Well, kids, there's no better way to come back from a hiatus than with 6,000 words on what is easily the most coNVOLUTED CONFUSING INFURIATING CHAPTER OF THE CANON
it's fine, we're fine
Anyway. Hi. Missed you. Will try not to get stuck again like I did on this one. I'm in the midst of a re-read and I'm having a fab time coming up with fun stuff to do but I shall not lie to you– figuring out the end of PoA almost undid me as a woman.
Please forgive me if this is just totally deranged and remember it was written inch by inch over a period of six months so everything seemed like a good idea at the time, if you know what I mean. We're posting this and not looking back or I'm never gonna get to all the fun stuff I've been dying to do for Goblet and Order!
Okay here we go. Stop the voices in my head with love and hugs in review form.
9 June 1994
She was in the manse, her parents' home, in the tiny kitchen with its familiar stone floor and striped wallpaper; the rush of nostalgia—of comfort—overwhelmed her for a moment. But neither her mother nor father were anywhere to be found, and it was very late at night. Minerva remembered suddenly that she'd only come downstairs for water, and went to fetch a glass.
Then the pounding started. Minerva spun, looking wildly around the kitchen. Someone was knocking urgently, furiously—at the back door? The window? No…
The knocking was coming from the door beside the stairs, which led to the cellar. We don't have a cellar, she thought, even as she watched the evidently locked door rattle on its hinges under the blows of whatever stood on the other side.
She felt a surge of dread. She couldn't open that door—she mustn't open it.
And then she stood directly before it, extending one hand. Just before Minerva laid her hand on the knob, the banging ceased and the air around her filled with a long, terrible, pressing silence. Her heart in her throat, she watched in horror as the knob turned of its own accord, and the door swung slowly open.
She squinted into the gloom, down a long, endless flight of narrow wooden stairs.
"Hello?" she called, struggling to speak around the fear that constricted her voice.
A flash of silver in the dark… two smaller glimmers, like a pair of eyes…
"Nice to see you again, Professor," said a ragged, rasping voice directly in her ear.
Minerva sat up so quickly in her own bed, she nearly fell out of it. Gasping like she'd just emerged from the bottom of a lake, she clapped a hand to her chest, forcing her eyes open. She was safe, she told herself, safe in her own quarters. Her fire had died down to just the glowing embers, but it was nowhere near morning. She tried to squint at the carriage clock on her mantel—
BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG.
Minerva jumped and stumbled upright out of the bed. "Coming!" she called, seizing her dressing gown, and then her wand and glasses. She hurried to the door, but stopped.
"Who is it?" she called.
"It's Filius!" squeaked a familiar voice. "I'm sorry to—"
"Filius," she breathed, flinging the door open at once. "I almost hexed you," she informed him. He stood on her threshold, looking very distressed. He was in his own dressing gown. "What's the matter? Has something happened?"
"I should say something's happened!" he told her urgently. "They've caught Black!"
Minerva stared at him, blinking several times. "Black—Sirius Black?"
"Yes! Sirius Black! He was by the lake, with Potter!" Filius told her, becoming more agitated. "Found by fifty dementors! He's here in the castle, Dumbledore asked me to fetch you—"
"Pott—" Minerva shook her head vigorously, then pulled on her dressing gown all the way and tied it tight about her waist. "Where are they?"
"My office," Filius told her. "I'll come with you!"
"No, you—would you go and wake Pomona and Severus?" Minerva asked, as they set off down the corridor together. "We need to make sure that the students are secure—"
"I can fetch Pomona, but Severus is already with the headmaster!" Filius squeaked. "He was the one who brought Black from the lake!"
Minerva stopped and stared at him. "How long have I been asleep?!" she demanded, before putting on a burst of speed and bolting to Filius's office on the seventh floor.
She rounded the last corner and nearly slammed bodily into Albus, who caught and steadied her. "Ah, Minerva," he said pleasantly.
"What's—happened?" she panted. "Filius said—Black—? Is Potter—"
Albus met her gaze evenly, his features looking more lined and wearier than ever in the torchlight.
Minerva's stomach bucked. "Albus," she said, "please tell me…"
"Harry is perfectly fine," he told her gently. "He is asleep in the hospital wing along with Miss Granger and Mr. Weasley."
"Oh, for Merlin's—them too?" Minerva asked.
"The dementors very nearly attacked both Harry and Hermione, in an effort to get to Sirius," he said. "But as I say, all three are perfectly fine—Mr. Weasley's leg was broken, I believe, when he was pulled into the tunnel beneath the Whomping Willow…"
Minerva shook her head. "What?" She stared at him. "The Whomping Willow—the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack, you mean? And—wait a moment—did you just call him Sirius?"
Albus stopped himself. "I am not, perhaps, the person best suited to explain." He took her arm, guiding her to Filius's office door, where the Auror Kingsley Shacklebolt stood guard. Albus lowered his voice, turning his back to Kingsley. "Minerva… you are about to hear some… extraordinary things," he said. "In the interest of time, as Cornelius Fudge is presently in my office with Severus, awaiting emergency paperwork from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, I must ask you to listen with an open mind."
"Albus, I don't understand," she insisted in a whisper.
"I must ask you to trust that in short order, you will," he replied, even more softly. "And I do need you to understand, so that you can help me formulate a plan."
"A plan for what?"
In response, Albus brought Minerva to the office door, nodding once at Shacklebolt, who stepped aside and unlocked the door with a wave of his wand. Minerva frowned. She couldn't be sure, but she had the distinct impression, from the way Shacklebolt glanced around the corridor, that he was breaking a direct order.
What on earth was going on?
"Minerva," Albus said slowly, as they stepped into Filius's dimly lit office, "you remember Sirius Black."
Minerva's heart juddered in her chest. In a chair near the window sat a shaggy-haired, skeletally thin figure. The dense, long black hair was grayish, not from age, but from the sheer amount of dirt matted in it. The robes he wore were ragged and thin, full of holes. His filthy feet were bare, his fingernails long and cracked. Black was gazing down at his own hands, folded in his lap, but raised his head enough to look upon Minerva with two sunken, dark eyes just visible behind his dirty hair.
"Nice to see you again, Professor," he said softly, in a hoarse voice.
Minerva felt a thrill of horror and slid one hand around the wand in her pocket. "Black," she replied evenly, holding his gaze.
They regarded each other like that for a moment, and then Black gave a harsh, barking laugh and smiled, showing yellowed teeth. "You're exactly how I remember you, you know? Still the toughest witch I've ever met." He raised a hand and scratched behind one ear. "That's a compliment, by the way. Take it from someone who's done twelve years in Azkaban."
Minerva felt as if she were rooted to the spot. Hatred, rage, confusion, and hurt were spiraling in her chest like a hurricane, making her heart race and her breathing quicken. She couldn't speak.
"Sirius, we haven't much time," Albus said gently, as he waved his wand. Two chairs appeared, facing the prisoner. "Minerva, if you'd—"
"No," she blurted out, and both of them looked at her. She stared at Dumbledore, uncomprehending, but her tone was soft. She shook her head. "Albus, if you expect me to sit and have a chat with a murderer—"
Black flinched, and Albus said, "Sirius is going to explain—"
Minerva barreled on, "You're going to need to give me a damned good reason to have an open mind." She took a deep, steadying breath, as years of pain and anger began to bubble in her heart. "What is he going to explain? How he can live with himself, after what he's done? How he can break into a dormitory full of sleeping children and—"
"I did have the password," Black muttered.
"Is this a joke to you?" Minerva hissed, rounding on Black, who looked cowed and shrank back slightly. She drew her wand from her pocket; Albus stepped between them. The wave of anger building inside her was now as raw and fresh as it had been thirteen years ago.
"Minerva," said Albus, "There is more to this story than what we thought we knew, but we are wasting valuable time now, and I need your help. Now, please, sit down, before the dementors arrive, and we lose the opportunity to understand—or help—permanently."
"I can give you a reason."
Both Minerva and Albus looked down at Black, who was scratching behind his ear again. "I asked you to bring her," he said to Dumbledore. "I can give her a good reason to stay."
Minerva frowned. "You asked—?"
"It wasn't me that betrayed James and Lily," said Black bluntly, cutting her off. "It was Peter Pettigrew."
"Peter Pettigrew is dead," Minerva snapped.
"Peter Pettigrew is an unregistered Animagus," Black replied, matter-of-factly, "who faked his death. Actually, I am too. Not fake-dead, obviously—but, an Animagus." He gave a deferential shrug.
"That's ridiculous—"
"It's not," he interrupted. "I'm a dog. A black one. Nothing personal, I did hope at the time I'd end up a cat—well, a lion, actually—but you get what you get, right? That's what you told us when we asked."
Minerva blinked, three times. Black held her gaze, but this time, the air between them was not as charged, somehow. She was remembering a conversation—she could not even be sure it was real, for so many students had asked her throughout the years… but she could have sworn she remembered saying just those words to Black, once upon a time. She breathed in and out sharply through her nose, and finally sat down, never taking her eyes off of his.
"Speak," she ordered.
Black looked at Dumbledore, who watched him just as steadily, and then he took a breath. "Well… I guess this starts with… all of us becoming Animagi."
"'All of us?'" Minerva raised her eyebrows. "You mean…"
Black sighed. "James Potter, Peter Pettigrew, and I all did, right around fifth year… so that we could sneak out of the castle with Remus Lupin when he transformed every month."
There was a pregnant silence. Minerva looked at Albus, who was frowning thoughtfully, and then back at Sirius. "Ah," she managed to say hoarsely. "I see."
And in less than fifteen minutes, the story was told. Everything that had happened while they were students, everything that had happened thirteen years ago, everything that had happened in the year since Black had escaped, and why he had escaped, and most important part of all, everything that had happened tonight—Potter, Weasley, Granger, Snape, the Shrieking Shack, the rat who was Peter Pettigrew, Lupin's transformation, the dementors by the lake—both the reality and what Snape believed had happened, had told Cornelius Fudge had happened. It was the most fantastical, unbelievable, implausible—
"Preposterous," Minerva said softly, her hand over her mouth. Her emotions were overrunning her good sense; she felt ready to cry, scream, and laugh, all at once. She looked sideways at Dumbledore, who still looked pensive, but whose expression now held a grain of triumphant satisfaction.
Pieces that do not fit the whole picture, Minerva thought.
She sat forward. "Sirius, this is—I don't know what to say."
"Using my given name, that's a good start," he said. He was clasping and unclasping his hands, picking at the overlong fingernails; his nerves were starting to show themselves as time ticked on.
"And Cornelius Fudge—" Minerva began.
Sirius gave another bark-like laugh, and Albus shook his head. "Cornelius does not believe this story, for which there is no proof, for a moment. Although Severus was in the Shrieking Shack, he did not see Pettigrew. He was—ah—incapacitated. From his account, however, Cornelius believes Sirius to have enchanted Harry and his friends."
"And by the time Remus is—" Minerva looked out the window at the full moon, "—available to corroborate, it'll be too late."
Three sharp knocks came at the office door, and all three of them jumped. Albus rose immediately. "We must leave you now, Sirius." He looked at Minerva. "Cornelius and Severus have left my office, doubtlessly they are headed to meet the dementors."
Sirius appeared to be shrinking, somehow. He didn't say anything, but eyed the door anxiously. Albus steered Minerva from the room without another word.
"Thank you, Kingsley," he said to the Auror at the door, who gave them both a wink before resuming his guard, wordlessly.
"You're going to have to explain that to me at some point," Minerva told Albus, as they rounded the corner and left Shacklebolt behind. "Where are we going?"
"I have had an idea, and I need your help," he replied, in a low, urgent tone. "You've instructed Hermione Granger to keep her Time-Turner on her person, have you not?"
Minerva frowned, nonplussed. "Yes, but—"
"We need more time, Minerva," he said, coming to a stop at a point where the corridor split two ways. "And Miss Granger—and I daresay Mr. Potter—are going to obtain it for us."
"What? You want them to—to—" she stared into Albus's face. There was a light in his eyes she didn't like. "No. Albus. They're children."
"Capable ones. You have a better plan?" Albus asked, his voice now clipped, nearly agitated. "Minerva, there is no proof of anything we have just heard without Pettigrew, who is long gone. And…" he shook his head, "There is Buckbeak to consider."
Minerva frowned. "The hippogriff? Wasn't he executed tonight?"
"Buckbeak was not executed," Albus said, his expression intense, trying to make her understand—something.
"But you said—at sundown—"
"The execution was scheduled, but did not take place," he insisted, "because Buckbeak escaped."
This announcement had the air of a key piece of evidence, presented as damning proof, but Minerva just stared. "Well, you're talking about a wild animal—and—" she hesitated, "I don't know that he'd really go this far, but Hagrid has—"
"Minerva, I saw him—we all saw him—chained up in Hagrid's garden, not five minutes before the execution. Hagrid did not set him free," Albus was getting frustrated. "A wild animal, perhaps, but that is a tall order for a random escape! There is something about all of this—something that tells me that using the Time-Turner is the right course of action. I won't pretend to you that I understand it fully—not yet, anyway."
He pulled out his pocket watch. "Half-past eleven. I am going to find Cornelius and Severus." He pointed down the left-hand hallway, which led to his own office. "I want you to go to the hospital wing. We shall have to try to get Poppy out of the way, so that they are alone long enough for Miss Granger to use the Time-Turner. I want you to wake Harry and Hermione, but stay out of sight, you understand? Then come back to Filius's office. You will be Kingsley Shacklebolt's alibi for Sirius's escape."
"Albus," Minerva said, and he grasped her hand.
"We are going on faith, my dear," he told her gently. "It's all we have, at the moment."
And he disappeared down the left-hand corridor. She took a deep breath, and set off to her right, faster and faster, until she was nearly at a run. Mid-stride, halfway down the corridor, she raised her wand and changed into her Animagus form. Smaller, now, but faster, and much quieter. She put on a burst of speed and slipped through the slightly-ajar double doors of the hospital wing, pressing herself low to the ground beside an empty bed.
Peering into the room that likely would have been too dark for her to navigate silently as a human, even with the moonlight at the windows, Minerva sniffed the air. She could hear Poppy moving at a nearby bed; stretching a little, she could make out a shock of red hair and a bandaged leg. Weasley.
Waiting until Poppy's back was turned, fussing with her medicine chest, Minerva slipped out from her hiding space and padded silently along the row of beds, looking for…
A-ha. There they were. Potter and Granger in two side-by-side beds, both wearing filthy, torn clothing, both pale in the moonlight that filtered over them. With a last glance round at Poppy, Minerva crept under Hermione Granger's bed. The girl lay curled on her side, the fingertips of one hand lying just over the edge of the mattress.
Stay out of sight, Minerva thought. She turned and brushed her long tail against Hermione's hand, which didn't move. She tried again, and the fingers twitched—but nothing more. Minerva lowered herself to the ground, inching forward on her paws, until she was directly under the girl's hand, but still hidden in the shadows beneath the bed. Then, quick as lightning, she butted her head up against Hermione's knuckles, and heard a sudden intake of breath. Minerva hunkered tight against the wall, watching as the hand disappeared, and the weight on the mattress above shifted.
Light sleeper, Minerva thought, now eyeing the space beneath Harry's bed. You're next, Potter—
Then came voices from the corridor.
"I thought Dumbledore was securing Black," said Cornelius Fudge, sounding confused. "Where can he have gone? The dementors will be waiting…"
"I'm not sure," Snape replied. He and Fudge had obviously, somehow, missed Albus—perhaps they'd gone the long way round the seventh floor, to check Black's security themselves. "But he won't allow them entrance to the school without his presence…"
"This is the hospital wing, isn't it? Maybe he's come to check on Potter…"
Minerva edged forward on her belly, and saw the lower half of Fudge's body appear in the doorway of the hospital wing.
"I beg your pardon—is the headmaster here?"
"No, Minister," replied Poppy, who had straightened up beside Weasley's bed.
"Oh—terribly sorry," he murmured, and his pinstriped legs disappeared again.
Minerva listened for a moment, her ears pricked. She was just wondering if Granger was really awake, when—
"Harry. Harry, wake up, please…"
The whisper coming from over Minerva's head was so soft, she doubted she would have been able to hear it as a human. Potter, for his part, looked very stalwartly unconscious. Hermione shifted on the mattress above. Minerva looked back and forth between the doors, through which Fudge and Snape could still be heard speaking in low tones, and the space beneath Harry's bed; Granger would surely notice her if she tried to bolt for it.
Then, there came a sharp clearing of a throat—it was Fudge. "Well, perhaps so. But I never could have imagined an ending quite like this. Shocking business… shocking… miracle none of them died… never heard the like… by thunder, it was lucky you were there, Snape…"
"Thank you, Minister."
Minerva could have rolled her eyes at the smugness oozing from Snape's voice.
"Order of Merlin, Second Class, I'd say. First Class, if I can wangle it!"
Well, that was really too much, Minerva thought. Over her head, Hermione had started whispering again, trying to wake Potter, and Minerva had to creep to the foot of the bed to be able to hear Fudge and Snape. That was when Poppy's feet appeared suddenly, and Minerva felt herself being scooped up and held tightly. Poppy was carrying her towards the hospital wing doors.
"Ah, ah, ah—no animals in my hospital wing—you'll have to do your nighttime hunting elsewhere, I'm afraid," she said, as Minerva tried to wriggle away from her. They were halfway down the ward when Minerva gave a particularly forceful twist and nearly wrestled herself free. "Oof—all right, all right—Minerva?"
In Poppy's shock, she loosened her grip, and Minerva leapt from her arms, tumbling onto the nearest bed and scarpering beneath it just as the hospital wing door opened again. This time, Minerva could see both Fudge and Snape's legs.
"Is everything all right, Madam Pomfrey?" came Snape's drawling voice.
"F-fine, Professor," said Poppy. "I was just coming to—ask you to keep your voices down."
"Dreadfully sorry," said Fudge. "We'll do that."
And the door shut again. Minerva, indignant and ruffled, crept out from under the bed and glowered up at Poppy.
"What are you doing?" Poppy mouthed at her, over the continued hum of Snape's and Fudge's voices. Minerva twitched her tail and darted off in the direction of Poppy's office, where she transformed just as Poppy came in and shut the door.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to drop you—" Poppy gasped.
"Never mind that, I'm fine!" Minerva hissed. She was looking around the office, trying to find a way out—but Poppy's quarters did not have a second exit; the only way out of the hospital wing was blocked by Fudge and Snape. "I need you to act as though you haven't seen me."
"Minerva, what's going on?"
Minerva put both hands on her shoulders. "Trust me, it's better if you don't know. Now just go out there, and make sure that Potter and Granger don't say anything at all suspicious to Fudge or Severus about what happened to them tonight! We need to get them both away from here. Albus is on his way."
Poppy gaped helplessly at her.
"I'm sorry, that's all I can say," Minerva turned Poppy around by her shoulders and steered her out of the office door. After a moment's hesitation, she seemed to come to life. With one nervous glance back at Minerva, she proceeded back down the ward to Ron Weasley's bed.
With a quiet pop, Minerva became her cat self again, and crept back down the ward.
"Well, well… we shall see, Snape, we shall see," Fudge was saying. "The boy has undoubtedly been foolish… but what amazes me most is the behavior of the dementors… you've really no idea what made them retreat, Snape?"
Minerva shifted, listening carefully. A Patronus, she thought, what else? But whose? That was one point neither Sirius, who had lost consciousness, nor Albus could explain.
Snape, however, did not seem concerned with taking credit for this particular point. "No, Minister… by the time I had come 'round they were heading back to their positions at the entrances."
"Extraordinary. And yet Black, and Harry, and the girl —"
"All unconscious by the time I reached them. I bound and gagged Black, naturally, conjured stretchers, and brought them all straight back to the castle."
"Ah, you're awake!" Poppy said suddenly. Minerva smelled chocolate; no doubt Poppy had produced some; above her head, she heard the springs of Potter's and Granger's creak.
"How's Ron?" they asked simultaneously.
"He'll live," Poppy replied. "As for you two… you'll be staying here until I'm satisfied you're—Potter, what do you think you're doing?"
The bed was creaking more than ever, and Minerva saw Harry's feet swing to the floor. "I need to see the headmaster," he said.
"Potter," said Madam Pomfrey soothingly, "it's all right. They've got Black. He's locked away upstairs. The dementors will be performing the Kiss any moment now—"
"WHAT?"
Two pairs of feet in muddy shoes and the torn-up hems of school robes appeared in Minerva's line of sight; Potter and Granger both leapt up from their beds. The hospital wing door swung open, and Minerva took advantage of the distraction to streak along under the beds toward the door as Snape and Fudge came bursting into the ward.
"Harry, Harry, what's this?" Fudge asked. "You should be in bed—"
Minerva heard nothing more—she put on a burst of speed and streaked down the ward, slipping through the closing double doors at top speed. She didn't think she'd been spotted, but just in case, she kept running until she was well down the corridor. She could still hear Potter's raised voice from here—then she saw Albus headed back in the direction from which she had just come.
Without breaking his stride or pausing to look at her, he murmured, apparently to thin air, "Wait until Fudge leaves the hospital wing. Then go and meet Shacklebolt."
"WE'RE NOT CONFUNDED!" Harry bellowed from behind the hospital wing doors, and Minerva darted around the nearest corner. She stopped and looked back just long enough to see Albus entering the ward.
"For heaven's sake!" Minerva heard Poppy shriek. "Is this a hospital wing or not? Headmaster, I must insist —"
Albus's response was so gently spoken, Minerva couldn't make it out before the hospital wing doors shut again. The rumble of conversation continued. She distinctly heard Hermione Granger and Severus raise their voices before the door swung open again. Instinctively, Minerva lowered herself to watch as Fudge stood in the doorway, holding it open.
"Sirius Black showed he was capable of murder at the age of sixteen," said Severus Snape coldly and clearly. "You haven't forgotten that, Headmaster? You haven't forgotten that he once tried to kill me?"
Minerva twitched her nose. Severus was angrier than either Black or Dumbledore had told her; she could hear it in his voice. And if this plan of Albus's went off…
"My memory is as good as it ever was, Severus," said Dumbledore. A second later, Snape left the hospital wing.
Now he and Fudge were headed her way. Minerva looked around for a place to hide and sprang forward to tuck herself behind a suit of armor on a plinth. But as she curled around the ankles of the armor, she knocked against the sword and set it swinging with a small, but audible, clang of metal on metal. For a heart-stopping moment, Minerva thought she saw Snape's eyes land on the armor as he swept past with Fudge, but neither of them stopped.
Minerva waited until they turned the corner completely, and then shot off in the opposite direction. Barely a minute later, she transformed, panting, into her human form in front of Kingsley Shacklebolt outside Filius's office door.
"Good timing—Macnair's just gone for the dementors," said Shacklebolt.
Their eyes met for a long moment, in which an understanding Minerva could not possibly have foreseen, but which she knew instantly to be solid and steady, crystallized between them. And Shacklebolt seemed to know what needed to happen next, even if Minerva didn't. He turned and rapped on the office door once with his knuckles, and then pointed his wand at a nearby vase.
"Accio!"
The heavy porcelain vase flew to his hands, and he caught it. Minerva understood at once, and raised her wand. Shacklebolt regarded her and asked in a low voice, "Dumbledore thinks this will work, does he?"
"I trust him," Minerva whispered. "That's—well, it's sort of all I have, at the moment, but… well, to be perfectly frank with you, I've done more on less." She hesitated, glancing at the office door.
Shacklebolt seemed to guess at her question. "I've been an Auror long enough to recognize a Dark wizard when I see one. For one thing, he hasn't got––" he broke off.
"A Dark Mark?" Minerva asked suddenly. This hadn't even occurred to her as a means of verifying Black's story. "He hasn't got one?"
Shacklebolt grimaced and nodded. "All the Death Eaters I've ever interviewed in Azkaban have them, even now. And anyway, after what I heard tonight…" He glanced at Filius's office door. "Things haven't been adding up for a while, and I couldn't get anyone to agree with me. So for now, trusting Dumbledore works—and I might not get sacked, this way," he added, with a hint of a grin.
Minerva didn't quite know what to say.
He winked at her and held out the vase. "Not the face, all right? And…" he looked around the corridor. "It probably wouldn't do for you to be the only one here when they find me."
"Leave that to me." Minerva flicked her wand. The vase hovered over Kingsley's head. For a long moment, all was quiet, until there came a very soft noise from within Filius's office, which Minerva didn't think she could have heard if she hadn't been holding her breath. It almost sounded like the window sliding open. This is madness, Minerva thought. She had to force herself not to think about what was happening beyond the office door in order to maintain her sanity.
Shacklebolt positioned himself in front of the door; he braced himself, and she allowed the vase to come crashing down on his head. He buckled immediately and sprawled on the floor. She bent and checked to ensure that he wasn't too badly hurt. Satisfied, she fired off two Stunning spells, both of which left scorch marks on the stones of the opposite wall. Then she aimed her wand at Filius's office door, which creaked ajar, and waved her wand. Her Patronus burst into being in the gloomy corridor and streaked off to find Filius.
Now Minerva only had to wait… and hope that Filius and Pomona would be faster than Snape or Fudge. She checked Finn's pocket watch—less than ten minutes to midnight. But she wasn't waiting long.
"Minerva!"
"Minerva—where is he?!"
"Are you all right?!"
Pomona and Filius had come dashing around the corner, wands aloft, as though ready for a fight.
"I'm fine! It's all right—" Minerva knelt beside Shacklebolt again. "Black escaped. I didn't see him, but he's gone—"
Pomona ran to push open the office door, and gasped as Filius bent to examine Shacklebolt. "How on earth…?"
"He'll be all right," squeaked Filius. He straightened and looked around the corridor. "Just knocked out. You're lucky Black obviously didn't have time to take his wand, Minerva—but where can he have gone? Disappeared again?"
"I don't know, I only just found the Auror like this…" Minerva gestured helplessly at Kingsley's prone figure.
"My God, Shacklebolt!"
Minerva turned and saw Snape and Fudge stopped dead in their tracks at the other end of the corridor. Just behind them stood Albus, whose piercing gaze swept the scene fully before he stepped to join them.
"I say, what's happened here?!" Fudge demanded. His eyes landed on the office door, and he yelped, striding forward to look inside. "Great Scott—Black! Where is he?!" He rounded on Filius and Pomona, who were closest.
Minerva pushed forward, placing herself slightly in front of Pomona, who gripped her arm. "We don't know, Minister. Filius summoned me a short while ago and I asked him to fetch Pomona, thinking we could offer our assistance in guarding Black. But by the time I made it up here, Black was gone and this Auror—Shacklebolt—was just as you see him now."
Pomona squeezed her arm, but Minerva ignored her. She was as painfully aware of Severus's silent efforts to catch her eye, as she was of Albus's intense contemplation of her. Fudge, however, was standing in the doorway of Filius's office, his mouth agape with horror, his hands slack at his sides.
"H-h-how?" he stammered.
"Potter."
All heads turned to look at Snape, whose teeth were bared in a nasty, ugly snarl as he stared fixedly at the open office door.
"What's that, Snape?" Fudge asked.
Albus stepped forward, gesturing at Pomona and Filius. "Would you be kind enough to revive Mr. Shacklebolt, please? Perhaps in your office, Filius?"
Minerva sprang forward as well, keeping her eyes down as the three of them struggled to lift Kingsley's dead weight—but that was not enough to keep Snape's next words from her earshot.
"This has something to do with—Potter—headmaster, you know—"
"I know nothing of the kind, Severus—"
"Come now, Snape, think what—"
"This has something to do with Potter and I shall prove it!" Snape shrieked suddenly, and Pomona jumped to snap Filius's office door shut. Minerva listened, but Snape's voice was fading, followed by Dumbledore's and Fudge's—they were moving away from the office.
"What in Merlin's name is he on about now?" Pomona asked, clucking her tongue. "What's been going on here?"
"A very long story, Pomona," said Filius, panting slightly. "Which we shall be happy to tell—once we've assisted our friend, here."
Minerva and Filius had managed to get Kingsley Shacklebolt into a slumped sitting position in the very same chair Sirius Black had occupied. Something about Shacklebolt's posture now jogged her memory.
"Macnair—the executioner, he went to fetch the dementors," she said, straightening up. "I'll go and stop him—Albus won't want it in the castle."
"Minerva—what?" Pomona asked, but Minerva didn't hear her. She hurtled through the castle, taking stairs two at a time, until she reached the entrance hall and hurried out the front doors. Immediately, she felt the sickening wave of cold she'd experienced at the Gryffindor-Hufflepuff match, and stopped, her stomach twisting horribly.
By the light of the full moon, she could see Macnair coming up the long drive to the front door, with three tall, hooded creatures in his wake.
"Stop!" Minerva bellowed. "Macnair, is it? I said stop!"
Macnair stopped abruptly on the path and flung out a hand behind him, so that the dementors stopped too.
"Their services are no longer required," Minerva called, repressing a shudder. "You can direct them back out of the grounds."
"Says who?"
"The headmaster," Minerva lied.
"I take my orders from the Minister, thank you, miss," sneered Macnair.
"Your prisoner has escaped," she retorted. "And as I understand it, that's not for the first time today. Instruct them to leave, or I shall make them. Expecto Patronum."
Her silver tabby cat once again flew from the end of her wand and alighted on the ground delicately, precisely between herself and Macnair, and began to pace back and forth, creating a kind of barrier that seemed to restore the warmth of the night air.
The dementors beside Macnair seemed to draw back slightly; he turned and muttered something, and the creatures began to glide soundlessly away, into the night. Macnair continued up the drive alone, glowering furiously. When he reached Minerva, however, he stopped and glanced at her Patronus.
"I remember you," he muttered. "An' not just from when I was a kid. Gotta say, I thought you were about a hundred then, though."
Minerva said nothing, but met his eyes steadily.
Macnair raised an arm and pointed at the silver tabby cat, which was watching him equally steadily. "Pretty sure I chased a cat like that one to a cottage on the Isle of Fife—what, ten, fifteen years ago now?" He gave a twisted grin; there was knowing, malicious look in his dark eyes. "Nice little family lived there. Shame what happened to 'em."
She blinked, and her gaze flicked to his outstretched arm. In the darkness, she couldn't quite make out what those scarlike lines were on the inner forearm, but if she had to guess…
"You may wait for the Minister in the headmaster's office," she told him coldly. Her Patronus vanished. "I'll escort you there myself."