This story is fairly dark and not kind to Magical Britain. Harry is an abused child who used his magic to 'hide' and he does not trust adults or other children. He is sorted into Hufflepuff and keeps his own counsel. He knows that the only way to keep a secret is to not tell anyone. But he makes true friends in Hufflepuff, learns to trust some people, but he must survive and deal with dangers at Hogwarts. (For this story, this is how transfiguration, and the subsequent transmutation works. If you disagree, please write a story that includes how you believe it should work. I look forward to reading your story!)
Chapter 1: 1995 McGonagall's Resignation15 July 1995Minerva McGonagall stumbled three times as she made her way back to her quarters from the headmaster's office. Each time was a misstep and she only remained upright by placing her hand against the wall or catching onto a doorframe. Her journey was slow as she glanced about the castle and stared at the portraits and statues of armor; this was the last time she would see these corridors and the office she had called her own for thirty years. After pushing the door open, she found her belongings already packed by the elves; her mementos and books filled two boxes. The door leading to her sitting room and bedchamber was open and she saw a trunk, already filled with her robes, shoes and hats. The lid remained opened waiting for her to close it as a final act of leaving. Walking to the fire, she placed her hands on the mantle and leaned forward, her forehead pressing against the marble as she remembered the interview just completed with the headmaster.
She'd stood before the new desk in the headmaster's office and believed she could still smell lemon drops, as the headmaster jumped immediately to the purpose of the meeting without platitudes or false compliments and greetings. "Madam McGonagall, I will accept your letter of resignation and you may retire to your ancestral family home without fuss and bother today."
"Resignation?" asked McGonagall. "I have no desire to resign from Hogwarts!"
"Then I shall terminate you for cause, effective immediately," the headmaster replied.
"For cause! What cause?" demanded the incensed witch, finding herself dropping into the chair in front of the desk – a real chair, not one transfigured for the moment.
"For thirty years you pretended to hold three positions at Hogwarts and never fulfilled the requirements of a single one!"
"I am an excellent professor of transfiguration!" she declared in her defense.
"And when was the last time you published an article on new spells or techniques in Transfiguration?" asked the man seated behind the desk in the headmaster's quarters. "Just over one year ago, an important breakthrough revolutionizing transfiguration was made by two students in their herbology classes with Professor Sprout. It certainly put Hogwarts on the map again and brought a lot of attention to the school… not all of it good but enough to force some changes."
Minerva frowned to be reminded that Pomona and her students had stumbled upon a revolution in transfiguration. Worse one student published the information naming the new magic as 'Neville's Law' and not giving any credit to her transfiguration classes or to Headmaster Dumbledore in the paper. McGonagall's frown grew darker as she remembered, 'Sprout must have written the bloody paper! Why didn't she spread the glory around?'
Realizing she was lost in thought, McGonagall returned to the matter about her overloaded schedule for the last thirty years. She addressed the new headmaster, "There were always issues with Gryffindor House and tasks to complete for Headmas… for Dumbledore."
"Yes, Gryffindor House. When did you ever hold a house meeting or help any student with their homework? When did you ever put a Gryffindor student first?" he asked rhetorically. "And you didn't perform the deputy headmistress tasks either… you never supervised a professor's class, never interviewed any candidate for any position, or reviewed the accounts!"
Ignoring the list of her failings except for the last one, Minerva vehemently protested the need to review the Hogwarts' accounts for improprieties by saying, "Albus Dumbledore never stole from Hogwarts!"
His own visage now sour-faced, the new headmaster pulled a half dozen parchments from his desk drawer. Each paper bore the official seal of Gringotts Bank, as he laid them, one after the other, on the desk in front of her.
"Please examine these certified documents from Gringotts," the insufferable headmaster instructed her. "While he was headmaster, Albus Dumbledore paid himself three salaries: one for being headmaster, the second being your deputy headmistress salary, and the third being money that was earmarked for the position of history professor. You were cheated out of half of your salary for thirty years and never noticed."
"My salary?" she asked reaching for the papers that the headmaster allowed her to review. The Gringotts documents verified the three salaries, as well as annual payments from Hogwarts funds to robe makers for the outlandish robes Dumbledore wore, payment for rental of house elves that already belonged to the school, and renumeration for the significant numbers of potions brewed by Severus Snape and the seventh-year students that were provided to Saint Mungo's. The bruhaha that erupted in third year when the 'new' potions professor took on the position had affected Dumbledore's reputation along with his other indiscretions.
"Dumbledore's wardrobe expenses would have paid for a master wizard to teach the magic of enchantments and illusions to the older students. He rented Hogwarts elves back to the castle for another professor's salary that could have taught music, art, and chorus. And the potions that Saint Mungo's paid for could have funded a professor to teach the younger students all the careful steps for ingredient preparation and then potion brewing. The potions 'professor' should only have ever taught the fourth through seventh year students."
"This is… How many galleons did he take?" she asked, aghast at the level of theft evident before her.
"Over a quarter million galleons in the last ten years," the headmaster replied. "Gringotts has pursued the matter and the school will recover approximately one hundred thousand galleons."
There was silence in the room for a long moment before the headmaster began again, "Now, with your letter of resignation, effective immediately, I shall authorize your pension in full and provide you with seven years of back pay for the assistant headmistress position."
"Seven years?" the woman asked in a daze.
"That is the limit on the years you can make claim for missing renumeration."
"But I don't want to leave!" Minerva protested.
"You do not have a choice about staying. You can choose to fuss and be terminated for cause, which means you do not receive your pension or the missing salary, or you can resign and leave with funds to be excessively comfortable in your retirement. Perhaps you can write a book about your experiences here at Hogwarts under the worst headmaster in the school's history."
Minerva shook herself out of the memory from earlier and once more paid attention to the walls of her office; the 'retiring' professor turned to the portrait of Travis Wentwhistle, a Hogwarts transfiguration professor in the eighteenth century, and asked, "Where did it all go wrong?"
"Girl, you stopped listening to me the first year you were employed as Transfiguration professor," the portrait replied. "But if you really want to know the tipping point, go back four years to the sorting of 1991."
The look of puzzlement on the witch's face only grew as she brought up memories of that year. Eventually, she said, "1991, that's when I lost the muggleborn witch at Halloween, and Quirinus Quirrell died at Christmas. Nothing else happened that year."
Wentwhistle shook his head and froze himself, retreating from further fruitless discussions with the witch. Disheartened, Minerva McGonagall closed the lid of her trunk, donned her travelling cloak and hat, gathered her wand. She shrunk the boxes sitting on her desk and slipped the now tiny items into her pockets. The trunk levitated behind her as she descended from the heights of Hogwarts to the entry hall. There she found the new headmaster, Jedidiah Hammerfield, and Professor Flitwick waiting.
"Minerva, I wish you well," Flitwick said as he bowed to the departing witch.
"Good journey, Madam McGonagall," Headmaster Hammerfield stated, bowing his head slightly.
As she walked toward the gates where an elf waited to open them, McGonagall searched her mind for the portrait's hint about the sorting in 1991.
She muttered aloud, "Who were the students in 1991? That was a very quiet year… Susan Bones, Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley…a terrible student. None of them will accomplished anything…"
Minerva's face grew hard as she was forced to admit that Potter and Longbottom had already had a great accomplishment to their credit. And in her field; Transfiguration!
Then she continued with her memories, 'It was 1992 that we had all the student deaths in the school. The Clearwater girl and some of the others from Ravenclaw died in the winter, the Weasley girl was injured, and all the Slytherin students died in spring…'
Once Minerva McGonagall was beyond the gateway and the elf closed the gates, the witch realized her mind was too distracted by the day's events and the questions in her mind to attempt to apparate.
'I'd be spread across the Highlands if I tried.'
She glanced back at Hogwarts but knew she would not be welcomed to use the floo, so she began the walk to Hogsmeade, her trunk following like a well-trained dog.
'The walk will clear my mind.'
Along the path to the nearby village, Minerva found her composure failing as she passed two young witches and a wizard headed toward Hogwarts. She did not recognize their faces and though they nodded as they passed, none of the trio spoke to Minerva.
'Did my replacement just pass me on the path? My replacements?'
At Rosemerta's tavern, Minerva McGonagall paid her three sickles to use the floo and began the journey to her home on the other side of Scotland.
In the next chapter, watch the changes in Harry Potter's years at Hogwarts beginning with his sorting.
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