Chapter Three
Twice in one day
Harry went back to his office, his mind caught on one Draco Malfoy. It was just so strange to see the man, and to have the man not lash out and point his wand at Harry, and for Harry to not feel the need to do the same. Of course he still carried some of the Malfoy attitude, but there was something different about him, he seemed like a new man.
Harry opened his office door and walked over to the desk. The document he had given up on earlier lay there neatly with a note on top. He walked around his desk and sat down to read it.
Harry,
It's all done, there was very little to be changed and altered but I suppose your boss likes perfection?
I've managed to tweak a few things and I hope this is alright for you. I'm going into a meeting now, but just wanted to tell you that everyone is at The Burrow again tonight if you want to come before you head out for drinks with Ronald. You must tell me how the interview went!
Much love,
Hermione x
He was sure if he went bearing the news about who he got interviewed by, The Burrow would be full of chatter and discussion tonight. It was then he realised he promised drinks with Ron. He needed it in all honesty. He sat down and looked at His half empty mug and Ron's full mug just sat there on his desk, cold. He supposed he better take them to the staff room. He ripped the note from Hermione off of the document and put it in his pocket, he didn't want Robards finding it and reading it. Then he made his way to the staff room with the mugs.
"Afternoon Mr Potter" A small brown haired man called out when Harry passed him on his way.
"Morning William" He replied. William worked in The Department for the regulation and control of magic creatures with Hermione, he was a kind happy young man that always loved a chat with Harry, but the good thing was, he never went on about the war or the troubles of Harry's past like most people did. He looked as though he was in a rush today though as he didn't stop, he just carried on fast walking. Maybe he was meant to be in the same meeting as Hermione, and was running a bit late.
Harry washed the mugs up with his wand and made himself a fresh cup. He was sipping it while walking over to a chair, where he sat down. His eyes caught on the Daily Prophet in front of him on the coffee table. The main headline read: Malfoy mischief once again? Harry picked it up to read.
'There has been some talk that the former death eater, Lucius Malfoy may be pulled in for questioning again. We all know he was let off in trial 2 years ago after the big Wizarding war, because lack of evidence to convict him. It is clear to many that he was, or still is (If you prefer) a death eater, but did he actually commit any major crime? He's been punished for what they can prove he has done, but does the Ministry of magic think they can lock him up in Azkaban now? What is this new piece of information they have on him? There are so many questions we are yet to answer, but they will be answered in the near future, most likely after the questioning Monday.'
'The Malfoy family were all put down on the death eater list, and are these days keeping themselves to themselves and hardly leaving their manor. However the youngest Malfoy, Draco has been a photographer for a small paper for the last 5 months says our insider, but for obvious reasons they do not put his name in the caption. The Malfoy family have -'
"Mr Potter, not out solving crimes?" He heard a voice say. Harry looked up from the paper to see Kingsley standing there in the door way, one arm leaning against the frame.
"Kingsley" He placed the paper back on the table. "No, needed to finish some paper work for Robards, so he sent Terrance with Ron today"
"Oh?"
"Yeah, but It's all finished now"
"Good, well I'll need you and Ron Monday, I'll inform Robards later. I'll need a few more Aurors too" Harry thought to where Monday last came into his mind...
"Lucius' questioning?"
"You read about it then" He asked. Harry pointed to the Daily Prophet on the coffee table and nodded. "Yes, as usual they're making it a bigger deal than it actually is, you need not to worry; he's not done anything that we know of since. It's just a routine check up and questioning on his part in the war again. We know he was working close with Voldemort thanks to you and your peers, but he's seemed to do a good job at keeping himself out of a life sentence in Azkaban." Kingsley Shrugged. "Some people think he may have some information he's hiding, or evidence to land other death eaters in Azkaban, As long as you Aurors can catch them of course." A hint of a smile played on his lips.
"But how did he manage to get only one year in Azkaban?" Harry questioned.
"It's not a great sin to follow a belief Harry"
"But he acted on that belief, made it clear muggle-borns were no good in the Wizarding world in his eyes. He used magic to make his point, to try and help Voldemort bring down what we had, and put his lord in power!" He then realised his surroundings and thought he shouldn't of had raised his voice, even if just slightly. He looked around the room, the room wasn't busy but the 7 people in it all had their eyes on him and their ears on his voice.
"This is not the place to discuss this Harry." He lowered his voice and bent down to Harry "But I'm merely saying if you think to the battle at Hogwarts, He technically never harmed a student or teacher, or anyone that night. He never killed anyone during that time. He's been punished for what happened here at the ministry, It's not enough to lock him up for good. He's already served time-"
"And he broke out" Harry interrupted.
"The first time. He served time after the war, but he escaped life imprisonment and only did a year" He looked at me and straightened himself out, coming away from the wall and standing straight. "If you think he should be punished, people will listen to you, but just don't act before you're sure it's the right thing. The ministry has seen an improvement in him. He was given a punishment that fit him, and it seems to have done what punishments were made for, rebuilding your life and making you realise you have done wrong, so you can learn to do right" He smiled. "Until Monday" He nodded and left the room.
Harry in that moment strongly disagreed. It was almost like Kingsley had learnt to forgive the pure-blood. Harry thought Lucius should have gotten life in Azkaban, after all he had done; it was the right thing! Harry buried his head in between his hands. He thought back to that morning… he had sat with Draco and done an interview, that they completed without shoving their wands in each other's faces. Draco was the same, but he was different. Harry didn't understand himself, but somewhere inside he knew that's what he saw in Draco today; A different guy. If the young Malfoy was capable of such a thing, maybe the older Malfoy was too.
He quickly thought back to the war, not back to the deaths and fighting, but to when Narcissa went against her Dark Lord and basically saved Harry by lying, saying that he was dead. During the war Narcissa changed. Sometime after the war, Draco changed. Maybe it changed the last Malfoy as well. Harry suddenly understood what Kingsley meant by 'just don't act before you're sure it's the right thing'. It sounded absurd to his ears in the moment, but he knew he would need to find out for himself if Azkaban and the war itself changed Lucius, before he brought up old wounds. If the pure-blood family were rebuilding their lives, then it would do no good for Harry to bring back the pain and trouble of 2 years ago. It was time to heal, not create more wounds and battle scars.
Even though the people in the room went back to what they were doing long ago, Harry wanted the privacy of his own office. So he stood up with his mug of tea and made his way there.
He sat down at his desk, he could see people buzzing around outside through the glass windowed walls. Not everyone had an office, only the higher up Aurors who deal with the bigger cases, everyone else had cubicles outside the offices. But this didn't mean Harry and Ron only did the biggest cases, They were sent on some simple easy things too - like what Ron was doing today - sometimes. But Harry was recently promoted, he's one position down from his boss Robards, but he can make big decisions and order people around. It was basically like being Assistant Head Auror. He had to do odd jobs for Robards too on top of his normal work.
He sat there with his head propped up against his fists, leaning against his desk, sat down on his spinney chair… looking bored. Because quite frankly he was bored, He had nothing else to be doing, with the documents done and Ron out stopping a fight with Terrance Luckett. Just as he started to think he should give the paperwork to Robards now, he saw him walking towards Harry's office. Harry quickly rushed to look busy.
"Potter, Weasley and Luckett need you down there right now, it's got out of hand, spells are flying everywhere; in sight of muggles too!" Robards seemed to have a permanent crease between his eyebrows and a frown placed upon his hard looking face.
"Yes sir" Harry grabbed his jacket and put it around him in one swift movement. He picked up the horrid documents he couldn't seem to get rid of and handed it to Robards. "Hope that exceeds your expectations… sir" He added on the end before walking out. Robards watched him go with no words to be spoken.
Harry apparated to the destination this was all happening, making sure he apparated in the alleyway nearby just in case. He heard screams, spells being performed, and the shouting of people as if they had been hurt. He peaked out from the stone wall to see Ron casting spells at a green haired man, Muggle women with their kids screaming in horror at what they were seeing, and screaming for a muggle man that was on the floor motionless. Many other witches and wizards were trying to perform spells at the man, others holding a tall brown haired man back, and Terrance on the floor… not moving. Harry done what he done best; he acted in the moment without really thinking anything through at all.
"EXPELLIARMUS!" He shouted and with that the green haired mans wand flew out of his hands into Ron's, and he fell to the floor. His 'act in the moment' plan went perfectly. It helped that Harry was behind the guy, so he couldn't have been expecting it. Ron stopped; the witches and wizards stopped, but the muggle women and kids kept screaming. Harry pointed his wand at the Green haired guy on the floor, and performed a spell to bind him up so that he couldn't move. He walked out from within the shadows of the alleyway and some people cheered, while the muggle people stood petrified and looked like they had seen… well… magic. The men let the tall brown haired guy go, he looked pissed off.
"Harry Potter sir, this guy attacked me just because I knocked him in the store, he's a psycho!"
Harry looked at Ron and nodded over to the muggles, he understood straight away. They performed a memory charm on all of the muggles and set them in to a sleep, Harry then looked down at the Muggle man, frozen. He knelt down and touched him, he was ice cold and turning purple.
"I don't know the spell, but he's not dead. What do you reckon… St. Mungo's?" Ron said.
"Yeah, and him?" He pointed over to Terrance.
"Don't worry, he was just hit by a body binding jinx, he will be fine, I'll take care of these lot and Green head over here, you take care of this guy yeah?" Ron looked at the frozen muggle man.
"Ok, sure you're fine here?"
"Of course, thanks for stepping in and helping Harry, I can always count on you" Harry smiled at the compliment and tapped his best friend on the shoulder. He sent a patronus to St. Mungo's and then looked up in front of him to see a thin blonde haired guy taking pictures.
"Hey, take your camera somewhere else" Harry started to walk up to the guy, then stopped a few steps away from the photographer when the guy removed the camera from his face.
Draco Malfoy.
"Potter"
"Malfoy"
"Nice work you did there, but is that the only spell you know?" Malfoy smirked.
"Sod off Malfoy" Harry turned around to walk away.
"There's me thinking me were on good speaking terms after this morning"
Harry turned back around "Planning on becoming friends with me are you?"
"No. Of course not" He spat.
"Right then, please just take your camera somewhere else, you'll be attracting more attention, and I don't want to have to modify more memories, I've done too many for one day."
"Can I just take a few more snaps of the attacker close up?" Malfoy started walking forward, with his camera around his neck.
Harry held his hand out and pushed against his chest. "No"
"But if I get a good story like this..." He stopped himself. "I may have a job, but that's because of my father's connections. I'm not very well liked, if I get a good story with fantastic photo's as clear evidence, maybe I'll be more than just a stupid ex death eater photographer" Malfoy took a breath and held his head high, as if what he said won't stop him from being better than everyone else. Harry could see his confidence flickering on and off.
Some healers from St. Mungo's came out from the alleyway and started to put the muggle man on a stretcher. They were clothed like normal people, the purpose being to not make the muggles suspect anything. But Harry was sure putting a frozen man on a stretcher and taking him down a dark alley would look odd to any sane person. "I'm sure you have enough shots Malfoy" He said before leaving the blonde to stand alone.
When he got back to the scene, Ron had already left with the Green haired man, and the other man involved. The other witches and wizards were starting to walk away and some went back in the shop, where this whole thing started. He looked back at where he left Malfoy and saw that he had gone. He had probably gone back to work to write his article on today's events, along with the interview this morning. It would all be full of insults and lies about him no doubt. Speaking of work, Harry knew he would be doing questioning later, with a whole load of paperwork on top.
Harry apparated back to the ministry. The healers took care of Terrance, and the poor muggle man who got caught up in it all, and said that they will keep Harry informed in any change of his state. He went straight to the questioning rooms.
After an hour and a half of piecing it all together, Harry felt he had asked enough questions for one day, and decided to continue tomorrow. On his way back to his office he bumped into Hermione.
"Harry!" He turned to look at her fast walking up to him on his right. "Ron told me how you disarmed a guy and saved Ron's life?" She babbled on, struggling to speak because she was so out of breath.
"What? I didn't save his life?"
"Well that's what he told me, said the guy took on himself and 3 other wizards at once, he said every spell missed him by an inch and he felt like giving up after what felt like an hour, but then you managed to disarm him, get him on the floor, and bind him up in just 2 spells"
"I'm sure he was exaggerating, he was doing fine on his own, but yeah I guess the guy was duelling 4 of them at once for ages. But I got lucky, I was behind him where he couldn't see me" He explained. "Oh yeah, and you could of told me it was Malfoy who I was interviewing this morning" He rolled his eyes.
"Malfoy!?" She said shocked "Oh Harry, I had no idea"
"Yeah then I ran into him again at the scene at lunch, he's a photographer for that paper you love so much" He said annoyed turning a corner with his best friend by his side.
"They let him have a job there?" She truly looked surprised.
"Obviously"
"That's odd, if it was Colin Creevy I would understand but… Malfoy? He's never been into Photography, has he?" She said as if she thought he was up to something dark.
"Maybe he grew a love for it over the past few years?" Harry then noticed it sounded like he was sticking up for the guy. "But yeah it's a bit odd"
"Hmm. Coming to The Burrow tonight then?"
"Yeah just for a bit before me and Ron head of for drinks, you're welcome to come you know"
"Oh don't be silly, it's a guys night out, I'll stay in with Ginny and play a board game or something"
"Ok if you're sure" Hermione stopped walking and clutched her stomach. Harry stopped too… "Are you ok Mione?"
"Of course, why wouldn't I be?"
"You look as though you're about to vomit?"
"Fair point" She clutched her stomach again and turned to run away with her hand over her mouth. "See you later" she called back with a muffled sound.
When Harry sat down at his desk a minute later, he was glad to have a rest. He kept thinking of Draco Malfoy. Of course it wasn't actually really that odd that Malfoy got a job in photography, it's been two years and even Harry knows that he himself had changed. He also saw a change in Draco too. But also if that's the only job Draco could get, Harry respected him for sticking to it if he actually didn't like it, although he doubted that. Draco seemed as though he had taken a real liking to it, and maybe a talent.
After 10 minutes of thoughts dashing through Harry Potters head, Ron walked in. "Come on mate, let's get home" Harry still called The Burrow home as he stayed there for a few months after the war, he helped the Weasley family rebuild it and make it homely again. Harry knew he was welcomed back anytime, but he wanted his own place. He realised after a while that he had a problem with letting people get close to him, and when they were close to him, he wanted to keep them far from him most of the time, because he knew he only brought trouble - even though not intentionally. He would still visit the Weasley's and they would visit him, he would still hang around with his best friends. But when it came to living arrangements and most of his days when he's in no mood to do anything, he wanted to be alone. He never understood these thoughts himself, but he had an idea that the war had something to do with it all.
He watched people die, watched people get injured and lose the one's they loved. He saw many people he loved dead too: Fred, Lupin, Tonks, Dumbledore… and even Snape. He may have realised it too late, but little did he know Snape would mean so much to him after that night.
"Mate?"
"Huh?" Harry hadn't realised his mind left the room.
"I said, are you coming or what?"
"Yeah" Harry collected his things and left his office, and the ministry with Ron.
