If it were even possible, that morning the courtroom was packed with more people than the day before. Ministry guards had to hold people back for Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Draco to make their way to their respective boxes. Make-shift benches were crowded into empty spaces and people stood along the walls or crouched in the aisles.

"Attention!" one guard yelled, his voice amplified by his wand. "The doors are shutting. Any latecomers must adjourn to the anti-chambers where we will have the sound of the trial played. All rise for the Ministry of Magic."

The sound of the crowd standing echoed through the room, and Harry wondered what would happen if a riot broke out in such a crowded space.

Once they were all settled in, Scrimgeour reminded them of the purpose of the trials: to charge the four of them with crimes against the Wizarding world.

"I now call Farrell Gringwad."

Harry craned around to look for Gringwad, but the man didn't appear.

Scrimgeour looked furious. "Farrell Gringwad! Is he in the courtroom?"

The crowd murmured, shifted, and buzzed with excitement, but the man did not appear anywhere.

Scrimgeour glared at woman beside him. "Didn't you send the summons to him last night?"

"Yes," she nodded fervently as she searched through stacks of parchment. "To his last known address. Of course, we send tax collections there every year and he hasn't paid in thirteen years. He did once drop a bag of Galleons off, but they were hexed and caused two days worth of chaos because every person who touched the gold went temporarily blind –"

"Enough!" Scrimgeour glared out at the courtroom. "Farrell Gringwad is now wanted by the Ministry for blatant disregard for a summons."

"I don't know what good that will do," another Ministry man on the other side of Scrimgeour commented. "We tried to lock him up in Azkaban before. There was an unfortunate 'accident' while transporting him to the prison and he disappeared. Anyone," the man raised his voice, "with information on Gringwad, please inform us immediately."

"I call Luna Lovegood!" Scrimgeour nearly roared.

Harry hadn't seen Luna since the attack on the manor, but she looked much the same as she tripped up to the stand and looked around with a dreamy smile.

Scrimgeour allowed a few other Ministry members to ask her bland questions – how long had she known Harry Potter? What family did she have? – and then he started in with the real line of questioning.

"Tell us about the night Harry Potter impregnated you."

Every breath in the courtroom was held as Luna blinked softly.

"Oh, it was very cold that night. I couldn't sleep and I felt something drawing me downstairs, down and down until I came the dungeons. I don't go into the teacher's rooms usually, but the door opened and I went in. Harry was sitting on the bed in the small room. He looked so sad. We talked and then we did more . . . together."

"He took your innocence," Scrimgeour said.

"I gave it to him," Luna replied. "He was so sad, but I was glad to distract him."

Harry had seen Mr. Lovegood sitting in the nearby rows when Luna took the stand, but he didn't dare look back at the man while his daughter was recounting the night.

"You were caught kissing before New Years," Scrimgeour produced the newspaper headline that showed Harry and Luna kissing under the words HARRY POTTER MAKES HIS MARK. "This looks like a cute infatuation. Students are allowed to date at Hogwarts, but there are magical restrictions which ban sexual encounters for all students. Parents shouldn't have to worry about their twelve-year-old girl being taken advantage of by a seventeen-year-old boy."

"Harry and I are both sixteen."

"The magic has not ever failed. If impropriety is attempted, teachers are notified immediately. But no alarms went off that night?"

"No, they didn't."

"You weren't caught at all, were you?"

"No."

"Would you venture a guess that the same powers which overrode the castle's secuirities were the same powers that drew you down to Mr. Potter that night?"

"I don't understand."

"You said you felt something calling you, pulling you down to the dungeons. You were powerless to resist, almost a type of Imperious Curse?"

"It felt different than that," she glanced away, eyes hazy with memory. "I felt needed, not commanded. I wanted to help."

"You went down there planning to have sexual relations with Mr. Potter?"

"No, not really."

"At what point did you decide? Was it a definite choice? Or rather, did you find yourself in the middle of the act before you could say no, before you could voice an opinion, before you could do anything against such powerful magic?"

"I don't know," Luna whispered. "I never really know."

Harry felt his stomach churning as his ears rang with raw humiliation and horror at the idea of forcing himself on her, on anyone. He had been nearly sick the first time he had heard about rape – 10-years-old and listen to a news story on the telly. He had gone to dictionary and looked up the word, not daring to ask his aunt or uncle about it. That night he had lay in his cupboard and thought about how horrible people could be to each other to do something like that. At the time, he hadn't even really understood sex other than the fact that babies were made that way and bodies fit together when doing it. Rape had been inconceivable then.

But as he watched Luna, he knew the word was in everyone's mind as they listened, listened to the sweet, dreamy girl confess to what had happened to her. Revolting.

"You were impregnated," Scrimgeour went on, "not with a baby, but a man's soul."

"I was," she absentmindedly twirled a lock of blond hair. "I knew something was different, but I told Harry I was pregnant because I had to stay with him."

"Just to be clear, Mr. Potter's magic draws you to him so he can impregnate you with the soul of his adopted father and then the magic forced you to stay with Mr. Potter. Magic that robs you of your virginity and then enslaves you to your rapist?"

"Stop it!" Mr. Lovegood shouted from the rows. "Stop it right now! Leave her alone."

"Mr. Lovegood," Scrimgeour was stern but glee flashed in his eyes, "I am recounting the facts so that punishment can be aptly applied. If I gloss over events, it helps no one."

"We look at things differently," Luna said. "Like when you look at the sky upside down."

"But your coercion was not the only one. Mr. Malfoy also tricked Mr. Potter into starting the battle on New Year's Eve, didn't he?"

For the next few minutes, Scrimgeour drew out details from Luna about the Portkey, the decision to set the marketplace on fire, and the switching of Marks.

"You are saying Mr. Potter no longer has a scar but he wears the Dark Mark still?"

"Yes, he does. The scar was burned in the battle, but the Mark remains," Luna tilted her head. "It's not a bad mark and he usually wears long sleeves. I have answered so many questions. Can I go home now? Can I take my father home and you let us live in peace like you promised?"

"You are dismissed," Scrimgeour said. "We will hear for the four accused and then they will be sentenced."

Ron went to the stand first. The scar on his face looked ugly in the cold light of the courtroom, but he faced the hordes of people without flinching. The usual questions commenced and then the hard questions. He was asked about his friendship with Harry Potter, his involvement in the battle, and his participation in helping bring back a man from the dead.

Ron answered honestly and openly, but towards the end he added, "You're wanting to know if I felt Harry's magic more than usual, if I felt coerced to go along with his plan. What you don't understand is that I've been his man ever since the day we rode the train to Hogwarts. I support him and I stand beside his decisions. He doesn't ever have to question my loyalty. I got this," he motioned to his face, "fighting beside him. I live fighting on his side and I plan to die as his friend and fellow warrior."

"You may step down," Scrimgeour growled. "Hermione Granger."

Hermione was almost the opposite of Ron. Her eyes darted nervously and she kept clasping a small vial in her hands.

"What are you holding?" Scrimgeour demanded.

"A potion for settling my stomach," she confessed. "I was sick all night. The nurse said I should take sips of this but – but I don't feel any better."

"Calm yourself. Just answer our questions."

They asked her mostly the same as Ron, and she replied almost verbatim but without the rousing speech at the end.

"One last thing," Scrimgeour pressed, "how did you elude capture on the day Mr. Potter brought back Professor Snape? You led the Ministry on a goose-chase through the Floos. How did you devise a way to avoid detection?"

Absolute panic flashed over her face. She glanced in Harry's direction, but at someone behind him and then blurted, "I don't know. I was just lucky. I'm fast – I'm a fast thinker and I can run fast."

"You were also the one who figured out the whole exchange of Marks and the weight of them, realizing that Professor Snape scattered as a result of the unevenness of powers. How did you figure that out?'

"I don't know," Hermione rushed out in a breathless whisper. "I'm smart like that. Please, stop. Please, I feel so sick."

She was dismissed and escorted back to the box, clutching her vial.

"Draco Malfoy."

Draco took the stand, his black eyepatch contrasted sharply with his blond hair.

"You instigated this whole thing. You brought a Portkey to Snapdragon Manor to take Mr. Potter to Diagon Alley that night to start a war."

"Correction. I took him to see the fireworks. Deatheaters arrived and they started the war. My own father did this to me," a gesture to his missing eye, "when he tried to kill Luna. You've had Deatheaters in your midst for years but you never stopped them. How big a group of cowards are you?"

"I'll ask the questions," Scrimgeour ordered. "Mr. Potter and his friends escaped Hogwarts, they came to your house and you not only gave them shelter but you joined them."

"I did. It was amusing, watching the Ministry chase its tail while we stayed in the shadows. We knew once you got Harry in the hospital that we had bought some time, enough time for Gringwad to gather his magic together. I see he's still eluding you. I guess this trial bought him more time."

"More time for what?"

"Whatever a man like Gringwad does," Draco smiled. "Eventually he's going to want to be Minister. I'd watch your back . . . before he puts a knife in it."

"Watch yourself, Mr. Malfoy. You have defied this court by breaking house-arrest only a few days ago. That could be seen as treason."

"I apologize," Draco bowed. "I went to Harry to see if he would ask Gringwad to bring my eye back. Between the two of them, they could find enough magic. And Gringwad did meet Harry later so he must respect Harry more than the Ministry. I guess he's your traitor."

Scrimgeour barked out a few more questions, but Draco answered in the same nonchalant tone. Harry couldn't tell if it were an act to throw off the mood of the trials or if Draco really didn't care anymore.

Once Draco left the stand, the court stilled in anticipation.

"Last accused, Harry Potter."

Harry stood and went to the stand. It was angled in such a way that he had to partly face the Ministry and partly faced the enormous crowd.

Scrimgeour didn't speak right away, letting the tension build higher and higher in the room.

"Mr. Potter, the charges against you are staggering. At every turn, at our every attempt to clean up your damages or keep you from further harm to yourself or others, you have resisted with more rebellion, more outrage, more damage, and more destruction. Fire, broken buildings, impersonation, theft, torture, near necromancy, death. At what point are you acting out because of grief and teenage angst and," Scrimgeour leaned forward, "at what point are you just the new Voldemort?"

Gasps broke out through the courtroom at the use of the name and several people stood involuntarily in fear.

"I'm not him," Harry said shakily. "I – this is just . . . a misunderstanding. I know the history and power vacuum thing . . . and-and fear like a mob thingy, you know."

"You're making no sense, Mr. Potter. You've had multiple occasions to stop yourself. But you kept going. What does it take to stop you?"

"I would have done anything to bring Snape back. He – he's my family and you can't –"

"Anything? Even sell your soul to darkness? How much of his power did you gain? How much of his dark, evil life force did you take?"

Harry hesitated. He couldn't lie and say none; they had too much evidence of his raw power for that. "I –er, I'm changing his power for – for –"

"For good?" Scrimgeour's tone was mocking. "This destruction is good? We have taken away your wand, we put you in St. Mungo's, we provided you with care and healers, and you decide to perform the Dark Arts with your friends. What is to follow? Will your friends get matching tattoos so you can call them? Will you start your own band of Deatheaters? Turn those little D.A. meetings at Hogwarts into your own Dark Arts army?"

"We created those to fight against the Dark Arts!"

"Pull up your sleeve and let us see your left arm."

Harry froze. He looked towards Snape, but the man wore a serious expression that gave him no message.

"Now, Mr. Potter. Show us your arm."

With trembling fingers, Harry unbuttoned his sleeve. He pushed up the fabric, this shirt a soft teal that had arrived in a stack of new clothes that morning. Against all hope, he prayed that the Dark Mark had faded.

But there it was on his pale skin, a skull with a snake coming out of its mouth.

"Marked by evil," Scrimgeour shook his head. "I think we've heard enough from you. We're risking our lives sitting here when we know you could decimate this room at any given second. Go back to the box."

Harry tried to think of something to say, but he couldn't think of a single rationale word to utter in the presence of some many people.

"We will confer," Scrimgeour stood, "and come back with a verdict."

The Ministry members rose and went out.

Conversation broke out all over the courtroom, creating a dull roar around Harry that matched his numb feelings.

A hand was on his shoulder.

"Here," Snape gave him a small box, "put this in your pocket. Remember your promise."

Harry slipped it in his pocket. He looked at Draco who was staring straight ahead into space. Next to him Hermione was looking sicker and sicker. She took a sip of her vial and closed her eyes, blowing out a long breath. In the last box, Ron watched Hermione, concern on his face.

Twenty minutes later, the Ministry returned. Every single member wore a serious, solemn expression as they took their seats.

"The accused will rise," a guard directed.

Harry rose, keeping a hand on the railing of his box for balance.

"Sentencing is as follows," Scrimgeour announced. "Ronald Weasley, you are sentenced to five years in Azkaban prison."

Gasps rang out. Ron's mouth opened an inch, his eyes round and terrified.

"Hermione Granger, you are sentenced to five years in Azkaban prison."

Hermione covered her eyes, choking back a sob.

"Draco Malfoy, you are sentenced to eight years in Azkaban prison."

Draco didn't move, didn't give any indication that he had heard him.

Scrimgeour's voice grew slightly louder. "Harry James Potter, you are sentenced to Azkaban . . ."

Harry stopped breathing.

". . . for fifteen years."