No, I do not own the Harry Potter franchise, though I do own copies of all the books and films. The people who do own the Harry Potter franchise are JK Rowling, Bloomsbury, Warner Bros. and a few other publishers. Thank you to JKR for letting us play about in the sandbox of the Wizarding World.
Harry Potter and the Court of Magical Brethren.
Chapter 2: The Truth Revealed
"Sit down, please." spoke Albus Dumbledore to the room full of people.
The separate conversations happening between the various members of the Order of the Phoenix ended as everyone moved to sit down at the long table.
Once they were all seated, Dumbledore spoke again.
"Severus informs me that he has some disturbing news to share with us tonight. Severus, if you would?"
Severus Snape stood and began.
"The Dark Lord has announced his desire to launch an attack on Azkaban in order to free all of his followers that are imprisoned there, and attempt to recruit the other prisoners to his cause. The attack is planned to take place two nights from now."
"Will he go after Harry?" asked Dumbledore.
"He is the main target." replied Snape.
That got the reaction that Dumbledore had expected.
The arrest and imprisonment of Harry Potter eight months ago for the murder of Luna Lovegood was still a very sore point, and one that caused divisions across the whole wizarding community. For the most part the populace believed Harry to be guilty; however there were small pockets of supporters for him.
Nymphadora Tonks pointed out that no one at the trial bothered to question Harry with veritaserum. When she was reminded that it was against the law to dose people under the age of seventeen with veritaserum, Tonks replied that people under the age of seventeen were not supposed to be put on trial before the entire Wizengamot, and they certainly were not supposed to be imprisoned in Azkaban.
Many people chose to ignore her when she pointed that out.
Alastor Moody, it seemed, was ultimately undecided when it came to Harry's guilt, but he did let it be known that it was his opinion that "If he's gone dark, he's been driven to it."
Dumbledore didn't like to think much on that point, because if it was true, then he himself was one of the biggest driving forces, what with placing him in the care for his abusive relatives and constantly failing to do what is right by him.
The most noticeable division had been amongst the students at Hogwarts, who had now divided themselves into three groups over the issue.
The first group was the obvious one, and the largest, those who believed that Harry had turned dark. Spearheaded by Ron Weasley, his sister Ginny and Neville Longbottom, this group comprised of most of the students from three of the four Hogwarts school houses.
The second group consisted entirely of Slytherin students and their sole purpose was to keep stirring the cauldron, as it were. Students like Draco Malfoy simply relished the strife that Harry's arrest was causing amongst the other students. They also took delight in the fact that it was their Head of House, Professor Snape, who had discovered Harry at the scene of the crime.
The third group called themselves the "Protection Assemblage" (or "P.A." for short, leading Dumbledore to guess that privately it stood for "Potter's Army", an obvious renaming of the former group "Dumbledore's Army") and they rallied around one student; Hermione Granger, whom many believed to be the one person who really knew Harry Potter, the person, rather than the "Boy-Who-Lived" persona that had been generated by the media and the Ministry.
This was the only group whose members were all known to Dumbledore by name, the most notable being the ones who had spoken up in Harry's defence during his trial, but there were a good thirty others.
It is needless to say that this group was completely ostracised by the rest of the school, so much so that they had now all removed themselves from their individual houses and now spent their free time in the Room of Requirement, within which Dumbledore presumed they had their own setup of common room and dormitories. No amount of requests or threats from the teachers could convince them to give up this arrangement. They emerged to attend classes, and even then they travelled in groups of no less than five. The rest of the time they were in the Room of Requirement. They even refused to come down to eat in the Great Hall with the rest of the student body, refused to study in the school library, and not one of them had attended a single Quidditch match or Hogsmeade trip.
This behaviour had begun three days after Harry's trial. Hermione had been in a thoroughly miserable mood as she sat in the Great Hall using her fork to push her dinner around her plate without really eating anything when Ginny Weasley had snapped at her, telling her, quite loudly, to "quit acting like Potter's widow."
Hermione had taken one look at Ginny before telling her to "Go off" (or words to that effect that had caused Professor McGonagall to take ten points from Gryffindor.)
Of course at that point the famous Weasley temper had bubbled to the surface as Ginny saw red. Her brother quickly added his two knuts' worth, and Neville waded in after him. Hermione was not alone, however, and her two dorm mates, Lavender and Parvati were surprisingly quick to back her up, even though the pair had never exactly seen eye to eye with her on many issues before. This of course, caused things to escalate, given how Ron was still of the impression that Lavender was his girlfriend and tried to order her to be on his side. Lavender then made their break-up indisputable in a very painful way, one which had both McGonagall and Snape issuing her with detentions, not that they were heard as Ginny had returned fire with a bat bogey hex. Things had only escalated from that point as Parvati trained her wand on Ginny as Hermione performed the counter-spell on Lavender. Neville aimed a hex at Parvati, but Seamus and Dean were ready for it. More Gryffindor students piled in and were quickly joined by various Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws. Many Slytherins added themselves into the fray simply to stir up more trouble.
In the end, Ron, Neville, Ginny, Lavender, Seamus, Hannah Abbott, Terry Boot, Ernie Macmillan, Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson and about thirty others had to spend the night in the Hospital Wing. All four houses were in negative numbers in terms of House Points and just about every student was in detention for the next month.
By the time those detentions were done, Hermione, Lavender, Parvati, Seamus, Dean, Katie Bell, and Colin and Dennis Creevey, as well as a few of their siblings had renounced their membership to Gryffindor House, citing there being too much short-sightedness, big headedness and close-mindedness for them to remain in the so-called "House of the Brave."
Padma Patil also renounced Ravenclaw, stating that there was too much ignorance and far too much faith in authority in the so-called "House of the Wise."
And Susan Bones, Hannah Abbott and Justin Finch-Fletchley renounced Hufflepuff, citing that the so-called "House of the Loyal" were too easily misled by others, and that there was a reason that Hufflepuffs were widely considered to be "A load of old duffers" by most of the rest of the school.
None of this had gone down well at all, though the Slytherins had once again taken much delight in the situation.
Or at least they had until Susan had asked Hermione in a loud voice why Slytherin was supposed to be the house of the cunning when it seemed to be home to the arrogant and the conceited. Draco Malfoy's response to this was to fire a curse at her, though Susan easily blocked it with a shield charm and used his behaviour to prove her point; no cunning, just "How dare you insult me? Take that."
Draco lost twenty points from Slytherin and earned another two days detention. Dumbledore was of the belief that had the spell hit Susan then Draco would have spent a month in the Hospital Wing only if he was lucky.
The Professors in charge of Gryffindor, Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw had, of course, tried to dissuade the group from their chosen course of action, but they refused to change their minds.
When asked why they were so determined to do this, it was Padma who answered "We turned to Harry for help last year and he gave it. War is coming and so far Harry is the only person who has shown us how to survive it."
Susan then added "It's because of Harry that I knew how to perform a shield charm, not a teacher of Hogwarts. Maybe you ought to think on that, rather than what House we do or do not want to be in."
Within a week the size of that group has increased to include Vicky Frobisher, Demelza Robbins, Ritchie Coote, Jimmy Peakes, Natalie Macdonald, and Emma Dobbs of Gryffindor, Lisa Turpin, Su Li, Kevin Entwhistle, Stewart Ackerly and Orla Quirke of Ravenclaw, Wayne Hopkins, Lilith Moon, Sally-Anne Perks, Eleanor Branstone, Laura Madley, Rose Zeller, Leanne Simmonds, Owen Cauldwell, Herbert Fleet and Malcolm Preece of Hufflepuff, as well as a handful of others, mostly their siblings.
It was highly noteworthy that, with the exceptions of Leanne, Vicky, Natalie, Jimmy, and Lisa, most of that group were Muggleborn, as were Hermione, Justin, Colin and Dennis.
Just a few days ago, McGonagall had managed to get a hold of Hermione and ask her exactly why she thought Harry was innocent. Hermione's reply had comprised of two simple points; one: it was Snape who found Harry at the scene of the crime. Harry supposedly then managed to give Snape the slip, only to be caught ten minutes later, sitting in the library trying to finish his Transfiguration homework. To Hermione something there did not add up. Two: why Luna?
Why Luna indeed.
As far as Dumbledore was concerned, that was the only thing that did not make sense. If Harry had joined Voldemort, surely the Dark Lord would have had Harry assassinate one of the teachers at the school, or a member of the Order, or perhaps kill a few Muggleborns. On the other hand, had Harry been driven to darkness, surely then he would have lashed out against one of those who pushed him towards it, like Draco Malfoy, or someone from the Ministry.
That the victim was Luna made no sense, but then Dumbledore refused to try and understand how Harry's mind must have worked that evening.
He looked at Snape, who had just finished giving his report.
"We must alert the Aurors and join them at Azkaban." said Dumbledore "Harry Potter must be prevented from falling into Voldemort's hands at all costs."
Drip. Drip. Drip.
In his sleep, Harry Potter squirmed and tried to move away from the constant drops of liquid that leaked into his cell through a crack in the ceiling and onto his face.
Slowly Harry's eyes opened and he looked around blearily. One of the wardens had decided it would be funny to rob him of his glasses, and without them everything was a blur to Harry. His eyesight was even worse now that his magic was bound. He brought his hand up to his face and wiped some of the liquid off of his cheek. He held his fingers close to his eyes in order to examine the substance.
Whatever it was, it was dark green.
Harry wiped his hand on his ragged clothes and then looked around the cell once more. There was something on the floor by the door. He could not make out what it was, so he cautiously made his way over to get a better look.
It was his dinner; two thin slices of bread and half a glass of some green liquid, most likely today's nourishment potion that the guards begrudgingly gave the prisoners that they didn't die of starvation.
It also likely explained the strange liquid that had been dripping onto Harry's face this morning. It seemed whoever was in the cell above had not wanted his potion.
All the more for Harry then.
Harry swallowed his potion in three large gulps and gobbled up the two slices of bread greedily.
Both tasted horrible, but at least they made him feel a little better.
Meal time over, Harry returned to the stone slab that served as his bed. The dripping had stopped now, but a small puddle of green liquid had now pooled in the spot where Harry usually laid his head.
Harry laid himself face-down onto his bed and lowered his face to the puddle. He stuck out his tongue and dipped the tip of it into the liquid. It tasted like the nourishment potion, so Harry hurriedly lapped up every drop. In Azkaban, even the slightest chance of extra nourishment could not be wasted.
Now he felt stronger than he had in a long time.
Harry sat up and pressed his back against the cold stone wall and thought, though not of anything in particular. He used to think all the time about what had happened to him; why he was in Azkaban now, and how so many believed him guilty. He had given up that practice a long time ago, as thinking of the trial caused him to think about Hermione, Susan and all the others who believed in him, and thinking of them made him happy, and that attracted the Dementors.
Speaking of Dementors, Harry suddenly realised that he could not sense them.
He pushed himself from his seated position against the wall and made his way over to the door. He stood there and tried to get a grip of his surroundings.
With his magic bound all his senses were lessened, but in Azkaban one quickly learned to sense the presence of the Dementors.
There was nothing.
No chill in the air that caused your breath to become visible, no aura that seemed to freeze you to your bones, no wailing, screaming or pathetic moaning from the other prisoners that were being fed upon, and no rattling breath.
It seemed as though the Dementors had left this wing of Azkaban unguarded.
Most prisoners of Azkaban would have rejoiced with that news, but Harry had a question that immediately sprang to mind: Why?
Had Harry's hearing been any better, he would have detected the cacophony of sound coming from the west side of the prison that explained perfectly well why the Dementors had abandoned his cell block, but the fact was that Harry's hearing was not up to much, and he was located on the east side of the prison, so he had no way of knowing of the battle that was under way upon the western beach.
Harry returned to his stone bed and sat on it.
Not even a minute later, he became dimly aware of the sound of approaching footsteps, followed by a set of keys clinking as the door to his cell was unlocked.
Harry looked up as the door opened. He could make out several people standing there, but he couldn't make out who they were.
"Come on, Potter." said a voice that Harry recognised as belonging to Auror John Dawlish "We're getting you out of here before your master can get to you."
Harry was grabbed roughly by several pairs of hands and dragged from the cell.
As they marched him from his cell, Harry repeatedly stumbled.
"Move it Potter." growled Dawlish.
"I can't see very well." replied Harry, using his voice for the first time in a long time.
Seconds later Harry's senses improved threefold. Obviously one of the Aurors had decided to hit him with some kind of sensory charm.
Now Harry could hear the noise coming from the west; the screams, the shouts and the explosions.
"What's going on?" he asked.
"Like you don't know." replied the Auror on Harry's right, whose name Harry did not know.
"If I knew, why would I ask?" asked Harry, who then received a hit to his head for speaking out of line.
The group rounded a corner and suddenly a jet of green light raced towards them. The Auror on Harry's left dropped dead.
Harry had chance to glimpse two Death Eaters standing in the middle of the corridor ahead. Neither was wearing their mask, allowing Harry to identify them as Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange. The three remaining Aurors threw Harry to the ground and immediately engaged the two Death Eaters in battle. Seconds later, Dawlish fell next to Harry with half of his face missing.
Repulsed, Harry pushed himself away from Dawlish and began a mad scramble down the corridor, away from the fight.
He had no idea where he was going; he had only ever seen his cell, and then only dimly.
Harry saw no one besides prisoners in their cells for a long time. There were no Dementors, no Aurors and no Death Eaters.
The wind howled, thunder rumbled, the waves crashed against the shore, lightning flashed through the sky and rain hammered down as the battle raged on the rocky beach.
The group of Dementors swarmed away from the light of Tonks' patronus, but Death Eaters were ready to take their place. Voldemort seemed to have brought his entire force to Azkaban in order to crush any resistance, and it seemed to be working.
The full, combined might of the Order of the Phoenix and the Ministry of magic (from its Aurors and Hit-Wizards to the run-of-the-mill Law Enforcement officers) had been present to counter Voldemort's attack, but they were rapidly weakening under the pressure of holding back the Death Eaters, Giants and Dementors.
Behind them the fortress of Azkaban was already burning. The dark hour of the failure of the light seemed to be upon them.
And it was into this chaos that Lord Voldemort's voice came, drowning out all other sound. The fighting stopped and the people from the Order and the Ministry began looking around for him, but he wasn't there. It quickly became apparent that the voice was merely a projection. They were all hearing a conversation that was occurring elsewhere, presumably within Azkaban itself. They were all shocked to hear the second voice, the voice of Harry Potter.
Harry threw himself onto the ground with his hands covering the back of his head as the wall exploded. He was covered in chunks of stone and dust, but not really harmed. He pushed himself up and made his way cautiously towards the huge hole in the wall.
For the first time in what felt like years Harry could see the outside world, but it was not a welcoming sight. The sky coated with thick, dark grey clouds that occasionally rumbled with thunder and light up in flashes of lightning. Rain fell heavily and the wind howled. Below the sea was black and churning violently. Harry looked down. The sea came right up to the wall of the prison below him. Strong waves hammered against it.
Harry leaned out and looked towards the west and saw the rocky beach where an epic battle seemed to be taking place. A swarm of black cloaked figures, who Harry took to be Death Eaters and Dementors, were battling it out against what Harry assumed to be the best that both the Ministry of Magic and the Order of the Phoenix could offer. There was probably anywhere up to three hundred people on each side, and Harry doubted that he would find a friend amongst any of them.
Suddenly a violent stabbing pain flared in the lightning-bolt shaped scar on Harry's forehead, causing him to cry out in agony. He bent double and clutched his face in his hands, his fingers massaging his forehead.
"Poor widdle baby Potter." came a mocking voice that was all too familiar to Harry.
Harry Potter turned and found his way back along the corridor blocked by the owner of the voice, Bellatrix Lestrange, arguably one of Voldemort's best Death Eaters. With her were other notorious Death Eaters, Lucius Malfoy, Antonin Dolohov, Peter Pettigrew and Severus Snape.
But most important of all was Lord Voldemort, who had come for Harry himself.
From the moment Voldemort began speaking, those fighting outside heard every word, though Harry could not know that.
"Well, well, Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, how that mighty have fallen, eh? Tell me, how have you enjoyed your stay in Azkaban?"
Harry said nothing.
Voldemort smiled sinisterly "How does it feel Harry, to know that the entire world has turned against you?"
"Funnily enough, I'm rather used to it." replied Harry "The world has a habit of turning its back on me, and I think that you can thank your buddies Malfoy and Snape here for contributing to much of that."
"Ah, yes, that's right." said Voldemort "This happened during your second year at Hogwarts didn't it? Back when everyone seemed to think that you were the heir of Slytherin."
"Actually it happened first in my first year." replied Harry "When I snuck out at night to help someone who at the time I thought of as a friend, and Lucius' son squealed, losing me fifty house points."
Voldemort chuckled "Yes, that's right. I remember dear old Minerva ranting about it as I listened through Quirrel's turban. And then there was your fourth year, wasn't there? When everyone believed that you entered your name into the Tri-Wizard Tournament. What a fun year that was. And then your fifth year, when everyone thought you to be a liar for announcing my return to the world. I imagine that this year you were prepared for it."
"I was, as a matter of fact." said Harry "At first I was a little surprised at what had happened, but to be honest it makes perfect sense. After all, the world has tried every other angle to make be out to be deranged, so the next logical attempt had to be framing me for murder. How was it accomplished, if you don't mind my asking?"
Harry had a strong feeling that he was about to die, and strangely enough he was okay with it. Perhaps he had just come to accept the inevitable; it certainly helped him to keep calm now.
Voldemort laughed "Well, who am I to deny a dead man his final wish. Very well, I'll tell you. It was quite simple, really. All it took was a simple dose of Polyjuice Potion, I'm sure you've heard of it."
"Ah, that explains it." said Harry "Would I be correct in assuming that it was Malfoy Jr. who carried out the deed?"
"Who else?" replied Voldemort.
Harry gave a nod "And of course it was dear old Snape here who "discovered" me at the scene of the crime, and with Draco wearing my face, a simple pensieve memory was all it took for Dumbledore to believe my guilt."
"Correct." said Voldemort "And with the world once again believing every world that tumbles out of the old fool's mouth…"
"… I could've sworn a vow on my magic that I did not kill Luna and still have ended up here." finished Harry.
"Very good, Harry. You'd have made an excellent Auror with reasoning like that."
Despite the situation, Harry led out a laugh "Yeah, right. Like I'd want to waste my time working for the Ministry of Muppets."
"You realise that I am here to kill you, don't you Harry Potter."
"Yes, I realise it." said Harry "And to be honest, I'm now rather looking forward to leaving this violent cycle of physical abuse and emotional turmoil that we call life."
Voldemort raised his wand and pointed it directly at Harry's chest, but the spell didn't come. Instead Voldemort gave Harry a way out.
"I offered you a chance to join me once, Harry Potter. Do you remember? Back when we met in front of the Mirror of Erised. I know that you are a powerful Wizard, and I offer you that chance again. Will you take it?"
Harry's green eyes studied Voldemort's face for a few long moments before he gave his reply.
"As far as I'm concerned Tom, if you want the world as badly as you seem to, then you can have it. But you'll have to do so without me. I'm tired of it, and I'm done with it."
"Very well. Goodbye, Harry Potter."
"Goodbye Tom."
"Avada Kedavra!"
The jet of green light left Voldemort's wand and slammed into Harry's chest. Harry dropped to the ground, lifeless. But as he fell, he went slightly backwards, towards the hole in the wall. His body landed with a soft thump, rolled a tiny bit and then slid through the hole and down, down into the churning sea below.
When the spell hit Harry, Voldemort gave a loud gasp and fell to his knees. The Death Eaters immediately rushed to his side, but he had his eyes on Harry and watched as his body slid from view.
"Bellatrix, send them the message." said Voldemort.
Bellatrix made her way over to the hole in the wall and looked down. She saw no sign of the body. She took her wand and aimed it up at the sky.
"Morsmordre!"
The Dark Mark of Lord Voldemort, a glowing green skull with a serpent for its tongue appeared in the sky.
Bellatrix smiled and turned away from it.
"We must leave." announced Voldemort, surprising the others.
"But my Lord," said Lucius "Our victory is near at hand. We are close to crushing all those who stand before us."
"No," said Voldemort "no. We shall leave. They heard all that I told him. They know now that he was innocent. I wish them to suffer with that knowledge. We leave now."
And so they did.
And so did all those down on the battlefield, though it was a mystery how the Giants disappeared. Must have been some kind of port key. The Dementors just flew off.
The Order and the Aurors had heard everything; the truth about Harry's innocence and about Luna's murder, they had heard Harry's calm acceptance of his death. They heard him reject both Voldemort and the Wizarding World as a whole.
They had heard his death.
Now they were left on the rocky beach, becoming drenched by the torrential rain and the spray of the sea, chilled to the bone by the biting wind, and bathed in the green light of the huge Dark Mark that now hung in the blackened sky above, mocking them and their failure.
They had been wrong, very wrong, and rather than kill them, Tom Riddle wanted them to suffer with the knowledge that the Wizarding World had once again sent the wrong person to Azkaban.
Harry Potter's body sank below the churning waves, and a slight current pulled him further out to see. The light from the Dark Mark in the sky above caused the water to glow with a green hue.
And as he sank a little deeper, a pair of arms wrapped themselves around him to hold him tightly.
There was a swish of a powerful tail, and the body of Harry Potter was carried out to sea.
A/N: Sorry it's been so long, but there's Chapter 2. I'm not entirely happy with it, but it rolls the plot along as necessary.
The truth is out, but at what cost? How will the world react to this latest series of events? And who has Harry's body?
Find out in Chapter 3, on its way soon.
For those wondering about the hearing Voldemort's voice thing, its Voldemort's way of taunting his opponents, and is rather like what he does during the Battle of Hogwarts in Deathly Hallows.