The day after Dumbledore disappeared Educational Decree 28 was posted; it declared the new head mistress was none other than Dolores Umbridge. Merlin was angry but it wasn't until he heard of the Inquisitorial Squad, which undermined the prefect system, that he took action. Merlin sought out the Weasley twins.
Merlin was standing outside the Gryffindor common room waiting for them when they exited. He snatched their arms quickly and dragged them behind a suit of armor where they took one look at him and crossed their arms.
"You've seen the new decree, right?" Merlin asked waiting for their nods. "Well that's not all that Umbridge has done. Now she has a squad of ministry supporters who can take points from whoever they want."
"What?" The twins exclaimed looking at each other in unison.
Merlin shushed them and said, "I know you two don't really care about completing your seventh year especially now that Dumbledore is gone and you could go start your joke shop any second. So what I was wondering if you wanted to make Umbridge's a living hell before you leave?"
"That depends-" Fred said with a grin that rivaled the Cheshire Cat's.
George completed his sentence for him, "On why you want us to."
In this case Merlin decided to be honest, knowing that it would affect the two of them more. "I was there when Dumbledore was forced out and I made him a promise."
With that the two red headed boys agreed to help Merlin and he was proud to see and hear the explosions of enchanted fireworks by lunch. The best part of his day was when one of the fireworks made its way into his class room and he'd been able to call on Umbridge to make her get rid of it.
From then until the day before Easter Break ended Merlin's life remained relatively calm with the exception of the two days that he'd taken the chance to go and fight off death eaters. However the night before school began again something unusual happened; Merlin saw the future without a crystal or flame, he dreamt it.
Harry knelt before a fireplace and flooed his head into the Grimmauld place so the he could talk to his god father. The room that he was in was a horrible shocking pink that could only be Umbridge's office. Footsteps slammed into the stairs as Harry pulled out of the fire and struggled to pull on his invisibility cloak.
He was to slow and filch caught the back of his shirt exclaiming, "Yes another one, now all I've got to do is find that whipping approval!"
As Filch swept his hand over the desk to grab what he'd been searching for Harry struggled against his hold. Nothing he could do got Filch to release him and he soon gave up. By that point the squib had what he wanted and began to work his way down the stairs to a crowd of people.
"I've got it." He cried to Umbridge, "and I caught this one in your office doing Merlin knows what. Can we whip him too?"
"Make sure he gets extra punishment," Umbridge cooed before whipping around to the Weasley twins, who had raised their wands upon seeing Harry, and yelling, "Expelliarmus."
"Maybe you could stun them?" Filch suggested with a wide grin. Umbridge nodded and did as was asked of her causing all three boys to fall to the ground with their backs exposed. Then she transfigured her clipboard into a whip and handed it to Filch.
"Take care of this will you? I'm quite tired." She told him.
Filch looked at her with pure adoration as he responded, "Of course," and began to whip the boys.
Merlin sat bolt upright in bed gasping for breath. Once he had calmed himself again he whispered to the ceiling and said, I guess I'll be busy tomorrow."
The next day the first thing Merlin did was set a tracking spell onto Harry so that he would be alerted whenever the boy got to close to Umbridge's office. Then he trekked out to the Forbidden Forest so that he could ask Firenze to watch over his class as he prevented the whippings.
The centaur readily agreed and followed him up to the castle so he would be there when Merlin stepped out. Once the two of them arrived in the room Merlin's third year class was already there and waiting. Merlin muttered a quick apology to them and began to talk.
He was on his fourth year class when he felt a faint tug in his gut begin to grow stronger. Knowing that it was the tracking spell he'd set Merlin exchanged heated looks with Firenze. The centaur took over instantly and the third years shifted their attention giving Merlin the opportunity to slip out of the class room.
Doing a half jog Merlin approached Umbridge's office. When he went through the door he saw Harry pulling himself out of the fire place having heard feet on the stairs.
When the student began to grab for his invisibility cloak Merlin said, "Don't bother with it, it's just me. Actually put it on Filch is on his way so put it on."
Harry obeyed and Merlin waved his wand around dramatically as he muttered a spell. The squib came in at that moment and searched for the small piece of paper that would allow him to harm the students.
Once he'd found it wand was out of Harry's site Merlin mumbled, "Amser, er Arglwydd Magic, atal."
Time stopped once again this time so that Merlin would have the chance to talk to Harry before he went to go check on George and Fred.
"Are you done talking to Sirius or do you need to floo him again, we have all the time in the world," Merlin said laughing at his little joke.
The boy stiffened at his godfather's name and said stoutly, "I have no idea who you are talking about."
Merlin nodded and said, "So you're done then."
Excitedly, the warlock clapped his hands and said, "Good, that's good. You learned everything you want to, I know Snape's memories left you with a lot of questions."
"How do you know about that?" Harry snapped at him, "I haven't told anyone and Snape hates you."
Not wanting to explain that he had lengthy discussions with the portraits Merlin waved him off saying, 'How I know doesn't matter, what matters is that he isn't teaching you Occulemency anymore. If Voldemort can see what you're up to that's something pretty important to stop so I wanted to offer to teach to some more."
Harry looked unsure and gave a tentative maybe. Once that had been taken care of Mein released the spell and hurried towards the twins. When he got down the stairs he was pleasantly surprised to see them summoning broomsticks and advertising their new store.
'Huh,' Merlin thought, 'they must have just been surprised to see Harry last time.'
Despite that Merlin waited until he was sure the twins were all the way gone to return to his class.
