Well, I'll have you all know that my plan to write for both stories simultaneously is going well, which will keep both significantly ahead of where I am posting, just in case of some sort of incident that prevents me from writing. Loving the stories as they are pouring from my mind now, and I'm excited for you all to be able to read them in time. Anyway, Relax, Read, and please Review!
Chapter Fourteen
Treachery
Voldemort stood angrily in a dark room of Malfoy Manor, feeling the Potter boy enter his mind unwillingly. How much he despised having the child know his thoughts, but he would put it to use in time, and then the boy would finally die. Turning back to the cowering man in the center of the room, he spoke. "I have been badly advised, it seems…"
"Master, I crave your pardon," croaked the kneeling form of Augustus Rookwood. Voldemort smirked, the fool was trembling.
"I do not blame you, Rookwood," he assured the simpleminded fool.
Walking around the high-backed cushioned chair, he loomed over Rookwood in the darkness.
"You are sure of your facts, Rookwood?" he asked.
"Yes, My Lord, yes… I used to work in the Department of Mysteries after… after all…"
"Avery told me that Bode would be able to remove it."
"Bode could never have taken it, Master… Bode would have known he could not… undoubtedly, that is why he fought so hard against Malfoy's Imperious Curse…"
Voldemort bid the man to rise, and he obeyed immediately remaining in a respective stooping bow.
"You have done well to tell me this," Voldemort said, "Very well… I have wasted months on fruitless schemes, it seems… but no matter… we begin anew, from now. You have Lord Voldemort's gratitude, Rookwood…"
"My Lord… yes My Lord," Rookwood gasped in relief.
"I shall need your help. I shall need all the information you can give me."
"Of course, My Lord, of course… anything…"
"Very well… you may go. Send Avery to me…"
The cowering man scurried away, and Voldemort turned to face a cracked, age-spotted mirror on the wall, admiring his new body still, he felt the presence of the boy leave as suddenly as it arrived. Pity, he would have enjoyed causing the boy as much pain by forcing him to watch as he tortured Avery for his failures. Not only had the man been mistaken, but he had let Bode disappear completely, which would let his enemies know he was after the prophecy, but they already suspected it anyways, so it was a small failure, but a failure none the less. And Lord Voldemort did not tolerate failure.
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Severus knew immediately that Faykan had used his 'detention' with Umbridge as a simple excuse to further torment the old toad. The burns on his and Harry's bodies were very convincing, but only illusions, which were dispelled during the night after Poppy Pomfrey put burn salve on them both.
The next day both boys had come straight to him with the vision that Harry had witnessed in the night, of the Dark Lord learning of his inability to claim the prophecy with a servant or imperioused person. "It's only a matter of time," Faykan told them both, "before Voldemort tries to lure you to the Department of Mysteries Harry."
"But why?" Harry asked. Severus grimaced, he knew that the boy's ignorance was partially his own fault, firstly by listening to Dumbledore, then by his own desire not to add more to the difficult burden the boy already bore.
"I'm not sure if I should really be the one to tell you Harry…" Faykan said painfully, and Severus could see in his eyes the desperate desire to give in and reveal the information. "It's not that I want to conceal it from you, but if you know, and Voldemort tries to enter your mind, he could find out, and that would be the last thing we would want."
"So," Harry said after several moments of thought, "my not knowing what he's after is our best defense from him getting it?"
"Yes," Severus confirmed, "It means that either you or he must enter the Ministry and retrieve it, because of its nature, anyone who it not clearly labeled on it will go insane if they tried to remove it from the Department of Mysteries…"
"And that," Faykan interjected, "will be when many different things will happen, again we cannot tell you the full details, but we will be going when it happens, part of an elaborate plan that me and Sev have devised. And we won't be going alone Harry."
"Ron, Draco and Hermione?" Harry said thoughtfully.
"Yes, but also the rest of the A.D.A. if we can manage to gather them in time. We'll need every trained wand that we can get. I'd take the rest of the D.A. as well, but we can't trust everyone in there, and most would not agree to come anyway."
Harry argued, just as Faykan said that he would, and only subsided when Faykan assured him that they would not force anyone who refused to go, only if Harry stopped trying to be noble and allowed people to help him, despite the danger. Changing the subject, Severus reminded then that Harry had a scheduled Occlumency lesson shortly and that they should move to the Room of Requirement to join with the other leaders of the Defense groups.
When they arrived, they found the others waiting for them. Severus took the opportunity to work with Harry one on one at first, and together they watched for a moment as Faykan, Draco, Granger and the youngest Weasley boy separated for their own personal practicing.
Severus regarded Harry for a moment as the boy watched his friends. His feelings about the son of his rival had changed dramatically over the years. The truth was, as much as the boy looked like his father outwardly, his nature was purely like Lily. Fiercely determined to help his friends, both intelligent and cunning, and the same raw talent that, Severus grudgingly admitted, was shared between his parents.
Harry caught Severus staring at him, and he was pulled out of his reminiscing by the look in those green eyes, the exact same eyes that had entranced him the moment he had met Lily Evans. Fighting back his wave of nostalgia, he set himself to the task at hand. He and Harry had been working ever since the near disastrous event to train Harry to build walls of his emotions as his defenses. Severus had realized that merely learning to detach himself from his memories, as he and Faykan did, simply would not work for Harry. He was a highly emotional person; they were his strength and his weakness. Therefore, they could also become his shield.
"Are you ready?" Severus asked, pulling out his wand and spacing them a distance apart. Harry nodded. "Alright then. One… two… three… Legilimens!"
About a hundred dementors were swooping across the black lake toward a thirteen year old Harry, and even Severus could feel the cold pain of their presence. Good, Harry was using the memories themselves to fuel the emotional walls. As the scene played out, Severus could see Harry across the room, becoming clearer and clearer, while the memory faded. Slowly Harry lifted his wand. "Protego!"
And suddenly they were thrown into Severus' own memories. He was five, and his parents were arguing while he cried in the corner. Then he was seventeen, shooting down flies in his room with magic. Then he was eleven, trying to ride a broom for the first time, while Lily laughed. "Enough!" he cried, forcing Harry out of his mind.
They both staggered slightly, and Harry's face was white with both shock and exertion. "Well, Harry… that was a definite improvement, using your emotions of the memories themselves to ground you in reality, well done. And the Shield Charm was also effective. May Merlin help the wizard that triggers the wall on your strongest memories…" he added with a small chuckle.
Harry was staring at him, and Severus realized that he had never done more than smirk in the boy's presence. Then he too started to laugh, hesitantly at first, then slowly warming up to the humour of the comment.
All noise ceased when the sound of a woman screaming sounded from far below. Severus' gaze jerked downward, "What the…" he muttered. Then he glanced around the room, "Did anyone see anything unusual on their way up here?"
Everyone shook their heads. A muffled commotion was coming from what might have been the Entrance Hall and the scream sounded a second time. "Come on," Severus beckoned, leading the five students through to his office.
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The screams were indeed coming from the Entrance Hall; they grew louder as Harry and the others ran towards the stone steps leading up from the dungeons. Professor Snape had already swept ahead of them, his cloak billowing wildly as he ran. When they reached the top they found the Entrance Hall packed; students had come flooding out of the Great Hall, where dinner was still in progress, to see what was going on; others had crammed themselves on to the marble staircase. Pushing forwards through a knot of tall Slytherins Harry, Faykan, Draco, Ron and Hermione saw that the onlookers had formed a great ring, some of them looking shocked, others even frightened. Professor McGonagall was directly opposite them on the other side of the Hall; she looked as though what she was watching made her feel faintly sick.
Professor Trelawney was standing in the middle of the Entrance Hall with her wand in one hand and an empty sherry bottle in the other, looking utterly mad. Her hair was sticking up on end, her glasses were lopsided so that one eye was magnified more than the other; her innumerable shawls and scarves were trailing haphazardly from her shoulders, giving the impression that she was falling apart at the seams. Two large trunks lay on the floor beside her, one of them upside-down; it looked very much as though it had been thrown down the stairs after her. Professor Trelawney was staring, apparently terrified, at something Harry could not see but which seemed to be standing at the foot of the stairs.
"No!" she shrieked. "NO! This cannot be happening… it cannot… I refuse to accept it!"
"You didn't realise this was coming?" said a high girlish voice, sounding callously amused, and Harry, moving slightly to his right, saw that Trelawney's terrifying vision was nothing other than Professor Umbridge. Faykan, at Harry's right, was clenching his fists and grinding his teeth nosily. "Incapable though you are of predicting even tomorrow's weather, you must surely have realised that your pitiful performance during my inspections, and lack of any improvement, would make it inevitable that you would be sacked?" Umbridge said cheerfully.
"You c-can't!" howled Professor Trelawney, tears streaming down her face from behind her enormous lenses, "you c-can't sack me! I've b-been here sixteen years! H-Hogwarts is… my h-home!"
"It was your home," said Professor Umbridge, and Harry was revolted to see the enjoyment stretching her toad-like face as she watched Professor Trelawney sink, sobbing uncontrollably, on to one of her trunks, "until an hour ago, when the Minister for Magic countersigned your Order of Dismissal. Now kindly remove yourself from this Hall. You are embarrassing us."
But she stood and watched, with an expression of gloating enjoyment, as Professor Trelawney shuddered and moaned, rocking backwards and forwards on her trunk in paroxysms of grief.
Harry heard a muffled sob to his left and looked around. Lavender and Parvati were both crying quietly, their arms round each other. Then he heard footsteps. Professor McGonagall had broken away from the spectators, marched straight up to Professor Trelawney and was patting her firmly on the back while withdrawing a large handkerchief from within her robes.
"There, there, Sybill… calm down… blow your nose on this… it's not as bad as you think, now… you are not going to have to leave Hogwarts…"
"Oh really, Professor McGonagall?" said Umbridge in a deadly voice, taking a few steps forward. "And your authority for that statement is…?"
"That would be mine," said a deep voice.
The oaken front doors had swung open. Students beside them scuttled out of the way as
Dumbledore appeared in the entrance. What he had been doing out in the grounds Harry could not imagine, but there was something impressive about the sight of him framed in the doorway against an oddly misty night. Leaving the doors wide open behind him he strode forwards through the circle of onlookers towards Professor Trelawney, tear-stained and trembling, on her trunk, Professor McGonagall alongside her.
Umbridge and Dumbledore continued to speak, but Harry found himself distracted by something incredibly odd that started to happen. It began with Professor Trelawney. Slowly, and as though she herself was unaware of it, she began tapping one hand on her leg, the same four beats, again and again. Then Harry noticed that Faykan had stopped grinding his teeth, and turning to look at him, Harry saw his friend's eyes unfocused, and he too began to tap the same beat on his leg, falling into Trelawney's tempo perfectly. Glancing around, Harry saw people here and there slowly take up the beat, and none of them seemed aware of their actions.
Eventually other people began to take notice, and the muttering grew to the point that even Umbridge and Dumbledore looked around. "What are you all doing?" Umbridge said, confused, "Stop that at once."
"They won't stop," said a new voice from behind Dumbledore. Harry turned to see the head and torso of a man joined to the palomino body of a horse. He had white-blond hair and astonishingly blue eyes, frighteningly similar to Faykan's. There was a shocked murmur around the Hall and those nearest the doors hastily moved even further backwards, some of them tripping over in their haste to clear a path for the newcomer.
"You see," the centaur continued as he came to a halt next to Dumbledore, "It is the sound of drums, the warning of the great ones for the mortal races, heralding the coming of war. It has not been heard for a long time, and even then there have never been so many gathered in one place able to hear it."
Harry enjoyed the thunderstruck look on Umbridge's face as she looked at the centaur. "This is Firenze," said Dumbledore to her, "and I think you'll find him a suitable replacement for the post of Divination teacher."
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Two days later, Hermione still didn't fully understand what had happened during the several minutes in the Entrance Hall. Faykan had only partial memory of what happened after the drumming started, and offered no speculation. They were all convinced that it was referencing Voldemort's return however, including the rest of the D.A. Many people had taken this as a sign that Harry might not be as mad as they thought, and more people than ever were starting to show their support for him and Dumbledore. Seamus Finnigan, who apparently had been unfriendly to Harry, Ron and Faykan all year, had formally apologized and said that he had written his mother with all that had happened as well.
I'll bet you wish you hadn't given up Divination now, don't you, Hermione?' asked Parvati, smirking.
"Not really," Hermione replied indifferently, pulling over the newest copy of the Daily Prophet. "I've never really like horses."
"He's not a horse, he's a centaur!" said Lavender, sounding shocked.
"A gorgeous centaur…" sighed Parvati.
"Either way, he's still got four legs," said Hermione coolly. "Anyway I thought you two were all upset that Trelawney had gone?"
"We are!" Lavender assured her. "We went up to her office to see her; we took her some daffodils, not the honking ones that Sprout's got, nice ones."
"How is she?" asked Harry.
"Not very good, poor thing," said Lavender sympathetically. "She was crying and saying she'd rather leave the castle for ever than stay here where Umbridge is, and I don't blame her, Umbridge was horrible to her, wasn't she?"
"I've got a feeling Umbridge has only just started being horrible," said Hermione darkly.
"Impossible," said Ron, who was tucking into a large plate of eggs and bacon. "She can't get any worse than she's been already."
"You mark my words, she's going to want revenge on Dumbledore for appointing a new teacher without consulting her," said Hermione, closing the newspaper, "especially another part-human. You saw the look on her face when she saw Firenze."
"Let her try…" Faykan said grimly, his face set into a mask of indifference, but even Ron looked at him with a small amount of fear, so strong was the underlying fury of his words.
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After breakfast Hermione departed for her Arithmancy class as Harry and Ron followed Parvati and Lavender into the Entrance Hall, heading for Divination.
"Aren't we going up to North Tower?" asked Ron, looking puzzled, as Parvati bypassed the marble staircase.
Parvati looked at him scornfully over her shoulder. "How d'you expect Firenze to climb that ladder? We're in classroom eleven now, it was on the notice board yesterday."
Harry recognized the classroom they were approaching as one of those ground floor rooms that were never regularly used, and therefore had the slightly neglected look of a storeroom. Therefore, when he entered it behind Faykan, and found himself in the middle of a forest clearing, he was momentarily stunned.
The classroom floor had become springily mossy and trees were growing out of it; their leafy branches fanned across the ceiling and windows, so that the room was full of slanting shafts of soft, dappled, green light. The students who had already arrived were sitting on the earthy floor with their backs resting against tree trunks or boulders, arms wrapped around their knees or folded tightly across their chests, and all looking rather nervous. In the middle of the clearing, where there were no trees, stood Firenze.
"Harry Potter," he said, holding out a hand when Harry entered.
"Err, hi…" Harry said hesitantly, shaking hands with the centaur, who was surveying him as though he could see straight through Harry's body.
"It was foretold that we would meet," Firenze said again. Harry joined the rest of the class, who were looking at him in awe, apparently impressed that he was on speaking terms with the centaur, even though Harry was confused as to why he was at all.
When the door was closed and the last student had sat down on a tree stump beside the wastepaper basket, Firenze gestured around the room.
"Professor Dumbledore has kindly arranged this classroom for us," said Firenze, when everyone had settled down, "in imitation of my natural habitat. I would have preferred to teach you in the Forbidden Forest, but Professor Dumbledore felt that it would be wiser to hold our classes inside the castle. But that is not of great importance, let us begin,"
Firenze swished his long palomino tail, raised his hand towards the leafy canopy overhead, then lowered it slowly, and as he did so, the light in the room dimmed, so that they now seemed to be sitting in a forest clearing by twilight, and stars appeared on the ceiling. There were oohs and gasps and Ron said audibly, "Blimey!"
"Lie back on the floor," said Firenze in his calm voice, "and observe the heavens. Here is written, for those who can see, the fortune of our races."
"Mars is bright…" Faykan said casually, lying next to Harry, and he noticed the red planet winking at him overhead.
"I know that you have learned the names of the planets and their moons in Astronomy," said Firenze's calm voice, "and that you have mapped the stars' progress through the heavens. Centaurs have unraveled the mysteries of these movements over centuries. Our findings teach us that the future may be glimpsed in the sky above us…"
"Professor Trelawney did astrology with us!" said Parvati excitedly, raising her hand in front of her so that it stuck up in the air as she lay on her back. "Mars causes accidents and burns and things like that, and when it makes an angle to Saturn, like now…" she drew a right-angle in the air above her "…that means people need to be extra careful when handling hot things…"
"That," said Firenze calmly, "is human nonsense."
Parvati's hand fell limply to her side.
"Trivial hurts, tiny human accidents," said Firenze, as his hooves thudded over the mossy floor. "These are of no more significance than the scurrying of ants to the wide universe, and are unaffected by planetary movements."
"Professor Trelawney…" began Parvati, in a hurt and indignant voice.
"…is a human," said Firenze simply. "And is therefore blinkered and fettered by the limitations of your kind."
Harry turned his head very slightly to look at Parvati. She looked very offended, as did several of the people surrounding her.
"Sybill Trelawney may have Seen, I do not know," continued Firenze, and Harry heard the swishing of his tail again as he walked up and down before them, "but she wastes her time, in the main, on the self-flattering nonsense humans call fortune-telling. I, however, am here to explain the wisdom of centaurs, which is impersonal and impartial; we watch the skies for the great tides of evil or change that are sometimes marked there. It may take ten years to be sure of what we are seeing."
Firenze pointed to the red star directly above Harry.
"In the past decade, the indications have been that wizardkind is living through nothing more than a brief calm between two wars. Mars, bringer of battle, shines brightly above us, suggesting that the fight must soon break out again. How soon, centaurs may attempt to divine by the burning of certain herbs and leaves, by the observation of fume and flame…"
It was the most unusual lesson Harry had ever attended. His priority did not seem to be to teach them what he knew, but rather to impress upon them that nothing, not even centaurs' knowledge, was foolproof. The bell rang right outside the classroom door and everyone jumped; Harry had completely forgotten they were still inside the castle, and quite convinced that he was really in the Forest. The class filed out, looking slightly perplexed.
Harry, Ron and Faykan were on the point of following when Firenze called them back, specifically Faykan and Harry. He permitted Ron to remain when he hesitated, but asked him to close the door.
"Harry Potter, you are a friend of Hagrid's, are you not?" he asked.
"Yes," Harry affirmed.
"Then give him a warning from me. His attempt is not working. He would do better to abandon it."
"His attempt is not working?" Harry repeated blankly.
"And he would do better to abandon it," said Firenze, nodding then turned to Faykan, who was still watching the enchanted sky above.
"Mars is bright," Faykan said absently again, a small grin on his face.
"Indeed, but it is not the only star that shines so brightly," Firenze agreed, "We centaurs have noted the waxing of Eärendil in the sky as well. Do you have some knowledge about it kalina heru?"
Faykan only smiled wider as he regarded the centaurs face, "The signs are coming more frequently, if even the guardians of the forest are seeing them. Know now that soon the work of the Maiar will come to a final end."
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March blurred into a squally April, and Hermione was boggled down between studying for O.W.L.s , the two D.A. clubs, and helping both Harry and Ron with their own studying. All the fifth-years were suffering from stress to some degree, save Faykan, and Hannah Abbott became the first to receive a Calming Draught from Madam Pomfrey after she burst into tears during Herbology and sobbed that she was too stupid to take exams and wanted to leave school now.
They had started work on Patronuses in the D.A., which all the members were excited to practice, despite Harry's constant reminders of the difference between using the charm in a classroom and against an actual threat. It was also the last lesson before Easter, so they may have been excited of leaving the castle, and Umbridge, as well.
"Oh Harry, stop trying to rain on their fun," Faykan had said, poking Harry in the ribs as they watched the different silvery animals prance, soar, or trot around the room. Each of the Advanced D.A. members had managed to produce corporeal Patronuses, and everyone else had at least managed mist forms, and Hermione was confident that they would manage it given time.
Harry was persistent in his opinion however, "But they're supposed to protect you, what we really need is a Boggart or something; that's how I learned, I had to conjure a Patronus while the Boggart pretended to be a Dementor…"
"But that would be really scary!" said Lavender, who was shooting puffs of silver vapour out of the end of her wand. "And I still… can't… do it!" she added angrily.
Neville went over to help her, his shining silver bear walking beside him, "You've got to think of something happy," he reminded Lavender.
"Harry, I think I'm doing it!" yelled Seamus, who had been brought along to his first ever D.A. meeting by Dean. "Look… ah, it's gone… but it was definitely something hairy, Harry!"
Hermione watched her otter gamboling around her; they were sort of nice, after all.
Everyone stopped when the room shook suddenly, and the Patronuses people had managed to conjure faded away as all attention turned to the doors to the seventh floor. A tiny crack had appeared in the stone doors. Harry immediately dug in his pockets and pulled out the Marauder's Map, searching for the seventh floor corridor. When he found it, his face paled.
"IT'S UMBRIDGE, EVERYONE RUN FOR THE EXITS!" he bellowed.
Everyone pelted for the four exits, pouring into the common rooms. "Harry come on!" Hermione screamed at him and Faykan as she jostled with the other Gryffindors.
"No, someone has to close off the exits, so she can't follow." Harry said. Faykan was already changing the room, causing the evidence to vanish away, even as the room shook again, and the stone doors trembled and cracked further.
"But what about you?" Ron yelled.
"FLY YOU FOOLS!" Faykan yelled, as he and Harry concentrated to remove the other three house doors. Hermione dragged Ron through the Gryffindor door just as the far wall blasted open. Hermione caught a glance of Umbridge, looking livid, snarling at Faykan and Harry, surrounded by Nott and the other Slytherins, just before the wall sealed itself off completely.
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Albus watched with a serene mask over his emotions as Dolores dragged Harry and Will Stanton into his office. Cornelius was already present, along with Minerva, Kingsley, John Dawlish and Percy Weasley. They all also turned as the three new people entered the room. "Well, well, well, well…" Cornelius said with vicious satisfaction.
Harry glared at him, while Will just looked around the room, a passive curiosity in his round face.
"They were both in the room we were informed of," Dolores explained, the same callous pleasure lacing her voice, "They were vanishing the evidence and altering the room as we entered."
"Were they now…" Cornelius said vindictively, "Well boys, I expect you both know why you are here?"
Harry clearly looked like he was going to defiantly say 'yes'. In fact, the word was half formed before he glanced in Albus' direction. Looking just over Harry's shoulder, to avoid eye contact, Albus shook his head a fraction of an inch to each side.
"Ye-no…" Harry said, changing mid-word.
"I beg your pardon?" said Fudge.
"No," said Harry, firmly.
"You don't know why you are here?"
"I do believe that is what we are saying," Will said absently, still looking around Albus' office.
Cornelius glared incredulously from both boys, then at Dolores. Harry glanced again at Albus, who was now admiring at the carpet of his office. Albus gave him the tiniest of nods and a shadow of a wink in thanks.
"So you have no idea," Cornelius continued, in a voice positively sagging with sarcasm, "why Professor Umbridge has brought you to this office? You are not aware that you have broken any school rules?"
"School rules?" said Harry, looking at Will, who shrugged in mock confusion. "No."
"Or Ministry Decrees?" amended Fudge angrily.
"Not that I'm aware of," said Will blandly.
Albus could tell the boys were enjoying pushing the Minister's buttons.
"So, its news to you, is it," said Fudge, his voice now thick with anger, "that an illegal student organisation has been discovered within this school?"
"Yes, it is," said Harry, hoisting an unconvincing look of innocent surprise on to his face.
"I think, Minister," said Dolores silkily, "we might make better progress if I fetch our informant."
"Yes, yes, do," Cornelius said, nodding, and he glanced maliciously at Albus as his Undersecretary left the room. "There's nothing like a good witness, is there, Dumbledore?"
"Nothing at all, Cornelius," Albus replied gravely, inclining his head slightly.
There was a wait of several minutes, in which nobody looked at each other, and then Dolores returned with Marietta Edgecombe. The Ravenclaw girl was covering her face with her hands as she was led in to stand next to the two boys.
"Don't be scared, dear, don't be frightened." Dolores was saying, in a poor attempt of comfort, patting her on the back, "It's quite all right, now. You have done the right thing. The Minister is very pleased with you. He'll be telling your mother what a good girl you've been. Marietta's mother, Minister," she added, looking up at Cornelius, "is Madam Edgecombe from the Department of Magical Transportation, Floo Network office; she's been helping us police the Hogwarts fires, you know."
"Jolly good, jolly good!" said Cornelius heartily. "Like mother, like daughter, eh? Well, come on, now, dear, look up, don't be shy, let's hear what you've got to… galloping gargoyles!"
As Marietta raised her head, Cornelius leapt backwards in shock, nearly landing himself in the fire. He cursed, and stamped on the hem of his cloak which had started to smoke. Marietta gave a wail and pulled the neck of her robes right up to her eyes, but not before everyone had seen that her face was horribly disfigured by a series of close-set purple pustules that had spread across her nose and cheeks to form the word 'SNEAK'.
"Never mind the spots now, dear," said Umbridge impatiently, "just take your robes away from your mouth and tell the Minister…"
But Marietta gave another muffled wail and shook her head frantically.
"Oh, very well, you silly girl, I'll tell him," snapped Umbridge. She hitched her sickly smile back on to her face and explained about the underground Defense group that Albus had been quite aware of ever since its formation the previous term. Albus thought very fast, striving for a way to spare the children Cornelius' wrath. Unfortunately that would mean sacrificing his position at Hogwarts for the time being, and he sent a glance at Kingsley that the Auror understood and took advantage of, wiping Miss Edgecombe's memory at the most opportune time. Sometime during this, Albus distinctly heard Will Stanton started tapping on his leg, four beats… always four beats…
"I cannot allow you to manhandle my students, Dolores," Albus said angrily as the woman raged at Miss Edgecombe's inability to further convict Harry and the others of the group.
"You want to calm yourself, Madam Umbridge," said Kingsley, in his deep, slow voice. "You don't want to get yourself into trouble, now."
"No," said Dolores breathlessly, glancing up at the towering figure of Kingsley. "I mean, yes, you're right Shacklebolt. I… I forgot myself."
"Dolores," said Cornelius, with the air of trying to settle something once and for all, "we have another witness, if Dawlish has the Veritaserum with him?"
"Yes," she said, pulling herself together and staring at Will Stanton, "yes… well, that will tell us all we need to know."
Albus say the boy's eyes widen as he realized what they were implying, and he started to back away, right into Dawlish, who had circled around behind him. "Just settle down young man," he said, leading the boy by the arm to a simple wooden chair, and pulling out the clear glass phial, "This isn't going to hurt you…"
Slowly, his eyes flickering with fear, Will sat and opened his mouth when indicated, allowing Dawlish to pour three drops of the truth serum into his mouth.
"Now," Dolores said, the sickly sweet tone back in her voice, "Mr. Stanton, tell us how long these meetings have been going on…"
The entire room seemed to draw their breath collectively as Will opened his mouth, "This was the first meeting…"
Dolores seemed to be upset with the answer, while Harry looked flabbergasted.
"And the purpose of this meeting was?" she continued.
"To see how many students would be willing to join Dumbledore in his army…"
Albus realized what was going on immediately. Will Stanton was not being affected by the Veritaserum. He was making their story up, placing all the blame on Dumbledore instead of the students. Understanding leapt into Cornelius' face as well and he leapt backward into the fire a second time.
"You!" he yelled, stamping on his cloak, "You have been plotting against me!"
There was nothing for it, Albus mused. He had to go along with this story, as much as he'd rather have stayed at Hogwarts to make sure when Harry was lured into the trap by Voldemort, but now he'd have to rely on Severus to relay him the message. "That's right." He said cheerfully. Glancing at Mr. Stanton again, Albus saw what looked, for an instant, like a darkened smirk of triumph.
"Very well, then," Cornelius said, now radiant with glee, "duplicate your notes, Weasley, and send a copy to the Daily Prophet at once. If we send a fast owl we should make the morning edition!" Percy dashed from the room, slamming the door behind him, and Cornelius turned back to Albus. "You will now be escorted back to the Ministry, where you will be formally charged, then sent to Azkaban to await trial."
"Ah," Albus said gently, "yes. Yes, I thought we might hit that little snag."
"Snag?" said Cornelius, his voice still vibrating with joy. "I see no snag, Dumbledore!"
"Well," replied Albus, thoughts whirling, "I'm afraid I do."
"Oh, really?"
"Well… it's just that you seem to be labouring under the delusion that I am going to… what is the phrase? Come quietly. I am afraid I am not going to come quietly at all, Cornelius. I have absolutely no intention of being sent to Azkaban."
"Enough of this rubbish!" Cornelius said, pulling out his own wand. "Dawlish! Shacklebolt! Take him!"
Albus had four spells cast before any of them could even move.
kalina heru : light lord
Maiar : lesser angels