Thank you for the reviews on Chapter 34!

The next chapter will be a bit late, since I have RL stuff to do first. But here is the Intermission, which I hope will clear up some perceptions of what Dumbledore's spell is meant to do.

Intermission: Power Play

Albus kept his eyes closed even as Hestia Jones walked around him, now and then murmuring soothing phrases or casting spells that eased his cramped muscles. It had been dangerous for Argus Veritaserum to arrange to sneak Hestia in again, and she could not stay long. Truly, Albus was not sure that it was worth it. He could have ruminated on his own failure just as effectively under the Still-Beetle imprisonment, and had many times over the last few weeks, as he realized how and why his spell had gone wrong.

That didn't keep his mind from returning to it now, and raking his own failure over the coals obsessively.

He had cast the spell intending to change anyone's perception of Harry from a favorable one to one that would hinder Harry, and keep him emotionally unprepared for opposing his parents and Albus. His friends should have become overprotective. His allies should have made mistakes in their rage that would get them killed. His enemies should have tried everything in their power to hurt him. Students with slightly negative feelings towards Harry would have them exaggerated, and should have made Hogwarts a battleground for him every day. Albus had known that his spell would leave those caught between two states of mind unaffected—notably, the Lestrange woman Minerva had hired, and werewolves—but they were only a very small portion of the wizarding population. There was no danger that anyone would figure out what was going on, at least, since the spell would steer the thoughts of anyone who did begin to figure it out away from that dangerous information, and then eat the memories.

His thoughts could spread along with the effects of the spell, and he would observe everything that went on, though he was powerless to alter it. Albus had believed that would content him. He would see how Harry slowly collapsed, and realized that the wizarding world on his own was too much for him. He would be a less than effective witness when the time came for Lily's and James's trial, and some members of the Wizengamot would be hostile to him, so they were likely to go free. The same thing would happen with Albus, he was sure. More of the public was willing to think him innocent, someone they loved and revered and knew worked for the good of the wizarding world, than two people who had lived in retirement so intense that their once-sterling reputations had faded. With Argus's tireless work in the press, and the spell, and Lily and James gone free, and even Harry likely to plead for him at the last, Albus was sure that he would see the outside of the Ministry again in March.

It hadn't happened. The spell had taken hold in Ravenclaw at Hogwarts, the House it had identified as the one with the highest level of hostile feeling for Harry, and influenced its students just as Albus had hoped. Some members of the Wizengamot, and those in the Ministry, muttered about how they had never trusted Harry; one could not trust a child with Lord-level power who refused to Declare for Light. A few of those who favored Harry, like Auror Mallory, had indeed become overprotective.

But Harry's allies and those closest to him—his brother, Severus, young Malfoy—had continued unchanged in mind. Albus had been startled, but concluded that, of course, powerful Dark wizards like Charles Rosier-Henlin were cautious and not used to moving immediately, no matter what their emotions might urge them to do. And Severus was limited by his position at Hogwarts from leaving for long periods of time, and young Malfoy was limited by his age and his need to be near Harry constantly. Eventually, the balance would tip, and they would make Harry's life as miserable as his enemies were doing.

And still it had not happened, and only on the night of the Woodhouse battle, when Albus had had the opportunity to compare the thoughts of the transformed werewolves to the thoughts of the fighting Dark wizards, had he realized the reason.

The mind of Charles Rosier-Henlin was as unchanged as the mind of Hawthorn Parkinson or Remus Lupin. Henrietta Bulstrode was a bit more influenced, but then, she was currently more of an enemy than an ally to Harry. Lucius Malfoy's desire for vengeance had heightened (and while Albus was sorry for Lily and James, he could not have Hestia reveal Lucius without revealing his own spell), but he had conceived the plan on his own, before Albus began to spread his change. The others seemed in the same boat as Charles and the werewolves.

When he pulled back and looked at them more carefully, then Albus had seen what appeared to his eyes as numerous tiny silver hands at work in each of their minds, doing nothing but unbind his webs as fast as they formed. They could not give Harry's allies the memories of his spell, because Harry himself didn't know the spell existed. But they could and did prevent those webs of compulsion from tightening much, unless the person in question already had a bit of evil in mind.

Harry was so much a vates that he had spread an unconscious influence of his own in response to Albus's spell, to tear it apart. He wanted freedom, and endless possibilities, for those he cared the most about, and for those who had chosen to follow him. If they volunteered to be overprotective, or to turn against him, that was one thing. If he did not know them well, or if he blamed them for something, as he blamed Auror Mallory for the arrest of his parents and Albus, his protection did not extend over them. But Harry and his magic and his will would shield the people whom he felt he did owe something to from an outsider attempting to transform them against their choices.

Albus had never thought that he would face a true vates. Even after the boy began to show signs, there was still a large chance that he might turn aside from the path. How he could maintain it? Falco Parkinson had assured Albus that it was impossible, that one would have to sacrifice his magic in order to free the magical creatures and allow other wizards and witches to grow to their greatest extent. And no Lord-level wizard would ever do that. Their magic was too much a part of them. It sang within them, and they either lived with it and used it for the good of the wizarding world, or they had a need to increase it and corrupt others with it, as had happened to Tom.

But it seemed that that had not happened with Harry. He was vates, unbinder, destroyer of peace and safety. He was so much a vates that he sensed webs as they were forming and fought them away. Albus suspected that Harry's magic would have revealed the memory-destroying portion of the spell, too, save that it actually destroyed the memories and didn't simply bind them. Harry appeared incapable of tolerating a web anywhere near him.

It frightened Albus immensely to think that his beautiful, delicate wizarding world, that fragile soap bubble he had fought so hard to protect, might be shattered at last. The wizarding world was webs all the way down, webs that insured most wizards and witches never needed to think about things like where their next meal was coming from or a centaur attacking them. Albus loved the world as it was. How could he stand aside and see it torn apart by well-intentioned but ill-guided revolution, by a will to freedom that would not even take note of all the wills to tameness standing to oppose it?

"My lord."

Albus blinked and came out of his daze. Hestia gently held a cup of water to his lips, and he drank and then nodded to her.

"I only need cast one spell today, my dear," he said, and then closed his eyes.

He would not end his compulsion—not yet. Severus was on the brink of figuring it out, but he would still not know what it meant, having no acquaintance with spells of that kind. It would depend on him speaking to just the right person, such as the Lestrange woman, and Albus was willing to risk that that might happen. He had been willing to take gambles so far, such as vengeance falling on Lily and James, in order to defend the larger wizarding world. This was only another of them.

But he did murmur, "Transformo Kingsley Shacklebolt."

His compulsion coiling lazily around Kingsley's mind tightened into a web. Albus suffered a brief burst of gladness that he could at least control Kingsley, whom Harry did not like much and had not shielded.

He felt sorrow as he concentrated, pouring what remained of his magical strength after the wide-spreading compulsion into this spell. He was sacrificing another of those who followed him, as he had sacrificed Lily and James to Lucius Malfoy's vengeance, as he had once sacrificed Harry and Connor to Voldemort's attack. But he was well-used to these decisions now, and he knew he was saving something larger than any one person: the wizarding world he fiercely loved and would not see crumble. He was willing to be damned, as long as the wizarding world could survive.

He knew matters had gone too far. Whether it was on purpose or not, Harry was a fully-fledged vates, intent on performing his dangerous miracles of change and transformation. It was not to be borne, not when he did not think enough of other wizards and witches and their welfare.

"Kingsley Shacklebolt, damnari inter sicarios," Albus murmured.

The compulsion funneled in a very specific direction, gnawed a small home for itself in the midst of Kingsley's mind, and settled there. It would spring to life only on the day of Lily and James's trial, the sixteenth of November, which was not very far away now.

Albus's heart was aching when he opened his eyes, and tears filled them, but he met Hestia's eyes and said, "You will tell no one of what you heard here?"

The young witch stood proud and strong, all but radiating loyalty. She shook her head. "No, my lord. Never. You are only doing what you have to do to protect our world."

Albus nodded back at her, and then let her use the Still-Beetle to confine him again. At once his mind roamed out on the wings of his spell, seeking to watch Harry, this time. His thoughts were filled with mourning.

I am sorry, Harry. But when it comes down to a danger that may threaten everyone else, there can be no faltering. If I do this one thing with a firm hand, then our world is saved—twice over, because the prophecy will have to choose your brother. I am sorry. But I think that, if you were in my position, if you were in the position you occupied even three years ago when you thought about other things than your own goals and life, you would agree with me.