My favorite chapter, (so far) please review!!!!
Ch 6:The Trial
Harry walked through the huge wooden doors at the front of Hogwarts. He headed to the great hall hand in hand with Ginny, so glad to be back home. He was too busy to notice that the eyes of most of the female population of Hogwarts were on him and Ginny. They batted theirs eyes at Harry, before shooting Ginny death glares. Harry steered Ginny over to the front of the room and they sat closest to the head table, next to Ron and Hermione. Harry was very startled to see Remus sitting at the high table next to Dumbledore. Harry vaguely wondered if Sirius was there but then decided that that probably wasn't the case. He stopped thinking, realizing that hunger was gripping his stomach. He turned to look at Ron.
"You hungry?" he asked
"Oh yeah, why can't they just get on with it?" Ron replied. Harry heard Hermione mutter something that sounded a lot like "boys". Ginny stifled a laugh and Harry turned to look at her, a look of mock hurt on his face, but he was betrayed by his smile and leaned over and kissed Ginny on the cheek. She blushed and laughed. Ron, looking scandalized, turned to Harry.
"You are fraternizing with the enemy, Harry! You should be tried for high treason!" this earned Ron a good smack from Hermione and they had started to get into their own personal version of flirting, a pointless argument. But they were silenced by Ginny, who wanted to hear the sorting. Harry was too hungry to pay attention, and was very grateful when their plates filled with food and they were able to eat. They talked about their summer and Quidditch until they were full of food and their plates vanished.
"If I could please have everyone's attention." The voice of Dumbledore rang through out the halls and all the students turned to look at him. "I have three knew teachers to introduce to you. First, professor Arabella Figg will be taking professor Snape's place as potions teacher." There was scattered applause and Harry clapped hard. Ron leaned over to Harry.
"Is that her?" Harry nodded.
"Second," Dumbledore continued," I would like to reintroduce you to your old defense against the dark arts teacher, Remus Lupin," applause erupted from the Gryffindor table," I would like all of you to know that Remus has my full confidence and you are to treat him with respect, anyone who acts other wise will be sent directly to me. Now I must ask you not to panic, but the person teaching care of magical creatures may be a bit…er frightening to you, but I assure you he will not harm anyone," suddenly Sirius stood up. I would like to introduce to you, Professor Sirius Black." Harry was amazed; ignoring all the gasps of surprise he ran up to the high table and knocked Sirius over in a big hug.
"SIRIUS!!"Harry screamed excitedly.
"Gerroff me paws." Sirius said trying to look serious, but failing as a smile of joy crossed his face.
"Stuff it padfoot." Harry said still hugging his godfather. He helped him up to be met by the very confused stares of the Hogwarts students. Sirius still holding onto Harry gestured for Dumbledore to continue.
"er.. as you can see, Mr. Black has no intention of harming Mr. Potter here. In fact it is quite the opposite. Sirius black is innocent and will be on trail tonight, you can read about it in the Daily Profit tomorrow. Sirius is not to be feared and you are to treat him like Remus with respect, in the event that the former potions and care of magical creatures comeback sooner than expected, these three will all be teaching defense against the dark arts together. I would like to ask Mr. Potter, Mrs. Weasley, Mr. Ron Weasley, and Mrs. Granger to stay behind. That is all you may go." Harry watched every one exit the great hall and waited for his friends to join him at the high table. Dumbledore turned to them.
" you are all probably wanting to attend Sirius's trial," Dumbledore said," so I am letting you, I have told your first to classes that you will not be there tomorrow because you are going to be up late. I am letting you do this because I am sure I will be bombarded with begging and pleading, until I say yes, now I get to avoid all that. But I expect all of you to be on your best behavior. Now I have with me a port key that will take us there, please grab on." Harry took Ginny's hand and put a finger on the plate Dumbledore was holding. He felt an all too familiar jerk behind his navel, and was whisked away.
Harry landed with a thump onto a cold cement floor in a small dungeon. He looked around to see Remus helping Sirius up and Ron helping hormone, so he turned to pull Ginny up just as Cornelius Fudge, the Minister of magic walked through the door, startling Harry. He accidentally dropped Ginny who wasn't too pleased. He bent down to pick her back up and gave her an "I'm sorry" hug.
"sorry sweetie, he just surprised me, I didn't mean to drop you." Harry said. Ginny nodded rubbing the place on her back where she had fallen.
"attention!" fudge said to everyone in the small room," you are here to defend the accused Sirius black, are you not?" everyone nodded. "I hope that you tell the truth, this is a court of law and anything you say can be used against you."
"doesn't look like much of a court to me." Harry heard Sirius mutter. Remus elbowed him in the stomach.
"shh!"
"I warn you Mr. black, if you try to hurt me you will have no trial at all!" fudge said in a somewhat frightened voice. Harry knew that fudge had never been the bravest person in the world but that statement showed pure cowardess. "if you will please follow me I will show you where you sit."
"thank you Cornelius, but I'm sure we will be able to handle it." Dumbledore said. "we need to get this over with as soon as possible, I have a school to run you know." Harry Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Sirius and Remus followed Dumbledore to their seats. "Cornelius, would you please get the jury so we can begin?" fudge nodded and opened the door leading in ten people Harry had never seen before. Remus stood up and shook hands with all of them. Harry noticed that every time he did he looked at his ring, which always glowed yellow. Harry knew this was a good thing but didn't know why Remus was doing it. Remus sat down and fudge started to speak.
"as you know we are here to over turn the sentence of Sirius black. He claims to have evidence that will prove his innocence. Would you be so kind as to show us please?" Sirius nodded and looked over at Remus who pulled out a jar with a rat in it. "a rat is your evidence?" fudge asked incredulously.
" this is no rat, this is an animagus, a wizard who you know as peter Pettegrew but I know as the traitor who killed jams and lily." Sirius growled. Remus shot Sirius a warning look and Sirius stopped fussing.
"we are going to turn him to his human form." Remus said and turned to the jar and opened it, just as the rat was about to attempt an escape, Remus hit him with the spell. Where the rat had been was a small bald man that looked extremely nervous. Gasps were heard throughout the room. Remus turned to Pettegrew.
"hello peter, it's good to see you again." Remus said in a sarcastic tone," you are the evidence at Sirius's trial, would you care to tell everyone what you told us two years ago?" Pettegrew didn't speak. "well at least your presence says something. As most of you know," Remus spoke to the jury," Sirius was supposed to be the potter's secret keeper, but he decided to tell James and lily to switch to peter here as a bluff. Since we knew there was a spy amongst us, and I was what I am, I wasn't even trusted with the knowledge of the switch. It turns out that peter was the spy and immediately went and told voldemort," expressions of fear passed over the faces of the jury at the mention of the name," who killed James and lily. Sirius horrified by what had happened, went to track peter down. He met him later that morning and attempted to capture him. Peter was too quick for Sirius and blasted the street with his wand behind his back, then he cut off his finger, transformed, and sped down the sewers into hiding. Twelve years later, when Sirius received a newspaper from the minister, he saw a picture of Pettegrew as a rat. The caption said that the boy holding him was going to Hogwarts. He knew he had to do something, he was the only one who knew peter was alive, so he broke out and headed to Hogwarts, where Harry Ron Hermione and I were told of his innocence, since then we have been searching for peter after he escaped us that night. Two months ago Harry witnessed him help bring voldemort back to power, he cut off his hand to do so and it was replaced with the silver one you see there." Remus turned to peter who looked terrified.
"I ..he …I was forced to. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named put me under a spell." Peter said, in a tone very unconvincing. Harry hated seeing this horrible person denying what he had done.
"YOU LIAR!!" Harry yelled," that is not what you told us, you did that out of your own free will!" Harry searched his mind for something that proved his connection with voldemort, then he thought of it," show us you arm." Peter held out his right arm, "your left one!" peter held out his hand shaking. "look." Harry said, he held up his wand.
"diffendo!" Peter's sleeve ripped, revealing a skull with a snake for a tongue.
"there," Harry said, "that is the dark mark, every death eater has it burned into them, if you search Sirius, you will not find this, it is impossible to remove, so he didn't do that. There is your proof, Sirius is innocent. Do you deny what you have done now?" Harry asked peter. He shook his head.
"please, you must have mercy, please have mercy!" he begged. Harry shook his head.
"bring in the dementors, he will go to askaban Sirius, you are free to go." Fudge said, he turned to the jury, "do you agree?" they nodded.
Harry watched as the dementors took peter away, Sirius was finally free, he could go live with him, and he didn't have to hide any more. Harry ran up and hugged Sirius.
"you're free now Sirius! How does it feel?" Harry asked.
"I've never felt better. Come on let's go back, you have classes tomorrow, it's really late, and I really need some food!" they headed over to where everyone was standing talking to the minister. Actually it was more like Ron and Hermione fussing and Ginny Remus and Dumbledore, watching with amused looks on their faces. Sirius walked over to them.
"guys, I'm free and I'm getting paid a "sorry we didn't know you were innocent" payment, you don't need to battle with the minister about it, not that I'm not flattered." Sirius told them. "now all we all go back to Hogwarts, I want to be awake to teach class tomorrow. Actually I have you three first and I won't go easy on you if you fall asleep." Sirius said to Ron Hermione Harry. "here hold on to the port-key thing and we'll be off." Harry touched the round gray ball that Sirius was holding, and felt the familiar jerk behind is navel and found himself back inside Hogwarts.