Protectorate
A/N: Congratulations to Moonbeam who got the closest to Dumbledore's plot. We will see the beginning stages of it here as well as the revelation of the cubs' names. Sorry this is a little short and a little late! From here on out, I will try and update every Friday night.
The group stayed mostly silent as they waited on Professors Dumbledore, Snape, McGonagall, Sprout, and Flitwick to arrive. Some of the younger girls were busy playing with the now wide-awake twins making Harry and Neville smile. How could they, or anyone else for that matter, ever think that these children were evil? Like a wise woman had once said, they all had a part to play. Harry was kicking himself over not having the charmed necklaces ready in time.
They only to wait twenty minutes before the wards on the room alerted Hermione to someone attempting to enter without the proper password. The witch rolled her eyes and opened the portrait, admitting the 5 professors. All the occupants of the room schooled their features into an impassive mask and moved to one side of the room. Snape glared at his students and sneered at the four not of his house. They just stared back at him unblinkingly, Hermione and Neville cradling the babies in their arms protectively.
"Why are you these students out of bed after curfew, Mr. Potter?" Dumbledore asked, his kindly grandfather look in place. Harry sighed.
"Sir, I've asked you repeatedly to call me by my proper title, Lord Potter-Black. Hermione, Luna, Neville, and I were relaxing in here after finishing our homework when we heard a banging on the entrance. Luna opened the door and we invited them in while we waited on you."
"Miss. Greengrass, why did the lot of you leave the dorm?" McGonagall asked her. Snape glared at her, daring her to say anything bad about the other Slytherins.
"Draco Malfoy and his band of merry goons decided to corner us tonight and summon our wands. We were bound and he allowed his bodyguards and the older students to beat on us. One of the other kids came in and managed to free us and rally everyone to get our wands back. We fought them but were severely outnumbered. After several minutes of this, we managed to sneak away and we ended up coming here," she told them.
"Now, what did you do to provoke this attack?" Dumbledore asked after sharing a look with Snape.
"We didn't do anything! Those other kids attacked us and we barely managed to get away even after Chris got our wands back!" one of the 2nd years under Neville's protection, Oliver Shirven, stated indignantly.
"Mr. Malfoy said that you came in and began insulting him and then raised your wand to him. He further says that Mr. Crabbe and Mr. Goyle were only defending him from your physical attacks."
"I'm willing to provide a copy of the memories and make an oath on my magic that Oliver is telling the truth," Blaise told the Headmaster. Snape's eye twitched and Harry smirked on the inside.
"And I can project the memory for the whole room to see," Neville added from next to his wife. The twitch in the potions master's eye increased.
"In fact, why don't we go ahead and do that so that you can all be satisfied," Harry said firmly, coming forward and taking his daughter from his brother in all but blood. Neville placed his wand to Blaise's temple and extracted a pure silver memory.
"As you can see, this memory is a silver color, meaning that it has not been tampered with in any way," Hermione told them, Luke cradled in one arm. Flitwick nodded and Neville performed the charm to project the memory.
Pansy, Blaise, Theo, and Daphne entered the common room after studying, talking quietly about the Transfiguration essay. Their wands were held loosely in their hands and as soon as the door to the dungeons was closed, the wands were gone. The four older students looked up and gasped.
Every single student who had participated in the Saturday meeting was being held at wand point by another Slytherin student and were outnumbered 2 to 1. Crabbe, Goyle, and two other burly students physically restrained quartet until Malfoy and Flint could tie them up with rope.
"Well, well, well. What do we have here?" Flint sneered.
"Looks to me like we have a group of Blood Traitors," Malfoy replied, twirling his wand.
"Well you know what we have to do, then?"
"Yes. As Purebloods, it is our job to beat some sense into these poor souls," the blond said with fake sadness as the older students all cracked their knuckles. They began attacking the four bound teenagers on the floor while Flint and Malfoy encouraged them.
This last for around 3 minutes until a 4th year entered the room. He noticed the wands on the sofa and grabbed them. On the pretense of joining in on the fight, he managed to return the wands to the students on the floor. He moved back and fingered his own wand.
At Theo's nod, the boy, Jamie Olf, stunned all four of the attackers while the older students jumped up and began fighting. Christopher Jarob, another 4th year, grabbed the wands of the hostage students and handed them out while defending the first years.
After a few moments of this, Professor Snape arrived, distracting most of the offensive students as he pointed his wand at the younger students. Very quickly, Pansy and Daphne ushered the other students out, encouraging them to run full tilt down the hall.
As the memory ended, McGonagall glared at Snape and turned to the students from Slytherin.
"It seems that you are telling you the truth. All of the attacking students are to have three months of detention and will lose their house 40 points each," she said. Flitwick and Sprout nodded their agreement.
"Now Professor McGonagall, don't you think that is a little harsh for a petty squabble amoungst housemates?" Dumbledore asked in a condescending manner. The Head of Gryffindor opened her mouth to retaliate but was beat to it.
"Petty squabble? That is what you are calling that vicious attack on students? Not to mention, that some of these students are scions to noble houses! You have lost your mind, old man," Professor Sprout sneered as she stood in front of the group. The headmaster turned a dark red with anger. How dare that wench address him in such a manner!
"However you view it, these students will immediately return to their rooms," he replied, his voice slightly strained. Harry felt his heart lurch as he saw the frightened faces on several of the younger children.
"I don't think so, Headmaster," he said, stepping forward.
"And why is that, Potter?" Snape asked. He needed these children back in their rooms so that he could properly punish them for disgracing the house of Slytherin.
"Because all of the children in this room, minus Pansy and Daphne, are under the protection of one of the Most Ancient and Noble Houses, of which the Greengrass and Parkinson families are a part of," Hermione told him smugly.
"And because we have authority of them, we demand that they be placed in a separate dorm for their safety," Neville added, arms crossed smugly across his chest. Dumbledore and Snape shared a look.
"I, Minerva McGonagall, allow these students access to the empty visitor's dorm," the older lady stated. Flitwick and Sprout followed suite, effectively circumventing the Headmaster.
"Well, as their Head of House, Professor Snape will need to know the password and the students must attend the weekly house meetings," Dumbledore told them, hoping to regain some semblance of control.
"We override his authority here since he failed to account for this attack and protect his students. They will answer to the authority of the house they reside under," Luna replied. Dumbledore and Snape left shortly after that, not looking very happy with the way the events had panned out.
"I will need to know which students are under which house," McGonagall told them, stepping forward with a Dict-A-Quill and a roll of parchment.
"Under House Longbottom, there is Shriven, Olf, Jakob, Avery, and the Tuten brothers."
"Under House Greengrass: Davis, Zabini, Nott, Rudolf, and Randolfini."
"Under House Lovegood there is Verini, Santori, Avando, Crijal, and the Bennett sisters. Under House Bones, there is Lasser, Thompson, Avent, Kinsella, Hudson, and McCreary."
"Under House Potter and House Black, there is Grenado, Averett, Jarob, Calentes, Mathewson, and all 7 Riddick siblings."
"Under House Parkinson, we have Alexander, Zakarian, Tonuet, Cresenca, Wantoz, and Perkinson." McGonagall nodded.
"How do you plan to stop the students from telling their parents what has happened? I believe some of them are staunch supporters of the Dark Lord," Flitwick asked.
"Blaise cast a spell so that no one in the room could write or tell about it for a week. By then we hope to come up with a more permanent solution," Harry told her as he placed his sleeping child in the arms of the eldest Riddick girl. Hermione likewise handed Luke to Chris Jarob as several faint whimpers were heard throughout the room. All heads turned the quartet as they knelt down next to a box on the floor, a small bottle in one hand. They each lifted out a cub and settled on the floor to feed and take care of them.
"Lord Potter! What are those?" McGonagall asked sharply. Harry shot her a calming smile.
"These little ones are our familiars. We found them at the edge of the forest and they bonded with us," he told her.
"You know that the Headmaster will try and rid you of them when he finds out," Sprout cautioned gently.
"He can try but as familiars that have imprinted on our magic, they cannot be separated from us," Neville responded, staring lovingly at the red cub in his hands.
"I suppose I should go ahead and register them. Do they have names?" the Deputy Headmistress sighed.
"This one is Athena," Hermione said eagerly. Pansy snorted a little, causing Hermione to fake glare at the dark haired teen.
"Rude, Parkinson!" she declared. Pansy rolled her eyes and smiled slightly. The professors stared at them in a slight state of shock.
"I have Connor," Neville declared as his wolf hungrily drank from the bottle of wolf's milk.
"This beauty is Raven," Luna told them all softly, intently focused on making sure no air got in the nipple of the bottle.
"And I have Soren," the Chosen teen declared. The deputy nodded and wrote the names down.
"The set of dorms you will be staying in is directly connected to this suite. The password for the dorm will be "Cashew Crazy" and will change every week. Since you are all in a new dorm, I will assign Zabini and Parkinson to be in charge," she told them as the other professors left. Blaise and Pansy nodded in acceptance of this position.
After the Professors left, Luna turned to the crowd of students and looked them over. They all looked tired.
"How about you all go and get settled in for bed. After all, we do have classes tomorrow and I expect there to be several confrontations over this. On each bed is a necklace with the Hogwarts crest. This will protect you from most spells and will also act as an emergency portkey. Never take them off!" she told them. They all nodded and retreated through the dark green door into the adjacent dorm. Pansy and Daphne were the only ones left.
"Harry, we may need to move our plans up. We'll need to get rid of the Death Eater parents at the same time as taking the children. That way the next in line can assume the mantle of the Noble Houses," Daphne told him urgently. Pansy nodded her agreement and Hermione thought for a moment.
"We can have Susan message Madam Bones about it. It should all work out nicely," she said, a small smile on her face as she imagined the chaos to follow when Voldemort realized that the majority of his finances were cut off it one fell swoop.
A/N: I'm going to cut it off here. Next chapter is the fallout of the Slytherins moving out, the start of the rescue mission, and Dumbledore's plan.