A/N: For those of you who are counting... In my universe, James and Al are three years apart. So, instead of having James seven years after the battle, as most people assume when they read the DH epilogue, he was born four years after the battle. Some of you might criticize me, hypothesizing that Ginny and Harry would enjoy married life for as long as possible before having children, but I like to think that they didn't have any of their children on purpose- because all the oops babies I know are especially nice.
The letter looked like something straight out of a bad crime show. The address on the front of the parchment was made out of cut out and glued on letters from Muggle newspapers, and the inside was typed in a generic font. It was a threat to the Minister of Magic.
Draco Malfoy frowned, running his finger over the letters. It was like something Voldemort would send, just lacking the artistic qualities he would have added- poisoned paper in his early years, or, in his later years, traceable to someone he wanted in Azkaban. He knew Harry wanted to be notified of this sort of thing, but then entire Auror Department was reluctant. This was not the first threat they had received, and they knew it wouldn't be the last. But this one gave Draco a funny feeling.
There was a knock on the door, and Draco jumped.
"Come in," He murmured when he realized that he was alone in his nightmares of the rebirth of Voldemort. Nightmares that had kept him up for weeks.
"Malfoy, did you look at that file I gave you?" Bill Weasley asked, and Malfoy rubbed his nose.
"No, Mr. Weasley, I was... interrupted..." Malfoy explained, holding out the letter, "This came through our screening. It's for the Minister," The Head of the Auror Department took it, his fang earring quivering as his face reddened in anger, his eyes darting over the page.
"I think we should strengthen security around the Minister and his family..." Draco began, but was cut off by Bill's sharp glare.
"Harry can take care of himself. So can Ginny."
"But Albus and Lily..." Draco pointed out, and Bill's lips tightened, "Even Mr. Dursley and his wife. Whoever is thinking things like this will use people's family for revenge. It's the same thinking as the Dark Lord and his followers."
"Draco... you are truly a great assett, and I will get on that right away," Bill said, giving Malfoy a squeeze on the shoulder before yanking a thick red folder out from under another stack of papers.
"Read it." He ordered, and waltzed out of the room.
Malfoy picked up the folder and thumbed through its contents, his mind still buzzing with the words from the letter.
We will kill off your dirty halfblood offspring bit by bit, until we finally reach you, and tear you apart with bloodstained hands.
"Harry, you're getting threats again," Bill announced as he waltzed into Harry's office.
Harry raised his eyes from the papers on his desk, peering at Bill through his spectacles.
"From?"
"Mr. Malfoy is going to start tracing them, um, tomorrow. After he finishes reviewing the Hinshaw case." Bill decided on the spot, and Harry took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration.
"He should start now. That case is over, it can wait. A letter is easier to trace when the trail is fresh. Did they send it via owl?" Harry was thinking of appointing a new Department Head. Bill was fine, but Harry knew he missed his old job, and now that the girls were older Fleur probably wouldn't mind him being away a bit more. Not to mention he was rubbish in situations like this. Harry needed someone a bit more competent.
"Um... I dunno. There was an unfamiliar owl in Malfoy's office..." Bill replied, scratching his nose.
"Could you send him here? Please?" Harry asked, and Bill frowned.
"Why don't you just fire me?" He asked in frustration, and Harry laughed calmly.
"Because, you're bloody good in the field, you're just pure rubbish at the behind-the-scenes stuff." Harry reminded him, "Just send me Malfoy."
"Right," Bill said in a huff, and took off towards the Auror Department. Harry continued to read the tedious memo on his desk until Malfoy came skidding into the room, a few papers clutched in his hands.
"Sir? You wanted to see me?" He said, staring at the papers.
"Harry."
"Excuse me?" Draco looked up at his old enemy, confused.
"Please, Draco. You've known this for years. Call me Harry." Harry clarified, and Draco bit his lip.
"Erm, Harry, this letter was sent to you, and came through our screening system as potentially dangerous... it's not poisoned or anything, we checked, so it's safe to touch," Draco explained, handing Harry the letter. He gave Harry a moment to read it.
Harry scanned it, his face paling a little, but kept up his calm appearance.
"Well, it appears as though someone wants me dead." Harry observed, setting down the letter and putting his hands beneath his desk, wishing they would stop shaking.
We will rip apart every member of your family, everyone you care about, and wave the pieces in your face like a flag. Only after you have suffered more than you could ever imagine will we end your pain, slowly and painfully.
"And what we want to know is why." Draco agreed, placing something else on the Minister's desk.
"Well, I'm the first competent minister the Department has had for years, so of course someone will want me dead. I tell the public the truth, and it's not what they're used to. It's not what they want." Harry guessed, running a hand through his hair and glancing at a complicated diagram that Malfoy had just put on his desk.
"Right. But, we also think it could be someone who heard about the whole Dark Lord buisness all those years ago and decided it would be fun to take up some of his old practices." Draco traced a finger over a few of the lines in the diagrams, "See this? It's coming from the same place I used to live. Where Malfoy Manor was. Where the purebloods went. It's all in ruins now, but it would be a nice place to set up a secret hideout to do this from. No one tends to their properties any more. It's just a horrible reminder." Draco's tone became somber, and he started picking at his nails again. Harry felt a surge of sympathy for his coworker.
His parents were both dead. Narcissa had been ruled not guilty of Death Eater practices in the trials that followed the Second War, thanks to Harry's testimony of her remorse. However, he had been unable to save Lucius, due to his lack of remorseful gestures. Rather than make the weak man suffer in Azkaban, he had been hanged three years after the final battle. Narcissa had died shortly after, presumably of loneliness.
"So have you found where the hideout is?" Harry asked, and Draco shook his head.
"No. It's unplottable. The only way we got this," The blonde gestured to the complicated diagrams on Harry's desk, "Is because it's our job to know the loopholes."
"Ugh. Magic is such a pain sometimes," Harry complained, stretching, "Do you have any idea where they could be? More specific, I mean."
"No. This is all we have. It shows the district where I was born, raised... as was every other pureblood who shared our values. And that's all we have. Even when we try to label the streets, it stops working. Whoever made it unplottable did a fool-proof job," Draco grinned proudly, "But it's not Auror proof. We're also working on identifying where the newspaper letters for the address and the font for the type came from. We have the type narrowed down to three different typewriters circa 1970, and every single R in the address has been identified as letters from headings in the Daily Prophet- every one of them exactly the same," Draco said, getting excited, and pointing to the R's in 'Minister, Harry, and Potter.'
"Which means they bought more than one copy," Harry said quietly, admiring the handiwork.
"And the paper fibers from each one are completely different, so each of five newspapers came from a different spot. If we didn't have this," Draco gestured to the diagram from before, "it would be utterly impossible to trace. Whoever sent this only overlooked one thing- the owl they used, and how we can identify distance and direction with them."
"Explain to me how that works. You've changed it since I stopped Auror-ing, haven't you?" Harry asked, intrigued.
"Yes. Owls that are unfamiliar can no longer go straight to the recipient. Without reading the contents of the mail, we study them to log where they came from. We look for which ways the feathers have been blown, how tired the owl is, how much food it eats when offered, how much food it has digested on the trip, and several other factors." Draco explained, and Harry nodded, stopping him from continuing.
"It seems a little imperfect. What if they made stops along the way?" Harry commented, and Draco smiled.
"That was my argument. But, after some research, we discovered that owls are not only trained to continue on their journey, but actually have an unbreakable charm on them keeping them from staying in one place for too long. Eeylop came up with it. It's genius, and it really does us a favor." Malfoy checked his watch.
"Do you have to be somewhere?" Harry joked.
"Um, the results for where the paper is from are coming..." Draco said, and Harry laughed.
"Go. Figure out all you can, and don't report to me. Tell Bill I put you in charge of this case. And could you pass this on to him?" Harry asked, passing Draco a letter he had just scribbled down.
"Sure." Draco said, and walked sheepishly out of the room, suddenly realising how informal he had been with the Minister.
"Thank you, Draco."
"Thank you, sir."
Harry sighed. It never ended.
***
"OW!" Renesmee sucked on her thumb, which had just been damaged by a squealing Mandrake. No one heard her, however, due to the fact that everyone's ears were covered with muffs.
She could still hear through hers, and wondered if that was dangerous. She was feeling a little sleepy, but figured that was more because James had kept her up last night with Wizard's Chess than the howling of the mandrakes. She shoved the stupid thing in a bigger pot and dumped a bag of soil on it.
There was a loud bang, and everyone threw soil in their pots and yanked off their earmuffs. Renesmee was the second one out of the classroom, racing to catch up with James, who seemed to be in a bad mood. She caught him in a hard grasp and yanked him into a corner of the courtyard at top speed. James glared at her.
"Don't do that! You scared the shit out of me!" He growled, his eyes narrowed.
"James, why aren't you talking to me? Seriously! It's almost dinner and you keep avoiding me. What the hell is wrong?" Renesmee replied, trying to avoid his eyes so he wouldn't see the tears that wouldn't stop flowing from her eyes. It was late October, and the tears had been coming less often. James wouldn't be happy to see that it was happening again. Ren just couldn't stand being shut out.
"My dad." James huffed, "Look, I'll tell you but I'm not supposed to, so can we do this tonight? I just... let's do this later. Okay?"
"Okay. Just talk to me next time. I can't stand being freezed out." Renesmee replied in a forgiving tone, and James nodded, exiting to the castle. Ren sighed, slumping against the wall and wishing she could talk to Zafrina.
***
Ren waited for James for an hour in the common room, but he never showed. When she was certain all the girls in her dorm were in the common room, she gave up on James and went upstairs to catch up on sleep. Thank god it was Friday- she couldn't have gone one more day with an early wakeup. She dropped onto her mattress and was asleep practically by the time her head hit the pillow.
That night, Renesmee had a weird dream. She was watching someone writhe in pain on the ground, her wand hand extended. Her wand was clutched tightly in her fist, and it seemed to be vibrating, some sort of raw power exuding from it. A single word hissed through her lips.
"Crucio."
**
James shook Renesmee awake, urgently murmuring her name.
"Ren, Ren, come on. Wake up! I need to talk to you!" James said, pulling on a strand of her hair.
"OW! James, what the hell?!" Ren mumbled, burying her face in her pillow and absently swatting in James's general direction.
"C'mon, Ren, you have to get up! You were having a bad dream, I think, you kept whimpering, but if I'm right then you need to get up! My brother gets those a lot, you have to stay awake and distract yourself, or you'll start sleepwalking. I think..." James urged, shaking Ren some more.
"Ugh. James, I don't sleepwalk. What do you need?" Ren asked, rolling over to face him.
James's face grew morose, and he held out three sheets of parchment.
"I think my Dad's in trouble."