Disclaimer: Come writers and critics and JK Rowling with your pen, and keep your eyes wide; the chance won't come again.
A/N: I was pleasantly surprised to see how positive the reaction was to the previous chapter. And now I'm worried I've oversold it. Once again, this story is meant to be a condensed version of events, so things like this will be resolved quickly in terms of word count. If anyone wants to write a longer, more detailed version of this episode, be my guest.
So, I miscalculated how long the last few scenes would run, and it turns out there are only three chapters left. The end of the story is now fully written. While it's in the queue, I'll be working on new chapters of my other stories. As always, thanks for reading.
Update: I've just put out a new one-shot, Blitz, which offers a different take on a similar topic, and features a young Tom Riddle.
Chapter 21
13 August 2012
To Hermione's surprise, she was not chained to a chair when she testified to the ICW, as she would have been in a trial at the Ministry of Magic. Instead, she stood, wandless, but free, in the middle of the floor while the delegates from around the wizarding world sat around her in something like an indoor amphitheatre. She didn't know if that was standard or if someone had pulled some strings to arrange it that way.
About a hundred and fifty witches and wizards stared down at her, a few sympathetically, but many more with hostility and many others with curiosity or suspicion. Some of her family sat up in the gallery with some reporters and a lot of other officials. Supreme Mugwump Babajide Akingbade stood on a raised dais at the front of the chamber, wearing traditional African robes that resembled the ones Kingsley Shacklebolt used to wear, though more ornate. He had a sour look about him and didn't take his eyes off Hermione as he addressed the room, and as much as she thought he believed he was doing the right thing by his country, he made her distinctly uncomfortable.
"On the matter of Hermione Granger, Doctor of Arithmancy, of the British Isles," Akingbade said, "the ICW has assembled to assess the impact of the disruption caused by Professor Granger's manifesto, and the appropriate response thereto."
Manifesto? Hermione thought. Was that what people were saying about her?
"Since 1689, the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy has been the cornerstone of magical society. It is central to the wizarding identity—a unifying force in our world. It has been key to keeping us safe from muggle persecutions, not just in remote centuries, but still today in many parts of the world. My own homeland is but one example; in Nigeria, the greatest number of witch-hunts, whether they find true witches or not, are directed at children, who are too young to defend themselves or control their magic. Yet now, we see a rabble of troublemakers, long suppressed by good sense, stirred into action by this provocateur…"
Akingbade went on for a long time, extolling the virtues of the Statute of Secrecy, describing its history and why it was put in place, why it was still needed today, and condemning the actions of those who would see it repealed. He said more about the people reacting to Hermione's paper than about Hermione herself, avoiding casting too many direct aspersions at the outset. She looked around at the room and thought she might have seen some kind of signals between the delegates, but there was nothing clear.
Finally, after a speech that was long enough that she wondered if it was meant to tire her out from the standing, Akingbade reached his conclusion. "…Some of us still remember the terror and slaughter brought about by the Dark Lord Gellert Grindelwald when he mounted his rebellion against the Statute of Secrecy from 1927 to 1945. A wizard who brought half the wizarding world under his boot heel and nearly destroyed us all with his brutal ways. Witches and wizards of the world, we cannot allow this bloody and subversive ideology to take hold once more.
"Hermione Granger, you are the instigator of the present wave of civil unrest. What do you have to say for yourself?"
Hermione took a deep breath and quickly mentally revised her statement in response to Akingbade's speech: "I say, Supreme Mugwump, categorically, that I am in no way a follower of Gellert Grindelwald or his ideas. Grindelwald wanted wizards to rule over the muggles, and I strongly disagree with that notion. Grindelwald sought to achieve his ends through war. I am making no calls for rebellion, and I condemn anyone who would twist my words for violent ends. This is not a time for violence or civil disobedience. It is most certainly not a time for any member of the magical world to attempt to unilaterally bring down the Statute of Secrecy, for this would do more harm than good.
"This is a time for rational debate," she said. "I used urgent language in my writing because I believe this is an urgent problem, but it is a problem that will be only be solved by careful discussion and planning. Like all of us, I merely want wizards and muggles both to live in peace. If there were still a way to do that separately, I would accept that, just as I have since I was eleven. But with the way things are now, I believe we cannot do it separately much longer, so soon, it must be together instead."
She thought Akingbade would continue to question her himself, but those opening statements seemed to be the cue to open the floor for questions. She could see more hints of politicking now—delegates whispering to each other in what looked like little cliques to her, with a few spokeswizards speaking for them.
"So you admit that you are calling for the repeal of the Statute of Secrecy?" one of the other African delegates demanded.
"In the narrowest sense, I have not, sir," Hermione said. "The point of my paper was that the Statute of Secrecy is unsustainable. I believe that in the not-too0distant future, it will fall whether I or this body act or not."
Another question: "I've read your paper, Professor Granger. It seems to clearly direct the reader to the conclusion that we should abolish the Statute ourselves. Do you deny it?"
Hermione sidestepped the question slightly: "It is my personal belief that the best course of action would be to repeal the Statute of Secrecy before it collapses so that we can plan our exposure to the muggles in advance, including all necessary safety measures. In my paper and my open letter, I did not say that directly, but I listed a number of arguments that, yes, would imply that is preferable. There are still workable alternatives."
"Such as?"
"Planning contingencies for a mass exposure event that is too large for us to cover up. In fact, we should probably be doing that anyway, and perhaps the ICW already has."
"We have contingencies for mass exposure events," Akingbade said dismissively. "Anything else?"
She shrugged. "A slower roll-out. Gradually bring more muggles in—scientists, politicians, journalists—all bound by magical contracts—and have them help us organise the full reveal. We had great success with something like that at the South Pole a few years ago. However, this has the disadvantage of looking like…of actually being a massive, global conspiracy of the muggles' own leaders. Many of them won't take that bit well. I'm sure the ICW could think of other ideas."
"You've seemed awfully certain of yourself through all of this," said a delegate with an American accent. "You make a lot of claims about what muggles are capable of, Professor Granger, but we have learnt to hide ourselves from muggles for three hundred years. We know a lot of tricks. You don't think we can keep it up?"
Hermione turned to the wizard. "Just because we've kept it up for a long time doesn't mean we can keep going with it, Mister…"
"Samuel Quahog, delegate for MACUSA," he said curtly.
"Mr. Quahog, simply put, the ability of muggle technology to detect magic, even by accident, is growing faster than our ability to hide it; and that gap will only grow over time. I describe this in more detail in the paper, but the number of cameras in the muggle world is doubling every two years. In England, we are very familiar with these cameras and the trouble they cause. The muggles use them to catch criminals, but they also see magic done in public, and it is becoming harder and harder to cover up what they see."
"And yet you're doing it now. Muggles can be Obliviated, and their cameras can be wiped clean. Any inconsistencies can be smoothed over with plausible stories. Even if these methods are a bit more difficult, we aren't having any trouble keeping the secret."
"But those methods depend on our responding quickly," Hermione said. "Before the muggles tell anyone else. Or to know where magic will be taking place, like magical train platforms. But we can't always predict where magic will take place. Accidental magic by muggle-borns, magical creatures getting loose—it happens. And mobile telephones have made it easier for a muggle to contact a friend at a different location. Phones with cameras made it possible for them to take photos on the spot, copy them, and send them elsewhere before we can reach them. With cloud storage, some of them are automatically copied and uploaded somewhere else instantly. The physical location of those photos can be on another continent by the time an Obliviator gets to them."
"Do you really believe we're so powerless against the muggles?" Quahog said. "We can expand our watch over the cities, as we are doing now."
"Honestly? Yes, I do believe that. And it's not just the cities. Right now, these cameras are mostly in the major cities, where magic is mostly confined to particular Unplottable areas and thus is not particularly exposed. But in another ten or twenty years, they will work their way down to the small villages, where our people live intermingled with muggles and practice magic more openly, and our usual methods of concealment won't be enough. Computer monitoring is also becoming able to watch far more cameras than the muggles can themselves and to detect problems automatically. The upshot: muggles won't need to actually see it happening. They'll start to notice something's up from the gaps or glitches in the video."
"We've heard this alarmism about muggles before," a different delegate spoke up in a stern voice. "We won't be able to hide ourselves. They will outbreed us. They will turn their weapons on us. Their pollution will kill us. Even your concern about surveillance cameras, Granger. But all of these have been unfounded. In three centuries, the only serious danger has been from those who would deliberately reveal us! People like you!"
"Perhaps you are biased by your muggle heritage," the Supreme Mugwump took over the conversation again. "Perhaps it makes you believe they are a greater threat than they really are. Or maybe you want us to reveal ourselves because of your loyalty is to them."
"NO!" she shouted without thinking, and she was surprised to find she meant it. "It would be better if we didn't have to—if we could stay hidden. I think I'm as afraid of revealing ourselves to the muggles as the rest of you—or even more because I can guess how they'll react."
"And how, pray tell, is that?" Akingbade said suspiciously.
"Jealousy. Jealousy and anger."
"Anger?" a witch who looked to be from Latin America said. "In what way?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Hermione said. "We have magic, and they don't. We live decades longer. We're genetically 'better' by many people's standards. That will breed jealousy, and the usual fear, but also resentment. There are certain kinds of muggles for whom it would be a crisis of faith, or a personal insult. And that's before the accusations begin."
"Accusations? Accusations of devil worship? The witch-hunts?"
"No. Accusations like, what were we doing during the holocaust?"
"The killings in Grindelwald's War? We were fighting Grindelwald, of course!"
Hermione nodded. "Fair. And what were we doing while the simple flu bug wiped out a hundred times the population of the entire wizarding world in the span of two years?"
A very old man answered, "In the Great War, Professor Granger? That wasn't exactly an easy time for us, either, you know."
"Perhaps not," she said. "And when earthquakes ravaged Indonesia and Haiti recently, we had our own people to worry about, though some of us did help the muggles. And when tropical cyclones wiped out whole cities—well, even we can't control the weather. There are always excuses, but do they apply every time? These are the questions the muggles will ask once they get over the shock and actually take the time to think about it. I'd wager plenty of muggle-borns think them already, but the Statute of Secrecy always provides them an answer. If it fails…Where were we when muggles were starving by the tens of millions in China? Could we have helped when five million muggles a year were dying of smallpox? Could we have stopped AIDS from becoming a pandemic if we helped early? Could we—"
"Enough!" Akingbade roared. "This is nonsense! We don't have the resources to help the muggle world like that!"
"Yes, we know that, but they don't! Muggles don't have a clue what magic can and can't do. Half of them will probably think we're immortal and can raise the dead. We'll have to explain ourselves and hope they listen—and when it comes to certain things like medical research, I'm not sure they'll find our answers adequate."
The muggle scientists at the South Pole had been understanding, but they did ask those questions. David Brin had asked too and had been significantly harsher.
At this Quahog spoke up again, angrier than before. "And here you are, preaching fear of the muggles! You speak of their power, their numbers, their anger, and the tools they can bring against us. You sound more and more like the doomsayers of the past."
She shook her head: "I'm only telling the truth as best I can determine it. The muggle internet era has truly been a change of a kind we haven't seen before."
"But that's just what he said about their atom bombs," and old European witch said. "'How long will it take before they turn their weapons on us?' Gellert Grindelwald said those exact words in his Paris rally in 1927."
"Would you have us conquer them before it's too late or simply exterminate them?" another said.
"Or do you think as he did that 'The beast of burden will always be necessary'?"
"Dammit! I don't want WAR!" Hermione screamed. She spun around, trying to meet the eyes of all the delegates at once. "War is the last thing in the world we want because we'd LOSE!"
There were gasps throughout the hall, which quickly subsided to silence. Hermione was shaking.
"We'd lose," she repeated softly. She seemed to have the floor, now. "Or at the very least, we'd never be able to win. Not even if we struck first. A million of us against seven billion muggles? We'd never be able to find them all, whatever we actually did with them. And no, they'd never be able to find all of us, either, but is that what we want? Both sides dug into our trenches and afraid to show ourselves in daylight? And what about the very muggle-born children you want to protect, Supreme Mugwump? In your homeland, it may be the worst witch-hunt in history, but in other countries? Cooler heads will prevail, and they'll think of recruiting them."
She turned around again, and her eyes met George's up in the gallery. It had been a long time since she'd seen him look that worried, and as she had a moment to catch her breath, she feared she'd gone too far. "This sounds extreme," she said. "It is extreme. This won't happen in twenty years. It might not happen in fifty years. And, God forbid, if a war does happen, I'm not nearly as confident about how it will go. But I am confident about this: we can't cover up the existence of magic much longer. We probably couldn't cover up a major incident now."
"Again you ascribe such power to muggles and such impotence to wizards, Granger," Quahog said. "We have dealt with mass exposure events in the past, and we have methods to handle them. The solution devised by Newt Scamander in the Barebone Incident of 1926—"
"I know about the Barebone Incident, Mr. Quahog," she interrupted. "I studied major breaches of the Statute when I was writing the paper. "The venom of the Swooping Evil concentrated and dispersed in a thunderstorm. You want to try that in Dubai? Or Cairo? Phoenix? Mecca? Casablanca? Lima? Ulaanbaatar? And even if you did, in the five minutes it took you to do that, there would be photographs on the YouTube servers and the Facebook servers and the Twitter servers, which are distributed across major cities all over the world. If as many muggles saw it today as saw the Barebone incident, it would virtually guarantee it. Already, the best we can do is hide the magical world the best we can and discredit the evidence that leaks out, not erase it. Again, it's all in the paper."
The room seemed nervous now, less angry, at least at her. She was sure there was still a lot of tension under the surface, but refuting one of the go-to methods like that, it was starting to get them thinking. Soon afterwards, a younger delegate from one of the East Asian countries—Indochina, in the magical world, she thought—stepped forward. "Let's remain calm, please, and think about this rationally," he said. "There may be other mass Obliviation options. What if we use the muggles' own media? That would allow us to erase their records as well. Can their television conduct an Obliviate spell, Professor Granger?"
Hermione sighed. No harm in telling the truth, she supposed: "If you tapped into a major ley line intersection, you might make it work in principle, but no muggle media is universally consumed. You'd never get everyone. And the internet doesn't run in real time. Most of the time, those images will be nothing but random patterns of magnetisation on a metal disk in a warehouse somewhere. You can't embed a spell in that. Sooner or later, someone will notice and get in front of it. I'm telling you, it's only a matter of time, and eighteen years is the most optimistic time I can give you."
"We have the International Portkey Network, if you recall, Professor." To her surprise, it was Turi Te Kanawa from New Zealand. "We could piggyback a muggle-specific Obliviation spell on top of it."
"And force all in-the-know muggles to wear Anti-Obliviation Charms at all times?"
"If necessary," Samuel Quahog grunted.
"You'd buy ten years," she replied. "Maybe twenty at the outside before computers get smart enough to notice the discontinuities on their own. Then you have all the surveillance systems in the world consistently throwing the same kinds of errors where muggles can't figure out what's going on. They'll figure out something's up eventually, and they'll be ten times as paranoid in the meantime because they'll think it's spies with invisibility technology or—or space aliens or God knows what."
"You seem awfully determined to be right for someone who's afraid of our exposure," someone observed shrewdly.
"Because I've already thought of as many objections as I could, and none of them worked," she said. "I already addressed a lot of this in the paper. I even approached the muggle author whose work inspired the paper under the guise of a fellow author writing a fantasy novel." That was a lie. She'd told Dr. Brin everything. "A muggle who knows their technology better than I ever will. In every scenario I could imagine, the muggles would still notice something was wrong, and from noticing something, it's a much shorter path to figuring out what that something is.
"Face it, this isn't a secret we can keep anymore. A million of us, only a few percent of whom can really understand muggle technology enough to keep up with it, against—I say it again—seven billion muggles? It just. Can't. Be. Done."
The questioning continued for hours and into the next day, but Hermione felt that the room had turned for the better at that point. She was interrogated on every part of the paper, and more and more scenarios were brought up about how secrecy might be maintained. Each night that week while the hearings went on, the delegates no doubt Portkeyed home to consult with their governments and experts in their home countries. The other arithmancers who had signed their support of Hermione were questioned, as were other experts who had expressed no opinion or were hostile. Some of them were even more hostile to her than the delegates and outright slandered her, but on balance, the pressure seemed to be easing. A few of the delegates even came up to her privately, very nervous, but thanking her for her work because they now felt detection by muggles was a very real possibility.
17 August 2012
The hearings finally ended on Friday, and by then, the tide had clearly turned despite a few holdouts. By the time it was over, even Supreme Mugwump Akingbade had to grudgingly eat his words.
"Professor Granger," he said. "On behalf of the ICW, I wish to apologise for your poor treatment over the past two weeks. You allegations were inflammatory, to be sure, but I confess we overreacted. Treating you like a criminal was unwarranted, and we thank you for risking your reputation and your liberty to bring this information to our attention…I must admit, reluctantly, that your claims may have merit…Let it be known that ICW will press no charges against you, and it will appoint a Special Investigative Committee to study the issue of the sustainability of the Statute of Secrecy in light of current muggle technology."
This caused shouting on both sides. The majority were more or less on her side now, but the decision was still sure to make people angry. Hermione didn't think it would be too bad until Samuel Quahog from MACUSA stood up. "Supreme Mugwump, MACUSA wishes to formally express its strong disapproval of the ICW's decision," he said. "Professor Granger should be censured for fomenting civil unrest if nothing else, and we continue to consider her a serious risk to the security of the magical world. In light of this, under the Rappaport Revision Act of 1966, MACUSA is exercising its authority to ban Professor Granger from entering the country effective immediately."
This again brought forth shouts of both approval and disapproval from the chamber, but Hermione's heart sank. This was going to be for the long haul personally as well as politically.
The Americans' declaration spurred on a scattering of others around the world, including several countries in sub-Saharan Africa, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Indonesia, and, weirdly, Poland and Argentina. Apparently, some people were worried she'd stir up trouble or take her little campaign a bit too far and wanted nothing to do with her.
There was clearly some wheeling and dealing going on behind the scenes, and even some delegates who supported the investigative committee were giving her funny looks. It soon emerged that they were also interested in restricting her movements; in the end, they couldn't exactly ban her from travelling internationally because she could always travel by muggle means, but they strongly implied they wanted her to be chaperoned whenever she travelled just in case she tried to do something rash.
"Of all the bloody, stupid—" she muttered to herself as she walked out. "They just couldn't leave it be, could they?"
But her anger was short-lived as she walked into the lobby a free witch, and Emmy and Robin both squealed, "Mummy!" and leapt into her arms.
"Oof! I'm glad to see you too, kids," she said as she adjusted her balance. "I love you, you know that?" She kissed both of them on the tops of their heads.
George managed to stretch his arms around all three of them and kissed Hermione hard.
"Eww!" Emmy said right next to their ears. Everyone around them laughed, and George ruffled her hair until she swatted his hand away.
"George, I'm so sorry about all this," Hermione said. "If I'd known they'd react like this—"
"You'd've done the exact same thing, and you know it," he cut her off. "You always do the right thing, Hermione. That's what I love about you."
"I would've done a few things differently," she muttered.
"Well, it's alright now," he said. "We'll fix the rest of the mess soon enough. Let's go home."
31 October 2012
Hermione flexed her fingers and massaged the muscles in her hands, trying to soothe the aches. She hadn't even fought for that long. It had been a curb-stomp, really. But like a sprint she wasn't conditioned for, that short frenzy of curses took a lot out of her. Maybe a little more magical conditioning was warranted. She was pretty sure she could still manage a drawn-out running duel like the one she'd fought against Bellatrix Lestrange, but she hadn't been in a real fight in so long that she was out of practice. And it seemed she still needed to stay in practice.
She was still angry—furious, really. She wanted to go off into the woods and burn off her excess energy tearing apart a grove of trees in dark, eldritch ways. But she suppressed her rage in front of her children, putting on a pleasant face for their sakes. They'd been traumatised enough already tonight
It had started innocently enough. Emmy wanted to go trick-or-treating, so Hermione put on her most traditional witch's robes for the occasion. Emmy decided she wanted to be Merida…which was embarrassingly easy to pull off. Robin didn't really know what was going on except that there were sweets involved, but she put him in a bear costume, then collected Russell Whitby from down the street and drove them up to the village (it was a bit far for the kids to walk), parking at a friend's house so they could make the rounds.
It went fine for a while. Moss was a quiet little village, only a fraction the size of Hogsmeade, and people rarely expected any trouble there. Unfortunately, Hermione and her family had grown complacent about All Hallows' Eve over the past decade, and when a curse flew out of the bushes at her at the edge of the village, she was caught unawares.
A wave of clarity not unlike what she felt from Ravenclaw's Diadem, and she saw what she had to do before it consciously registered. She was carrying Robin, as they were walking back to the car. At that moment, she spun on the spot and half-dove to place herself between the attacker and the three children. She practically tossed Robin into Emmy as she pushed all three of them to the ground, then twisted her body so she wouldn't fall on them. Screams cut through the night. A jolt shot up her arm as she landed on her elbow, her other hand occupied by reaching for her wand. The first curse exploded behind them, blasting her face with heat and specks of dirt. Another curse flew, and she flicked her wand, barely getting a shield up in time for the spell to explode against it.
And then it was her turn. She rolled to her feet and slashed her wand at the bushes even as she reached for her other one. Twigs snapped in the bushes, clearing some of the brush away.
"Drop your wand!" she ordered.
She was answered by more spellfire, but she responded twice as fiercely. In seconds, the bushes were utterly destroyed, and she could see her attacker, a wizard in a faceless, black robe.
The duel paused just long enough for her to react. "Drop it!" she shouted again.
"Dunglicking mudblood bitch!" The words were slurred. Then, he attacked again. Later, she wasn't sure if he'd meant to cast at Emmy or if he was so drunk his aim was just that bad, but when she heard her daughter scream, that was when Hermione came down on the dark wizard like an avenging angel.
When the dust cleared, and she had obtained and snapped her attacker's wand, she quickly checked on the children. Robin had bumped his head when he fell and was insensible with terror. Emmy wasn't hurt that badly. The curse had missed, although she had a few cuts and scrapes from the backlash, and Russell had run halfway across the field by the time she spotted him again. Little kids were fast when they wanted to be.
"Mummy?" Emmy said quietly when she approached.
Hermione pulled her into her arms, near tears. "It's okay, Emmy," she said. "He's gone. No one's going to hurt you." She raised her wand in the direction of Windrose Field, a mile away, and cast red sparks into the sky as high as she could. She didn't think she'd be able to manage a Patronus for a few minutes.
Emmy was still scared stiff. "Mummy? Did you do that?"
Hermione pulled back far enough to see her daughter's wide eyes staring over her shoulder. She turned around and saw the place where the attacker had been was a smoking ruin, and her heart sank. Emmy was scared of her—or maybe not scared, but certainly intimidated.
She quickly turned her away. "It's okay, Emmy. It's over. You're safe. I'll always protect you and Robin; I promise."
"Is he dead?" Emmy said.
She groaned. Of course she'd pick up on that. If she'd had to kill in front of her kids, even to protect them…But when the Aurors arrived and checked the body, she was surprised to find he was still alive. He looked like a nightmare, and Hermione made sure the kids couldn't get a clear look, but he was alive. Probably for the best; they could question him that way. Unlike with Umbridge, the Healers made her lift the curses on him before they treated him. She wasn't keen to, but she could see why it was necessary.
George and the Whitbys arrived to take them all home, and the incident was over, but they wouldn't forget it for a long time. Emmy had settled down by then, although her animated attempt to describe the fight to George made both of her parents uneasy. It might not be the best for her to get too excited about how "bad-ass" (George's word, and not in front of Emmy) her mother was.
It was only to be expected that some people would be unhappy about there being even a chance for the Statute of Secrecy to be repealed—even driven to violence in their anger. Hermione kicked herself for not anticipating it.
Things were already changing in magical Britain. After she was cleared by the ICW, Gawain Robards had lost his bid for reelection and was replaced by Penny Haywood in an upset. Tonks was an old roommate of hers and said that she was a half-blood who spent a lot of time in the muggle world. Anyway, Hermione could only hope the chaos would die down in a few months, but she feared it would continue at least as long as the ICW continued its investigation.
Things were changing for her, too, and not just because of the attack. She was switching gears in her work. Some of her long-term projects, ones she'd dabbled in over the years, but never put serious effort toward, seemed to take on a new sense of urgency, both because if the Statute fell, she had a feeling she wouldn't have much spare time for a long while, and because some of them might come in handy if there were problems with the repeal. Chief among these was replicating Ravenclaw's Diadem. When the time came, she'd feel better having her own copy to work with rather than borrowing the original from Hogwarts.
That would be something else that would be good to have in case of emergency, she thought, even if she wouldn't have had time to use it tonight. It wouldn't be easy, though.
1 September 2013
Sadly, the civil unrest continued to simmer over the next year, but there were no more serious attempts on Hermione directly. Word got around on what she'd down to the man who'd attacked her family. That wizard, the son of a Death Eater and a habitual drunk, had spent months in St. Mungo's even with her lifting the most troublesome of the curses on him. Dark magic never came away clean, especially when there were spell interactions.
There had been one attack on Harry in the past year. They caught him when he was alone, trying out his new Firebolt Supreme (which he said was finally good for once). Two wizards dropped down from above him and tried to hex him out of the sky. This didn't end well for them. Harry and Ginny had so perfected their mental connection over the years that to attack one of them was to get cursed in the back by the other before you knew what hit you.
Hermione had come to King's Cross again today to see off Marcus for his fifth year, but this year, she was joined by the rest of her family, and by more of her old classmates, notably including Harry and Ginny. James was starting his first year with young Morgan Lupin by his side, and both looked very excited.
In other news, Headmistress McGonagall decided that this was an excellent time to retire. As Hermione recalled, her exact words were, "Two generations of Marauders is enough."
Sasha Lupin had responded to this with, "Clearly, I haven't been trying hard enough."
But they were in good hands. Professor Flitwick had graciously agreed to take McGonagall's post, saying he "Liked a challenge."
Marcus was less enthusiastic this year. In addition to the gruelling O.W.L. year before him, he had been the target of ire this past year because of Hermione's political activism. The debates about the Statute of Secrecy within Hogwarts were just as fierce as without, and Marcus was stuck in the middle. By the time he came home for summer holidays, he was expertly imitating Harry's "angsty teenager" phase. Harry himself had told him to lighten up, but it only had so much effect.
The one major difference inside Hogwarts, according to the kids, was that there was more uncertainty and fear among the students than among the adults in the world at large (or maybe that was just the loud ones). Sasha had reported that Columba Malfoy was simply afraid, rather than angry like many of the old-family purebloods. Meanwhile, the muggle-borns were much more unreservedly for repeal, too young to understand the troubling implications, which further raised the tensions.
"I hope the ICW gets done 'investigating' soon," Marcus said. "Then we can finally stop debating it all the time."
Hermione snorted. "If only," she said. "Once they're done talking, we still have to actually do it."
"Ugh…" Marcus groaned.
The ICW was indeed still "investigating" and largely hadn't consulted her for information or insight. That worried her a little. Just putting it off would eventually see the decision taken away from them, but the insider information said they were making genuine progress and the committee would eventually recommend repealing the Statute of Secrecy. Until then, though, she would be waiting.
14 April 2014
"It is the recommendation of the Special Investigative Committee on Global Secrecy that the International Statute of Wizarding Secrecy be repealed in a controlled fashion within ten years, or risk forcible and irrevocable exposure by the muggles."
The uproar in the ICW chamber that week was palpable. A lot of people were embarrassed over having eat crow after their harsh words two years ago, and some of them were still strongly against it. It did, however, mean that Hermione's travel restrictions should be lifted soon, so that was a plus.
It took them three weeks of debate to actually approve the repeal, during which the arguments for why they couldn't keep hiding were rehashed again and again more times than even Hermione cared to count. Finally, it went through, with no small help from Percy Weasley, who was by now the British delegate. The wizarding world would come out of the shadows within ten years. All that remained was to pin down an exact date.
It had taken three years to fully implement the Statute when it was first enacted, but everyone said it would take even longer to dismantle it. A minority argued that it couldn't be done even in ten years, but the Committee was firm on that point. Hermione, through the Percy, had proposed the first of January 2020 as the effective date of repeal as a middle of the road compromise, but there were still detractors.
"Supreme Mugwump," the American delegate said—not Quahog anymore; he'd been elevated to President. "While MACUSA has, after much deliberation, determined to acquiesce to the ICW's decision, we cannot countenance any kind of reveal in 2020. The potential chaos caused by revealing the existence of magic during a muggle election year is too great to risk."
"This is preposterous!" one of the other delegates objected. "There's always an election somewhere. We can't accommodate every country. Why should MACUSA get special treatment?"
"Don't think we made this call lightly, sir," the American said. "Why should MACUSA get special consideration? Because the United States remains the most influential country in the muggle world, and it's elections are the most impactful. Indeed, what other elections could be? Russia? Those of you who are familiar with muggle politics, does anyone doubt Vladimir Putin will be reelected in 2018 without struggle? The Chinese President is elected by the legislature. India? Of regional importance, to be sure, but global?
"But in addition to this, the United State is one of the most religious and prejudiced-against-magic muggle countries in the western world. The Second Salemers would never have been able to function in any other western country in the twentieth century. If we were to reveal ourselves in an election year, this prejudice would be used as a political token and could be used to turn far more people against us than at another time. This could have worldwide implications for the revelation to go smoothly."
Akingbade did seem swayed by that argument. "You make a compelling case," he said. "Does MACUSA have a proposed date of its own?"
"In the muggle world, the first one hundred days of a President's term is considered to be a time for actively pursuing his political agenda. Although these efforts often fizzle quickly, we believe it would be prudent to wait until after this period is over to make the revelation. The one hundreth day of a presidency is April twenty-ninth, so we propose April thirtieth, 2021 as the repeal date."
Percy shot to his feet, improvising on the fly with a fervour Hermione had rarely seen from him: "Supreme Mugwump, the British Isles strongly object to this date. The thirtieth of April and first of May are a day and night of remembrance for the victims of our civil war. We understand that the ICW cannot accommodate everyone, but I think we can agree that there are few countries with memorials as solemn and recent in mind as ours. A few days either way will make little difference. If MACUSA wishes to propose a date in the spring of 2021, the British Isles will revise our own proposal to—" He checked his calendar. "—Monday, the third of May."
He looked down at Hermione and the other representatives. She nodded, and the others quickly agreed.
There was a good deal more back and forth over that, but more arguing about the logistics of having the reveal in the spring of 2021 as opposed to later (or earlier, a small minority said). A fair number of holdouts still wanted to wait as long as possible, but gradually, consensus began to build. When the final vote came, Percy's compromise was approved. The Statute of Secrecy would be officially repealed on the third of May, 2021.
15 April 2014
Hermione looked down and studied the Diadem of Ravenclaw in her hands as she waited outside Minister Haywood's office. She'd come a long way with this thing, but it was past time she ought to replace it and give it back to Hogwarts permanently. Maybe someday another student would come along who could actually use it.
Rowena Ravenclaw must have taken years or even decades to make this, working through methodical trial and error. When Hermione studied it, the principles seemed surprisingly simple, and she almost worried she was missing something. But Ravenclaw knew neither arithmancy nor neurology, nor did she have the diadem itself to help her along. In fact, she probably had only the barest notion of what a savant was until she actually wore it and learnt to wield it. To modern eyes, the mystery seemed much plainer, and months of work had given way to a breakthrough in understanding the artifact.
The hardest part was magically strengthening the diadem and making the charms permanent. It took a fair amount of alchemy, but changing the more ethereal qualities of the silver rather than the base ones. That was in addition to runes, minor rituals, and, at one point, polishing it with a Memory Potion. That was one of the more minor things she needed to talk to the Minister about today.
The replacement diadem wouldn't be an exact replica, of course. Rather, it would be an Archimedes Jewellers original, and it was one of her hardest pieces because she had so little guidance for what she wanted to do. Hermione first looked for symbolism tied to memory. An eagle would be too similar to the original. An elephant would look a bit kitschy since it wasn't African-style art. Ivy could symbolise memory, but more in the funereal sense. No, she needed a different angle.
On crowns they hung the dragon-fire.
Tolkien had rarely steered her wrong. She couldn't take it as literally as she had with Dragontooth. She was pretty sure that wasn't what was intended by the poem. A more abstract representation of dragon fire, but even then, she didn't have much to go on. She looked at a lot of possibilities online and saw only hints of what she had in her mind. Mostly, she was winging it.
Her own diadem, nearly complete now, was made from bands of yellow, white, and red gold braided together, but not in equal measure. Loops and swirls came off of the main band, trying to make it look windswept. It was studded with small diamonds and a type of large gem she hadn't created before: fire opals. That took a whole new manufacturing process on her part and a lot of experimentation to get those slapdash splashes of colour just right. She considered calling it Dragonfire, but eventually decided on The Sidereum, meaning "starry," for the opals.
"You've certainly done a lot with that diadem, haven't you?" George said beside her, motioning to Ravenclaw's.
"It's better to finally put it back where it belongs," Hermione replied. "Get one more thing wrapped up."
"I'm sure you'll think up plenty more," he teased her.
Yes, he was kind of right. They may not have been planning to repeal the Statute of Secrecy for seven years, but for herself, she had plenty to do in the meantime between homeschooling two kids and her arithmancy work.
Finally, they were let in to see the Minister. Minister Penny Haywood, a cheerful-looking woman with long, blond hair and bright blue eyes, had easily won over the voters, but Hermione was more pleased to see she had grown into the role quickly and had become a strong advocate for the repeal position, not to mention Hermione herself.
"Professor Granger, Mr. Weasley, welcome back," the Minister said. "And congratulations. This was a hard-won fight for you most of all."
"Thank you, Minister," Hermione replied. "And thank you for your support this past year. Incidentally, I take it my travel restrictions are lifted?"
"Yes, of course," Haywood said with a chuckle. "You have plans?"
She held up the diadem. "Yes, I need to make a trip to Africa to find some natural mortality ivory for the ritual to duplicate this thing. It's impossible to source in Britain these days." For good reason, but still, it was inconvenient. There weren't any replacements for ivory with similar alchemical properties. In fact, it was a bit surprising that Ravenclaw hadn't used any ivory in the diadem itself.
"You know, you still amaze me sometimes, Professor. So, what is this about? You said it was important in your note."
Hermione glanced at George. "Something that should be kept secret," she said. "Some of it extremely secret. I want to start a program that will anticipate potential threats from the Repeal and work to prevent them."
"The ICW's already looking at that," Haywood said. "MACUSA has been complaining that they still have Scourer descendants to worry about—modern-day witch hunters who will come out of the woodwork if they have proof magic really exists."
"That…could be a problem, but that's not what I'm talking about, ma'am. You know what I can do with magic. But consider: the muggles could easily have a hundred scholars who are my equal in mathematics, and still more in other fields."
She gave that a moment to sink in, and Haywood's smile vanished. "Oh, God…" she breathed.
"Yeah. That's the real problem. Have you read about that project I did a while back to prevent wizards from building nuclear weapons? It's that kind of thing, but now we need to get ahead of the muggle curve." She looked to her husband again. "George, I haven't even told you all of this, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate you not pushing me on it…It's time I told you what I really did to Bellatrix Lestrange."
A/N: I didn't have a good place to put this in the chapter, but I wanted to address one more argument I've seen on Reddit a lot, which is that wizards could easily beat muggles even without ridiculous magical power levels because they could Imperius the muggles to use all the nukes on themselves.
This will not work.
They did studies back in the Cold War, and the main finding was that 20% of people would survive a nuclear war even in the United States and Russia. And this was back when we had a lot more bombs. Yes, you would wipe out the technology that was in danger of discovering magic, but enough of humanity and its knowledge would survive, including EMP-shielded military databases, to rebuild some of it in a few decades. You might beat back the muggles enough to take them over by force, but even then, I think their numbers advantage would be too great to manage.
In my opinion, saying wizards would win because they could nuke muggles is just as silly as saying muggles would win because they could nuke wizards, even though I think muggles would win for other reasons.