PLEASE NOTE: This is Chapter 21, not 20. Yes, I know there were problems getting to Chapter 20, "Cry Havoc," yesterday. Yes, I did repost and post another copy of the chapter, trying to correct this, and it didn't work. That was a problem with this site, rather than just this one story. I deleted the extra copy of the chapter and let the second one become Chapter 20 (or Chapter 25 according to the numbering here). I'm very sorry if you can't access it, but it isn't something I can help. I also post on my livejournal and my Skyehawke account, the addresses of which are in my profile, and you can always look there if this site won't let you read the new chapters. This chapter is not going to make sense if you haven't read "Cry Havoc."
Chapter Twenty-One: To Be Slytherin
Rufus was glad that he had at least got to finish his morning tea before Aurors Tonks and Mallory returned from Hogwarts with Snape. It gave him some time to lean back, ease his nerves, and consider what, exactly, he was going to do.
Amelia had tried to pretend this was just another ordinary arrest. It wasn't, not when the Minister himself had laid charges against the prisoner. It could not be, not when the charges were filed in concert with a different set of charges by a man who had reason to hate the prisoner. It came just after the Minister himself was accused of abducting the child at the heart of this storm. And the prisoner was the guardian of a child with Lord-level power, who could make life very difficult for the Ministry if they decided the wrong way.
It was all, Rufus considered as he took another sip of his tea, quite complicated. A good job for Amelia that I'm currently the Head of the Aurors, and know Potter, and am aware of all these complexities.
He set the teacup aside and studied the papers sprawled all over his desk. He had discovered enough information to take him close to his ultimate goal. He'd intended to wait, though. A large part of any strategy was timing. He couldn't just charge in and accuse the Minister of the things that the papers proved he had, in fact, done. He would need to go through a careful legal process, and he had to pick just when it was best to begin and end the process.
But, then again, he thought, lifting his eyes to his door as he heard footsteps pound among the desks outside it, sometimes the circumstances around me shift, and don't give me the chance.
Someone banged on the door. Rufus rolled his eyes and nodded to young Percy, who sat on the other side of the room, copying down one of the less important papers. Percy jumped, as though he found his superior's gesture more startling than the noise, and then hurried over to open the door.
Rufus watched his back, thoughtfully. Percy didn't say much anymore, just copied and listened and grew more and more pale by the day. Rufus wondered if he even realized how much he was learning, and that Rufus's main purpose in taking him under his wing wasn't to control one of Dumbledore's spies. Probably not, though. Percy was still too caught up in the perceived drama of having betrayed his family by refusing the position his father had secured for him.
Tonks hurried through the door the moment it opened, nearly crushing Percy to the wall. A moment later, she measured her full length on the floor in front of Rufus's desk. Rufus just raised an eyebrow and waited for her to speak. The girl was a good Auror. He would defend her to anyone who asked. At least she didn't try to mumble without lifting her face, the way that someone more embarrassed with her own clumsiness might have done.
"Sir," Tonks gasped, "I spoke with Harry—I mean, with Potter, when Mallory and I went to the school to arrest Professor Snape. He wanted me to talk with you and see if there was anything you could do to help his guardian."
Rufus blinked once, twice, then shook his head. He still wasn't used to someone with Lord-level power who asked instead of demanded. Dumbledore would have been here already, trying to cozen the Minister out of the charges, if this was someone who truly mattered to him. Other Lords Rufus had been familiar with, past and future, would have had no qualms about trying to tear the Ministry down. Potter still asked.
Or trusted me to handle it.
Rufus stamped on the peculiar feeling of warmth rising in his chest. He could not afford to be that partisan. He liked the boy, yes, but his Ministry came first. If the boy had been making accusations against Cornelius without merit, then Rufus would have gone after him just as easily for wasting an Auror's time. It was just good that there was dirt on Cornelius, and that so far Potter seemed to understand that he couldn't just come in and take over the Ministry.
"I will indeed do so," he said, and saw Tonks's face ease. Hmmm. "Auror Tonks," he added, as she stood up again and swiped dust from her robes.
"Yes, sir?" She glanced up at him. Her brown hair was already turning green, a much more cheerful color.
"I hope you remember," said Rufus gently, "that our allegiances are always to each other and the rule of law first and foremost, above any personal loyalties that we might have."
Tonks promptly blushed, even growing larger cheeks to blush in. "Yes, sir," she said, more meekly. "I just—well, I met the boy over the summer, when he was still living with his blood father. I just wish he didn't have such a hectic life. It's not good for him. Or for anyone else, if he gets too stressed and strained," she added. "Sir."
Rufus nodded. "Harry Potter has a way of collecting people," he said. "Simply make sure that you are not blinded by the cloth of his pocket."
Tonks flushed even more brightly, but just nodded and managed to back out of the office without a word or a fall. Rufus sat back behind his desk and held out a hand. Percy was already there, hovering, and handed him a folder with a copy of all the case parchments in it, from the original document filed by James Potter claiming his child back to the latest round of charges.
Rufus looked over them swiftly one more time, as he heard the unmistakable sound of Auror Mallory's voice lecturing a prisoner on how good he had it. No, he was finding nothing to contradict his basic impression of reading between the lines. Yes, Potter was going to be upset, and had the right to be. No, Rufus did not believe the timing of these latest charges was a coincidence, and he did not think that the Minister was only acting in a disinterested way for the good of the wizarding community.
But that still meant Severus Snape was an idiot.
Snape kept his head high and his eyes locked forward, not deigning to return the stares of the lesser men and women who sat among their desks and chased paper for a living. The infernal witch with him would not shut up, but that did not mean he had to pay attention to her. She must have been a Gryffindor, he thought, to have so much to talk about even after their journey outside the school and their Apparition to the Ministry.
"...don't realize how lucky you have it, not really. Auror Scrimgeour is overseeing this case himself. Of course, the circumstances are rather unusual, since after all he did lead the investigation of the boy's parents last year. Couldn't have the parents of the Boy-Who-Lived infested with Dark magic, could we? And Auror Scrimgeour hates Dark magic. But what he found was rather unusual. Of course, you probably know about that. Might have been the one who cast it…"
No, Snape thought, lured into paying attention in spite of himself, that was Harry.
Harry.
He knew that the boy had not meant to write any words that could be used as evidence against Snape; that was only too clear in the moments after Mallory had announced what had happened. His ward's eyes had been distressed, his face clearly revealing the emotions the charge called up inside him. But it had still happened, and Snape wanted to grab and shake the boy for it. Why hadn't Harry anticipated that particular consequence of his actions? Wasn't he Slytherin enough to do so?
And why had he brewed that particular antidote for James, when he knew full well that Snape did not believe James deserved it?
Snape shook off the thoughts when he realized how close they were to the Head Auror's office, and did his best to settle himself into his cold thoughts again. If that bloody phoenix hadn't come and showed him the vision of his burned notes—notes that he now wondered about, given that Harry must have come into his office to learn how to brew the antidote for James—then he would still be all right. He could face any accusations effortlessly, fend off any shows of concern or nattering about the letter of the law. With the ice gone, and inconvenient emotions once more sliding through him like frogs through muddy water, he wondered what could be done.
I will find out, he thought, as Mallory opened the door to the office and ushered him through. Scrimgeour is Harry's ally. That ought to count for something.
"Here he is, sir," said the infernal woman, and deposited him roughly in a chair in front of Scrimgeour's desk. Snape turned and gave her a long, slow glare. Mallory gave no sign that she'd noticed it was happening. "Would you like me to stay, or do you think that you can handle him alone? His hands and his magic are bound, and I have his wand. I made sure of that," she added.
Snape stiffened in rage. He hadn't even noticed her picking up his wand from the head table. His back had been to it, granted, but he ought to have done. His hands squirmed inside the tight bonds of the silver cords she had fastened about them, yearning to be free. Let me only get one spell on my lips, and I will show them what a Dark wizard can do.
Then he told himself to be still, and stopped moving his fingers. He was acting childishly again, ridiculously. This was not the kind of thing his mother had told him to do, not the kind of thing that any wizard who had gone cold to survive would do. He breathed deeply, trying to relax, trying to rise above the emotions and see everything clearly, calmly, rationally.
"Thank you, Auror Mallory, I think I can question him on my own," said Scrimgeour's voice, and Snape focused on him again. The man was sitting casually behind his desk, in a posture that probably eased his bad leg, but at the same time looked entirely natural. His yellow eyes hadn't looked away from Snape once since he'd been brought into the office. "But please, stand right outside the door. When I am done questioning the prisoner, I'll need you to escort him to a holding cell."
"Of course, sir," said the infernal witch, and bowed, and exited the office. Snape relaxed a bit. It had been unnerving, traveling confined with someone who was as strong as she was. No, she could not challenge him, not quite. But that margin of error was too small for comfort when his hands and his magic were so expertly bound up.
He knew that the Auror would probably defend him if they were suddenly attacked, but that was no guarantee that he would be safe from her.
"Ah, Snape."
Snape's eyes snapped back to Scrimgeour as the door shut. This was not how he had expected the interrogation to go, not with the Auror's former manner and one of the younger Weasley spawn in the office. The elder wizard was leaning forward, and looked almost pleasant.
Snape scrutinized his face for a moment, carefully. He is Harry's ally, and he was Slytherin. Does he intend to go easy on me because of that? Was all his calmness before only a façade to fool that woman?
"You're an idiot," said Scrimgeour.
Snape blinked for a long moment, cursing himself for being caught off-guard like that, and for not being prepared with a retort more quickly than he was. At last he narrowed his eyes and was able to say, "I would think this would constitute abuse of prisoners. I see you are continuing that fine Ministry tradition." But it took far too long, and Scrimgeour watched him, not with anger at having his methods compared to Fudge's abduction of Harry, but with cheerful contempt in his eyes.
"Not at all abuse, Severus," said Scrimgeour. "May I call you Severus? Of course I may. I'm older than you are, and considerably cleverer, if the way you've acted in the last month is any indication. You are an idiot. Head of Slytherin House, Potions Master, and yet you couldn't chose any subtler way to show your enemies your disfavor?" He shook his head, clucking his tongue. "Such a disappointment, when the wizard who's been out of the House for more than forty years has to scold the one who's been in daily contact with it for two decades and more. You haven't been acting very Slytherin, Severus. The very fact that you've been caught shows me that."
Snape could, if he turned his head, see the gaping eyes and mouth of the young Weasley. He felt rather gut-punched himself, though of course he did not allow his eyes to widen or his mouth to fall open in that undignified manner. The cold barriers shattered and fell away from his mind completely, and the frogs of his emotions stirred and swam.
Scrimgeour seemed to take his stunned silence as invitation to continue. "Where have your mistakes come from? Oh, there have been so many, it will take some time to enumerate them all. First, you did not pursue legal action against Cornelius immediately after the abduction. And why not? You had an eyewitness in the form of Harry. You could have filed charges against him. And you did not. Even if Harry didn't want to, Severus, you should have. You have the ambition and ruthlessness necessary to get the Minister sacked, and if you had used that flood of outrage in the first days after Skeeter's article was published, you might have managed. But you made no motion. I wonder why?
"I'll tell you why. You wanted to punish your enemies more personally. That's always been a Slytherin weakness, you know—wanting to stand over the writhing bodies of those we hate and gloat. But it's an avoidable weakness. It's certainly not one that I would have expected you to fall victim to."
Snape found his tongue at last. "What is this?" he said. It did not sound like a splutter, he was sure, because Severus Snape did not splutter. "What right do you have to lecture me about my actions? I believed this was an interrogation, held according to formal legal rules—"
"Oh, it is," said Scrimgeour. He leaned back and folded his arms, smiling at Snape, looking as if he were in immense good humor. "I'm simply interrogating your stupidity, Severus, and no lesser culprit. And I don't need Veritaserum, or the beating that you no doubt expected. A good dash of intelligence and the expressions on your face are my only tools.
"Then comes the second mistake. You did not take steps to prevent your past actions, including your reputation as a Death Eater, from being used against you. Why? That was another easily avoidable blind spot, and you ignored it. Perhaps that was only a continuation of a past mistake, though, and not a new one," Scrimgeour added, in a musing tone. "You've acted for the past thirteen years as though no one would come after you for that, as long as you hid at Hogwarts and taught. But, on the other hand, it was an issue last year when we were arranging your legal guardianship of young Harry. That's another thing you could have used that flood of good publicity to do, you know: show yourself forth as a good guardian. But you did not." Scrimgeour paused to give him a single, severe censuring look.
"I have nothing to say to you," said Snape, and lifted his chin, and looked away. Unfortunately, the only things to look at in the office were the photographs, which were utterly ridiculous in their number and display, or the Weasley, who still hadn't shut his mouth.
"And then there was the third mistake, and, I think, your greatest," Scrimgeour said, as if he had not heard or did not care about Snape's declaration. "Severus, Severus, Severus. Really. Gryffindors are the ones who let schoolboy rivalries rule their lives and influence their legal wrangles decades later. Slytherins use the good parts of their school experiences and put the past behind them. You did not. Perhaps you could not, though in truth, I hope it is not that second thing. We do not need someone who cannot let go of his past raising a child as powerful as Harry."
Snape's hands clenched in his bonds, and he resisted the urge to snap that Scrimgeour knew nothing, nothing, about either what Snape had suffered at the hands of James Potter and his friends, or the savage abuse Harry had taken from his family. He was not speaking. His sudden words would have to hold the force of a vow, even in the face of this extreme provocation.
"And so you used a potion with such obvious and traceable effects," Scrimgeour said, his voice slightly muffled. Snape darted a glance at him, and found the Auror with his head in his hands, shaking it sadly. "In front of witnesses, no less. You make me despair of you, Severus. Are you sure that the Sorting Hat said Slytherin and not Hufflepuff? Though, in truth, your loyalty would only be to yourself." He lifted his head and gave Snape a patronizing stare it seemed he must have learned from Dumbledore. "No, on second thought, I believe it must have said Gryffindor. This is the kind of rash, hot-headed thing that one of them would do."
"I was a Slytherin!" Snape hissed between his teeth, and then clenched his jaw, berating himself for letting the other man bait him.
"Yes," said Scrimgeour. "I knew that. Just not a very good one, Severus. Or you would have noticed your own mistakes and corrected them before now.
"So you not only used a potion with such obvious and traceable effects, you left it intact, rather than brewing the antidote and sending it undetectably." Scrimgeour closed his eyes and shook his head in sorrow. "Wanting an enemy to suffer is no good when it obstructs your goals. And I would have said that your goal was to retain guardianship of young Harry."
Scrimgeour opened his eyes and fixed Snape with a sudden, scorching stare. "But perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps, after all, you took up this guardianship not to benefit the boy, but to get one over on his father."
"I did not!" Snape found himself lurching forward in his chair, his emotions swirling and kicking up to the surface of his mind. "James Potter would be nothing to me if he would stop trying to take Harry back!"
"You should have let him be nothing to you regardless," said Scrimgeour, his face utterly stern now. "A Slytherin does what he knows will do him and his friends and allies good, and he does it undetectably. I know we are very different in our allegiances, Severus, but I would have thought we were at least alike in that.
"This slipping of an unknown potion to the Minister, in such a way that it left traces Augustus Starrise could notice, is the last straw, the mistake that truly makes me think you are worthy of being arrested and sent to the new equivalent of Azkaban. Did you plan to kill him, Severus, or blackmail him?"
Blackmail, Snape thought, and bit his tongue to avoid letting it out. Scrimgeour seemed to see the answer in his face, though, and nodded.
"You have lost control," the Auror said, softly, almost kindly. "You have let your anger outrun you, and you have made no effort to restrain yourself. And now it has torn gaping wounds in both you and young Harry. I don't like that on a personal level, I must admit, especially after I went to such lengths to insure that you could retain guardianship of the boy."
He leaned forward across his desk, his eyes never wavering from Snape's face. "But more, I am offended as a Slytherin. Why did you act the way you have done, Severus? Why? Give me one honest answer."
Snape closed his eyes and breathed harshly. He was acting like an emotional idiot. If only he could rebuild his walls, then he could answer as a mature, rational adult—
A mature, rational adult who had made all those mistakes that Scrimgeour talked about while behind his ice walls.
Snape went still. For a moment, a shudder seemed to invade his stomach and creep up towards his throat, and, incredulous, he wondered if he were actually about to vomit the small breakfast he had eaten. Then he realized his hands were clasped so tightly in his bonds that his wrists seemed about to tear the ropes. He shook his head, sharply, once, not even sure what he was denying.
"Come, Severus," said Scrimgeour, his voice stripped of all its spite. "You can tell me. You must tell me. I think I deserve an answer, after laying out all your mistakes for you and making you see them in a new light."
A new light. Snape fought down the urge to laugh hysterically. Yes, one might call it that.
He looked back on the last month in his mind, a mixture of his own memories and Scrimgeour's words, and shook. Had he truly done that? Had he truly been that stupid? It seemed impossible. As if awakening from a dream, he could see the insanity potion and the Meleager Potion, and he wondered what in Merlin's name he had thought he was doing. Their creation was at once a combination of the most cunning intelligence and the most mind-numbing stupidity. Oh, yes, all very well to create an untraceable potion, but then to feed it to the Minister in such a way…and to create such effects with the insanity potion that the wretched woman in the Department of Magical Family and Child Services would know something was wrong, because the effects only began when Snape showed up…
And Harry.
He had said he would train the boy in Dark Arts so he could defend himself, and yet, he had not explained more than a quarter of the spells he showed him—the best times to use them, the variations on the incantations that would produce more or less subtle results, the ability to cloak them behind similar Light spells that had allowed Dark wizards to survive for centuries undetected by the Ministry. He had simply demonstrated, and expected Harry to understand immediately. The boy had imitated him, flawlessly most of the time, and not demanded the explanations. Snape had been creating a killing machine with not the least idea of discretion in employing the spells, the very thing he had said he was going to stop.
He had not thought, for one moment, that Potter might not take the consequences of the insanity potion lying down, or that Harry might investigate and brew the antidote, at his brother's urging if not his own. He had not thought of what Augustus Starrise might notice when entering Fudge's office just after they left. He had not thought of anything, but simply reacted in a short-sighted manner, bulling ahead.
He had not even checked, at least in the last two weeks, what the book Draco was using might have done to the boy.
Snape closed his eyes and released a long hiss.
He had been acting more Gryffindor than he ever had in his life.
He opened his eyes and answered Scrimgeour's question. "I did all that because I was behaving idiotically."
The Auror simply stared at him for a long moment. Then he smiled, as though approving a rather slow student who had at last managed to master an essential lesson. "Very good," he murmured. "Good. There may be some hope for you after all." He tapped a hand on the parchments spread on his desk, though Snape couldn't read them from this angle. "I have some plans to set in motion, plans that this debacle has only encouraged me to speed up, not create. But it will go much more smoothly if I know that you are not intent on causing more trouble."
"What do you want me to do?" Snape asked, his throat tight. It made him feel a fool, still, to ask for advice, but after Scrimgeour had enthusiastically ripped open his other mistakes, he didn't see that had a choice.
"The smart thing," said Scrimgeour. "The subtle thing, that will make your enemies overconfident. The Slytherin thing. Bow your head and sit still for right now. No one will be looking for a threat coming from you, and they shouldn't have to. You're arrested. You sit there, and you look humble and penitent. Appearance is half of everything at this stage in the game. If you rage and spit and persevere in your idiocy, you only hand your enemies your wand."
Snape felt his hands flex in his bonds, this time out of instinct. "I hate being helpless," he said. "I began this in the first place so that I would not have to feel that way."
Scrimgeour gave him an unimpressed look. "Then I think you should reconsider your feelings and your hatred," he said, standing. "You're not helpless, anyway. You're being helped. I am certainly going to do everything in my power to do so, and young Harry is already moving, or I don't know him."
Snape blinked. Another consequence I did not consider. "But what can he do?" he asked. "He has you as an ally in the Ministry, but no one else that I know of."
"He has the Skeeter woman on his side." Scrimgeour's voice was extremely dry. "He'll appeal to her first, I should imagine. And after that…who knows? The Dark wizards I met that day would be a good start." He raised his voice. "Auror Mallory! I need you to escort the prisoner to a holding cell."
As the office door started to open again, Scrimgeour gathered the papers on the desk together with a wave of his wand. They massed in front of him, hovering, and Scrimgeour used the sound to conceal his murmur to Snape. "I mean it, Severus. No more idiocies, however you might think they can help. Leave it up to other people to defend and protect you, since you've put yourself in the position of having to be defended and protected."
Snape lowered his eyes instead of snapping out an immediate reply, as was his impulse. None of his impulses in the past month appeared to have been right.
"Are prisoners allowed to send post?" he asked abruptly, as Mallory gathered the cords around his wrists together and hauled him up.
"It will be read before you send it," said Scrimgeour. "But yes."
Snape nodded stoically. He desperately needed to send a letter to Harry, and one to Draco—carefully-worded, of course, because he did not want to think of Harry's reaction if he learned, at this stage, that Snape had set a compulsion on Draco and it had gone wrong. That could come later. Harry had to worry about getting his friend free, first.
"Come on, you," said Auror Mallory, and tugged at his bonds.
"Careful, Fiona," said Scrimgeour, just a touch of rebuke in his voice. "He is no longer quite as stupid as he was when he came here."
The tugging eased at once, and Mallory led Snape towards the lifts, which, he suspected, would bear him to a holding cell where he would have much time to think.
He actually welcomed that. He felt as if he needed it.
Rufus started to leave his office, and then turned back and collected Percy with a glare. The boy shut his permanently gaping jaw and hurried after him, but he did whisper, as they wended their way through the desks, "Sir, why did you allow me to hear that?"
"Because I thought you needed to hear it," said Rufus crisply, not glancing back at him. The boy was one of those potential Aurors who had never considered the career, and who needed to be carefully nurtured into it. It was about time that Percy had his eyes opened to some of the wonderful, necessary, but unofficial things about working in the Ministry and defending the rights of ordinary witches and wizards. A dressing-down, rather than an interrogation, was sometimes called for.
Actually, Rufus felt sure Percy had already grasped that. The tricky thing would be teaching the boy the subtle art of reading people so that he would know when a dressing-down would work and when it would not.
And he was about to learn something else—perfectly legal, but not truly official, much like the waltz of paperwork that Scrimgeour had danced through the summer months, foiling incompetent busybodies who were trying to find some way to punish young Harry for freeing the Dementors. It was not his fault if they could not keep up with him. The truly intelligent and committed people in the Ministry, the ones working to keep it free of any one interest's or Lord's touch or taint, would have been able to follow him. Rufus could salute a worthy opponent.
He was on his way to make one of them into an ally, at the moment. He halted in front of the glass door displaying her name and knocked once.
"Come in!" came the call, and Rufus opened it and strode in.
Amelia Bones looked up from behind her desk, adjusting the monocle in one eye so that she could see him better. She was a short witch, her hair graying, but her outthrust jaw and piercing eyes gave her all the authority she would ever need. She'd been the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for over a decade, and she looked calmly at him now, as if she knew what he carried in his hands and was unimpressed.
Rufus knew she didn't know anything about this, though, because he trusted her integrity. He laid his bundle of papers on the desk and nodded to them. "The top three only," he said.
He knew very well that only his long acquaintance with her allowed him to get away with this, but the thing was, he would get away with it. He was busy being a better Slytherin than Severus Snape could be in a month of Sundays. The long slow look that Amelia gave him showed it, as she then turned and began to read the stack of papers after giving him that long slow look.
Her face paled. She shot her eyes back to Rufus. "You're absolutely sure about this?" she whispered.
Rufus nodded to the documents. "These are copies of the ones from the archives, Amelia, but I can retrieve the originals easily enough. Yes, Fudge did create these Hounds, and yes, he did hire Aurors we'd sacked for using Dark magic without permission to staff them, and yes, he did capture and try at least one other person in secret before young Mr. Potter." Rufus felt his jaw twitch. The Minister often did that to him. "And he—executed at least three more."
"Call it murder," said Amelia, even as she went back to reading. "Not execution."
Rufus felt free to relax and take a chair, massaging his aching leg as he did so. Percy hovered behind him, not seeming to know what else to do with himself. Rufus shrugged. The art of gracefully standing in a corner was another one that the boy would have to learn.
Amelia made it halfway through the third paper before she drew her wand and hexed a mirror she kept in the corner of her office. It shattered, but the pieces of glass only flew a short way out of the frame before reassembling themselves. Rufus smiled slightly. Most Heads of Departments had a mirror like that somewhere in their offices, for stress relief if nothing else.
"Something must be done," said Amelia flatly, turning to him. "But what? What, for Merlin's sake? We won't have another election for three years, and the full Wizengamot has to agree unanimously to sack the Minister. They won't. I know they won't. He has too many bought allies."
"There's another thing the Wizengamot can do," said Rufus, leaning forward. "And you only need a simple majority there, not consensus."
Amelia stared at him for a moment longer. Then hope and color surged into her face, and she smiled sharply at him. Rufus smiled back at her.
"You weren't a Slytherin for nothing, were you," Amelia murmured. It wasn't a question. "Very well, Rufus. I'll call for a vote of no confidence. But you know that it can't be done that quickly. It might be near the end of November before the Wizengamot votes."
"I know," said Rufus. "I don't want to hurry it, Amelia. I want to rip out every weed that Cornelius has planted here. We'll do everything nice and legal and proper, and that way no one can accuse us of anything." It always amazed him how few people thought of legal solutions. Handle them right, and it was extremely hard for an opponent to challenge you. And Rufus Scrimgeour had always believed in neutralizing opponents or persuading them over to his side. None of this letting them have ground to bring charges against him instead, the way Severus Snape seemed to think was best.
Amelia nodded slightly. "And even then, it won't be easy," she warned him. Rufus thought she was speaking against her own hope as much as his. "Cornelius still has money behind him, and not everyone will be persuaded by the new evidence."
"If I'm right," Rufus murmured, "some of Cornelius's more fanatical supporters have convinced him that his fear of the Dark is justified, and they're using the chance to strike mostly against Dark wizards, through him. That means the Light pureblooded families, and one in particular. I think I know a way to take out most of his support at a single blow."
Amelia knew him too well, at least once he revealed his plans. Her eyes narrowed. "And what will it cost us, Rufus?"
"If I fail? My support. I'll have to step back," said Rufus. "But I really do not anticipate that happening."
Amelia stared at him for a long moment. Rufus stared back, calmly. This was the way things had to happen. And there were some risks that couldn't be lessened. The one he was about to take was one of them.
Amelia sighed, at last, and nodded. "Then go do whatever it is that you're going to do," she said. "And don't let me hear about it."
Rufus smiled grimly at her and stood. "I assure you, Amelia," he said, "the wizard I'm about to challenge will keep everything perfectly legal and respectable."
She winced at the word challenge, but her eyes were steady. "As you will, then," she said.
Rufus inclined his head at her, and then strode out of the office, young Percy in tow. The poor boy looked ruffled. Well, he was getting quite an education this morning.
And he was about to get a deeper one.
"Rufus Scrimgeour. This is an unexpected pleasure."
Rufus bowed slightly, as much as he could with his head in the flames of the hearth, never taking his eyes off the face of the wizard in front of him. Augustus Starrise sat calmly on a divan covered in cloth of gold, his hair braided with the usual bells that proclaimed his status as a dueling war wizard, and thus his utter contempt of the need to move in silence, because no enemy could take him. His hand rested on a glass of wine, but he'd put it down when his house elves told him who was waiting to talk to him. His eyes were piercing and curious, both at once.
"Mr. Starrise," said Rufus, the words spilling easily from his lips, "I have come to challenge you to single combat, under the terms of the Sunset Accords of 1163, a week from today."
Augustus blinked slightly, very slightly, and then inclined his head. "The price to be the usual one?" he asked quietly. "No meddling in politics of any kind for the loser, for a year after the victory?"
"I am willing to extend it," said Rufus. He could not let his prey avoid this trap. "Five years, if necessary. Yes, if I lose, I step back, Augustus. And if you lose, you step back from your support of Cornelius."
The Light wizard closed his eyes for a moment, and then shook his head, making his bells ring. "A year should be sufficient, I think," he said. "I accept your challenge. A week from today, we dance." He opened his eyes and gave Rufus a smile that brought back old, old memories. "I look forward to it."
"Under the sunset be it sealed," said Rufus, and pulled his head back from the flames, brushing the soot from his hair.
He straightened and met Percy Weasley's horrified, fascinated gaze. The young wizard swallowed several times before he could move his tongue. Rufus waited, and watched, massaging the old wound in his leg.
"It's a duel, then?" Percy finally managed to whisper.
Rufus nodded. "What you heard. The dance for this duel locks onto the wizard once the combat has taken place. If Augustus loses, then he won't be able to give money or support to Cornelius any more—or anyone else, for that matter—for a full year. If I lose, then I can do nothing more than act in my position as Head of the Aurors for a full year. No office politics, no Ministry politics, no maneuvers of the kind I suggested to Severus or Amelia."
Percy shivered and stared at him. "What happens if someone meddles in politics anyway, after that?" he whispered.
"Well, that's only happened twice," said Rufus. "The magic coming and cutting off a limb if the offending wizard breaks his word is considered sufficient price."
Percy closed his eyes and shivered again. "Do you think you can take him, sir?" he asked.
Rufus half-closed his eyes, memories flashing behind his eyelids. "I don't know," he admitted. "He gave me this scar." He drew back the sleeve of his robe to show a long, pale mark twining around his wrist and up towards his shoulder. "That came from the last duel I fought against him. I lost."
Percy all but squeaked. "But, sir, if you lose—"
"I know," said Rufus. "But I don't intend to."
Percy only stared at him.
Rufus rolled his eyes and made for the lifts. Use the weapons against your enemies that will work, that will utterly prevent them from troubling you in the future. Against an idiotic Slytherin, exposure of his idiocy. Against a Light wizard, Light dances.
I do not see why this lesson is so hard to understand.