Chapter eight

Harry began work at the ministry. Kingsley had him use the Merlin's orb on his staff first. Apart from the minister's staff they were starting with the department of magical transport. After them it would be the heads of most important departments. The aurors first, hit wizards, unspeakables, obliviators, then the department of experimental charms and potions. He would do the department of magical cooperation then the department of games and sports. When they get new governors, they would do them then. After that it will be the workers in each department. Once the ministry was done then it would be the staff of Hogwarts and the healers and medi-witches at St Mungo's.

He got through all those on the list in the first two weeks. Many were either stunned or shocked at their scores. Some people who didn't have high enough power scores were transferred to other departments and letters went out to ones that had applied but had been turned down because they weren't pure-bloods. If any person had another boost to come and they were only short of the minimum score, they could remain where they were. The ones they contacted who had been turned down for the job, they were asked if they were still interested in working for a certain department to come in for an interview. The letter did explain that they would have to have their power level tested first before the interview.

Kingsley had worked one big change the moment he returned from the ICW meeting. He had an unspeakable work on a magical oath for all employees to take, so they would serve all people with no discrimination of any kind and that included when they hired someone. He also worked the oath so, no one could accept bribes or favours that involved the ministry. It took a few days to get the wording right, but Kingsley, Arthur and the unspeakable knew now they would have people working at the ministry that were not dark, would not serve anyone dark and would work to make their world better for every witch and wizard, along with magical creatures and did not discriminate.

On the weekend Harry picked up Sally so they could continue looking at houses. 'So you want something that will give you some privacy, which means no neighbours.'

'No close neighbours, but yeah, I want to be able to fly. It helps when I'm stressed or I'm trying to work through a problem. Like I told you, I want to continue my education even if I'm doing self study and taking my time.'

'So something that has some land would be best then. There are four on the list you showed me, they just need a bit of work.'

'I don't care if it needs repairs, between Winky and me we can fix whatever needs fixing.'

'Then let's go to the first one.'

Harry and Sally checked the address of the first one, then apparate there. After the first they went to the last three. All were good in one way, but one stood out for Harry. It had a lot of land, but there was also a forest that surrounded two sides, the third side had a row of hedges, which again would give him privacy. The house was set back from the road which Harry liked. He also liked the fact that is it was a single story home, but large. It did have a cellar and a small attic for the owls to use when they needed to sleep. There were stables, which Harry thought of converting one into a garage. Since he wanted to retrieve Sirius's old motorbike, he figured it would be perfect to house the bike. The other stables could be made into work rooms for when he began working on brooms.

Sally liked the open plan living of the house. But it had enough fireplaces that the heat would spread through the rooms. The bedrooms, all five of them had small fireplaces. There were three bathrooms, one was the en-suit and the other two was for anyone else to use, whether it was kids or visitors. But there was another toilet near the laundry.

There were a few things that needed to be repaired or replaced. Harry wanted to bathroom and kitchen replaced and modernised. He wanted them to be like modern muggle bathrooms and kitchens, just without electrical items. He would need to get some pictures then speak with a magical builder, but for now he had to organise to buy the house. The rest of the house was fine for now, but he intended to strip it all so it would end up back as original as possible. Harry loved a lot of the old historical homes. He felt like they were more homey than modern homes. He liked the modern kitchen and bathroom, but the rest of the house would eventually be restored to its former glory.

Harry continued to use the orb and record the power scores of people that worked at the ministry. He only had to spend a few hours a day, three days a week at the ministry. It gave him time to work on his hobby.

Harry had just finished recording the scores for everyone in the department of magical games and sports when he got a memo from the minister.

Harry was gestured to go straight in, he found Arthur there with the minister, 'Is everything okay Minister?'

'It's a casual meeting Harry.'

Harry smiled, 'Then what's up Kingsley?'

'We've been working on who would make a good governor and we've been working on the power level for all teachers of wand based subjects. We feel it's time to set up a meeting with the staff. Now as to why I asked you here. The first reason is I would like you to take one of the governor positions.'

'But I'm only eighteen, nearly nineteen but still young.'

'Age means nothing. You care about Hogwarts and you came up with some damn good ideas. I know the others did as well, but it's what you said many times about Hogwarts that told me you would be perfect as a governor.'

Harry thought about the things he said about Hogwarts and could only come up with one thing.

'I always called Hogwarts my first real home.'

'Exactly, which tells me how you truly feel about the place.'

'Um, okay, I would like to be involved with Hogwarts so no student ends up in danger and they get good teachers.'

'Then I will get Amos to take you through everything tomorrow. I'm going to set up the meeting for the following Monday after we have our first full meeting with all the governors. Which is being called for this Friday.'

'Are we going to implement some of those ideas we talked about?'

'Yes, we are. Naturally funds will determine when things like the swimming obstacle games can take place.'

'I plan to work this out after I bought my house. I'm going to donate two million galleons to Hogwarts to help upgrade things like the brooms and library. It can now go towards those as well as the pool and another arena for the racing league.'

'And everything else. We have already worked on what it would take to start all the programs we want and that's just over 500 thousand galleons.'

'Then the rest can stay in a vault to buy things like books when new ones come out, or anything else that might be needed. Since I'm going to be one of the people that allocate money, I can make sure it's not being wasted. This will give you time to use what money you have to for the ministry.'

'It would take some pressure off. We can do a lot with those extra funds. Alright, thank you but I will be making sure it's know you donated a large sum to Hogwarts.'

Harry sighed but he nodded, 'How do you think McGonagall will go hearing about all these changes?'

'We believe once she knows that she will not be headmistress and about the changes, then she might retire. There is a chance she may stay teaching. If she does, then she will teach the sixth and seventh years and keep her deputy head position, but not head of house.'

'The heads of house needs to be someone that has plenty of time to be available for the students, also someone students feel they can approach.'

'Exactly.'

'If there were others around when Ginny was writing in that diary, we may have figured it out earlier.'

'Since Ginny was at Hogwarts at the time, we never saw the change in her. I agree that the heads of house needs to be someone that is there for their students and no other reason,' Arthur said.

'Yes, it will help with the first years as well. They sometimes just want someone to listen to them about being homesick, but they also don't want to be teased so they are too scared to talk to a friend. McGonagall was always busy since she basically had three positions. She also came across as a bit hard, so she was not someone that most first years would feel comfortable approaching. I know I didn't.' Harry said.

'We've also decided that anyone, me, you, Arthur, Minerva, it does not matter, no one can hold more than one job. If Minerva wishes to teach and only the senior years, then she can remain as deputy head and that's down to the fact she will only be teaching part time. It's like with you Harry, you're testing everyone using the orb but again it's a part time job. The governor's job is also part time, but putting them together you're still only working part time, or half the time as others. I don't know how Minerva did it before, she was deputy head, transfiguration teacher and head of house. She also ran Hogwarts when Albus had to come to the ministry or work for the ICW. Albus had three of the most important jobs in our world, which should never have been allowed. It gave him too much power which I believed led to his main problem of always believing he was right. I can have a seat on the Wizengamot, but I cannot be chief warlock while I'm minister, yet it won't affect my Wizengamot seat.'

'That's a good idea and I hold a seat on the Wizengamot because of Sirius, but I wouldn't want to have the responsibility chief warlock when I'm already working. I think that was part of Dumbledore's problem, one, he was just too busy that he missed a lot of what was going on around him. Two, he held so much power that he forgot that others might know more than he did. Even though he was given ideas or opinions, he never took it as he felt he knew what was best.'

'Yes, all of us in the order gave our opinions on different matters, he never did listen to us. I know part of the reason was to do with what happened to your parent's because of Peter, which I get. But all he had to do was ask for a magical oath or ask if we would take veritaserum so he would know we weren't traitors.' Kingsley said.

'Even though Snape was loyal to the old man, he should not have been given so much leeway. Veritaserum might have told Dumbledore his real feelings if it was used.' Arthur said.

'Exactly. Now let's talk about the ministry and some of the changes I want to make.'

'Before we get started, I had an idea, which I know Hermione would hate. But it's something I think is needed, for the safety of everyone in our world.'

'Then explain.'

'Okay, I know a lot of people in this world do not consider muggles dangerous. They would be wrong. Muggles can kill thousands with a push of a button. They have weapons that you won't see coming, that will kill you the moment you breath the air. I know that if the Dursley's were offered money, they would tell everyone about our world without a second through. We're all covered by the statute of secrecy, we break it, we could go to Azkaban. The muggles aren't covered, none of them, not even the relatives of muggleborns or raised. They have to know so their kids can come to Hogwarts and learn, but what's to stop them telling someone? You could get one that thinks we're evil or the devil, they get into Diagon alley with their children, plant a bomb and boom, it's all gone and people die. There are some really fanatics out in the muggle world that would see it as doing god's work or because we're abnormal, or something along those lines. The muggles have also started working on DNA, that's basically the things that make us who we are. They want to be able to remove a bad gene so the person won't end up with cancer or some type of physical deformity. They could easily work on a way to stop us being able to use magic or stop us having any children or stop our children from being magical, which means we would die off, slowly. I don't know a lot about it, just heard bits and pieces on the television.'

Kingsley and Arthur glanced at each other, both looked worried.

'Do you have a suggestion on how to fix this so we're safe?'

'I'm sure someone like an unspeakable could come up with some type of spell that could be cast on a muggle, legally, that will make sure they can't speak about us or communicate in some way to someone that doesn't already know of the wizarding world. As for places like Diagon alley or even the phone box for visitors, there has to be some type of spell that will stop someone dropping a muggle bomb down on us or taking it into Diagon alley. The same for the gateway to platform nine and three quarters. If someone planted a bomb on the Hogwarts express to go off while it was on it's way to Hogwarts, every magical child from eleven up would be killed.'

'That will be something I will work on straight away. After some of the things you told me about the Dursley's, I believe they should be the first.'

'Yeah, they should. But you should get someone to research muggleborn or raised families. For all we know there could be heaps of them that think we're…freaks and believe we need to be eliminated.'

'Then we have a lot of work to do. Not just making our world better, but safer for everyone.'