Ch 26 Parents of the MELL Students
More great work by Deb and Diane, my beta advisors. Thank you.
"Hermione and I are meeting the parents of the MELL students, and the students, and other family members, today," Harry told Ginny as they were getting ready to go to breakfast. Harry was dressed and was gently bouncing Minerva on his shoulder as he waited for Ginny to finish getting ready. "From the messages we have been receiving over the last weeks, the whole day may be one contentious meeting after another. Do you and Minerva want to be somewhere else?"
"Jane too," Ginny proposed with a firm nod. "The last thing she needs is to be in the middle of arguments that she is not involved in and doesn't understand."
The same family group met for breakfast, and the tables were arranged the same, except that Ron Weasley was next to Hermione, so Jane was next to Ron.
"It sounds like I am going to be lucky to be at the Weasley's Wizard Wheezes store here in Switzerland instead of confronting all the parents of the Magi and Elf Language Learners," Ron remarked with a grin. "I will be thinking of you."
"All you will be thinking of is gross sales and profit margins," Hermione huffed.
"My profit margins help you buy beautiful books, my beautiful wife," Ron kidded. "Smartest witch in the world, and bloody beautiful too."
Hermione turned towards Ron, her face full of exasperation. Ron kissed Hermione before she could say anything. A world of emotions ran over Hermione's face, but her visage finally softened, and she returned Ron's kiss.
"I am going to take Jane back to our quarters," Ginny announced, rolling her eyes at the antics of her brother and best friend. "I am going to work on the next couple of Quidditch columns, and teach Jane how to take care of a toddler."
Jane did not understand all that was going on, but apparently most of the people at the table were concerned that they were facing a difficult day full of conflict. She was glad that she was going to be going with Mrs. Potter.
After breakfast Harry, Hermione, Albus, Rose, Cleo and Scorpius walked to a moderate sized room on the first floor of the castle. The castle had two floors above the main floor labeled floor one and two, but most of the castle was below the main floor, and those floors were labeled minus one to minus ten, a strange if accurate way of labeling the floors.
Harry and Hermione sat in an overstuffed piece of furniture, and the four students perched on high stools behind them, as they waited for the parents and other family members of the MELL students to assemble. There were several Auror guards, people from Britain and Switzerland, but no Elves of any kind.
The first families to appear were the French Canadians. Joseph Marie DuMond Jr., his wife Emilie, and their daughter Gabrielle were first, followed by Jean-Paul Felion, his wife Melissa, and their son Jean-Louis. Everyone was impeccably dressed, and the women each wore a fortune on their fingers.
Joseph wasted no time in attacking as he stormed over to Harry. "What have you done, Potter, with the house elves and goblins? My house elf and my wife's told us they are attending meetings, not staying with us! Impertinent! Disobedient! I thought that just the three of us and our servants would come, and two more house elves accompanied them, and four goblins. I think the two smaller ones were goblin females; they looked almost like house elves. They were just dressed like prosperous goblin wives, as near as I could tell.
"They took us to a big house owned by a Mr. and Mrs. Zwiefollhofer. They have this huge estate between the top and the next main road, with a house elf quarters that has at least six bedrooms and I do not know what else. The goblins are staying in one of the bedrooms, and our house elves announced that they were staying in another bedroom.
"The goblins indicated that they were paying the Zwiefollhofer house elves for the rooms, like those house elves owned those living quarters. That is WRONG!
"Other house elves took our luggage to our rooms and left us. What have you done?" He continued to glare at Harry as if everything in the world was his fault.
"We have not done anything," Hermione retorted, a little miffed that he hadn't even acknowledge her at all. "I assume your Elves are Elves, paid and clothed, even if the pay is minimal. I would guess they want to be treated as equal beings."
"Elves, house elves, bah. Their families have served us for generations," Joseph yelled, throwing his hands up in anger.
"Maybe they are not so eager to be treated as slaves anymore," Hermione suggested, her tone sly but hard.
"They are not PEOPLE!" Joseph screamed.
But Hermione insisted, "There is nothing that forces them to be unequal beings." Hermione looked at Harry.
"Genetic evidence shows that both house elves and goblins are genetically as similar as different members of the human race are," Harry explained. "They are all descendent from beings we are calling High Elves. They are no more inferior to us than black skinned people are genetically inferior to light skinned people. I think they are getting tired of being treated as slaves."
"We do not abuse our house elves!" Joseph insisted very indignantly at the suggestion.
"Hire Magi to do what your Elves do for you now?" Hermione scoffed. "Hire No-Maj."
"Why would I hire No-Maj?" Joseph sneered as if the idea disgusted him.
"You are not as removed from the No-Maj world as you imply, or you would not be using a Magi Cell Phone," Harry retorted, referring to what they called a Magic/Muggle Mobile on the continent.
Joseph thought that argument was ridiculous. The discussion continued for several more minutes.
Meanwhile Gabrielle DuMond was pointing to Cleopatra, and whispering to her mother. They both shook their heads and quite obviously were looking askance at Cleopatra, who was admittedly looking rather frumpy. Rose glared at the two as they were obviously talking about her friend. 'Pretty is as pretty does,' was a favorite saying of her grandmother Granger and these two were definitely showing their ugly petty side with their actions.
They were interrupted by the entrance of Cindy Edington, the North American Minister of Magic, her husband Bill, two of their children and their spouses, and the grandchildren who were MELL students, the cousins Luta and Henry Edington.
"Just what kind of danger have you put our grandchildren in, putting them in Slytherin?" Bill snapped, pulling away from his wife's calming hand on his.
The French Canadian Magi stepped aside as another confrontation began, Gabrielle huffing, "At least I'M in Ravenclaw, the only house that has brains."
"Your children were not asked to nor allowed to go into the Chamber of Secrets, and we kept them as safe as we could," Harry replied to Bill Edington as the Canadians left to mutter in a corner of the room.
"I cannot say my grandchildren are very fond of the character of that Slytherin house," Bill noted.
"It seems to me that the Magi of North America are always problem solvers," Harry replied. "There are problems with Slytherin, and one solution is to put people like you on the Hogwarts board so we can change some of the rules the Slytherin operates under and appoint our candidates to be the prefects and leaders of the house."
"People like me?" Bill pondered, obviously shocked at the sudden change in the conversation.
"You, Bill," Harry countered. "I want you on the Hogwarts board. You. I've run it by most of other board members and Minerva McGonagall, and they agree. Don't just complain about the very real problems we are facing. Do something about it. And please keep this conversation confidential!"
Bill looked at his wife, his children and their spouses, and finally agreed, "I will do what I can.
There was a moderately long conversation between the Edington clan with Harry, Hermione, and the children concerning Hogwarts and Slytherin before they were interrupted by another group.
Late in the morning the Chinese contingent arrived. Hermione spotted her partner in writing and revising the Potions textbooks, T.T. Chang, and waved him over. The whole Chinese contingent followed.
Patricia Wang, the mother of Harry and Ginny Wang, two of the Slytherin MELL students, started, her voice raised, "Just how much danger were our students in from those basilisk? We did not send our children to Hogwarts to put them in danger."
"The danger from Tom Riddle Hanley has passed," Harry insisted, loud enough so the whole room could hear him. Harry continued much more quietly, "Hogwarts is reasonably safe. There are dangers in our world. You are in the part of the world most haunted by the Lord of the Dementors. Our world is facing multiple challenges and dangers, as well as opportunities. I know the Chinese word for crisis, wēijī, is composed of two characters signifying opportunity and danger.
"Life is not risk free. Our children are more at risk, by far, than your children. You will not keep China nor our magical world safe by hiding in China. You know that."
Patricia's husband Paul jumped in with, "Is there anything we can do to help?"
"The person I need help from is T.T.," Harry replied, looking at T.T. Chang. "I need you to agree to be on the Hogwarts board."
"Why me?" T.T. inquired.
"I would rather not have anyone too prominent in one of the Ministry of Magic's on the board. I cannot have anyone who runs another magical school on the board. And I know who I want," Harry explained.
"Does this have anything to do with governing Slytherin?" T.T. asked, beginning to guess what Harry was trying to do.
"Do not suggest that, please!" Harry emphasized, grinning with a conspiratorial grin.
T.T. grinned back, putting his finger on the side of his nose in understanding. He was almost certainly Harry had some plan in the works. "I would like to see running a school from the other side," T.T. agreed. "I've been a teacher most of my life. This will be a good experience."
After all the parents and students had arrived the gathering broke up into groups of adults and smaller groups of the children.
As the afternoon developed, Eduardo Rios started to spend time with Albus and Cleopatra, talking about spells. Cleopatra's unusual wand, and the odd way she performed most spells, fascinated Eduardo, who was quite content to let his wife lead the LA School of Witchcraft and Wizardry while he taught and developed spells.
Hermione and Rose found themselves pinned down by Emilie DuMond and her daughter Gabrielle, as they talked about details of classes, and how Hogwarts was run verses how their very good magical school in Quebec was taught. Meanwhile Jean-Paul and Melissa Felion, the parents of Jean-Louis Felion, approached Harry.
"Where is your wife?" Jean-Paul wondered as he looked around the room. "Will we see her at the opening ball?"
"She is taking care of our toddler Minerva, who is just a year old, plus an eleven-year-old girl raised in a No-Maj house who is starting Hogwarts with our daughter Lily Luna next year," Harry explained.
"Avoiding the conflict?" Jean-Paul asked, looking at his cousin Emilie grilling Hermione, her daughter Gabrielle looking on.
"Ginny will be at the dinner and ball tonight," Harry replied with a nod.
"What about that Malfoy child's parents?" Jean-Paul persisted. "Where are his parents."
"Back in Great Britain," Harry admitted. "They are no longer part of the power structure of British Magi at this point."
"But Scorpius is?" Jean-Paul wondered.
"He is a nice person," Harry suggested, "and he is not liable for the sins of his father and grandfather. He is too young to see what he is going to become, but I have high hopes for him."
Jean-Paul looked at his son Jean-Louis. Jean-Louis agreed, "Scorpius is OK. He is on the side of all the people in Slytherin who are trying to change the character of the house. He also seems to be a really nice person. He and Rose study harder than just about anyone."
"How did he become your group's spokesperson?" Jean-Paul wondered.
"He took notes when no one else did, and worked at it," Harry argued. "No one is preventing anyone else from doing it, but it is a lot of work. I know he has spent most of the last few days writing articles, working very hard at it."
As the day wore on Harry recognized that most of the parents were just trying to get to know their friend's parents. All of them had met before, but there was much catching up.
2020