Thanks for the reviews yesterday! As for the questions involved (mostly about Rufus's ethical stance), some of them are answered in this chapter.
Chapter 38—Among the Ruins
There are some things that simply cannot be condoned, even in the name of war.
And what Rufus saw among the ruins of Azkaban was one of them.
From the confused explanations of the few surviving guards who had been on the shore when the attack happened, the raid had involved Death Eaters appearing and the Dementors turning on the prisoners who weren't Death Eaters. There were certainly no Dementors here now, though the mist rolling through the air gave the impression that they had not gone far.
Rufus stooped over a tall, pale wizard he vaguely remembered as going before the Wizengamot some years ago, for a murder. He still breathed, but that was all. His eyes didn't move, the way they would in sleep. His limbs didn't twitch, as they might if he were dreaming. He'd been Kissed, and he was less than a vegetable. There was no chance that he would ever wake.
Rufus shook his head and stood, glancing swiftly around. Shattered walls loomed about him; the ground was scattered with rubble. Everywhere lay the non-corpses of those who would never rise again. No one who watched, Auror or not, spoke. Rufus had never seen so many faces gray with emotion.
If it had not been for those Kissed, who lingered between death and life, Rufus's overpowering sensation would have been relief.
Every wizarding politician in the last hundred years, from the Minister on down, who had tried to act against Azkaban, or even recommend some way of ameliorating the system of punishment for the prisoners, had been stripped of office or sacked almost at once. The victims of heinous crimes deserved to know that the criminals were suffering, went the argument. No one had ever explained to Rufus how much pain was permissible in return for what they had done. Was fifty years enough payment for a murder? Sixty years? A hundred? Who made the determination, and how?
He had been forced to ignore Azkaban, because if he didn't, he risked being thrown out of office and losing what power he had to address other injustices. But now it was gone, and no power in the wizarding world would convince him to bring it back. It had been little more than a system of torture.
And torture, for him, was not permissible even in the name of war. It never could be. If killing must be done, let it be swift, in self-defense or for the purposes of mercy. Killing was not always avoidable, but consciously making another human being suffer for hours always was. The government that developed techniques of torture and sanctioned them for use on its enemies could too easily turn around and apply them to its own citizens when the war was done. Rufus was too experienced a politician and observer of the world to believe that the mindsets of people acclimated to torture rapidly changed with peace.
The Dark curses used on the Death Eaters Snape had slain were swift. They still inflicted an amount of pain Rufus considered unacceptable, but they were done. He did not yet know if the same thing had happened to Bellatrix Lestrange, or if she had been made to suffer before she perished.
If she had suffered…
Rufus half-narrowed his eyes. As Dumbledore said, our greatest problem with this scenario is a lack of knowledge. We have no way of knowing if she was tortured—yet—or what did it, or even whether it was Snape or Potter who performed the torture. And even if I had proof absolute, I have no idea where they are. That means that I can't yet reject Snape and Potter out of hand.
So. A letter in the middle, then.
"Sir?" said Tonks at last, speaking from what sounded like a dry throat. "What do you want done with them?"
In silence, Rufus drew his wand.
Tonks nodded, and drew her own. They wouldn't have to do much to the people who were Kissed—certainly not cast an Unforgivable. A simple cutting spell would open a vein, and they would bleed to death simply and painlessly.
Rufus did his best not to imagine what these people had been thinking and feeling in the moments before they were Kissed; he couldn't be certain of any of it. He wanted to imagine that they would be grateful for what he and the other Aurors did now, but he had no way of determining that, either.
And I can't be certain what happened with Snape and Potter. I am planning to find out, however.
Severus was training with Potter in the means of reaching a wizard's mental core quickly and efficiently when the owl arrived. The tiny hole he had left open in the wards for owls coming from the Minister usually warned him when the first tap sounded at the window, but in this case, he had been deeply involved in dodging Potter, and had not noticed.
He started when the owl landed on his shoulder, and he saw Potter raise his wand towards the bird. He shook his head with a quick scowl. After one searching glance, Potter dropped his hand.
The searching glance pleased Severus. Potter still listened to him, and trusted him as much as was reasonable, but he also gave due consideration to his trust, and wondered, now and then, whether it was the wisest thing to let guide his actions.
Severus removed the letter from the owl's leg and read it in silence. It was blunt, as though Scrimgeour had no patience for even politeness, let alone coy and discreet mind games.
Severus Snape:
I have no explanation for what happened in your ambush of Bellatrix Lestrange. I want reassurance before I continue to act as an ally. I demand that Potter write to me, and give me his own explanation of it, or I shall assume that you tortured her—my forensics specialist says that there is literally nothing of Lestrange's brain left, and informs me that only very painful Legilimency could have killed her like that—and that you intend to train Potter in torture. That, I cannot allow.
In return for Potter's letter, I will inform you of this: the Weasley twins saw everything that could be seen with the eye, and they have given a report to the Headmaster that has all but turned the Order of the Phoenix against you.
Rufus Scrimgeour.
Severus raised one eyebrow. Well, he had anticipated this. He had not expected it to happen quite so soon, true, but there was a reason he had insisted that Potter be strong enough in his own mind to face the consequences of his actions, and logically clear about what he was doing. And he could read Scrimgeour's last sentences well enough: Dumbledore would be hunting him, and he could not really hope to avoid the Headmaster's magic forever. At best, when he appeared with Potter to kill the Dark Lord, he could expect to be taken prisoner.
He did not want that. He wanted glory and credit for his actions, and he intended to receive them.
"Sir?"
He glanced up. The expression on Potter's face was somewhere between curiosity and awe at his own daring. He wanted answers, but fully expected to be denied them. Severus approved. He will someday be formidable compared even to me—if he lives—but that time has not yet come.
"You may read the letter, since the Minister made a request concerning you," he said quietly, and held the parchment out.
Potter took and read it. His face drained of color, as Severus had expected, but his hands didn't tremble, and he remained on his feet. Better, far better, than he would have done two months ago. Severus waited.
Potter glanced up. "If I write him the letter, won't he just—give it to Dumbledore? So telling him won't make any difference. I could remain silent, and he'd react the same way."
Severus shook his head. The boy had missed some nuance in the letter, of course. Typical. "Scrimgeour does not say he will give your letter to Dumbledore. He will assume the worst from your silence, and he warns us of the Order's suspicions. He is not completely allied with them, nor yet with us. I think that, if your letter satisfies him, he will return to his original bargain, sending us information and saying nothing of what he knows to Dumbledore."
"But he said that he won't allow you to train me in torture," said Potter quietly. "And that's what's happening."
Severus snorted. Harry stared at him.
"Did that, or did that not, happen only once?" Severus demanded. "Will you, or will you not, kill the Dark Lord in cold blood, inflicting no more pain on him than necessary in order to reach the center of his mind?" He dropped his voice. "You disappoint me, Mr. Potter. You will pause to take revenge on the Dark Lord instead of slaying him, then?"
Harry's right hand slowly closed into a fist. Then he said, "No. I'll write the letter."
Severus nodded. "You will show it to me before you send it."
"Of course," Harry said, with a faint offended tone to his voice, and then walked into his bedroom to settle himself with ink and parchment.
Severus went to attend to his brewing. It would probably take the boy a good half-hour at least to decide what he wanted to say, never mind setting quill to paper.
Harry drew several deep breaths, trying to calm himself down enough that he could begin to write. Images of being dragged back in front of Dumbledore before he managed to perfect his Legilimency danced wildly through his head. He'd have to use some other kind of magic as a weapon against Voldemort. He'd be told that what he had done was evil, and wrong, and that it didn't matter that he'd live with it. All the effort he'd put into learning, and recovering from his obsession with suicide, and tricking his friends, and brewing the Medea's Draught, would mean nothing.
His killing of Bellatrix would mean nothing. His friends' horror at what he'd done wouldn't bring her back. And if the only possible meaning of her death was to teach him self-control, as Snape insisted…
He couldn't let that happen.
He shoved the images away from himself violently. He had a chance to prevent that from happening. He would. He would take it, and show the Minister what had really happened. Snape wasn't teaching him torture, and Harry wasn't about to become some kind of monster who tortured everyone around him. He just had to prove that.
Dear Minister Scrimgeour:
This is Harry Potter. I know you probably don't believe me, so I will say that I met you in Hogsmeade on Halloween, and that I told you I'd support the Ministry in exchange for your trying to clear Sirius's name and letting me slip past the edges of the law sometimes. You forbade me to take that as a license to cast Unforgivables.
I might have done something as wrong as casting an Unforgivable. You'll have to decide for yourself.
Snape has taught me Legilimency, because my wand and Voldemort's are brothers, and I can't fight him that way. He saved my life when I tried to kill myself, and convinced me that it was much better to kill my enemy and still survive after he died. He's done nothing but what he needed to do. I was the one who lost control when I confronted Bellatrix Lestrange. Snape had determined that I had to test my skills and kill a Legilimens before I went after Voldemort. He didn't tell me to kill her the way I did.
She was the one who murdered my godfather last year. That was the main reason I reacted as violently to her as I did. I tore her mind, and I enjoyed it at the time. Now, afterwards, I know it was wrong. It physically sickened me. I won't let it happen again. In fact, the only other person I ever intend to kill with Legilimency is Voldemort, and it would be the height of stupidity for me to play about in his mind under the insane idea of making him 'pay' by hurting him.
I know I have no way of proving to you that I mean what I say, except by my actions in the future. If I hurt someone else because you trusted me, then I'll accept Azkaban or execution. But Professor Snape has already promised me that he would prevent me from turning into a monster. I believe him.
I know you have no way of knowing for certain that I wrote this letter, either. It's the hardest letter I've ever written. But I'll leave that up to your judgment. There's no excuse I can make. I can only explain.
Sincerely,
Harry Potter.
He read it over once or twice, corrected some of the more obvious blotted words, and then took it to Snape.
Severus read the letter with a practiced eye. He could see nothing to object to in it, though his eyebrows rose at the news of the boy's political machinations with the Minister in Hogsmeade. It was good news, though. If Scrimgeour had been willing to make secret bargains and trifle with the rules once, there was an excellent chance it would happen again.
And, of course, he also appreciated Potter's attempts to make sure that no blame pursued him. At times, Gryffindor self-sacrificing heroics could serve a purpose—namely, when a Slytherin could benefit from them.
"I will send this," he said, lowering the letter to stare into Potter's eyes. The Occlumency shields shimmered at him, and a casual but unanticipated probe revealed no weaknesses. Severus nodded. "And then we must step up our training and work on infuriating the Dark Lord, or persuading him, or manipulating his dreams, until we can bring the battle to him. And we must bring that battle in a place we will inform Scrimgeour and other witnesses of beforehand."
Potter blinked. "Why?"
"I do not fancy Azkaban for myself, as some people would if they thought I had kidnapped the Boy-Who-Lived," Severus said dryly. "And there are some who would put you down as a mad dog, too, if you simply defeated the Dark Lord in the night and they never knew anything of it but the method. No, Potter, this will be as public as possible, a spectacle. We will look like heroes. We will reap so much of the public's adoration, at once adding to your legend and securing some honor to my name, that the Ministry and Dumbledore will have much more trouble punishing us."
Potter blinked. Severus sneered, but it was half-hearted. Incredible though it was, ht had accepted, after numerous trips into the boy's mind and hearing him talk under Veritaserum, that Potter really had never thought of trading on his fame that way. Well, now he must.
As it turned out, however, Potter's question was about something else. "The Minister and Dumbledore are both influential," he pointed out. "Will even killing Voldemort really be enough to protect us?"
Severus laughed softly. "There are no certainties, Potter, but you have not seen enough of the hatred and fear that Voldemort's very shadow provokes. You did not witness the celebrations that took place after you first defeated him, when his death was regarded as a miracle. Kill him permanently, after a second rising, and with no chance of a third? Glory will follow his killers—glory and love. It is the best shield we can have against the kind of pretty moral knots that Scrimgeour and Dumbledore will try to tie about us. Yes, we will try for it."
Harry nodded, and Severus turned to post the letter with the owl, who had waited patiently in the kitchen. After that, he fully intended to come back and drill Potter until they both dropped.
And then they must begin reaching out to the Dark Lord.
I will have it—life, glory, honor, power, and freedom. The Headmaster will not deprive me of it. Nor will Scrimgeour.
And though Potter may not think to use his childhood as a weapon against the old wizard, I am more than willing.
Rufus read Potter's letter. Then again. Then a third time. He had already verified with several Magical Law Enforcement wizards who regularly worked with forged documents that the same hand had definitely not produced this letter that had produced the ones he received from Snape.
That didn't mean Potter had written it, of course.
But Rufus chose to accept that he had. If he were mistaken, the consequences would be on his head. He would hunt Potter down, and he would certainly resign his office.
And it threw the decision on his shoulders once more.
Potter losing control would explain everything, from Lestrange's pained screams to the line the Weasley twins had heard him speak to Snape. No, it might not be right, but Rufus had better knowledge of both Potter's character and the actual situation right now than anyone but the pair who had hunted the Death Eaters.
He weighed his remembrance of Potter, the shadows in his eyes, and the way he had spoken at Hogsmeade against what the Weasleys had reported.
In the end, he chose to sit down and write a letter to Potter and Snape that included the information about the breakout at Azkaban, and more concrete information on what Dumbledore had told the Order of the Phoenix.
In the end, he chose to trust that, if Potter had done something not permissible even in the name of war, he would not do it again.