Sorry, my mind obviously wandered off because there was no way that Crouch would have escaped the summary judgement by Magic, this has now been corrected.
I also belatedly remembered the common trope that most adult Pure-Bloods can't survive losing their magic, so Karkaroff and Crouch carked it as well in the last chapter.
Bronze, what I was saying was that I didn't agree with Tonks being paired up with a pathetic werewolf almost twice her age, so I paired her up with Bill instead.
Refer Chapter 1 for disclaimers.
The Durmstrang ship left with the rest of their students about two weeks after the Second Task. It had taken that long to get the Norwegian and Bulgarian Ministries to accept that the only ones who could be blamed for what happened to Krum and Karkaroff were Krum, Karkaroff and the people who roped Karkaroff into going along with the plan (the newly Squibbed or dead members of the French Ministry). They had to concede that Harry had given Krum and Karkaroff fair warning weeks before the task, and they'd gone ahead with their plans anyway.
The delay had given the Merpeople the time they needed to weave enough large stick and seaweed baskets to hold themselves and everything they were taking with them and attach them with seaweed tow ropes to the hull of the Durmstrang ship. Harry spoke with the Chieftainess of the village again just before the ship left and she swore to him that all of her people and all the Grindylows they could find would be leaving with the ship, and as far as she knew they'd gotten them all.
There was considerable upheaval in the Weasleys' lives in the aftermath of the Second Task, because while Molly died when she had her magic stripped from her for her part in Dumbledore's machinations, Charlie, Percy and Ron didn't…. So they had to be obliviated of any and all knowledge of the Magical World and their family, given new identities and taught how to live in the Muggle world. Arthur couldn't really blame Molly's Squib cousin for refusing to have anything to do with them after what they said to and about him the one time they met at Ignatius Prewett's funeral, but that meant that the only option left was to send them into the Muggle foster care system. Charlie Diggory and Percy Crouch managed to adapt and assimilate into the Muggle World without too much trouble, but Ron Bagman (The Muggle paternity tests done when they were being prepared for the Muggle World had shown why Charlie, Percy and Ron were nothing like Arthur, they weren't his children! Getting a sample of Crouch's blood for the test was easy, because they were keeping his body in statis while they performed the official investigation into his death. Needing to get Cedric Diggory's blood to confirm Charlie's patrimony was more problematical. but Cedric freely agreed to give it because his mother reminded him that the last Lord Black had ensured that the two of them a decent life, when he could have taken everything from them after what his father did.)... Ended up in a special needs home because he was too stubborn, stupid and lazy to put any effort into learning even the basics of what he needed to get by in that world so he was written off as a lost cause.
The twins and Ginny were the only ones who'd stayed with Molly who didn't lose their magic. The twins jumped at the chance to come live with Arthur and Emma, but Ginny was too much like her mother to accept that her ridiculed and betrayed father had the right to be happy with someone who actually cared for him, so with Arthur's agreement she went to live with her betrothed's family. Arthur gave her the Burrow (their family home in Devon, which Arthur built on land given to them as a wedding gift when he married Molly) as her dowry, because he and his sons wanted to forget about that part of their lives…. And Emma, clever Witch that she was, pointed out that James Fleamont wouldn't be able to get away with asking for money to help defray the cost of raising her after Ginny had been given the biggest thing Arthur was able to sign over as her Dowry. Sherwood House, the ancestral home of Clan Weasley, was grander and more valuable than the Burrow but that was attached to the Weasley Barony and couldn't be given away without the title, which was being rightfully passed on to Bill as his Heir, and then Fred and George as next in line. Fred had also been officially made the Prewett Heir so that the Prewett Baronetcy would go to him if anything happened to Bill, and George was the next in line after him for that as well.
As expected, the pure-Blood bigots on the Hogwarts Board tried to get their own candidates placed in the Head and Deputy positions but Minerva was confirmed as Headmistress and Filius and Pomona Sprout were confirmed as Deputy Headmaster and Headmistress. The Pure-Bloods would never have accepted a Half-Goblin as the Deputy Headmaster but they weren't given a choice and gave in to the argument that they needed Filius' help if Hogwarts was to ever return to its former glory as one of the premier schools of Magic.
They didn't appreciate being told that as at the start of the new school year, there would also be a House Master and House Mistress for each House (which would no longer include the Head or Deputies). There would also be at least two teachers for each subject, so that the students could get the appropriate assistance, and students would be advanced or held back purely on the basis of their knowledge and ability.
Starting in the new school year, the useless Muggle Studies Elective would be replaced with Muggle Culture, which would actually teach the students how to survive in the Muggle World. The current Muggle Studies Elective would be made self-study for the rest of the year, with updated material to include the key events and developments of the last Hundred Years…. And Charity Burbage, the Pure-Blood Muggle Studies Mistress, would be moved over to teach History of Magic because Cuthbert Binns was being exorcised, effective immediately.
Professor Burbage was being put on notice that Muggle-Born or Muggle-Raised Witches or Wizards would be teaching the new Muggle Culture Elective next year, but she would be able to remain as one of the History of Magic teachers if she got up to speed on the expanded curriculum in time…. That would give her five or six months to prove that she understood the material, and teaching History of Magic in the meantime should help with that. Charity had actually gotten an 'O' on her History NEWT so if she applied herself she should have no trouble getting up to speed.
Muggle Culture would be joined by the reinstated Wizarding Culture Elective and a subset of the applicable course would be made mandatory for all students raised in Wizarding or Muggle society, to teach them the basics of what they needed to survive in the culture they were ignorant of.
Oh, and the useless Divination Elective was being cancelled and that drunken sot Trelawney thrown out of the castle, effective immediately. Students taking Divination would be moved into other Electives that would actually teach them something, but they would be able to continue by self-study and sit the OWL and NEWT exams for another year or two if they wished. If any students genuinely had the sight, proper coaches would be found for them so that they could pursue their talent outside class hours….
And some other useful cancelled Electives would also be reinstated.
When members of the Board started to arc up about the fact that they hadn't agreed to any of this, and there was no money to pay for it, they were informed that it would all be paid out of the monies that were no longer being redirected into Dumbledore's and others' pockets…. And that while the articles currently being prepared were only naming Dumbledore as the thief, any attempts to stop these necessary changes going through would see all the ones who had been stealing Hogwarts gold named in the Daily Prophet and on the Wizarding Wireless Network…. Which would probably result in criminal charges and penalties being applied, not to mention irate Witches and Wizards coming after those who were named.
Harry had been prepared to invoke Founders Heirs' rights if he had to, as they were looking at enough change to the senior positions at Hogwarts that it wouldn't be that much more if they refilled every position….. But the threat of exposure….. And the fact that the once Most Noble and Most Ancient House of Macmillan was now the Macmillan Family, because they had been found guilty by Magic of being part of the plots against Harry and his betrothed. Therefore they forfeited all their titles, lands and everything else to the Most Noble and Most Ancient House of Potter and Its Associated Houses, which in turn meant that they lost their seats on the Board and the Wizengamot to the newly elevated Most Noble and Most Ancient House of Emrys…. Had made that unnecessary…
Even with all the course changes, the biggest shock to most of the students when Minerva was officially confirmed as Headmistress was the announcement that effective immediately…. Hogwarts was imposing a zero-tolerence rule on bullying in any form, so if they did not wish to be ostracised by their Houses for significant point losses, or suspended or expelled for more serious offences, they better familiarise themselves with the new rules and penalties quick smart. The staff were told separately that the same rules applied to them, but dismissal and criminal charges would be the penalties for them.
Argus Filch, the Squib Caretaker, surprised them all by having enough sense to get out before he fell afoul of the new rules, tendering his resignation then and there. He was obviously hoping that he would be leaving them in the lurch though… Because he was quite put out when Minerva immediately announced that she knew a Witch who could handle the Caretaker's role easily and what's more, she would probably be able to start straight away. Minerva explained that Isobel MacDougal was a war widow with a daughter at Hogwarts who could do with the work and that she'd hired her to deal with problems that had come up with the Ross estate at times when she couldn't get away from Hogwarts over the last decade or so, because Isobel was quite capable and had a good head on her shoulders… Minerva made a quick floo call and Isobel joined them for the rest of the staff meeting as Hogwarts' new Caretaker.
One outcome of Magic's judgement that Harry was actually happy about was that it showed that his father hadn't been involved in Dumbledore's plans to get him out of the way in the First Task, because the Minor House of Fleamont didn't lose anything else, or that was how Harry was choosing to see it anyway. James hadn't severed his ties with Dumbledore as Harry warned him to, so they lost the Lestrange Barony and other titles, lands and fortune, which of course included Lestrange Manor, when Dumbledore finally managed to piss Harry off enough to call judgement on him and his allies, which meant that the House of Fleamont reverted to a Minor House, and Harry bequeathed one of the apartments in Diagon Alley which had been forfeited to him by another House that hadn't had enough sense to sever its ties with Dumbledore to the Minor House of Fleamont so that his brother would have somewhere to live…. This was partly to forstall James trying to get Gryffindor Cottage back, because they'd already reclaimed it from the Ministry by then, pointing out that the Ministry should have verified that James was actually the rightful owner before they went forward with the deal, instead of blindly taking Albus Dumbledore's word that everything was above board and legal when he presented it to them as a fait accompli... As giving them an apartment to live in would cut any attempts to spin a story to make it look like he was throwing his own family out on the street off at the knees.
Even though they'd lost most of what they had in their vaults and the income from the Lestrange businesses, between James' Ministry wages and the Hundred Galleons a month he could draw from Hadrian's Trust Vault (and larger amounts from time to time) they lived comfortably enough in the smaller apartment, though of course James and Hadrian were constantly complaining that they weren't living like the Lords they should be. James still boasted to all and sundry about getting one over that stupid Goblins whenever the Potter Account Manager approved larger withdrawals from Hadrian's Vault…. But the Potter Account Manager was just complying with Harry and Lily's instructions to allow withdrawals up to the annual limit when it was to Hadrian's benefit to do so.
James' Child-Bride Leta (She'd embraced the pet name Baron Scamander called her when he wistfully told her at a Ministry Ball that she was just as beautiful as her namesake had been at her age) was actually happy to be living the quiet life. From what she heard from her Mama and other women she came in contact with as she was growing up she'd been expecting her lot in life to be married off to some brutish Death Eater, used to bear his heirs, take his frustrations out on and entertain his friends until she was used up and broken, and then discarded like her brothers' mother and hers had been…. So her life with James had been a pleasant surprise, as he'd waited almost three years until she was sixteen before he started having sex with her and hadn't gotten violent with her for failing to bear him children or anything else. She'd heard from other women that she probably had Lily Evans to thank for that, because apparently James still remembered the lessons she had taught him… Just as she had Bellatrix to thank for her brothers and father leaving her alone, though she'd sometimes wished that Bella had killed her brothers like she had her father, as they seemed to have gotten more vicious after she ripped their bits off and she hadn't always been around to protect her from their anger. The only times James took her anywhere were when he wanted to show her off at Ministry Balls or other society events, but at least he didn't restrict her from talking to or visiting her friends….
Of course James wouldn't be at all happy if he knew that she'd been speaking with his ex-wife and estranged son at several of those get togethers over the last year and a half. Lily had given her some helpful tips on how to handle James when he was being difficult, which had worked quite well when she combined them with what her Mama taught her about how to passively manage your husband before she died…. And Harry was generally far more level headed, easy going and pleasant to be around than her spoilt brat of a stepson, and his betrothed when she began living with them. The only times she'd ever seen Harry throwing his considerable political weight around was when someone, like James, pushed him too far, and even then he took care to restrict that treatment to the ones who offended him…. He'd always been a perfect gentleman to her whenever they ran into each other, and his three betrothed… Or rather, if what she got from what she'd overheard at the Quidditch World Cup Final (Barty Crouch hadn't been the only one in the Minister's Box who spoke fluent French, that was just one of the things she'd been required to master before she went to Hogwarts, and Bella told her that it had been much the same for her as a daughter of the House of Black)….. And read between the lines in the Prophet article about the Second Task was correct, it was quite likely that he was betrothed to Comte Delacour's Veela daughters too so it was probably five betrothed…. Were perfectly charming as well….
While Leta knew the Old Laws well enough to understand that they'd probably used the old forms of the magically binding betrothal contracts which magically wed the prospective bride to her betrothed when her magic accepted that she'd lost her virginity, and stripped the magic from the one who took her virginity if it wasn't her betrothed… Doing the same to anyone other than her betrothed who tried to complete a magically binding marriage ritual with her in order to claim any titles, lands and fortune she was due to inherit, though in that case it also stripped their titles, lands and fortune from them and transferred them to her House….
(This was as much to protect the brides-to-be from rape and abandonment as it was to protect their families from scandal and line-theft. And that was the reason ambitious families who were always looking for ways to get more gold and power refused to use the old forms, because they stopped the prospective groom's family having his betrothed raped or coerced into sex, accusing her of being a slut who was sleeping around and using that to cancel the betrothal, demanding reparations for the insult, if they found a better option elsewhere.)
What she didn't realise was that Harry had already completed the formal bonding rituals normally performed after the wedding ritual, which used the mutual climax of both parties in the consummation of the marriage to seal the bond between the couple and release their full magical potential, with all of his betrothed except for Gabrielle…. Whose mind, body and magic had not yet matured enough for her to safely take part in a tantric ritual which would bestow the Family Magic due to the magically accepted Consort of the Head of a Most Noble and Ancient House on her, and release her full magical potential as an adult Witch…..
They had decided to go ahead with the bonding rituals because the Delacours had argued that it would be safer for Fleur to compete underwater if she had her full magical potential unleashed, and Luna, Daphne and Hermione Jane all insisted that it was their right, as Harry's senior betrothed, to go through the ritual with Harry before Fleur. This meant that Harry and girls, other than Gabrielle, were now magically mature adults whose magic was linked at a deep level, and they had all the magical benefits of being the accepted Consorts of their partners' Houses. They were married in the eyes of Magic, even if they wouldn't be officially be married in the Wizarding World until they performed the requisite marriage rituals to formalise their unions….. So Luna, Daphne, Hermione Jane and Fleur were effectively Harry's brides, not his betrothed.
It was hard to believe that Harry was only a few hours older than Hadrian when he was so tall and strong, physically a grown man oozing enough power and charm to make most women drool (not that anyone but his betrothed ever got anything more than friendly attention from him), while his twin was a still an irritating petulant child…. Not to mention the fact that Harry was far more intelligent, better educated, more polished and more well travelled and worldly than James… No, being cast out of his father's life hadn't hurt the young Lord Potter-Peverell-Emrys-Black one little bit.
By April, Hogwarts was settling into the new order. Some students had been expelled and/or imprisoned because they refused to accept that times had changed. No-one missed Argus Filch or his creepy cat one little bit (Isobel MacDougal did have a half-kneazle familiar but like Janie Granger's familiar Crooks, Gus was far too proud to slink about in the shadows), as Madam MacDougal was approachable and efficient and the castle was much brighter under the care of someone with magic and proper sensibilities.
Much of the teaching had improved as well, as the teachers had been put on notice by the Triad (Minerva, Filius and Pomona) that anyone who didn't prove that they were capable of teaching their subject well would be dismissed at the end of the school year. While some had been held back by Dumbledore, others had just been going through the motions, certain that they'd never be dismissed no matter what they did…. But seeing the Trelawney bint thrown out on her arse, Binns exorcised and Burbage summarily moved over to teach History because she wasn't teaching the students anything useful about the Muggle World as soon as the Triad took over had cured them of that misconception.
Silvanus Kettleburn would be making his best efforts for the rest of the year, but he was quite happy to retire and hand Care of Magical Creatures over to Hagrid and Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank at the end of the school year, especially when he discovered that Hagrid already had his Mastery in the subject, earned under Newt Scamander no less! Horace Slughorn was also thinking of retiring , because the Triad had taken most of his authority from him and were making him comply with their rules like any other teacher. Albus had recognised his importance in their world and given him the leeway to do as he pleased, but these three ignored all that.
The teacher they were keeping the closest eye on though was John Dawlish, because quite aside from the fact that none of them would have hired something like him in the first place, his behaviour had been quite erratic through the year. It was almost as if he'd been different people at different times. At the start of the school year he'd been far more driven and powerful than they remembered him being in his time in the Aurors and Ministerial Guard, but after Samhain he'd returned to the surly, arrogant, mediocre git they'd come to expect of Dawlish…. Then some time in late May, he started reminding those who had been part of Dumbledore's Order of the Phoenix in the war of that grimy little thief Mundungus Fletcher (he was usually known as 'Dung' for a reason) or his illegitimate son Peter Pettigrew.
The ones who'd been in the Order kicked themselves when Jareth told them about Pettrigrew's parentage, because he was so much like his father in many ways that they didn't know how they'd missed it. Fletcher had gotten the Muggle-Born prostitute Arabella Figg pregnant in July 1959…. Arabella was a worn out Knockturn Alley street whore going by the street name of Pretty Polly at the time, and she only got pregnant because she was too tired to remember to cast the contraceptive charms on herself. Arabella had never been pretty by any stretch of the imagination but she wasn't the one who came up with that name… Pure-Bloods got all the decent jobs in Magical Britain when she finished Hogwarts just after World War Two and there were no jobs to be had in Muggle London either…. So in the end she was desperate enough to start whoring to get money for food… But one of the Pure-Bloods working Knockturn Alley got jealous when she found out that Arabella had finished Hogwarts because she was no better than a Squib, so she started calling her Pretty Polly the Mudblood and made sure the name stuck….
When Fletcher went to Dumbledore to get him to clean up the mess though, Dumbledore decided that it could be useful to have a whore and a thief in his pocket to do the type of jobs his other minions would baulk at. So he set them up in a dingy little flat in a cheap part of Muggle London and sent enough 'jobs' Fletcher's way for him to be able to afford to maintain the two of them and the brat. It hadn't been too hard to sell Fletcher on the idea that sticking with 'poor Widow Polly Pettigrew' and their son Peter would give him somewhere to live and someone to cook and clean for him, and save him having to pay for sex to boot, and Arabella wasn't about to argue because putting up with Fletcher maybe once or twice a week when he was sober enough to get it up was much easier than trying to make a living as a Sickle a pop street whore.
The day after Samhain in 1981 though, Dumbledore grabbed Arabella and set her up in a cottage close enough to where Lily Potter's Muggle sister lived under her real name to keep an eye on Harry Potter for him after he was delivered there… But he forgot all about her being there when he forgot about Harry, and after a while she started breeding and selling cats and kneazle crosses to pay the bills. Arabella certainly wasn't complaining about being forgotten, because she liked being the Crazy Cat Lady of Westeria Lane one hell of a lot more than she had being the Widow Pettigrew who had to take in a dodgy lodger to pay the bills.
When Peter turned Eleven, 'Uncle Albus' had used money from the Hogwarts accounts to pay for his tuition and supplies and ensured that he went into Gryffindor with the Scions of the Most Noble and Most Ancient Houses of Potter and Black and Remus Lupin, whom he'd been grooming to become a loyal minion ever since he survived being turned by Fenrir Greyback…. Albus had been miffed that Lupin was the only one of the children he selected to be turned who had survived to Hogwarts age actually. His plan had been to have at least four or five of them beholden to him, so that he'd have loyal followers who would be ready to do whatever it took to recruit the Werewolves to work for him, but when the time came, all he had left was Lupin.
The point was, there was something up with Dawlish, and now that Albus was dead, the question of who in the Seven Hells he was working for had become more important… Because Dawlish wasn't the sort to keep working on a plan if the one who came up with it wasn't around to keep him on track.
While it was a pyrrhic victory at this point, Harry got the Prophet to publish a speculative article about the fact that aside from two or three weeks in late November last year to set things up for the First Task and then remove everything after the Task... No-one involved with the Triwizard Tournament had been anywhere near the Hogwarts Quidditch Pitch between the beginning of September last year and the beginning of June, so they could have quite easily allowed Hogwarts' Quidditch Cup to proceed without effecting the Tournament.
Apparently, the only reason they were starting to get things ready earlier for the Third Task was that they were actually growing something on the Quidditch Pitch… a maze as they later discovered... which would take longer than just using magic to set things up. They obviously hadn't twigged that Harry was able to see what creatures they were keeping in the clearing where the dragons had been though, and he watched as a collection of Trolls, Acromantulas, Quintapeds and Manticores was accumulated there through June.
It had been enlightening to listen to the beast handlers complaining about the fact that they wouldn't be getting the Sphinx or most of the other interesting beasts they'd been looking forward to because the ones who had been bankrolling the Tournament had lost everything to him after the Second Task. Their comments about the fact that at least the Lethifolds were being replaced with the two Dementors that Minister Fudge had for his personal bodyguards were more worrying though, because neither Fleur or Oliver were experienced with the Patronus charm… Which meant they both had to spend quite a bit of time in Runic Time Chambers, getting themselves to the point where they could cast a Patronus well enough to protect themselves from the foul creatures.
They also spent time training to deal with the creatures Harry found in the clearing, and whatever other traps Harry uncovered evidence of. In the best of possible worlds, Harry and Fleur would just let Oliver win, as he was the only one who had actually entered the Tournament fair and square, but Harry knew that someone still had a plan for what happened in the Tournament…. And he would be better prepared and equipped to deal with whatever was waiting for the one who reached the Triwizard Cup first.
Harry did what he could to make sure that Fleur and Oliver would get through this okay, but just before the Third Task started, he insisted that they all needed to win or lose on their own merit. Oliver took that statement at face value because he was very competitive himself, but Fleur gave Harry a look that said he'd be explaining himself afterwards.
They were all entering the maze by separate entrances (the entrance on the fourth side had been filled in because Krum was knocked out after the Second Task), and Harry was willing to bet that he'd have a straighter run to the Cup than Fleur and Oliver. Someone other than Dumbledore had wanted him in this Task and if they just wanted to kill him, they would have made a move before this so they most probably wanted him alive for whatever plans they had, and he was betting that the fastest way to find out what those plans were would be to appear to be going along with them.
When he had a quick run to the enclosure where the Cup was and only encountered a small fraction of what he'd seen going into this thing, he was pretty sure that he'd been right about what the plan was, so he took a breath and grabbed the handle of the Triwizard Cup, being wrenched away by a portkey… Dumbledore must have been involved in the portkey's creation before he died, because only the Headmaster or Headmistress and Accepted Heirs of the Hogwarts Founders could create portkeys that could pass through Hogwarts' wards, and there was no way that Auntie Minnie had been involved in that.
Harry landed in a crouch in a graveyard, with his training making him immediately jump to one side, so that the stunner that had been cast at him flshed past him. In the brief glimpse he had as he was jumping aside, Harry registered that there were at least twenty five to thirty figures in Death Eater robes and masks arrayed around a huge cauldron that had been set up in front of a grave, so now that he was safe behind a nice solid gravestone, his next order of business was to try and even the playing field. He'd been expecting trouble, so he had the Potter, Peverell and Black Ship Trunks (Bennu, Djinn, Bran and Raven) in his pockets, and he willed them to spawn seven Golems each to give him a fighting force to face off against the Death Eaters.
As he was doing that, he heard a sickly laugh and a mocking, high pitched voice calling out to him.
"Hiding will do you no good Harry Potter, so why don't you just come out and face me like the Gryffindor hero you're supposed to be?"
Shite! Well that explained who wanted to get him here, because the last time he heard that voice, it was coming from the back of Quirrell's head. He still didn't know why Voldemort wanted him there though, so he decided to see whether playing a confused victim could get Voldemort boasting again.
"What? So you can get your Death Eaters to kill me? Where did you find them anyway? I thought they'd all crawled away to find holes to hide from the Law in…."
Law... Now that was an idea! Calling on Magic to judge and punish the ones trying to harm him and the girls under the Old Laws at the end of the Second Task had worked quite well… Could he dare hope that it would work again?
"My servants won't kill you Harry Potter, that is my right…. They were invited here to witness you assisting in my triumphant return, so I can take up the noble fight to cleanse our world of all those who are unfit to wield magic again…."
Damn, he needed more time to make sure he worded this right. "Those who are unfit to wield magic? Oh that's right, you mean everyone born of Muggles and Squibs, don't you?"
"Very good Harry Potter, that is exactly who I…."
"More specifically, the ones like you, whose Squib mother used love potions to trick your poor Muggle father into her getting her pregnant…. But she stupidly stopped potioning him when she was sure she was pregnant with you… Allowing him to come to his senses and run away, and get the marriage annulled as soon as he got home to his Mummy and Daddy so that you were born a bastard, and then you became an orphan soon after that because bringing an abomination like you into the world killed your mother."
Voldemort's wordless scream of rage made it fairly obvious that Harry's barb had hit home, then he screeched (it was too high pitched to be called shouting). "Find him and bring him to me! Alive! If anyone but me kills him they will die a thousand deaths!"
Harry commanded the Golems to engage the Death Eaters and anyone else who came at him and finalised the wording of his decree in his head. He stayed just where he was as he stated.
"I, Lord Henry James Potter Peverell Emrys Black... Accepted by Magic as Head of the Most Noble and Most Ancient Houses of Potter, Peverell, Emrys and Black and their Associated Houses... Call on Magic to Judge and Punish all those who are have been actively involved in attempts to Harm, Kill or commit Line Theft against me and my family. Under the Old Laws, I call for any and all who are found guilty of these crimes by Magic to have all of their magic stripped from them and for their Houses and Families to forfeit any and all titles, lands and everything else belonging to them to the Houses of me and my family. So. Mote. It. Be!"
There was a flash as Harry's decree was accepted by Magic, and a pulse went out in all directions from him. Less than thirty seconds later, the only sounds in graveyard were people cursing and crying. The Golems told him that none of the ones who had been waiting for him to arrive had any magic left, so Harry stood up to see the damage his decree had done, willing the War Wand in his hand into a magical pistol form as he did so because he wasn't naive enough to think that losing their magic had made them all harmless.
He was thankful he listened to his paranoia soon after he stepped out from behind the gravestone, because he'd hardly gone ten paces before he was attacked by a huge magically enhanced viper, later identified as the Nose-horned viper which had been Voldemort's familiar. He didn't stop to work out what it was when it was attacking him though, he just 'fired' his magical pistol into its open mouth and blew its head off.
Harry headed for the giant cauldron, because that was obviously the focal point of whatever was going on here. The bundle one of the ones near the cauldron had been holding had fallen to the ground and unravelled when he dropped dead from having his magic stripped from him, and the twisted toddler's form that had been inside the bundle was decomposing so fast that the flesh was already falling from its bones. A quick diagnostic scan revealed that the remains reeked of dark magic, even more than the magically enhanced viper had, so Harry was fairly certain that this had been Voldemort's final physical form.
While the Golems were telling him that over two thirds of the Death Eaters had died when they had their magic stripped from them, Harry got a forcible reminder that the other third or so hadn't, because he was charged by three big, burly Death Eaters. These were later confirmed to have been Goyle, Crabbe and Bulstrode, whom Lucius Malfoy had kept around to strong arm and intimidate people when he was alive. As they had all been magically weak, they relied on their physical size and strength to intimidate people, but this had served Malfoy well because it didn't leave any magical evidence which could be traced back to him. The fact that they were mainly physical muscle meant that they were less effected by losing their magic, but being shot in the head at close range did a good job of stopping them… Permanently. It worked just as well on Macnair when he came at Harry from behind with an axe.
Of course Harry was in trouble with his Mum, the girls and most of the family because he didn't think to send one of the Golems to tell them he was okay and where he was straight away. When they saw all the dead Death Eaters, some of the more conventionally minded MLE Patrol Officers who arrived to process the crime scene tried to arrest Harry, but they were quickly disabused of that notion by Alastor and Gawain Robards… and the sparking wand in the hand of the furious Lily Evans…. Harry defused the situation by publicly promising to submit memories of everything that happened and testify under Veritaserum as soon as they returned to Hogwarts, and the presence of the loathsome remains of the toddler who was dropped by the dead Death Eater helped quell some of their doubts, as did the presence of a magically enhanced viper that was two or three times the size of any natural viper.
He wasn't too surprised to hear that 'Dawlish' had dropped dead back at Hogwarts, or that he had changed into Mundungus Fletcher when the loss of his magic stripped the polyjuice effects away.
The Squibs, corpses and other evidence were all recorded and then portkeyed back to the DMLE. But before they returned to Hogwarts, Harry addressed another matter that came to his attention while they were talking. One of the Death Eaters who didn't drop dead when he lost his magic was mumbling about the ritual they were there to do and he seemed to be in shock, because he kept repeating "Bone of the Father. Flesh of the Servant. Blood of the Enemy..." over and over again.
The grave that the cauldron had been set up at the foot of belonged to one Thomas Riddle Junior, Tom Riddle's Muggle father, so to make sure that no-one could try this ritual again, Harry vanished the grave, gravestone and everything else within a metre of the grave…. Leaving a hole five metres long, four metres wide and three metres deep, making the sides jagged enough for it to look like the soil had been dug out. There was no evidence of how the sixty or so cubic metres of dirt, stone and metal had been taken away from the grave site, but the police gave up trying to work that out after a while. Along with why no corpses turned up to explain the amount of human and reptile blood they found there and why no-one had heard the firefight and explosions that had apparently occurred in the graveyard that night, going by the scorch marks and blown apart gravestones that the Witches and Wizards from the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad had also missed.
They made sure that the Prophet the next morning had a full report of what happened (except for the Golems being called 'Guards' and a vague explanation about them having specialised portkeys that brought them to the location of the runic tracker that Harry always had with him). The decree that Harry made and the fact that the DMLE had confirmed his testimony to be true by certified memories and Veritaserum were reported in the article, which made it almost impossible for the ones who lost their magic and everything else that night to come up with anything to support their protestations of innocence. It was hard to argue that you are innocent and transfer any blame for what happened to Harry when his wording was quite clear, and it was their own magic that judged them and found them guilty.
The Summer Solstice Session of the Wizengamot…. Which as one of the four Annual Solstice and Equinox Sessions, all Wizengamot Members were required to attend…. Had been moved back to the day after the Third Task, and after he heard what had happened the night before, Tiberius Ogden, the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, was quite happy to agree to Harry's requested addition to the standard procedures…. This being that every Wizengamot Member and Officer was to be made to publicly confirm their titles and credentials to attend as Members of the Wizengamot via the Stone of Truth before they would be allowed to take part in proceedings or leave the Wizengamot Chamber.
Tiberius knew that he still had all his magic and titles, and was pretty sure that Harry and the rest of his Allies did too, but there had been quite a few others coming to Wizengamot sessions and stirring up trouble over the last year and more who he was sure no longer had their titles at least. Between Harry pulling the plug on Dumbledore and his allies last March and stripping all the titles, lands and fortunes from the ones who were plotting to harm and commit Line-Theft against him and his family this year, many of them would have lost those titles… So they no longer had the right to vote or speak as a Wizengamot Member, and falsely claiming that they did was an insult to the legitimate Members of the Wizengamot.
The fact that the Daily Prophet had a much larger contingent present than they normally did, even for the Solstice and Equinox sessions, was a sign that they were expecting to be in for quite a show today, and when Tiberius ordered the Wizengamot Chamber to be sealed as soon as he proclaimed the Summer Solstice Session of the Entire Wizengamot of Magical Britain had Commenced, more than a few of the Wizengamot Members started asking what was going on.
The way the Chief Warlock, Potter and several others who were part of the Albion Alliance were displaying what could only be described as evil smiles didn't bode well for the ones who opposed them. Nor did the Chief Warlock's next announcement.
"It has been brought to my attention that over the last fifteen months, if not longer, several of the Witches and Wizards in this chamber have been fraudulently representing themselves as legitimate Members of the Wizengamot for the purpose of undermining the ability of the Wizengamot to perform its duty to Magical Britain. Therefore a request has been made of me that I, as the Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot of Magical Britain, am quite willing and ready to agree with. This request was that every Member and Officer of the Wizengamot be made to present their credentials to be here and have them confirmed by the Stone of Truth, here and now in front of the entire Wizengamot, or be permanently banished from the Wizengamot. To demonstrate my agreement with the need for this measure, I will be the first to do so..."
With that, he turned and descended the stairs to the floor of the Wizengamot Chamber without giving anyone a chance to argue or try to get this move blocked.
The Magic of the Chamber ensured that everyone in the Chamber heard as he stopped before the large crystal that was known as the Stone of Truth and announced.
"I am Lord Tiberius Marius Ogden, Baron of Ogden, Baronet of Meade and Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot of Magical Britain."
Then he placed his hands on the Stone of Truth and the Stone 'spoke'.
"Confirmed! Tiberius Marius Ogden is Magically Accepted as the Baron of Ogden, Baronet of Meade and Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot of Magical Britain."
The fact that Harry was standing there, ready to bow to Tiberius and take his place in front of the Stone when he stepped away, quashed any doubts about who it was who had made that 'request' of the Chief Warlock, but the whispered conversations about that died out as his litany of titles seemed to be going on forever…. And more than a few Witches and Wizards sitting on the Members' benches heard titles that they were supposedly representing being named…. It was no surprise when the Stone of Truth confirmed every title that Harry claimed, but the ones who had been claiming them started worrying about what was going to happen to them.
After the first seven or eight who tried to sneak out of the Chamber to avoid being outed as frauds (forgetting in their panic that the Chief Warlock had sealed the Chamber) were forcibly dragged over to the Stone of Truth by MLE Patrol Officers and made to announce what titles they claimed to represent, the rest of them gave up and resigned themselves to being shown to be liars and frauds. They couldn't work out why Potter threw them a bone though…
After the first one was shown to be lying about his right to be attending as a Wizengamot Member and had his plum coloured Wizengamot Robes turned yellow (to set them apart from any proper Wizengamot or Ministry robes) with all the Wizengamot trappings stripped from them... Harry stood and waited to be recognised, talking over the jeers and catcalls being directed at the shamed Wizard when he was.
"Chief Warlock, Officers of the Wizengamot and fellow Wizengamot Members, be not so hasty in your condemnation. I know for a fact that it was only last night that some of the Wizengamot Members and Officers lost their titles, because that was when I called for Magic to Judge and Punish them, so it is possible that some of them have not yet received notification that they have lost their titles. Might I suggest that this Wizard, and any others who have lost the titles they claim to represent, be given the opportunity to step forward, proclaim when they believe that they may have lost their titles and then have the Stone of Truth announce when they were actually lost?"
Tiberius nodded. "An excellent suggestion Lord Potter. They may have been judged and found wanting by Magic but they may at least be cleared of the charge of knowingly deceiving their peers here in the Wizengamot. Do you wish to take the opportunity to do this Mister Shafiq?"
The Wizard on the Chamber floor nodded. "Yes please Chief Warlock... And I thank you for this opportunity to clear my name of the charge of knowingly deceiving the Wizengamot Lord Potter."
With that he stepped up to the Stone, stated "I, Marcus Ali Shafiq, believe that I lost my titles on the Twenty Fourth of June Nineteen Ninety Three." and put his hands on the Stone, which spoke. "Confirmed. The titles of the Baronetcies of Oxbridge and Wellmouth were forfeited on the Twenty Fourth of June Nineteen Ninety Three."
It was strange to see him bow respectfully to Harry and walk away to the indicated section of the gallery in his yellow robes with his head held. He had obviously been enough of a supporter of Voldemort to have been involved in the business which culminated in the graveyard in Little Haggleton the night before to lose his titles, but he had at least been exonerated of lying to his peers about his right to be there.
The ones who tried to bypass the Stone and go straight over to sit with the others who had been ejected from the Wizengamot because they'd been falsely claiming to have titles that they'd lost fifteen months before when Harry struck back at Dumbledore and his Allies, and four months before at the end of the Second Task weren't so lucky. They'd been playing their peers for fools, and often lording it over ones who were above them in the House Hierarchy on the basis of titles and wealth that they no longer had and the Aristocracy doesn't forgive that sort of thing, so they were forced to go through the full process. James Fleamont was just lucky that he'd humiliated enough to stop claiming titles that he didn't have over a year ago, so he could get away with jeering the ones who were exposed as being frauds since then.
After nearly thirty Wizengamot members had been shamed and banished to the yellow peril section of the gallery, the Chief Warlock got their attention again. "It is my duty to advise you that, in addition to the Wizengamot Members here who have lost their titles and seats, another twenty four lost not just their titles and seats, but their magic and lives as well, and included among them were Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic…. Ludovic Bagman, the Director of the Department of Magical Games and Sports and Anthony Abbot, the Director of the Department of Magical Education."
"Obviously replacements for these Ministry positions need to be chosen as a matter of urgency, but while the selection process for the new Department Heads would normally be the Minister's duty, we cannot afford to wait for the new Minister to settle in and then go through the selection process. Therefore, it has been proposed that all of these positions be filled here and now. The other business on the agenda for this session is being pushed back until after we have done this."
"In order to reduce the time this selection process will take, a proposal has been made to add the duties and role of Director of the Department of Magical Education to the existing duties and role of the Governor of the Wizarding Examination Authority, Countess Griselda Marchbanks…. For those who do not know her credentials, Countess Marchbanks has served the WEA for over a Century, she's been the Governor for the past Sixty years and is Magical Britain's foremost authority on magical education… Countess Marchbanks, it is my understanding that you have indicated that you are willing to take on this additional responsibility, is this correct?"
Griselda nodded. "Yes it is Chief Warlock, neither role is particularly arduous and their workloads tend to peak at different times, so it would be no great inconvenience to take on the Director's role as well. In fact the two roles were generally held by the same person up until around a hundred years ago, and holding both would make it easier for me to assist Headmistress McGonagall and her Deputies in returning Hogwarts to its former glory as one of the Wizarding World's premier schools of magic."
"Thank you Countess Marchbanks. Very well, with no further ado, I will now call for votes for those who support Countess Marchbanks assuming the role of the Director of the Department of Magical Education in addition to being Governor of the Wizarding Examination Authority…."
It was obvious that the vote had passed by quite a large margin (the Albion Alliance controlled enough votes to get it passed without hunting other votes now), but for form's sake Tiberius had to call for the vote to reject the proposal, and then announced that Countess Marchbanks had been voted in by an overwhelming majority.
The pure-Bloods could see the writing on the wall, but they still put forward their own candidates for the new Minister for Magic. It was a wasted effort though, because most of the Neutrals and almost half of the remaining Pure-Bloods voted for the Albion Alliance's nomination, Lord Francis Harfang Longbottom, so no-one else had a chance. Quite aside from his qualifications as someone who had spent over five years in the Auror Operations Office in Wartime, Eleven years in the Auror Investigations Office, over Ten years serving as one of Magical Britain's Representatives to the International Confederation of Wizards. (Crouch had tried to dictate who would replace Dumbledore but the Wizengamot and ICW had the final word on who represented Magical Britain and Bagnold wasn't about to stick her neck out for anyone at the time, so Frank was appointed in 1983 and his political and business knowledge and connections in the Old Magical Nobility of Europe had made him more effective in the role than any of his predecessors over the previous forty years had been.) And had been doing quite well as the Director of the Department for International Magical Cooperation since Crouch died at the end of February…. Frank was also on very good terms with the new French Minister for Magic, as Jean-Pierre Delacour had been elected almost unopposed after he stormed into the French Ministry to wipe out the bastards who tried to get his daughters killed or enslaved, only to find that the Minister and most of his key supporters had already died as a result of their magic being stripped from them by Harry's call for Judgement.
As soon as he was sworn in as the Minister for Magic, Frank announced that he wouldn't allow someone whose beliefs differed as much from his own as James Fleamont's did to remain as his Under-Secretary, but suggested that James replace Bagman as Director of the Department of Magical Games and Sports so that he wouldn't lose too much status. This helped keep the Pure-Bloods quiet, because with the brains behind their operations gone, leaving their people in control of some parts of the Ministry (no matter how unimportant they were) allowed them to believe that they were still players in the game, even if they weren't, and throwing James a bone like that helped keep him in line.
It wasn't difficult to get Lord Cyrus Alfred Greengrass accepted as Frank's replacement as Director of the Department of International Magical Cooperation either, because Cyrus had also been doing well as one of Magical Britain's Representatives to the ICW for the past Ten years (Frank's success in the role made Cyrus the obvious choice to fill the next vacant representative's position six months later). His success had been helped along by having made influential contacts all over the Wizarding World as he expanded his family's Centuries old trading houses into a substantial and successful international business empire over the past Eighteen years, and accompanied his father on business trips over the previous fifteen years. Not to mention the fact that his family was also part of the Old Magical Nobility of Europe.
A/N: Before anyone starts complaining about Harry's sort of stepmother's thoughts about him, please remember that. a) She's only Twelve years older than him and in real terms, the difference is only about half that because of all the time he's spent in Runic Time Chambers. b) There's nothing wrong with innocent appreciation of the opposite sex. c) While her relationship with his biological father isn't terrible, there's considerable room for improvement... And most importantly, this is all fiction so her hypothetical thoughties don't mean anything.
And for those who don't recognise the name Leta Lestrange, she was introduced in Fantastic Beasts as Newt's old friend and potential sister-in-law.
While I'm at it, I realise that I have Dumbledore becoming Headmaster, Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump etc twenty years earlier than he supposedly did in canon, but it just doesn't make sense for him to rise to power twenty years after he was proclaimed as the hero of the Wizarding World. Even in canon he's openly calculating and manipulative, and he showed by what he did to Harry and Sirius that he was ready to make use of the sheep's excitement to get whatever he wanted while everyone was high on it…
'Oh yeah, my father told me about what Albus Dumbledore did in that War back when he was a boy' Wouldn't get him elected with a groundswell of support… But Albus Dumbledore, the Vanquisher of the Dark Lord Grindelwald, would have been able to get anything he wanted while everyone was still celebrating the War being over… Just as he used the excitement about Harry supposedly vanquishing Voldemort to get all his dodgy arrangements for Harry and Sirius approved while everyone was still hyped up about it in canon.
NB: As far as Wormtail's parentage and upbringing and the reasoning behind the old forms of betrothal agreements go, I maintain that there's no truth in the rumours that my picture is next to the words 'Cynical'and 'Awful' in the dictionary…. But while I've never seen anyone propose Dung and 'Mrs Figg' as Wormtail's parents before, it made sense to me, because what else did those two have to offer the Order of the Phoenix?
Arabella's profession was chosen to add a bit of colour to her dreary life (Scarlet is a colour, isn't it?).
And yes, I know I've used Lupin being deliberately turned to create a Werewolf liaison for Dumbledore before, but it's a concept that works far better for me than letting one Werewolf go to Hogwarts with no explanation why he was the only one ever allowed to go.
I've borrowed the idea I saw somewhere in a fic years ago that ghosts/shades/spirits only exist for Magical souls. So the Voldemort Shade 'died' for good as soon as Harry had all of Voldemort's magic stripped from him because all of his soul anchors had already been destroyed. Tom Riddle was officially recognised by Magic as being 'dead' at that point, but Harry didn't need to claim everything he had by Right of Conquest, because Magic had already done that.
(NB: Having his magic stripped from him also removed Dumbledore's magical image from all the magical portraits he had made of himself, so they were nothing more than rather ordinary Muggle paintings now and he's totally gone too. Albus had left the building!)