CH 7

Harry - James - Potter - Harry - James - Potter

Professor McGonagall was not thrilled that one of her favourites had garnered the attention of Professor Umbridge so soon. The woman had asked for a meeting with the Headmaster, herself and Harry Potter for the following day. She'd sent a note to the boy to attend the meeting in the Headmaster's office and now they waited for the young man to arrive.

Harry hissed (...Open...) at the gargoyle that guarded the Headmaster's office. He held up a shiny bit of exotic metal in the shape of an oval gem and inserted it into the stone guardian's mouth. The gargoyle moved out of the way with a satisfied rumble and crunching noise, (…Just this once…) He said. (…I was told you might like these and I can't imagine you getting them that often or at all. It's as if someone may have forgotten about the needs of stone guardians…)

The magical creature nodded its head and allowed him to take the revolving stairs behind him without making the Boy-Who-Lived guess at the current Headmaster's candy named passwords. The young man smiled remembering last year and how he found out about that little Parseltongue trick to bypass the current Headmaster's candy obsessed manipulations.

"Come in Mr. Potter," Headmaster Dumbledore called out to him, surprised that the boy had gained entrance so quickly. He was positive that the boy would at least be stuck out in the corridor for about five minutes guessing at the password. He did so enjoy making the people he summoned guess at the sweet names that he changed on a near monthly basis. It gave him ideas to find different sweets since the muggle-born students had access to many different types of sugared confections.

The old man had also been hoping that he wouldn't come into the boy's presence this early in the year since he strongly suspected that the Dark Lord had access to the boy's mind. Too bad the old coot didn't think to talk to the young man to find out that that wasn't the case at all.

"Sir," Harry said as he came into the room. "Ladies and Fawkes," he said as he elected to conjure up his own chair instead of waiting for someone to do it for him. It was considered extremely rude to do so, but then again how was he to know that when such things were no longer taught at this school. He sat down in it, next to the firebird's perch and asked, "What can I do for you?"

"You can explain why you felt the need to defy your Defense Professor and you failed to complete the lines she gave you to do for detention," Professor McGonagall started out, miffed at the loss of those points. "Gryffindor lost an extreme amount of points because of that."

"You mean when she called me a liar and then used the Imperious Curse in order to force me to use a Blood Quill to write lines," Harry asked. "I didn't want my magic to hurt the Professor, so I thought it best to leave before acting in any other fashion."

"You did lie to me," Professor Umbridge stated to everyone in the room. "That boy has lied about the return of the Dark Lord too and he's still doing it."

"You were present at Sirius Black's trial where you not?" Harry replied. "You know that I can not lie."

"You can too," the odious woman said. "You're doing it right now, trying to get the honourable Professor and Headmaster here to doubt my sincerity."

Harry stood up, pulled out his new wand, place it crossed his heart and declared, "I swear on my magic that the Dark Lord has returned and that I cannot tell a lie due to Geas Command. Magic of mine defend me against mine own accuser so-mote-it-be!"

It had been the simplest activation form of protection for someone that had a curse upon them and especially of the old magical Geas Command Curse. It only worked if the accuser kept denying the limitations of someone's geas condition and if the accuser had been present when the curse magic was laid.

The goblins dealt with family squabbles and thefts in that manner still. All legal through their own private clan or the clan courts. It looked like the humans had nearly forgotten those old forms of magic and to accuse someone who had a Geas Curse on them preventing a particular action meant that magic could be called upon for retribution. The magic inherent in the individual guided the form of the punishment without a directed spell. That's just the way it worked.

A piece of floating parchment and a charmed quill had recorded all words with a date and time stamp in order to protect his interests. It included everything in a typed script format which was what Harry had found most useful. But the script had also included the declarations that he was a liar and the words for the Imperious Curse.

Madam Bones had remembered to tell him about the specific charms that he needed to use on the quill. But she'd also been the one to provide him with the magical ministerial record paper. It was almost like having an official ministry scribe present taking down everything said by everyone around him.

All eyes that looked at him were surprised by the swirl of colour that whirled around him and then dove into the heart of the woman that had been assigned by the Ministry of Magic to undermine those teaching at the school of Hogwarts. She'd been placed there to monitor the school and to spread doubt about the return of the Dark Lord.

"Harry," his Head of House said in a startled tone as she half stood to do something, but was not sure what. She just looked at him in shock.

"You've read the transcripts of Sirius' trial," he stated since he'd known that most members of the Order of the Phoenix had read them. "Even if you haven't you should know that everything that happened was true. The Minister of Magic has laid a Geas Curse on me and she," he pointed to Umbridge. "Was present at the time therefore she knew about it. It's all on record officially and it certainly is not my fault that she refuses to believe it."

"What's going to happen to her now," she looked at the woman that was twitching and had some smoke coming off her pink, fuzzy sweater. She had moved her chair slightly further away from the spell struck woman.

"I don't know," Harry said. "I just followed Madam Bones' advice and said what she told me to say."

"I think that your magic only struck her," the Headmaster said. "Madam Pomfrey will sort her out, but for the time being your classmates will still have to have her as a stand-in Professor at least until Sirius can take over the class." He stroked his beard and then said, "You're to be removed from Defence Class for independent study in the meantime. We can't have you in her sights."

"That's all right," Harry said. "I know I can study that subject much better that any Professor you've ever hired for the subject other than Professor Lupin because he was just brilliant at the subject of course." He paused and then asked, "Can I ask that Luna Lovegood and Neville Longbottom be excused as well until Sirius comes to teach, that is?"

The Headmaster's eyebrows rose, but the man nodded. There was a knock on the office door and in came the Head of Slytherin House, followed by the other two Heads of House, three goblins and Madam Pomfrey.

"Severus," Dumbledore said the man's name in a questioning tone, seeking answers, while he wondered why goblins would be at his school. He knew that the school's vaults were in good working order or so that's what the books said.

"They're here for her," the Potions Master pointed at the smoking woman, who was still slumped in the conjured chair. He had an eyebrow quirked up at the sight and wondered just what happened to the odious woman.

"Whatever for," Professor McGonagall asked.

"Mr. Potter," Grubstone looked to the young man. "I received your note last night."

"I hope that you were not inconvenienced by it," Harry stood to bow respectfully at the creature. "I did feel it to be a matter of some importance."

"Not at all," the goblin replied with a full, toothed grin. "We've been instructed by our clan Heads to track any goblin made artifacts or gifts to ensure that they are not being incorrectly used." He sneered at the Ministry toady before continuing. "We've been investigating the situation that occurred to you this past summer and the Goblin King has decided to deactivate all goblin gifts given to the Ministry of Magic and some of those gifted to prominent human Families," he glanced at the human female dressed in pink, still smoking from the protective magics. "This is to prevent any other incident of that nature. Lucky that you were able to keep your situation limited in duration."

"I was lucky," Harry nodded. He then looked to the Professors present and explained. "I'd realized what was happening just in time since I felt strange magic being activated in the court room." He shrugged at their incredulous looks at having been able to sense the activation of magic for someone his age. "I was able to limit the time frame of the Geas to 'this scholastic year'. I used Parseltongue to cover up what I said so that additional conditions couldn't be added in English."

"She accused you of lying then," Professor Snape observed as he watched the foul woman come to under the skill full wand of the Mediwitch (Mw.) Poppy Pomfrey. "Interesting effect," he stated. Then he developed a distinctly calculating look and directed it at the Boy-Who-Lived. It looked like he wanted to test that lying theory for himself.

"Magic just knocked her out," Mw. Pomfrey said. "She'll have a headache, but that's all. I wouldn't recommend any kind of magical relief or potion since the magic may lash at her making the effects linger much longer than it normally would. This is a punishment for the accusation against someone with this kind of curse. I've seen it happen before." She nodded to everyone and said, "I'll return to the Infirmary now and make a note of it in for her private Healer's files."

"Mr. Potter you're dismissed," the Headmaster said. He still refused to look the boy in the eye and Harry had long since given up on the old man. He certainly wasn't looking towards him for any type of approval now that he'd been blood adopted by Sirius Black and Remus Lupin.

"Just a moment," Grubstone said. "We need to question him. We also want to know if this woman has given detention to any other students. If she made them write lines we'll need their names in order to redress this issue and have her pay compensation for the abuse."

"You'll need their Heads of House present too," Professor McGonagall said. "I'll send those students a note and we can all gather in one of the meeting rooms near the entrance. Harry, please escort them to room 10A on the main floor. I think it will accommodate all of us."

"Yes ma'am," Harry said. "May I order tea for everyone too?"

"Of course," the Headmaster said and waved him away.

"Follow me please," Harry said to the goblins. They'd all left as his Head of House sent notes with a small army of house-elves to get the students in the same place to discuss something of a very serious nature.

It was very serious business since the goblins had placed magical hand-cuffs on Professor Umbridge's wrists and were currently leading her around the school like a common criminal. There were a lot of students twittering about it and the rumour mill was highly active again not that it had ever stopped.

Harry - James - Potter - Harry - James - Potter

"All of you should have had the sense to come to your Head of House," Professor McGonagall told the five students present. The goblins had left the meeting complete with all questions answered and they took the foul woman away with them as she could not be trusted to remain at the school at this time. They had examined her rooms confiscated all questionable artefacts and received a copy of Harry's script of his time in detention with her. They also had their own personal issues against her to deal with and it was best done away from the school.

"I did," Fred Weasley said. "You told me to keep my head down and not make a fuss."

"Well you could have said that she was making you use a Blood Quill," the woman replied sharply.

Fred looked to Harry who nodded and asked the question that many of the Professors didn't want to hear from a student. "Did you let them tell you their side of the situation or did you blame the student for being punished because they were trying to ask questions of Professor Umbridge? Also not everyone can articulate what happened in a way that makes it understood that something wrong was going on. We don't learn about prohibited artefacts either so how are we supposed to know that what she was doing was not legal. She implied that you all knew about it."

The three Heads of House didn't say a word as it seemed that they were all guilty of not wanting to rock the Ministry boat anymore than it should. Harry looked to all of them and stated. "You do know that the Ministry does not have any jurisdiction at this school right?"

"What do you mean," Professor Snape asked. He wasn't surprised that his lone sixth year student hadn't even come forward to him. He knew it was because his Slytherin would rather plot revenge rather than complain. If the woman came back she would be subject to that revenge and he wouldn't do a thing against his student so long as the youth understood that they were not to get caught.

"It's in the Founders' Charter of Hogwarts' Rules and Regulations," Harry said. "This is a 'Private School' and as such the Ministry can only insist that some of the curriculum conform to Ministry Testing requirements because the specialty guilds, like Potions, Defense, Healing etc…have demanded it. That's why they administer the O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s they way they do. Unless something has happened in recent law to change that…" He paused and the carried on with a shrug. "Which is something I'm not sure of."

"The Board of Governors would have noticed something of this nature," Professor McGonagall said.

"They were appointed by prominent families only three hundred and thirty-four years ago," Harry replied with a huff. "Their purpose is to oversee the management of school funds for the purpose of building maintenance and comparable reference and materials fees for all magical children invited to attend this school. I don't see how they are supposed to dictate what's taught here or how either." He looked at all of the various expressions being sent at him and so he looked down to the dusty floor saying, "I'm sorry, I could be wrong there too."

"This will require some kind of review," Professor Flitwick said. "What will we do for the Defence Class now that the goblins have taken their Professor out of here?"

"Wasn't she supposed to be monitoring or evaluating the school or something of that nature," Professor Sprout questioned.

"We're getting off track here," Professor Snape said. He looked to the students and said, "No Professor can assign any kind of corporal punishment that harms the student while they are attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It's in the student regulations handbook that you as students should have read. It's a part of your school letter package before agreeing to attend this school or at the very least you should have bought yourselves a copy from the school stores."

"Um," Harry hedged as his fellow students panicked including the only seventh year there. "There was no handbook of school regulations on the booklist with my first school letter or any other after that." He looked to the nodding students and then continued, "It wasn't even listed as a book essential or advised to be purchased along with the other texts for class requirements."

"What," Professor Snape said. "Surely copies were made available in your common rooms."

"If they were we weren't told about them," Harry said.

The man was about to yell at him for lying when he was interrupted by his own Slytherin's words. "The Prefects did not point them out Professor nor did you mention them during your speech when you welcomed us to our House."

"You got a speech," Fred said with in impressed whistle. "Lucky you we only had the Prefects telling us where our dorms were before we knocked off to bed."

"Obviously each House has their own method of doing things," the third year Ravenclaw said. "What are we going to do about Defense Class?"

"It's only for a month or so before Professor Black can come," Harry said. "If we can use one of the larger duelling halls for true practical practice we should be all right. Maybe we can write to Remus for a copy of his syllabus to use as a guide for the start of the year. He seemed much more organized than the other defense teachers I've known, what do you think Professors?"

"The boy does have a point," Professor Flitwick said. "We can have the Prefects monitor the duelling rooms…"

"What about the first to fourth years," Professor Sprout said.

"Have them do readings and essays," the third year Ravenclaw said. "It's what we did in the beginning of every year so far, why should this one be any different? If Professor Black is going to be here anyway, let him make the corrections by correspondence. Why not let him send us the assignments from a distance too?"

Harry turned to Professor Snape, "Sir you do have Mastery in Defense right? Couldn't you set something up for them in the mean time? A practice schedule or something of that nature?"

'What is Potter up to,' the man thought, but he nodded. "I could certainly follow the wolf's old syllabus, but what of the older years?"

"O.W.L.s and N.E.W.T.s, plus sixth years will just have to do the Ministry's evaluation tests to figure out what they're lacking," Professor Flitwick said. "If they did that they'd know where to begin their independent studies, what do you think?"

"Foolish," Severus said as though he'd leave the older students unmonitored. "Let them do it then and we'll just see who passes." He turned to the students still present. "Spread the word among your compatriots that there is a student regulations handbook that will let them know what a Professor can and cannot do during a detention. This should at the very least mitigate any wild accusation stating that we approve of any kind of physical harm or that physical harm has ever been used as punishment. If it has then I'd suggest thoroughly researching those circumstances. Understood?"

"Yes sir," the students said almost altogether.

"Well then," the man said. "Get out of here before I dock points." The students scrambled out of the meeting room. Leaving their Head of Houses to come up with something for the Defense Against the Dark Arts class.

Harry - James - Potter - Harry - James - Potter

Harry's next DADA class was very different from the one with the Ministry Professor, who still hadn't returned to the school after being hauled away in unconscious humiliation by irate goblins.

Hermione walked in carrying a stack of booklets.

"These are the Ministry's O.W.L.s evaluation test books for the Defense Against the Dark Arts exams. The answers can be found at the back of them," she said. "Everyone must to take one and use it as a test of your current DADA levels. They're a tool to use as a review of what you'll need to learn and know in order to pass your DADA O.W.L. Next class you'll have the option to use the Library, a Study Hall or the fifth year assigned duelling location on the fourth floor, corridor eight, room 467. You must put your choice on this sign up form so that the Professors know where you are. If you do not put your names down for any other location then you are to report to this room or else."

"Or else what Granger," one of the Slytherins sneered.

"Or else face Professor Snape's wrath," she said as she brought one of the booklets to Ron and Harry while the rest of the students whispered about what she'd just said. Most had wandered up to the table and picked up a book while choosing to sign up to be at some other location for the next class.

She opened up hers and began to make notes of the questions being asked in the book as she explained to everyone, "Professor Snape is going to be one of the Professors monitoring those sign up forms so whatever you write down on it will be noted by those Professors. Even if they are not present here today they will still know where you're supposed to be for your next DADA class."

Harry put his booklet away because he wanted to finish the extra credit proposal that he'd been in the process writing up for Professor Flitwick and his Charms Class. He'd hoped that the Professor would allow it. It wasn't like he was going to create something terribly complicated.

It had been a lucky thing that Grubstone had come to the school too since the goblin had been the one to let him know about the Copyright issue with his creating a magical version of the particular muggle board game he'd chosen to convert for fun and hopefully to gain extra credit for his Charms and Transfiguration classes. He had to pay a fee and buy the rights to make the version he wanted because the original patent was currently owned by an elderly squib.

Harry had made sure that that was all in order before he could bring his proposal to the Charms and Transfiguration Professors. Payment had been properly made and he had his confirmation papers with him so that he could actually make the proposal and re-create the game.

It was now just a matter of outlining the magical properties he wanted to include as well as researching different types of charms that would make certain objects move and the transfiguration portions that altered the steps in the hallways of the board game. It was going to be interesting to see if he could change some things to be more of the Wizarding World rather than the muggle.

His game of choice was Clue or Cluedo depending on the version he was using as a template, but the principal of the thing was there. If it turned out well he was hoping that the twins would be willing to add it to their store offerings for whenever they opened an actual physical store.

Although it would never be a prank item it was certainly still classified as a new toy of some sort. He was hoping that he could work on it long enough to produce testing copies for the common rooms of each House in the school.

"Harry you should be studying," Hermione said when she noticed his attention was not on the booklet she'd just given him.

"I'm planning to do it this weekend," he said after adding death by a basilisk stare as one of the possible ways to die in Hogwarts Cluedo. He had the standard ones like hanging rope and knife, but he replaced the gun since that was a muggle concept that would never work in a magical environment. He chose to change it to death by exploding cauldron since he'd already seen the kind of destruction that one of those could do and he added a poison vial as another death option too.

His version of Clue was going to be centred on Hogwarts since he didn't know the layout of mansion like places, but he did know his school. It had several noteworthy places, like the Astronomy Tower, the Library, the Quidditch Pitch, the Forbidden Forest, etc… and those could be used to make up the locations where the game murder took place.

Four of the six figures would be the founders plus two that every student has used as a swear word or an exclamation quite frequently are those of Merlin and Morgana. However he wanted more ways to die rather than just limit them to the six in the normal game, but that involved some finicky calculations that he was actually looking forward to.

He rolled up his notes and put them away as the bell was about to ring. He chose not to write his name on the form sheet at the front of the room. He looked to see where most everybody chose to be and wasn't surprised that Hermione was going to go to the library while most others, including Ron, wanted to go to the duelling room.

Only three students had not chosen to put their names down for anything, one was Neville who looked like he wanted to talk to Harry and the other was Hannah Abbott, who was not in class with them today.

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Near the end of September, Harry was still testing some of the students for abilities in the old form of spell casting. He wanted to get at least some of the third years involved in his project and word of mouth was just not working so well. So he put up a notice on of the House dorms notice boards that stated the following:

ANCIENT MAGICAL STUDY - ALL HOUSES WELCOME

YEARS 3 & UP ONLY

Interested in researching ancient magical techniques?

Think you may have the ability to learn something unique and new?

Final Magical Testing will take place, last two Saturdays of September.

TIME: Between 10am and noon, only.

LOCATION: Rm. DD2243, sub-dungeon, level 2, old dueling hall.

Come if interested, no admissions will be accepted after October 1st of this year.

HP

"Really Harry," Hermione said as she posted the last notice in the Gryffindor common room. "What's this all about?"

"Just something I've discovered," Harry said. "I want to know if any other students have the same capability to learn this magical form or not."

"But you posted this in all four common rooms," Ron said. "Why?"

"I'm not going to limit this to only those from my House Ron," Harry said. "I want this to be for all Houses in this school. It's not fair to do otherwise."

Ron huffed, but Hermione said, "Think about it. How would you like it if Gryffindors were excluded from some kind of assembly just because we're not liked?"

"I'd claim bias," Ron said and the nodded. "All right, I get it. But what is all of this."

"Practice of magic, a different sort of magic, that's all," Harry replied. "It might contain DADA stuff, but it's going to mainly be something else." He paused in his notes and then said, "It's not like everyone that tries this will be able to do it. I've already tested several people and the ability is either there or not."

"I don't understand," Hermione said.

"Well if you want to know what it is," Harry looked at her. "Just come and try it out for yourself."

Harry - James - Potter - Harry - James - Potter

TBC…