Chapter 3: Tactics to Win
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May 17, 1977
Harry apparated back to the House of White. He had just found the time to return for a thorough search. The idea had captured his imagination some time ago and hadn't let up.
The structure looked vastly different in the dark. It wasn't as cruel and insane as Sirius Black's family home had been, but it was close.
He walked to where he'd felt the presence of secret passageways. One opened just from Harry stepping through it. The room contained a number of tea cozies sized for house elves and a few small beds. A second passage didn't want to open, but Harry had learned cursebreaking from some of the best years earlier. He brought down the wards preventing his access.
The room behind the wards was quite something…quite disturbing. It was a divination suite, much like the bizarre tower Trelawney had cloistered herself inside at Hogwarts. But this one had prophecy spheres inside it, too.
They were obviously very old. Harry reached out and plucked one off the shelf. Instead of breaking or refusing his touch, the sphere came willingly. He tapped the thing with his wand.
An ethereal image filled the sphere. Since he was able to view the prophecy, it either pertained to Harry or it was already complete and could be viewed by anyone.
The forces of Light falter and cower,
Hiding behind their shields,
None willing to send the first bolt or last.
Fate decides differently, as the old crumble away.
The new one comes from a distant land,
Black hair turned white before its time, eyes gray,
A vicious tongue will lead them to victory.
Harry found the prophecy interesting, especially as it wasn't about him. Still, it made Harry wonder if Dumbledore had stalled in dealing with Tom Riddle for so long that fate had moved on and tried to disregard the old wizard.
Harry plucked another half dozen prophecies off their shelves and listened to them. It was almost soothing.
He wondered, for a moment, what would happen with Trelawney if Harry had gotten the last horcrux before it was time for her prophecy. The idea was sort of amusing, especially considering Harry didn't like the idea of having to break into the Ministry again to retrieve the same silly locket.
Harry continued his journey through the house. Two more passages on the first floor revealed little of interest. In fact, it was only when Harry arrived at the third floor did he find the prize of the house.
Harry walked into the ritual chamber and stopped short. He'd heard of them, of course, but only the oldest of the pureblood families ever had them – and, given the political climate Harry had grown up in, none had ever admitted it. Rituals of every type had been deemed illegal for the last one hundred fifty years. Harry, of course, had been witness to a horrifying variety of them in his short life, legal or otherwise. But it didn't change the fact that no one ever admitted to knowing about them or performing them.
He thumbed through a few ancient books detailing the White Family rituals. Nothing caught his eye, but a spark of an idea lodged itself in his head.
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July 17, 1977
Master Auror Janus Wilmot had been easier to get ahold of than Harry expected. The man had been dispatched to a Death Eater raid at the home of a muggleborn Hogwarts student named Robert Billings (rising into 4th year, Hufflepuff). Harry had subdued the Death Eaters and was about to arrange for the entire Billings family to go into hiding when he spied his target.
Harry created portkeys to send the Billings family on its way. Then he waited and watched Auror Wilmot.
The man sent severing curses at two wounded, but not dead, Death Eaters. The man was doing his 'best' sort of work, cowardly and unworthy. Harry had killed Death Eaters, but only in the heat of battle…this lowly worm of a man was walking through and killing whoever he found. Coldly, without hesitation. It struck Harry as being wrong.
Harry had to bide his time for Wilmot to move away from his colleagues. Harry finally saw the opening he wanted. He picked up a small stone, turned it into a portkey to a secure cottage Harry used for his interrogations, and sent a number of high intensity stunners at the Master Auror. Harry caught the man unaware as he was trying to kill a third injured Death Eater, and the Auror slumped to the ground. Harry banished the portkey toward the Auror and watched the vile man disappear.
Harry looked closely at the remaining injured Death Eaters. He couldn't exactly leave them here for the Aurors to massacre them, could he? That wasn't right – and it would possibly change the entire timeline.
Harry created a half dozen portkeys and dispatched the wounded Death Eaters to St. Mungo's. There they would get some form of treatment and the Aurors couldn't just let loose with spells…but, given the corruption inside the Ministry, Harry fully expected to see them all 'escape' and make it back in battle. The second time Harry wouldn't be generous.
He apparated to where he'd sent the Billings family and left a brief note. He promised food and books (especially training materials for the young wizard) and safety.
Then he made his way to the Master Auror.
Harry searched the man before awakening him. He was as paranoid as Alastor Moody: three wands, four portkeys, six different potions. He had a notice-me-not charm on one of the portkeys and some kind of voice activated charm on one of the potions vials. Harry put all the items in a strong box and banished it outside the safehouse.
Harry bound the Master Auror and placed four drops of Veritaserum in his mouth. Harry woke the man and didn't give him any time to think or collect himself.
"How many Death Eaters have you killed?"
"Twenty nine."
Harry nodded. His official count was seven.
"Have you ever entered the Department of Mysteries?" The sole reason Harry had been looking for this particular Auror was to ask this question: Harry needed to determine a way to get inside the Department of Mysteries and recover Slytherin's locket. Damned bureaucrats and functionaries, they had one of vilest creations ever conceived and they just sat around and studied the magic that went into its creation.
Some forms of curiosity were dangerous.
The Auror's eyes went fuzzy for a second as he tried to resist answering Harry's question. He was obviously under a secrecy charm of some sort that was warring with the veritaserum.
Eventually he croaked out, "Yes."
"Where do they keep or study enchanted dark objects?"
He fought the charm again before blurting out, "The Chamber of Unraveling. It's where all the cursebreaking happens in the Department."
"Describe how to get inside the chamber."
The man said, "I can't. I know of it but not how to get inside it."
Of course it wouldn't be that easy.
"Have you ever seen a golden locket there with an 'S'…"
"The Slytherin locket?"
"That's the one. The Unspeakables know it came from Slytherin?"
"Yes. It's a fascinating object. No one has the first idea what kind of curses are on it."
Harry knew all too well what the foulest 'curse' was. He wish he didn't have to repeat history in quite this way. He wished the worthless piece of junk…well, he had to stomp on his emotions to keep from wasting time with this Master Auror.
"Why hasn't anyone destroyed it?"
"You'd sooner get an Unspeakable to cut off their own nose than destroy something they hadn't yet unraveled."
Harry kept his angry thoughts to himself.
"Who works with the locket?"
"I've heard of three teams working on it at various times. The only name I heard was Diricawl."
"A codename?"
"Yes."
"Do you know who Diricawl is?"
"No. All DoM identities are kept secure. We may know that such and such a person works there, but we never connect up street names with codenames…"
That was all he could get on the most important subject, that of the horcrux. His great clue was a name, the Diricawl, a sort of presumed-extinct bird. A Dodo bird. It wasn't a lot of help.
Harry turned the interrogation to another subject. "Do you modify the reports of your subordinates?"
"All the time."
"What specifically do you modify?"
"Anything that brings discredit to the Aurors."
Harry kept back his invective. He merely noted mentally that such conduct, 'brings discredit to the Aurors.'
"Have you ever reassigned blame for the killing of a civilian from an Auror to a Death Eater?"
"Of course."
"Does your boss Barty Crouch do anything to the reports?"
"When needed, yes."
"Have you ever accepted a bribe?"
"Of course." What an attitude to have about the whole thing.
"Has Crouch?"
"I don't know."
"Do you know who has been freeing prisoners?"
The Auror grumbled as much as could under the truth serum. "No, but I wish I did."
"Any suspicions?"
"A lot, but none of them have any evidence behind them."
Harry thought about what to do with this vile example of wizardry. "If you were looking for a safer world for everyone, what would you do with a rabid killer who had taken thirty lives?"
The man fought the truth serum for a few minutes. "I'd kill him."
Harry just nodded. "Obliviate."
He had some more thinking to do. He had wanted to handle Voldemort and his followers before dealing with the Ministry – but this Master Auror was easily on par with any Death Eater.
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September 13, 1977
Harry sat in his flat in Manchester and listened to a meeting of the Order of the Phoenix. He'd managed to get listening charms inside the meeting room by enchanting the tea cups used at the Prewett Manor, their temporary headquarters. Harry listened to Arthur Weasley speak for a while on the security leaks that had led to muggleborns being identified by records from the Ministry. Moody interjected with several scathing attacks on the man's intelligence and dubious parentage.
Harry thought it was frightening that age had mellowed Moody from a near psychopath when it came to security (in 1977) to a mere paranoid delusional (in 1995).
Harry finally perked up when an old man named Parks began to speak about weird happenings inside St. Mungo's. "We've got four Aurors, including the just promoted Lead Auror Janus Wilmot, in one of the wards. No one can figure it out, but they're alive but not really functioning. It could be Cruciatus exposure; or severe use of Memory Charms; or a coma-inducing potion. We just don't know, but it's definitely a new tactic the other side is using…"
Moody, as usual, was the first to respond. "Wilmot was a rabid beast. Best thing that could have happened, I think."
Albus Dumbledore just tutted in response. "No one deserves that, Alastor."
Harry thought differently. He was the one responsible for their condition after all.
He'd used an old spell that he'd stumbled upon in his quest to finally get some protection from Legilimencers. The men were all alive, but Harry had locked their conscious minds away from active control of their bodies. (Harry had used the spell on himself, in a more limited fashion, to lock away sensitive information.) He could restore them any time he chose…but he didn't think he'd do that anytime soon. The four Aurors, including Miles Tavinish, had killed, rather than arrested, sixty two Death Eaters among them. By any measure, they were dangerous people who had no regard for the laws they were paid to enforce.
Harry smiled at the concept of 'regard for the law'. He, of course, had broken fundamental laws of time to come back and do this. He didn't have a high moral ground to preach from, but he did have his rules: the corruption had to go from both sides, from Voldemort as much as from Fudge and Crouch and Dumbledore.
Death Eaters targeted non-combatants to make a statement. Aurors and the Order of the Phoenix went after the Death Eaters in sometimes disastrous ways. They were tearing the world apart…and they didn't care. Everyone thought in the present, no one of the future.
That was Harry's burden, it seemed.
A new voice interrupted Harry's musing. After a while Harry pieced together who it was, Frank Longbottom, Neville's father.
"I asked my fiancee to start recruiting from among the students. She and I both agree that James Potter and Sirius Black would make excellent members…"
Harry smiled a bit. He hadn't caught much on his parents or his godfather since he'd returned in time, but every little bit was a joy. At the same time, Harry wished his parents had refused the Order and moved far away from Britain. He wished they'd gotten away from Voldemort and Dumbledore both.
It would only happen if Voldemort was dead and Dumbledore discredited by the day they graduated. It was a goal to work for…
Moody, again, had the first retort. "That Black, I don't know how we can trust him… He's Potter's friend, sure enough, but he's a Black. Bad blood will out…"
At that moment, Harry's own blood chilled. Marge Dursley had said something similarly revolting about his dead parents years and years ago.
"Now, Alastor, I've watched the boy for years. I've even been inside his head a few times. He's not like Orion or Walburga or even his younger brother Regulus."
The debate on James' being invited took no time at all. The conversation on Sirius consumed most of an hour. Harry realized why these people never did all that much during the first and second wars: they were always debating with each other. Dumbledore wasn't leading a war correctly; he wasn't even leading a meeting very well. Had the glow from defeating Gellert Grindelwald really made him seem that infallible when, in truth, he was barely competent?
Harry wondered if he needed to borrow from Rita Skeeter's bag of tricks and go for some character assassination to lessen Dumbledore's influence in the wizarding world.
Of all the problems Harry had to solve, dealing with Dumbledore was by far the most challenging, even more so than the horcruxes. He'd loved and revered the man for a long time – even come back from severe doubts about him in his late adolescence – and now he saw more and more of the disturbing truth surrounding the man.
Powerful, smart, cunning; arrogant, complacent, unwilling to wield his power, self satisfied, dismissive of the views of others, a user of other people's trust and lives, and far less competent than he projected. Dumbledore was all show and no substance, Harry finally realized. The man had good intentions or Fawkes would have left him, but he didn't do nearly enough to merit the reverence people held him in.
What to do?
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October 11, 1977
Harry Potter walked through the wards of Dumbledore Manor without a single problem. The old man was brilliant, true, but he was arrogant. He used powerful, obscure wards to protect his house…but they had little offensive power behind them. They relied upon confounding properties and repelling wards and secrecy charms and other 'lighter' methods of securing a property. They could also be bypassed rather than needing to be destroyed.
As it was, Harry had learned how to create and subvert them from books Albus Dumbledore's own portrait had suggested to Harry in the years after the war.
The Dumbledore Manor was a rather small, but sprawling, home. It was but a single story, but it was spread out in odd ways. It was unclear how the old building still stood…magic, perhaps. It swayed a bit in the light wind. Harry was not very excited about walking inside. It looked as crazy as Dumbledore acted at many public occasions.
He did eventually walk inside. He was the only being inside, as the Dumbledores had long ago freed their elves. He walked, disillusioned, from room to room examining everything and casting silent detection spells.
Inside what appeared to be a small office, Harry found something of interest: a pensieve. It was, in fact, the identical pensieve that Harry had viewed Death Eater trials in his fourth year at Hogwarts and memories about Tom Riddle in his sixth. Why had Dumbledore moved it to his office at the school in later years? Just for Harry's benefit?
He watched the swirl of memories inside the stone basin. He was rather resistant to the idea of leaving himself defenseless while viewing a number of memories – or allowing a projective viewing of the pensieve to trigger any sound-based wards Dumbledore might have established in his manor.
Harry settled on the difficult, but not impossible, step of copying the whole body of memories and storing the duplicate in a conjured glass jar he could take with him.
Three hours later Harry walked out of Dumbledore Manor with the duplicated memories – and a strong case of magical exhaustion. That kind of work required intense concentration and a massive amount of magical output.
It would be some time, days at least, before Harry would be back to his usual self. Perfect excuse to take a nap and then hole up while viewing the memories.
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November 6, 1977
Harry hadn't realized how many decades worth of memories he had copied. Dumbledore hadn't stored every breakfast and bowel movement inside his pensieve, it just seemed like it. But on further reflection, the old wizard had captured memories of anything he considered worthy of further study. It was still a massive amount of information to sift through.
It did not, however, contain anything from his younger years, his association with Gellert Grindelwald, or any moment of the life of his sister Ariana.
Harry had made it through perhaps a hundred hours of memories by this point. It left only five or six hundred hours left, judging by the remaining mass of the memory strands.
Harry selected up another memory and stuck his head into the pensieve.
A young looking Alastor Moody walked over to Dumbledore in a courtroom. Dumbledore flicked his wand and then bent his head over to the Auror.
"Is it done, Alastor?"
"It is, but I don't like it, Dumbledore. It's a dirty business…"
"Crouch is the best man to prosecute the war, Alastor. Disqualifying the incumbent and the other opposition was necessary in this case…"
"I say you're the best one to prosecute the war. Bring the Order into the public sphere; take over the Auror branch. Hit them hard…"
"I'm not a politician or a policeman, my friend. The kind of things the Order can do are best planned with public scrutiny, you know that. Inside the Ministry, Crouch will do what needs to be done…"
"It's dirty tricks planting evidence on…"
"And I say, thank you. Obliviate."
Moody shifted a bit but didn't seem too overwhelmed by the erasure of his memory.
"…I say, Alastor, that we need to get Diggle or Podmore together with a few of the new Order members to ensure they really understand what we're up against…"
"How about I duel each of them, give them a good hiding?"
"That could work as well, my friend. That could work…"
The memory ended and Harry came out. He was angry at himself – angry at Dumbledore – angry at Moody.
Dumbledore, contrary to what Harry had claimed, had used some of his vaunted powers in the war effort…but only to condemn it to failure and severe loss of life. And he'd used a friend of his as his lowly thief-in-the-night…and rewarded Moody with the loss of his memory.
Why hadn't Harry seen any of this? Why hadn't anyone of the present timeline ever suspected? The man was cool and calm and vicious when need be. Why had Harry forgiven… The man used Obliviate more often than the breath freshening charm. Had he tried memory tricks on Harry, too? Had Harry not 'forgiven' the old man willingly? Had he lessened Harry's anger somehow after he'd died, after he'd met with Harry in that mental projection of King's Cross Station?
Harry didn't know what to think…other than to continue viewing the memories and documenting them for whatever sort of article or book he'd end up using to discredit Dumbledore.
It would be many months before he finished viewing all of it. Many months of pain.
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December 24, 1977
Harry played Father Christmas to every hidden family under his protection. He didn't literally visit each hidden cottage, but he did send out his two house elves (acquired in Denmark to minimize the questions he might be asked in Britain) with special gifts and baskets of holiday foods.
He included in each basket a letter updating the families on the war.
Dear Billings Family,
Enjoy the holiday cheer these gifts and foods can bring. Unfortunately, the war continues and it is not yet safe for you and your family to reappear in public. Many of us are working very hard to ensure the world will soon be safe for all families, all parents, and all children.
There is an envelope at the bottom of this basket containing newspaper clippings over the last year. Do not worry about the non-combatant families mentioned as victims of raids. All of them are under protection right now similar to yours.
Please let your house elf know if there is anything you need or want in the coming days and weeks. We all remain hopeful that this will be the last Christmas you and yours will need to spend in protection. For now, that is all we can say.
Stay safe.
Harry felt the mounting pressure to find the last horcrux, to find it, and then destroy them all. But he didn't know how to get inside the Department of Mysteries and its Chamber of Unraveling.
Without that knowledge, walking inside the Ministry of Magic was akin to suicide.
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April 10, 1978
Harry Potter had a bit of a lull in the official timeline between the raids he needed to prevent and a few other duties he needed to attend to. He was taking the opportunity to visit the United States for a few days to set up some provisions there: a safe house leased to "Andrew Thatcher," bank accounts under three different names, and a series of safe deposit boxes filled with gold bullion in New York and Maryland.
He had been very careful in the things he'd done so far…but the end of the Death Eaters was approaching and Harry wanted to have a further safe haven set up in case he were ever discovered by the Muggles or the magicals.
Constant vigilance: not just pretty words.
Harry enjoyed the sites. He spent a day walking through Manhattan, people watching and browsing in the stores. It was so far removed from his world, so insignificant. People scurried about in their jobs and their lives…doing nothing. Harry enjoyed the temporary sense of freedom.
He ate a hot dog from a vendor cart for lunch and had a three course French meal for dinner. He rather preferred the hot dog.
He liked spending time in Washington, D.C., even more. He walked the Mall, visited several of the Smithsonian museums, and walked among the dead in Arlington. He also spent a lot of time learning how to blend in as an 'American' should the need ever arise.
It was a fun exercise. It was almost like a vacation for a person who was almost like a human.
Harry had the most fun eating his way through America. There was some decent pizza to be found and a couple of interesting restaurants here and there. He'd found some incredible Southern barbeque in Washington and wonderful Italian and Chinese in New York. (Still, that hot dog rated pretty highly.)
It was good to have fun…and fun to have good food.
Harry lacked fun in his new life. Vengeance didn't usually allow for it, but Harry made exceptions now and again.
Too bad his return flight boarded in nine hours. Slipping out of reality every now and again was good for the soul.
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May 29, 1978
Harry was amazed at how little the timeline had changed. The warfare had gone considerably worse for Voldemort this time around, but he was still recruiting heavily from Britain, France, and Eastern Europe. The key for Voldemort is that it seemed like his campaign of terror was working: people 'died,' manor houses burned to the ground, the Dark Mark was seen several times a week. He was now at the height of his power and influence. (It began to wane a bit after the prophecy had been made originally, as Voldemort had become erratic and unfocused because of his pursuit of the Potters and Longbottoms.)
Tonight Harry had made the final decision on how to acquire the final horcrux and when he was going to destroy Voldemort. He would give himself a few weeks to acquire the locket, destroy all of the vile devices, and kill Voldemort on June 17, 1978 (the next time on Harry's timeline that Voldemort was known to personally attend a raid).
That day also happened to be four days before his parents would graduate from Hogwarts. Harry thought it a fitting gift.
He could no longer wait to make sure he had dealt with the final horcrux. Harry wanted to ensure some kind of peace in the British wizarding world before his parents graduated from Hogwarts. Harry, if he needed, could track down the final horcrux later and then deal with the Voldemort wraith that would inevitably make its way to Albania.
He was willing to compromise on his original plans, if he needed to, in order to be sure the Potters saw their son graduate from Hogwarts. The idea had been on his mind for some time.
His only fear about giving his parents this gift of peace was that he was mucking around in the timeline too much. That his parents wouldn't marry on time – or wouldn't have Harry on July 31, 1980 – or that Harry would be someone else entirely. Harry Potter had done everything, including technically killing himself, to ensure that one unborn child would grow up in a world of peace.
In Harry's mind, there was no 'greater good.' There was what was needed for Harry James Potter, infant extraordinaire, to grow up in the loving family he deserved…
He hoped all of this would work…and Harry would grow up the way a child should grow up: normally.
But, first, Harry had to focus on today…not on the day Voldemort died or the day he would be born. He needed to make some more changes right now for the better. Tonight was the night that the Prewett twins would get themselves killed if Harry didn't help things along.
According to the timeline, they were to be a part of the response team to a Death Eater attack on the Bones Mansion in Kent. The sadly ironic part was that Edgar Bones had already fled the place with his wife…and the response team was unnecessary.
Harry apparated to the place. The wards felt stale and unrefreshed, as if no one had cast any magic nearby for some time. Harry thought it was obvious the place was temporarily abandoned. He risked a quick jaunt over to one of the windows…and saw a large, empty room. The Bones' had even taken their belongings with them. Perfect!
Harry stepped back outside the wards and waited.
"I wonder exactly how the Order gets the message to come and assist," Harry muttered to himself. If it had been ward-triggered, Harry's exploration of the estate should have brought members along. It had to be something else…
Harry looked up when he heard apparition. Dark robes and masks: Death Eaters. But then Harry saw something he didn't expect, a Patronus-based messaging spell. It was an application for the Patronus Charm that Dumbledore himself had created. He certainly wouldn't have intended to teach it to Death Eaters…
Had a traitor in the Order just called for victims?
Traitors made Harry think of that woman…and it made Harry seethe. There was nothing Harry hated more than betrayers.
Whoever the traitor was would die this night, Merlin willing and the Code of Harry be damned.
Harry watched as the crew of five Death Eaters quickly set to destroying the Bones Mansion. They'd obviously come expecting more of a fight. It was a few minutes before it arrived, however.
Gideon and Fabian Prewett, plus Alastor Moody, Dedalus Diggle, and Aberforth Dumbledore, arrived just outside the Bones wards. The Death Eaters pivoted and began a brutal assault. Moody, who still had his natural eyes and appendages, was knocked unconscious with a dark bludgeoner. Diggle was hit with a flame cutter and only a hastily thrown up shield saved his life.
Harry moved, under his Disillusionment spell, quietly near the Death Eaters. He didn't know which one had sent the Patronus spell, but he was going to find out.
Aberforth sent an oddly colored yellow spell at one of the Death Eaters. The recipient promptly fell over shrieking in pain. 'Good one,' Harry thought. He resolved to try to figure out what spell did that.
Then Harry did a little bit of magic. He had earned his Dueling mastery while competing on the professional circuit after Hogwarts (in the Quidditch off seasons while he played for Puddlemere), but he was most proud of the Mastery he earned in Spell Design. His Master's project was a nonverbal spell that bent magic in a specified direction: it was in place of shielding or dodging, of course. It worked on all spells, even the Unforgivables which still were unblockable via direct magical shielding.
Harry used his magic bending spells in slight ways to ensure that Death Eater spells hit other Death Eaters. The tallest cloaked man sent off the Cruciatus Curse – which Harry forced to miss one of the Prewett twins – and then a Cutting Curse which seemed to fly out of his wand at a weird angle. The Cutting Curse sliced off another Death Eater's wand hand.
The battle turned from there. Two Death Eaters down, three remaining. Three Order members remaining. Harry ensured nothing the Death Eaters cast hit the Order, while the Order had free reign on the black-robed attackers.
The battle ended without additional Order casualties five minutes later.
Aberforth unmasked the Death Eaters. Antonin Dolohov – he who had nearly bisected Hermione at the Department of Mysteries battle so many decades earlier in Harry's remembering – had lost his wand hand. Aberforth staunched the flow. Another was Lucius Malfoy. The surprise member was Sturgis Podmore, a member of the Order of the Phoenix, the traitor.
One of the Prewett twins was the first to react. "How did that blasted Phoenix let Sturgis in if he's sold us out to the Death Eaters?"
Aberforth offered an angry shrug. "My brother never has been too concerned with security. God only knows what foolish thing he'll conjure up to say about this."
The other twin shook his head in disgust, but was more concerned with Moody and Diggle. "We need to get them to a Healer, gents."
Aberforth nodded. "You lot get them mended. I'll stay here with our friends, especially this Mr. Podmore. Foolish bunch can't even aim their wands, can they?"
Harry just smiled. He hoped his revision of history this evening would hold. He hoped Molly Weasley would have her elder brothers for a long time to come.
Harry stuck around the Bones Mansion even after two Order members Harry didn't know came to collect the five Death Eaters. Aberforth went with them.
Harry wanted to see when or if the Aurors would show up to a burning Mansion. He wanted to continue his evaluation. So far very few Aurors looked like decent people in any respect.
Finally, fifteen minutes after the battle had concluded, Harry heard more apparition. Four Aurors, including one strangely familiar female Auror, came into view.
"Three false alarms and then this. The ancestral home is a wreck. There's tons of scorching and even a goodly pool of blood – and, oh my, a severed hand…"
Harry tuned out the rest. He had finally placed the Auror's voice: Amelia Bones, sister to the Edgar Bones who had owned this Mansion. Poor lady.
Harry was getting ready to apparate back to his flat when he heard something most interesting.
"Dodo, mark down needing to investigate who put in those false alarms. It stalled us by a good fifteen or twenty minutes."
"Amelia, don't call me Dodo…" That clinched it for Harry. It was a name he was ashamed of. But it wasn't terribly embarrassing. It was highly confidential.
The word Dodo, Harry knew, was another name for the Diricawl. And that was the name of an Unspeakable working on Slytherin's locket. Had the man's Auror nickname followed him to the Department of Mysteries in a morphed form? It was the best line Harry had into getting inside information on the Chamber of Unraveling.
"With a name like Disraeli Dreckmuller Doge, you object to the nickname Dodo? I see," said Amelia Bones with a high level of amusement in her tone.
Harry decided he would be making friends with this Mr. Doge. Very good friends.
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June 8, 1978
Years into his work as an Auror, Harry had given up on his prejudices concerning the Dark Arts. He'd had to learn the damned things, hadn't he? Even the Unforgivables. So he didn't feel particularly upset or nervous when he put his final horcrux recovery plan into effect.
His revised plan was safer and much more likely to work than the earlier ones he'd conceived of… It wasn't legal, but Harry didn't care at this point. He just wanted Voldemort dead and the killings to stop. There was a world to secure.
Harry had discovered where Mr. Doge lived in London. The man didn't even use wards. Harry arrived at the man's home before sunrise and walked inside. His wife and two children were put into deep sleeps. Mr. Doge was put under the Imperius Curse.
"You will go to work early this morning because of an experiment you must oversee. Then you will procure the Slytherin Locket and feign an illness. You will bring the locket to this flat. You have until nine thirty to return."
The man hopped to his task, dressing rapidly and with no useless motions. Harry felt Doge's will trying to fight with his own, but Doge really was a weak wizard.
Harry felt very good about this plan. The Ministry – even after numerous pleas through the next two decades, in the original timeline – wouldn't erect anti-Imperius wards until 1999. What a ridiculous bungle of bureaucracy.
Harry sat patiently and was rewarded. At eight fifty, Disraeli Doge returned with the locket. Harry had part two already to go.
"Tomorrow you will return to work earlier than normal. You will look pale, but not nauseous. You will catch up with your other duties. Then at ten o'clock, you will conduct an experiment on this locket. You will cast any four spells on it and record them in your research journal. The fifth spell will be the Dark magic cleansing spell Amplector. The locket will explode. Once that happens, you will pass out for five hours. When you reawaken, you will no longer be under my control. Nor will you have the last two days worth of memories. You will forget them forever."
Harry walked out of the flat clutching the last horcrux. He had spent many months chasing it originally and had added about another two years in this timeline. Harry was looking forward to the final resolution.
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