August 2nd, 1993
It was a farce. The entire Wizengamot had convened; 50-odd wizards and witches present to see justice done.
Except of course, a good portion of them would rather have eaten their wands than have seen her father cleared – they were Death Eaters after all.
On the side of the Cowards, as she mentally called them all, were Avery Jr, Crabbe Sr, Goyle Sr, Selwyn, Macnair, Malfoy and Yaxley. Thankfully, they were only present as a courtesy. Only Selwyn and Macnair held seats.
Benjamin Nott did too, but she didn't know whose side he would take. He had never publicly supported the pure-blood agenda, which was the corner stone of every Death Eater's policies. Also, he had been working on mending his relationship with Jupiter for a year now. Overall, she didn't count him as a Death Eater anymore – especially since he'd volunteered to take veritaserum and had revealed under its influence that he'd never killed anyone, rather taking the punishment Voldemort had thus inflicted on him. Poor Theo had turned green when he'd heard.
On the side of the Good Guys, there were the Notts, the Weasleys, Mad-Eye, Remus and the Tonks. Marina was shocked that Molly Weasley had allowed all of her kids to come along – even Ginny.
Due to Dumbledore's and Kingsley Shacklebolt's involvement, Amelia Bones – the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement – had caught wind of what was going on. The woman had personally marched into Azkaban and questioned her Dad extensively. Afterwards she'd marched back out, so furious her wand had been shooting sparks, sought out Marina and promised her she would personally ensure his freedom. With Amelia on board, Griselda Marchbanks and Elphias Doge had been informed – they'd been equally outraged.
And because Amelia knew, so did her niece Susan – who was a really nice girl Harry's age, but a bit of a gossip. Within a few hours Susan had owled her best friend Hannah Abbott, and both girls had proceeded to owl all their friends in Hufflepuff.
Like a snowball cascading into an avalanche, it had only taken a few days for almost all of Hogwarts to find out – especially since one of those kids had apparently discussed the subject at dinner; with a family friend present who just happened to be a reporter of the Daily Prophet.
It had come as no surprise at all when Marina had been buried under a storm of owls for the next few days. Everyone who'd ever met or talked to her wanted to express their opinion on the matter.
It had been driving her batty, as a lot of the birds had crashed her duelling training, and she'd asked Ted to erect a ward to keep the owls out. Hogwarts didn't offer Duelling, so she could only train during the holidays. All the mail had been diverted to the post office who would try and send it again in due time.
Her biggest concern however wasn't her renewed celebrity status, for which Susan and Hannah had apologised rather profoundly. It was Harry.
When one of the many messages had somehow reached Hermione, who didn't really get that much owl mail, she'd immediately contacted Harry to congratulate them on the success.
Needless to say, her brother had not been amused that she'd kept it from him. Marina had spent an entire afternoon explaining why she hadn't told him: first and foremost because she feared the Cowards would move to have her father's memories watched on record, and she really didn't think it was necessary for Harry to see his dead parents. She only remembered their screams at the end, and that was bad enough.
Harry had understood her reasons – but categorically insisted that he come along. Marina was may things but not a hypocrite, so she'd badgered the adults until Dumbledore had finally agreed.
So now here they were, sitting in a court room stuffed with people who really had no business being here; not least of which the press.
Dumbledore's and Amelia's support would be enough to sway a lot of votes, unfortunately Macnair and Selwyn held about as much influence on their side of the bench.
Marina hadn't allowed herself to think on the What If of her father not being cleared. It would be the height of injustice and lunacy, in front of reporters no less, but it was possible. They didn't have the rat as evidence.
"Silence, please!" Dumbledore requested loudly from his seat up front. "The trial will now begin!"
Four hours later...
They were still sitting in that court room, listening to the members of the Wizengamot argue. They'd gotten up at five o'clock in order to be on time for the eight o'clock trial. Harry had finally succumbed to his exhaustion – the muggles had once again been working him all summer – and had laid his head against her shoulder.
Marina, for her part, was thoroughly annoyed.
They had questioned her father, under the influence of veritaserum no less, forward and backward for hours. He'd told them everything, from how the Marauders had become animagi to how everything had gone so terribly wrong and ended at Hallowe'en 1981.
She was grateful she'd decided to tell Harry all of it before they had attended this nonsense.
Even Mad-Eye, who was accustomed to the process, was getting frustrated a few rows over. Ginny had fallen asleep between the twins, and Tyler wasn't holding up much better.
What was really putting a strain on the older teenagers, and the adults, though were the bloody dementors. Nobody was actually feeling their effect, thanks to Dumbledore's patronus: a phoenix. But their present was like a constant reminder of doom – and her own awful memories she hadn't told anyone about.
"Leave her out of this!" her Dad suddenly barked and Marina snapped her head around, shocked. It was the first time he'd spoken in anything but calm and collected tones.
Even after the veritaserum had worn off, he'd shown them all nothing but deference. Consequently, she was surprised at the outburst.
"If your brat is so sure of your innocence-," Macnair sneered, insisting on being stupid, "-why didn't she insist on due process sooner?"
Her idiot of a father actually tried to stand to defend her. Not that he got very far.
Harry had straightened at the Death Eater's scathing accusation.
"Maybe you should be asking me that," Marina said calmly but firmly, her voice ringing loudly in the court room.
The Cowards collectively flinched and looked her way, after they'd obviously forgotten she was there.
"Ms Black, you have not been called as witness," Dumbledore said sternly, his persona of Chief Warlock in full force.
"Then someone should remind Mr Macnair that my father is not a legilimens," Marina replied dryly. "He can't possibly know what I was thinking."
Said father had a hard time suppressing his smirk.
"Let the girl answer," Lucius Malfoy suddenly spoke up, a spectator himself, albeit one with a lot more political weight than others.
She had to stifle her laugh when she spotted a pretty smug Narcissa pet her husband's arm.
Dumbledore looked around, saw most of the Wizengamot members nodding in agreement, and gestured at her to proceed.
"First of all, I didn't press for this trial sooner because the... adults in my life decided not to tell me about Dad until a year ago," Marina said and had to force herself to sound calm. "And as soon as I did find out, I pestered everyone involved. Now here we are – and have been for four hours, might I add."
"Proceedings such as these take time, dear," a woman sitting close to the Death Eaters told her condescendingly. She had a pink ribbon on her head, of all things.
"He's told you everything he knows under the influence of veritaserum," Marina countered, a bit exasperated. "And thanks to Madame Bones, Magical Law Enforcement has finally done its job and come to the conclusion that the whole scenario of Dad blowing up that street makes no sense."
The angle of how the spell had hit didn't fit her father's position at the time at all; never mind the fact that he had been trained as a Hit Wizard and was capable of making a clean kill, not that massacre he was accused of.
"Aurors make mistakes," ribbon-head said sweetly.
"Obviously-," Marina fired back, "- seeing as my father has been in prison for twelve years. Let me ask the Wizengamot this: did anyone ever test my father's wand?"
She knew they hadn't. David and his partner, Elias Whitmore – who's father held a seat – had kept digging through the archives for months, until they'd found her father's untested – and thankfully still intact – wand in evidence.
"What does that have to do with anything?" Macnair snapped.
"Because then you would know that he never fired any such spell," she responded dryly. "In fact, you'd see that he wasn't even trying to kill Pettigrew – much as he might have wanted to."
And hadn't he already testified that he'd only been trying to stun the rat? Furious as he had been, her father had still known that they would have needed Peter alive – it would presumably have been easy enough to get him to talk and give up his terrorist friends.
"Whitmore," Amelia spoke up, loudly, and Marina snapped her head around. She hadn't paid any particular attention to the aurors on duty and part of this farce. If Elias was here...
"Yes, Ma'am." Elias stepped forward, dressed in an auror's duty clothing: form-fitting pants, a dark shirt and duelling robes.
Different to casual robes, they were always open and cut in a way that wouldn't hinder the person during a fight; sleeves that actually ended at the wrists, for starters, and were snug as to not hamper spell casting. Combined with the man's pitch black hair, he looked overall sinister. Really though, he was a great guy – then again, he'd have to be as David's best friend.
Thinking of which: David stepped forward next to his partner, dressed the same and entirely fed up. Marina was the only one who knew the latter, of course.
"Go to evidence storage and retrieve Mr Black's wand. Meanwhile, Nott, extract Mr Black's memories from '81. It is time to settle this once and for all."
Marina tensed at the same time as her father. But while his eyes immediately shot to her in concern, she looked at Harry instead.
Knowing what had happened to his parents was one thing. Knowing Marina actually remembered them when he didn't was one thing. Seeing them in her Dad's memories was another league entirely. It was exactly what she'd been afraid of.
"It's okay," Harry whispered, a small smile on his face. "I can handle it."
Well, it wasn't like she could bloody stop the Wizengamot from doing what they wanted.
When she looked back, her father was still looking at her and David hadn't moved to do as ordered. He was staring at her too. She nodded at them both, sighing. Best to get it over with.
None of the people present had missed the exchange, but surprisingly no one commented.
"I'm sorry," Carmen whispered as her brother pulled silvery strings of memories out of her father's head.
"Better David than anyone else," Marina replied grimly. "At least I know he knows what he's doing and not messing up Dad's head."
"He volunteered for duty today," Bianca offered.
The eldest Nott had returned from Africa to support Marina during the trial. And to inform her parents that she'd met someone that, if she had her way, she would marry at some point. Considering the fact that he'd owled her four times in the week she'd been back, Marina figured the woman's chances were pretty good.
"At least he's on our side," Harry mumbled in a way of responding to Bianca. He'd met her for the first time outside the court room this morning.
"How are you holding up?" Marina asked him and slung her left arm around his shoulders. Her brother laid his head back on her shoulder, yawning from exhaustion.
She smiled when she remembered that it had taken Hermione to explain to Harry why Marina had always hesitated to hug him. Of course, once the genius witch and Ron had overheard Marina call Harry her godbrother, they'd gone and told Harry. He simply called her his sister since and had written to her every other day during the holidays. Iris, Hedwig and the Tonks owl had never been so busy.
"Half of me really wants to see the memories," he admitted a bit sheepishly. "The other half doesn't want to see them... dead."
"That's why I didn't want to bring you," Marina sighed. "Mad-Eye said this might happen. I don't want to see them dead, either."
"At least you can get your Dad back," Harry said, attempting to cheer her up. But his own pain and loss almost made her choke.
"I did mention he's your godfather, right?" she huffed. "Do you really think he'll leave you there?"
"Dumbledore-"
"Means well, probably has a gazillion good reasons for leaving you there and had every right to make that decision back then," Marina cut him off before he could get her mad at their headmaster. "But with Dad's name cleared, he is your legal guardian. Even Dumbledore can't challenge that."
"Assuming he is cleared," Percy Weasley butted in logically.
"I'd like to see them try and lock him back up," Marina said grimly. "The wand will test clean and we have the Head of the DMLE on our side. Now it's just a matter of strong-arming the Cowards into backing off."
Elias came back with the wand just in time for David to finish the memory fishing.
Marina noticed her father staring at his wand longingly. It had been twelve years since he'd seen it last.
"Auror Whitmore, if you would," Amelia ordered officially and the entire room watched with rapt attention as the man cast a Prior Incantatem on the wand, forcing it to reveal the last spell cast.
Of course, in a court room the magic of the entire Wizengamot worked in tandem. It gave Elias' already powerful spell an extra edge and forced the wand to reveal more than just one spell. A dozen echoes appeared – none of them lethal or explosive.
"Let the record show that Sirius Black did not cast any spells capable of blowing up that street or killing anyone," Amelia announced. The magical quill scribbled down her words for the public archives.
Elias ended the spell and, without waiting for instruction, walked up the gallery, handing her the wand. When she took it, her fingers tingled. It wasn't resonating like her own, but she supposed it knew she was its owner's daughter.
"That doesn't prove anything," Selwyn prevailed.
But Marina could tell that most of the Wizengamot was appalled; they were starting to realise that the previous administration had indeed locked up an innocent man.
"On the contrary," Fudge countered dryly. "It proves that Mr Black did not murder anyone."
"Perhaps it's time to see for ourselves," Amelia said and waved at David, wordlessly ordering him to put the memories into the modified pensieve. It would allow the entire room to see the memory in question.
Yet again, David looked at Marina first.
"Ready?" she asked Harry, squeezing his shoulder. He nodded. She gestured for David to get on with it.