choice we had."
"But, Minister, you still need to decide what to do with these men," protested Horace. "Individually, they're dangerous. Together, even without wands and under guard, how long before they try something. If the general public knew the situation..."
"The only people who know are either in this room," interrupted Kingsley, "or the few Aurors I have left. Let's keep it that way." His eyes closed for a moment. "If there's nothing else, as Minerva suggested, you may return to your duties."
Arthur coughed hesitantly.
"Sir, a reminder about my proposal for Ministry recruitment. We are too few." A tense silence descended on the room again, and Arthur lowered his voice, forcing the other wizards to lean in to catch his words. "So many of the staff have died, we're hollowed out just as our power and authority are coming under question."
Kingsley looked vexed. "You know I will have to go to the Wizengamot, given the extent of your request, Weasley." A ripple of exhaustion passing over his face. "But yes, for now tell the departments that they should try to fill the roles of those we lost. I leave it to you."
The Minister stood up. Arthur watched silently as McGonagall, Slughorn, and Dawlish left the room, ducking through the recently installed Thief's Downfall. Ms. Granger's idea, but then, she hadn't had to pay for it. He looked over to see Shacklebolt watching him apprehensively.
"What happened to Aberforth?"
Arthur could see the Minister avoid flinching, but there was fear in his voice. "Your ears only, Arthur. He was transporting Rookwood. Rookwood managed to escape. Aberforth is dead." He didn't give Arthur a chance to interrupt. "I know what Rookwood did to your family, Arthur. We'll get him back. But right now, what's important is that no one knows. We need to keep it that way. The Ministry looks weak enough as it is. If people knew — you must promise me to tell no one." The empty room seemed to absorb his voice.
Arthur nodded his head in the silence and walked out. He felt wet for a moment, then cold, then very still. The men of action had died solving the old problems, he thought. Where would the new problems find their heroes?
"No, not that way. Did you do the first pass to look for the repetitions and patterns we discussed? OK, great. Now, have you triaged — have you compared just the last two spells performed by each wand?"
Arun could hear Zhu shake her head through the office wall, the trainee's hair was so long. She'd only been on the job for a couple weeks. It made him feel like a seasoned pro with his three months of experience, hearing Sally-Anne get frustrated with someone else for a change. He grinned and leaned over in his chair to peek around the corner of the door.
The office he saw would have been small for one person; there was barely room for both the two tiny desks that had been pushed together and the people sitting at them. Sam, sitting at the far desk, glanced up as Arun peered in. He looked like a man grown used to suffering, older by far than the others. Facing Sam, with her back to Arun, sat Zhu, staring down at the monthly records from Wand Screening. Standing over her, hovering in the exact manner Arun still had nightmares about, was Sally-Anne.
It wasn't that Sally-Anne looked imposing, Arun thought. Mafalda Hopkirk's junior officer was barely older than he was and only a year older than Zhu. And, Arun conceded to himself, if someone had described Sally-Anne to him, he would have laughed at the idea of her being intimidating. His boss wasn't particularly tall and she wasn't particularly slender. Her clothes were rumpled and out of date. She wore glasses, not prescription-less ones as an affectation like some people did who tried to be cool by aping Potter, but librarian frames that held lenses thick enough to distort her face.
And none of it mattered, thought Arun. Sally-Anne didn't try to present well. She didn't try to impress people. And when she was around Mafalda, she sometimes seemed to fade into the background. But when it came to the job, when it came to making sure her trainees didn't mess up, she was fire and brimstone. That drive was puzzling, because it meant she was trying to be something. Bur what?
His nascent idea popped like a soap bubble as Sally-Anne noticed where Sam was looking. She turned quickly.
"Aren't you supposed to be finishing a draft of that report?"
Arun groaned and turned back to his desk — that was a laugh; he's seen plates at the British Museum with more surface area — which, along with Zhu's, hunched in the corridor against the office's outer wall, trying not to get noticed. Or run into by any of the other Ministry workers on Level Two.
Sally-Anne stepped into the corridor and sat down at Zhu's desk. "Did Philip give you any grief this morning along with the screening results?" She looked intently over at Arun.
"Other than about having to work on a Saturday? Not really. He just laughed and asked if we were still wasting our time now that the Death Eaters were all captured."
"But Alice's running the tests again? They've picked back up after the Battle of Hogwarts?"
"Hooray for institutional imperative, I guess," Arun replied, nodding. "Wizards are used to being scheduled to come in and get their wands checked, Alice's used to screening them with Prior Incantato, and Philip's used to updating the official list of the spells each wand has performed in the last month."
"And you're used to getting them from him and compiling." There was a wry grin on Sally-Anne's face, so Arun mirrored it.
"You bet, boss. Only not this month, I guess. How's Zhu picking it up?"
"What was your reaction when you graduated Hogwarts and they informed you that you would need to submit your wand every month so that every spell it had cast could be recorded and analyzed by the Ministry?"
Typical Sally-Anne, that, thought Arun. Answer a question with a question. And not an easy question. He could respond with some politic answer informed by hindsight, but instead he took a moment to remember the person he had been when he'd learned of Wand Screening. It frightened him sometimes how quickly something went from being shocking to being normal. Like Voldemort being dead. A week ago, he couldn't have imagined ever getting used to that. But already the fact had faded to something irrelevant, dull.
"I hated it." Arun decided to be honest. It was probably a common enough response. "But it also explained a lot."
"Like what?" Arun noticed that Zhu had turned slightly towards them, listening in even while she continued to compare spells cast by different wands.
"Well, why wizards don't abuse their power more often, for one."
Sally-Anne nodded. "That's good. If the Ministry was only reactive, if we relied on Ms. Hopkirk, Sam, and myself in the Improper Use of Magic Office, and Mr. Perkins and Mr. Weasley in the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts Office, to stop every wizard only after she went rogue, it would be a disaster."
"No wonder we don't have enough manpower," Zhu chimed in. Sally-Anne gave her a look and Zhu spun her back to them again.
"The slacker at my desk isn't wrong. Knowing the spells every wizard is casting is not only efficient in identifying possible trouble, but also acts as a deterrent. Otherwise, Sam couldn't devote his enormously valuable time to getting kids into trouble."
Arun couldn't tell if she was trying to be funny or cutting, but Sally-Anne might have been speaking about Quidditch for all the reaction she got out of Sam. None.
"But there's a better answer." Sally-Anne's magnified eyes were back on Arun. He froze.
"Ms. Perks, I think, uh, I think I have something." Sally-Anne went back into her office and looked at the two columns that Zhu was pointing at.
"Red flag," remarked Sally-Anne. "And last month with the war there were no screenings. What about February? Yaxley was still doing them, huh. No spells cast by either wand?" Sally-Anne was silent for a moment and Arun and Zhu looked at each other apprehensively.
"The particulars. Thank you. Mr. Patel, you're with me. Good work, Ms. Lang."
Once outside the Ministry, Arun's heart rate accelerated. This was only his second time in the field, other than for training. A promising sign.
Sally-Anne waited until a bus went past, watched a group of tourists outside Downing Street, and then spoke without turning to look at him.
"Do you see Philip's mistake? No? There's no reason you would. But do you remember your visit to Ollivander's? You would have been, what, ten? Eleven? Did he say anything, well, peculiar?"
Arun did remember. He'd been terrified, a small boy whose parents were ashamed of their heavy accents, mesmerized by an old man who reeked of fanaticism. He swallowed.
"He said he remembered every wand he's ever sold."
"Correct." Sally-Anne sounded amused, which Arun knew by now meant he'd done well. "But don't be too impressed with my prodigious feats of deduction. Or worse yet, illegal Legilimency; Ollivander is notorious for that hoary line. But it means every wand is unique. Length, wood, core: material and origin. So if two wands are checked and reveal the exact same sequence of spells, it means — ".
"They're the same wand!" Arun cut her off with the realization.
"Think before you answer." Sally-Anne started walking towards Trafalgar Square. "There are three possible explanations. First, coincidence. But these two wands each performed the same 27 spells in April and, even assigning approximate probabilistic weights to every possible spell, I believe we can safely dismiss coincidence." She spoke and walked quickly and Arun was focusing on keeping up, in both ways, too much to be sure he'd heard humor in her last line.
"Second, as you said, someone is concealing their activities by substituting another's wand for screening. And this is something Philip should have recognized, if he were noting wand descriptions properly. Lax."
She ran a hand affectionately over one of the bronze lions guarding Nelson's Column, then pulled out the piece of paper Zhu had handed her.
"But there is a third option." She seized Arun's arm.
"A trap." They vanished.
Arun took a step to balance himself and turned to look at Sally-Anne. They were just outside the tube at Golders Green. He understood why it was safer to Disapparate in crowds; no one believed what they saw, especially when no one else reacted. But if a person saw someone who was standing alone vanish, well, that tended to cause the kind of trouble that required Obliviators.
"'A trap?' Someone's feeling melodramatic today."
But Sally-Anne was already walking towards a coffee shop at the intersection. Arun scrambled after her.
"What else does Wand Screening explain?"
"What?"
"You said Wand Screening keeps the actions of wizards in line. What else does it do?"
Arun had anticipated this question, so he was able to answer it immediately; he was nervous any hesitation would make her think he was deciding whether or not to give what he knew was the right answer. He was afraid of her thinking him stupid, but if she started to think he was trying to manipulate her, trying to only give answers that made her think favorably of him, he was finished.
"It prevents wizards from practicing."
"What kind of practice?"
"The kind necessary to become powerful. If some wizard came in and his wand showed three thousand castings of Stupefy, there would be serious questions asked. And not in Parliament."
"So it's good we have Wand Screening." She turned into Helenslea Avenue and started examining the houses for numbers.
"Absolutely. If wizards could practice any spells in secret until they were masters, and then use them, the power they'd have without Ministry oversight, the danger for abuse by bad apples, or even conspiracy! But the Ministry, working with Ollivander, can use this tool to prevent that."
"So the Ministry has to have the power to keep wizards from gaining power. And that's a good thing."
"Yes. I mean, that kind of government power is necessary to keep everyone safe, even Muggles like my parents."
"This is the first address. Mark Regan." She reached up to clean her glasses, turning to look at Arun for the first time since they'd apparated.
"And Arun, either you can conceive of a Minister being elected by the Wizengamot, or even a member of our office being appointed, whom you wouldn't trust with that power, or you have a very poor imagination."
She looked up at the house appraisingly. "Half four. He should still be at work. I'll knock, we'll do a little B&E, surprise him when he comes home, lean a little, home by six, Bob's your uncle. Place your bets, but address like this my money's on him having gone native and being the patsy for the other wand. Paul Church." She went up to the front door and knocked authoritatively.
"Unless it is a trap, of course."
Arun, after waiting for a minute, stepped forward, wand ready for the Alohomora. He nearly dropped it when a soft bell rang, as though they were at a shop, and the door opened to reveal a young woman, quite pretty, and neatly dressed in slim jeans and a white blouse. She looked at Sally-Anne for a moment and then at Arun, but the wand was out of sight by then.
"Let me guess. Canvassing. We're strictly Labour. Thank you. Good day."
Sally-Anne recovered before the door closed. "We're here about Mr. Regan."
Arun was startled to see how quickly the woman's expression went from slightly impolite dismissal to extreme concern.
"Is Mark all right? Has there been an accident?"
"Ah, so you are the girlfriend. Ms… Ms…" Sally-Anne gestured to Arun for the name. He didn't know it. Of course he didn't know it. She had to know he didn't know it, right?
"Sue. Susan. Susan Williams."
"Yes. That's right. Ms. Williams. We'll tell you what we can about what's happened to Mr. Regan — Mark." Here Sally-Anne smiled at the stranger and Arun made a note of the cold reading. Another wizard would probably have already Confunded the woman, he thought.
"But first we need to ask you a few questions."
"Oh God. Oh God. Of course." Susan stood there, nonplussed.
How long would it take for her to move, wondered Sally-Anne, if I didn't prompt her? She looked at the woman, past her into the house, and then back at the woman.
"Forgive me, please come in. Watch the step. Which branch did you say you were with?" She showed them into a tastefully finished living room. Two couches, off white. A black coffee table between them. Over the mantle was a large mirror, and in the mantle's left corner a slender glass vase with a white orchid. There were no pictures on the eau de nil walls.
"We haven't. Yet." Sally-Anne sat down heavily on one of the couches and loosened her tie slightly in order to undo the top button of her shirt. "Could I trouble you for a glass of water?"
"Oh, of course." Ms. Williams had just begun to sit down, but she awkwardly got to her feet again.
"That's all right. My colleague can get it." Arun took the hint and smiled reassuringly before stepping into the kitchen he could see down the hall. "Now, how long have you know Mr. Regan?"
Ms. Williams watched Arun until he was out of sight and frowned.
"Ms. Williams." The young woman blinked and looked back at Sally-Anne, who repeated the question.
"Oh, it feels like forever. He's a wonderful man. And you still haven't told me what this is about."
"How did you meet Mr. Regan?" asked Sally-Anne. Arun smiled; he could still hear them, if a bit muffled. He fetched down a glass and began to fill it slowly from the tap.
"He rescued me." Ms. Williams laughed at the memory. "It's a wonderful story. Mark is incredible. I'm lucky to have him. Now, if you would just — "
"What the hell."
Arun froze. That had been a man's voice. Loud. Angry. He hadn't come past Arun and the front door hadn't been opened. Mark Regan was a wizard, but how had he known to Apparate home at this moment? Had the woman somehow signaled him? Arun quietly turned off the tap, put the glass down in the sink, and, feeling a sense of deja-vu, peaked around the corner to look at Sally-Anne. She was still sitting on the couch, looking up at someone Arun couldn't see.
"Mark, this woman was just asking about you. I told her what a wonderful boyfriend you are, but — "
The male voice cut her off.
"Be quiet."
The woman immediately shut her mouth.
"What are you doing in my house." It didn't sound like a question, but Sally-Anne answered calmly.
"Paul Church."
Arun started to inch his way back towards the living room. He knew Sally-Anne could see him out of the corner of her eye, but she kept looking steadily forward. Arun could guess where Susan and Mark were sitting and standing, respectively. He stopped just out of sight.
"He did too many spells, didn't he. That bloody fool, I warned him." The hardwood floor creaked as Mark took a step towards Sally-Anne. "Look. I don't want trouble. It's better this way, trust me. She's happier. Loves it. Loves me. Just look at her." Sally-Anne did, slowly and deliberately. There was a tiny whisper of sound.
"Not an Auror, are you." Arun heard both triumph and menace in the voice. "Just some silly trainee foolish enough to let me get the drop on her." Arun drew his wand and pointed it above the head of his boss and to the left. He wondered if Mark could hear his heart beating. He stopped breathing.
"I bet your department head doesn't even know you're here. Do they?"
Sally-Anne slowly pushed her glasses back up her nose.
"Now."
"Expulso!" shouted Arun. The glass vase exploded and the green light that shot across the room hit the wall where it had stood, just above and to Sally Anne's right.
"Sectumsempra."
Sally-Anne, wand drawn, was still seated on the couch as Arun rushed into the room. He followed her eyes. Laying on the hardwood floor was a well-dressed man in a gray business suit. A short distance away, holding a wand, was an arm in a gray sleeve. The gray suit was slowly turning black where the arm should have been.
Susan Williams opened her mouth and made what sounded like a strangled cough. Her hands gripped the couch; her knuckles were as white as its cushions. Her eyes were so wide as they stared as Mark that Arun noticed their curvature.
"Where did he come from?" Mark looked over at Arun, and then back to Sally-Anne, utterly confused. He tried to sit up, but lost his balance as he reached for his wand.
"Azkaban isn't even open any more. Paul gets a copy of the Daily Prophet. Likes to stay informed. Bugger at proper wand care, though." He laughed weakly.
Sally-Anne looked at Arun. "Healer. St Mungo's. Now."
Arun closed his eyes. Destination. Determination. Deliber — .
The sun still colored the bricks on the higher floors of the houses on Daleham Gardens as Sally-Anne neared home. She checked the time, her key pausing halfway to the front door. Just gone six. Late, but not seriously. Not that it mattered, but still. She took the stairs deliberately and let herself into the small flat on the second floor.
Everything was just as she'd left it that morning. Her bicycle still stood against the wall next to the door. In the kitchen, the morning's dishes were still slumped in the sink. And, at the small yellow kitchen table, her father was still trying to finish The Times crossword. The rest of the paper sat on the other chair. She picked it up and sat down.
"Hi dad."
Surprised, he looked up.
"Hello, love. Didn't hear you come in." He was tall and slender, neatly dressed, with thinning white hair he kept pushing down behind his left ear. He watched her get up and check the cupboards and the refrigerator. He noticed the clock on the wall above the sink. "Look at the time. You'd better see your mother; you know how she hates waiting."
"Have you eaten anything today?" Sally-Anne asked. She pulled out a bowl and a box of cereal.
"It's just, I was struggling a bit with this one, you see." Sheepishly, he gestured at the paper.
"I know, I know." She placed a full bowl and spoon on the table. "Here, eat this for now. I'll go to the market and make us something decent. Then maybe we can take a walk."
"You know how your mother feels about that." He was already shaking his head. "It's so dark out, not safe." He stared off, his eyes unfocused, as though remembering something. "She loves me very much, that's why she gets upset when I do something dangerous."
"Look, I'll be right back. For now, eat. You need to eat, dad."
"You're a good daughter. I tell her that, you are, I do." Sally-Anne stood there a moment longer until he'd started to slowly munch the cereal and then took a deep breath before walking into the smaller of the two bedrooms at the back of the flat.
Her mother was laying across the twin bed, but she got up as Sally-Anne came in. "Well, look who decided to finally show. Hope I wasn't keeping you from anything important at your precious job."
"It's been a long day, mom. Can we not do this again?"
"So rude. And after I raised you to be a proper young lady, too. I never would have believed my own child could treat me like this." She gestured dramatically to the bed. "I've been laying here, waiting for you, but you're too busy at the Ministry to be home on time. It's not right. You wouldn't even have that job if it wasn't for me."
"It's not my fault!" Despite her best efforts, Sally-Anne found herself engaging. "Do you even care about what I did today? I saved someone, mom!"
"How dare you raise your voice to me." Her mom crossed her arms and glared. "I deserve to be treated with a little respect in my own home."
"This is my room!" Sally-Anne stepped past her into the closet, looking for a heavier sweater. You're always in here. You're always in my stuff."
"Not that sweater. It makes you look fat." She looked Sally-Anne over critically. "All that sitting at a desk. I was so slender at your age." She shook her head in disappointment.
"Thanks, mom." Sally-Anne rolled her eyes.
"Would it kill you to make an effort? I swear, sometimes I think you deliberately oppose me." Her mother plucked at the sweater with an expression of distaste and the persecution complex of a Cassandra.
"By the way, dad hasn't eaten again all day. Or didn't you notice?"
"You don't know what you're talking about." Her mom sat down on the bed suddenly, her voice tightening. "I sacrificed so much for you. You'll never understand. I don't deserve this."
Sally-Anne felt the familiar pressure building behind her eyes, but she refused to cry. Refused! She'd wept only once, as a child, and been taught never to try again.
"I need to go, mom. Groceries for dad." She grabbed a jacket, turning for the door.
"You were always hard to love." It was barely a whisper. Sally-Anne froze for a moment, then walked out, slamming the door behind her.
It was almost midnight before Percy could get to New Bond Street. He walked slowly, looking into each shop window, but he couldn't stop himself from fidgeting, pulling at his cuffs, although no amount of tugging could make them cover his thin wrists. Why couldn't they make shirts in his size?
"When you're quite through fiddling." Percy looked up to see the reflection of his father next to his in the glass and breathed out in relief.
"How did the Minister respond?" They started to walk more briskly towards Piccadilly.
"He says he'll bring it up to the Wizengamot. Or what's left of them." Mr. Weasley's face twisted for a moment, looking contemptuously into the distance. "Old men don't take well to change. Even after everything that's happened, they can't act. Paralyzed by fear."
"But what if they don't agree?" Percy looked over at his father cautiously. "What do we do?"
Mr. Weasley sighed. "What we have to." He grinned at Percy wistfully, putting his hands on his son's shoulders and looking him in the eyes. "I didn't bury your brother and watch your mother almost die just so these — ." Percy winced involuntarily as his father's fingers spasmed.
"Pureblood members have been electing their own to join them in the Wizengamot for a thousand years. Even with half of the Wizengamot dead at Voldemort's hand, I doubt they can adjust. Without change, nations become brittle. We need new blood at the table: half-bloods, Muggle-borns. This is the moment of danger, Percy. The chaos that follows a devastating storm. Wizardkind itself is in peril. We must unite!" He started walking again, talking almost to himself. "We must. Or we will be weak; we will be destroyed."
Percy pulled nervously at his cuff again before finding his voice. "I agree. We are stronger together. But you said yourself Kingsley is too timid. So how?"
They had just reached the corner when a ghostly, illuminated lynx jumped out of the wall in front of them. Mr. Weasley cast Notice-Me-Not in a blur of motion before Percy even recognized Kingsley's Patronus. The lynx was clearly agitated, pacing up and down before them, heedless of the danger of being seen.
"Arthur! There's been another attack. On the Aurors transporting Macnair."
Mr. Weasley summoned his own luminous Patronus and spoke to it, even as the lynx vanished.
"I'm with my son, Percy." Mr. Weasley's voice was calm, but Percy noticed he didn't sheathe his wand. "Should this conversation wait until I can get to the Ministry?" The weasel looked around for a moment, then seemed to dive into the pavement. After a moment the lynx reappeared.
"There's no point in trying to cover this one up, Arthur." Percy thought the wildcat looked subdued now. "First Rookwood escapes, now Macnair. Proudfoot's dead, and his trainee. Dawlish is alive but unconscious. They're taking him to St. Mungo's. But Arthur, something else." Kingsley's voice dropped, becoming urgent, almost pleading. "It's why I contacted you first. Whoever did this, they used Muggle technology. I'm told the Aurors were killed with bullets. Arthur, we need you. We need your expertise." The lynx vanished.
Mr. Weasley didn't hesitate.
"Percy, I need you to go to St. Mungo's. John Dawlish must be watched. On Kingsley's authority, do not let him speak with anyone. Anyone. Stay there until I contact you." With a pop, he Apparated away.
Percy stood there for a moment, his mind roaring incoherently, before his father's order registered. He began to run towards the Burlington Arcade.
