A Dark Lord

Now that the children had left the room and were out of earshot, the woman let out a sigh. Perhaps it no longer seemed like a good idea for her to present Harry as a relative. They should have just passed him off as a stranger, that would have been much easier. But now they couldn't escape it and there was little point in regretting it. Because of the complications in communicating with her children, he hoped that his stay here would be of limited duration.

"I have a question," Harry suddenly spoke up, who had lapsed into a depressed silence for a moment: "Is Albus Dumbledore also Headmaster of Hogwarts in this world?"

Lily's face twisted when she heard that name and that alone answered the question for Harry. Nevertheless, she replied in a very grim tone, "Yes, the old wretch is still at the head of Hogwarts."

"Considering the restrictions I've heard about by now, I'm guessing he's not a particularly pleasant personality."

She then laughed briefly and mirthlessly and then looked at him very gravely: "Albus Dumbledore is the most dangerous and cruelest wizard of all time. No one, not even Mr. Riddle, is his equal. Never set out to meet him and if you do, for whatever reason, I advise you not to provoke him.

"He is a patient man, you have to give him that, but you had better not risk incurring his wrath. He uses people shamelessly for his own ends and manipulates anyone who gets in his way. He is not the kind of villain who commits atrocities in public. He rather operates from the background and sends his minions to commit misdeeds."

"What kind of misdeeds are we talking about here?" Harry asked wary of the answer, "You see, in my world, Dumbledore was the strongest force on the side of the resistance against Voldemort's regime."

"You know what, I'll show you our Dumbledore in all his glory. Come with me!" she said suddenly and left the room. Harry followed her, confused but silent, back into the cellar. There they entered another room that seemed to be some kind of workshop. Scattered all over the room and its furnishings were many bowls of various shapes and materials. He realised that these were pensieves.

Knowing how valuable and rare even a single pensieve was - he had long tried in vain to find one himself - he marvelled and murmured: "So many pensieves! I didn't even know there were so many of them. It must be worth a fortune!"

"They are, but they are not mine either, after all. That is my work. I repair and restore pensieves. Of course, it's an unofficial business. As a mudblood, I shouldn't normally even be allowed near such valuable magical artistic treasures. But I am now much cheaper than other restaurateurs. And probably better too," she replied proudly: "In principle, the ministry itself is responsible for my earnings. The introduction of state-set incomes, which were supposed to ensure that purebloods were also paid sufficiently well, have meant that moonlighting has become very attractive for both, recipients and providers. There are, of course, not exactly many specialists in pensieves. Three in the whole of the UK, perhaps, already counting me.

"I have developed this complex field through self-study alone and the traders trust me. Since official restaurateurs of ancient and antique relics have to charge vast sums of galleons for their work in order to maintain the prescribed minimum standard, clients prefer to give their goods to antiquarians, who in turn make use of the existing illicit labour, mainly of halfbloods and mudbloods. There are countless specialisations: For brooms, magic cauldrons, antiobscurants or, indeed, pensieves. It is a profitable business. For the time being, one has to say. Who knows how long the ministry will remain as inactive as it has been.

"I must admit, however, that it hardly matters any more in the meantime. The repairs are of course a secure source of income. But in the meantime I understand the function of pensieves, their arithmantic constitution and thus also the conception of size, material, form and the matching runes so well that I can certainly make some myself. Of inferior quality, but I am on the right track. This one -,"she briefly interrupted her enthusiastic spiel to lift a Pensieve lying on a work surface and show it off to Harry from all angles, "- is my latest and best yet."

The bowl seemed to be made of a dark metal, unlike the Pensieve at Hogwarts. It was noticeably larger than that one and seemed to have a lot more runes on it - as far as Harry remembered. Harry was almost as carried away by her enthusiasm as she was herself. The assumption was that her favourite subject at this Hogwarts had not been Potions, as it had been with his real mother, but ancient runes. Otherwise she would undoubtedly have become a specialist in other things.

"So you mean you'll be able to sell pensieves of your own making in the future?" asked Harry enthusiastically.

She smiled much more genuinely now than before. Until now she had met him with a cool professionalism that did not necessarily seem friendly. Now that role seemed to have fallen on her and she said, "Well, it will be some time before I am ready to guarantee the necessary security to people who would spend money on it. A pensieve is a highly complex structure and also a dangerous one. Not only in terms of the runes. Simply put, the spells that cause the disappearance of a person in a memory are extremely complex and have to mesh smoothly with the runic effects. But we have nothing to fear when we use this one. I have tested it several times and nothing happened to me."

She put the dark pensieve back on the work surface and then drew threads of memory out of her head with her wand, letting them slide into the pensieve. She looked at Harry resolutely and said, "If Dumbledore really is such a lovely person in your world, then this might come as a shock. But I think it is important that you see this as an example of his wickedness. This is a court case against three supporters of Mr Riddle who were taken alive. The whole thing was twelve years ago now, but I remember it very clearly. After you!"

He accepted her invitation and leaned into her swirling thoughts. He was sucked in by the substance and landed rather hard on the rock floor of the courtroom. No doubt the Thinkarium's technique wasn't particularly sophisticated at this point, as he didn't recall feeling any kind of pain in Dumbledor's memory. In fact, everything he could see seemed to be rather bluish and somehow oversaturated in colour. In some places the room would occasionally dissolve into smoke and reform again. Everything therefore seemed rather unstable and did not convey a particularly pleasant atmosphere.

Lily now landed next to him, crashing through the ceiling onto the floor. She groaned, but then said almost elatedly: "I definitely still have to work on that," she looked around and attested to her work: "The consistency is not really satisfactory yet, but the colouring is much better than last time. I must say I am pleased with how well the pensieve accommodates two people. It means I'm a big step further. Very nice."

"Does that mean you haven't tested this thing for more than one person at all?"

"Well, there were some experiments with older prototypes until Severus refused to be my guinea pig for the foreseeable future. He said it would irritate him and all the other people very much if he flickered in different colours for a few weeks. But I rather think it was the burns that made him withdraw his help from me and keep lecturing me about homicidal research. I didn't hold it against him - well, a little bit - but it deprived me of the opportunity to test out the person volume. You don't have to worry though, I don't think anything bad will happen today."

Doubtful, but also somehow amused, he nodded and looked more closely at the place and the people over the errors of the projection. It was the same menacing courtroom where the Barty Crouch junior of his world had once been tried and where he himself had had his unjust hearing for underage magic. Even though he himself had brought many people here to face charges and was by now more used to being here as a witness, this room had never really lost its terror for him. It was a cold place that constantly made you feel unwanted. The cool blueness of the light created by the inadequate pensieve did not help to strengthen the feeling of well-being in him either.

His gaze focused on a man with a long silver beard who, on the one hand, seemed immensely familiar, but on the other hand, incredibly alien. Harry could understand that Lily had portrayed him as a dark or at least disagreeable wizard. This Dumbledore - quite unlike Voldemort - did not need red eyes or serpentine features to have a threatening effect.

His gaze alone, which here appeared sharp and ruthless, was enough to send shivers down one's spine. His black clothes seemed far more fitted and somehow plainer than those Harry would usually expect to see on him and his face also seemed less wrinkled and old. In general, Harry saw him more as the implacable patriarch of a pure-blooded aristocratic family than as the eccentric and strangely naïve warlock he had known.

Dumbledore took the floor in a most chilling and official voice: "I greet you in the name of the Wizengamot, over which I am called to preside. Today, after a tedious period of interrogations, a verdict is to be passed on the heinous misdeeds and aberrations of three former members of our benign society, from whose order those deplorable creatures have willingly and wickedly removed themselves.

"The misdemeanours of these two mudbloods and the treacherous pureblood Regulus Black were an assault not only on highly respected members of the wizarding community but also on the community itself. The cowardly assault by these three monstrosities on the esteemed Chairman of the Department of Segregation and Peace, George Greengrass, which has now been proven and documented beyond doubt, can only be punished by the harshest of measures.

"They have forfeited the right to live in our social and humane society. According to our great customs, the two pitiful mudbloods Edward Howler and Herald Bottling should be punished for their sheer deeds with at least life imprisonment in Azkaban, since they have also attacked the pillars of our society in accordance with their lower nature. For Regulus Black, however, who has not only done the same, but in addition has betrayed his own blood, something else is to be arranged.

"Undoubtedly, the mind of this youth, distinguished by noble blood, has been confused by sufficiently well-known heresies. Because of the resulting mental derangement, he can only be partly held responsible for his own sins. But does this not mean that the two mudbloods, the instigators of this terrorist atrocity, are even more culpable?"

A murmur of agreement went through the audience: "Yes, certainly. Actually, one should demand the kiss of the Dementor for those unworthy creatures who claim to be wizards. In truth, however, as far as their nature was concerned, they were never more than the most worthless Muggles, who felt a spark of magic more in them than the rest of these lowly creatures. But magical society is not cruel. It knows mercy.

"It would be unworthy to subject common Muggles to the highest punishment our law knows for wizards. We do not wish to declare them as such by condemning them in this way. And yet their deed must be weighed more heavily on account of the corruption of a pureblood. Therefore, in addition to that life sentence in Azkaban, which I have already named as the basic measure, I propose that these mud-bloods be given a weekly Cruciatus treatment which will perhaps help them to put behind them their mental imbecility, which they have foolishly passed on to Regulus Black, the Pureblood, as well. Regulus Black, by virtue of his pure-bloodedness, shall spend seven years in Azkaban pondering his proper status and sublimity, that he may understand that only the true, present order of wizardry is natural and right."

The audience applauded and cheered for Dumbledore, who then displayed his this side version of his infamous twinkle, which, however, did not appear amiable in any way. Suddenly, through the approving shouts of the audience, Regulus Black angrily spoke up: "I demand to make a statement!"

The hall fell abruptly silent as an overweight bailiff replied, "It is granted according to the rights he has as a pureblood."

"All that I and those who support us do, is for freedom and justice alone. One may, with some justification, question the mere intention to kill. I concede that. But that does not mean that we are acting without reason or out of lower motives. This society is rotten to the core! A few ignorant self-appointed rulers lord it over a great mass and all that distinguishes them from the rest is their birth. Neither in talent, goodness or character are those of Muggle descent inferior to the so-called purebloods.

"And yet you separate us, letting skills wither rather than nurture them, and punishing those who strive for better nonetheless. None of us is inferior! The white sun, the symbol of the future, will one day shine upon us all. You will decide today to destroy two freedom fighters in spirit. The cowardice of the masses to stand up for what is right is all that still protects you and the ministry that is decaying from within. We are becoming more and more.

"And soon you will be fighting a superior force of liberty-minded witches and wizards. Yes, witches and wizards. And humans. For it is you who have long since lost that status. Your rigid regime will be torn to shreds as a fierce dragon does to a herd of unsuspecting pigs. I renounce my privileges as a pureblood! Condemn me as a Muggleborn! I do not need your ridiculous paternalism and leniency!"

Dumbledore was in no way shocked or piqued by the vehement contradiction. He smiled smugly as he replied: "You misjudge your position, Mr. Black. It is not you, who has to judge the sentence or the rights you are entitled to. It is the wizarding community, represented by the wise Ministry and noble Wizengamot, who have to resolve these issues. According to the Wizengamot, the ancient laws and ordinances of our country are based on evidence and greater wisdom.

"I myself, as you know, have been involved at Hogwarts for a very long time. There it already shows in adolescence. Mudbloods are undisciplined, rebellious, disrespectful and usually below average in talent. And where there actually is a talent lying dormant, the training of it is basically undermined by their natural, inferior character. It's in the blood. All serious research into the need for the purest possible blood proves that mudbloods are inferior to true witches and wizards in all areas.

"It is the grace and prudence of our society that allows those unfortunate creatures to receive an education befitting them at all. I believe, Mr. Black, that once you have been away from those terrorists in space and spirit for a while, it will soon be very clear to you how wrong those things are that you think are beliefs. You will once again become a part of our society as befits your blood."

Regulus was now practically quivering with anger. Harry had never seen him in the flesh in his world and he knew that his godfather had despised his brother. But this man who was accused here could hardly be compared to his counterpart. He seemed to be a man of integrity and high character. In his rage, the actually smaller and lankier Regulus seemed much taller than he actually was.

With a look of utter contempt, he turned to Dumbledore again: "I understand. You will erase my memory, reprogram me. As was done to Marlene McKinnon, Gideon Prewitt and Rabastan Lestrange. I would rather die than become part of this so-called society. Worse still unknowingly by-"

Dumbledore had raised his wand and pointed it at Regulus Black, who was clutching his throat convulsively. Dumbledore replied frostily, "You are crossing the line of good taste. We know your vile aberrations. But you'd better spare us these tall tales of yours, which you have certainly concocted in order not to have to give up your erroneous view of the world.

"But since you mention these three excellent members of the wizarding society, they are outstanding examples of successful reintegration into our society. They have realised how foolish and simple-minded Tom Riddle's ideology is and now unconditionally profess the true order," he now addressed the Wizengamot: "Dear distinguished members of the Wizengamot, let's get this unpleasant matter out of the way quickly. Who is in favour of sentencing the wrongdoers to the proposed sentence?"

All the members raised their hands and gave the accused Muggle-borns disgusted looks, while they gave Regulus pitying ones. The audience went wild. The cheers of condemnation were filled with shouts that did not spare swear words and insults for the condemned. Lily sighed heavily and watched Dumbledore, who was now waving at the rabble-rousing crowd with a complacent expression on his face.

Harry looked at the old man shaking his head and finally said, "I see what you meant. This is appalling. What happened to Regulus Black and the other two?"

"Bottling passed away after only a year in Azkaban. Howler is still there today, completely insane. They call it the 'healing process'. Of course, no one has ever really been cured in the Ministry sense, they have merely lost their minds. This crutiatus treatment, this torture that they pass off as medical therapy for severe cases, adds to the effect of the dementors. It unofficially serves as a deterrent for Muggle-borns not to commit crimes. Regulus, as he expected, was hit with a strong memory charm after his seven years.

"I suspect that weaker spells were used at first. Apparently he managed to resist them. Somehow the persons responsible - we don't know who performs the memory charms - must have noticed the failure of their plan. He had no memory of himself or his former life afterwards. However, his abilities and his mind remained intact.

"Today he lives with his brother and his brother's family in the ancestral home of the Blacks and in that respect is no longer one of us. While it must be said that he has not publicly made any statements that would be negatively directed against the Fellowship of the White Sun or Riddle, I hardly think this stems from consent, but rather from keeping him away from these things for fear of a relapse."

Lily finished their stay in the pensieve and they were now standing in Lily's workshop again with a harsh jolt. Harry stared at the pensieve, concerned and somehow shocked. He did not like this world at all. There was so much unfairness in it and his already very easily inflamed sense of justice burned up inside him. Sure, the three of them had tried to commit murder and it was understandable that they should be punished. He could see that.

But the nature of the sentence, which in all three cases amounted to a deliberate destruction of their evolved personalities, was simply inhuman and unethical. It was a barbarism that was hardly better than Voldemort' watched him and was obviously surprised at the impact the memory had on her false son.

She snapped him out of his musing when she said: "That's what we're fighting against. Against this judicial system and against this regime, both of which degrade so many to second or even third class human beings. We can use every fighter for our righteous cause as you can see.

"When Severus returns, he will take you to the Fellowship headquarters. You can stay there for now. I am sure he has informed Riddle of you and the circumstances of your presence here and I would be very surprised if he passed up the opportunity to meet you. You can start studying our strange world there. No one will force you to do anything for us, but I very much hope for your commitment. You don't strike me as someone who would let such things happen."

"I am convinced that I have to fight these conditions," Harry admitted, "But I can't say anything about it yet. It all depends on who Riddle is in this world."