Chapter 15 Changes at The Ministry and The Gift.

I made my way into work, it being later than was my usual wont, but I had telephoned ahead this morning citing an urgently needed visit to Gringotts and Kingsley had been most accepting of my request, so on arrival, I was surprised to be told by the security wizard at the front desk that Kingsley wanted to see me in his office as soon as I arrived, what was wrong now…

I made my way to his office and knocked on the door, still having no idea of the reason for this unprecedented summons. "Enter." Came the voice of the Minister from within. Apprehensively I entered. "Ah, Dudley, you're back earlier than I expected, please take a seat, and I'll call someone else to join us," he gave his wand and a silver lynx patronus shot from the end of his wand and through the wall of his office. Seeing the expression on my face, he gave a reassuring smile. "Relax, you're not in trouble." There was a knock at his door and Hermione Granger entered the office at Kingsley's invitation. She smiled at me, and took a seat, in the chair next to me.

"Thank you minister, for arranging this meeting for me." She turned to face me. "Dudley, I find myself in a bit of a quandary about something, in the short time that you have been with the ministry, you've managed to do more than I have for the integration of magical Britain. Your entire approach is different to mine, I try to research everything out and come to a solution to the problem, only to fall flat on my face when it doesn't work. You've managed to free the house elves from their centuries of servitude, goblins have full legal rights in muggle Britain and I'm sure sometime soon, you'll manage to get the same in the magical world, and to top it off you have the centaurs looking into integration. I feel as if my time at the ministry has been wasted."

I spluttered… "I don't think your time has been wasted, if it wasn't for you I wouldn't have met Firenze and known there was a problem, and the answer doesn't lie with you. It lies in the fact that essentially it is a social workers job to integrate different peoples together. I admit when I was studying this particular problem it was making sure that a child of a different ethnic background had all their cultural needs met if fostered or adopted by a family from a different culture, but magical Britain doesn't seem to suffer in that way. Everyone is the same, whether black, white, Eurasian or whatever, it's completely different species you deal with, but the issues are the same."

"Exactly, which is why, when I leave in about a months' time I want you to take over my department and do your best to achieve all the goals I've wanted since I first found out about inequality in the wizard world."

"What do you mean, why are you leaving? There's no reason for your leaving, it's not needed or wanted."

"There is a reason for my leaving, and it's nothing work related, but a different matter entirely. I'm pregnant, Ron and I had discussed children; I admit this is a little earlier than I wanted to start a family, but…"

"You're pregnant! Congratulations, any idea whether a boy or a girl?"

"We're pretty sure, it will be a boy, Ginny; Harry's wife was the first girl born into the Weasley family in seven generations, so a boy seems more likely, but I must admit I would like a girl. We'll wait to find out when its born though, about three months, probably just after the new year."

I looked at Hermione and then at Kingsley, "did you know about this?"

"I did indeed, Mr. Dursley, although only late Friday evening as we were leaving work and Mrs. Weasley told me. I've thought about her ideas over the weekend and I agree, from what you told me when you first came for an interview, I think that this does fall within the remit of your job. I propose making you, the head of both departments, essentially merging the two, essentially you would be Minister for Social Services and Racial Equality."

"So a sort of Home Secretary, then?"

"Good grief, a much important responsibility than a secretary, really what gave you such a notion."

"Minister, if I may," said Hermione, "I understand what Dudley means, in the muggle parliament, the Home Secretary is a position in the cabinet, dealing with the affairs at home; the foreign secretary deals with affairs of the kingdom relating to other countries. He's right, that's what you are creating, or on that way anyway."

"Fascinating, I thought I was well versed in muggle politics from my meetings with Mr. Blair, I now see I am still almost ignorant, I definitely need to pay more attention to that side of my job. Now back to the subject at hand, Dudley will you accept this promotion as offered."

"Er, Yes Minister, I'd be honoured to accept, it's nice to know I've been doing a good job and am appreciated for my efforts by my superiors."

"Good job, doesn't even come into it! You're the best person for the job, have been since we employed you. Although it pains me to say it, your work has mostly left Hermione with egg on her face, sorry Hermione, but it's the truth. Dudley has done more for magical Britain than you've managed to achieve. I feel it would be an injustice to not offer you the job and allow you to continue the good work you've been doing. It's either that or obliviate you, send you back to the muggles and save myself a lot of work that you seem to cause me. I don't know which is more tempting." He chuckled at his own joke, and Hermione and I joined him, he'd been threatening to do something similar ever since I got the job in the first place.

I spent the rest of the afternoon with Hermione going through what she had resourced out on the various creatures in the magical world, trolls, giants, merfolk and the goblins and how we could do more to gain them further recognition and equality in society. I had to hand it to her, she made an excellent researcher, but the putting of her theories was where her efforts failed her. I only hope I had more success when I took over in a month's time.

Later that day, I returned home, only to find that Gabrielle and Elrond had been speculating together about what the gift from the goblins was. They were unable to open the box and have a look and were both anxious to find out what I had been given. Gabrielle thought it might be some sort of weapon, given the very militaristic society of the goblins, Elrond disagreed, thinking it was something to help promote peace and understanding in the magical community, though he was unsure as to what it could be.

I took the box from the table where it had been sitting and looked at it closely, for any idea as how to open it. There appeared to be a small opening on one side like a keyhole but too small for any key I possessed, no more than a couple of millimetres in size. I turned the box over and could see nothing underneath it to indicate how to open it. I took my wand and tentatively touched it to the small 'keyhole' on the front of the box, there was a quiet click and the lid of the box on unseen hinges.

I reached forward and slowly opened the box, inside was a large yellow and black egg, roughly the size a rugby ball, (football to American readers), a small piece of rock about the size of a hens egg, a beautifully bejewelled goblin ritual dagger and a piece of parchment with some writing on it.

I stared hard at the writing, it was written in some sort of runes, a language I did not know how to read. I gave a sigh and gave a thought to how I was going to read these instructions when suddenly I could. It was if my mage sight was seeing them in a new way and at the same time it wasn't. The runes were not standard runes, they were goblin runes and the instructions were in Gablish. 'Place the egg in an unlit grate with wood of oak, ash, and olive. Add the cinnabar, several drops of blood, along with something with essence of the fyrebird, start the fire with magic and wait.' I read the instructions aloud so everyone knew what was involved in this.

"Dudley, olive wood and essence of the fyrebird, does that mean you have to burn your wand with this?"

"It does, the high priestess told me that my wand would be returned to me, somewhat changed, but still of use to me in magic, I don't rightly understand what she meant but I trust her."

I looked at the wood, we had stacked alongside the fireplace, there were several pieces of ash wood, I could tell from the dark colour of the grain, but I doubt I would be able to tell if oak was there if it came up and bit me. "Err…!"

"Dudley, what is it?" asked Elrond seeing me staring at the woodpile by the fire.

"Well, I recognise that we have ash wood in the pile, but I don't know if any of it is oak, or even how to tell."

Elrond looked at the woodpile and then began touching every piece of wood in it, "no oak, Dudley, you have pine, ash and willow in there, but no oak."

"How did you…?"

"I can feel the wood's for want of a better word aura, natural signature and tell what tree it comes from, it's just something I can sense, things like that have been happening to me since I changed when we exchanged oaths, I feel more in touch with nature and the natural part of the world, I can tell that your wand is olive, and Gabrielle's is willow with veela hair, other things like this speak out to me occasionally. At Kreacher's funeral, it just seemed right to join hands with Dobson and will the grass to grow. I can't explain it any better than that."

"I think you've explained it quite well, it may be a manifestation of the returning of your Eledhel heritage, and I definitely think that you should take the high priestess up on her offer of education about your language and heritage. It would help you in so many ways."

Gabrielle nodded beside me, "I agree Elrond, any chance you have to enhance your knowledge of your people and who you are should be grabbed with both hands and it may help you in your duties as ambassador for your people with the queen." Elrond nodded, wide eyed with a pleased expression on his face at this. "Do you have any idea where we can get some oak wood to put on the fire?"

"I know of an oak tree in the square in the centre of Grimmauld Place, but I do not feel right about just hacking off a part of a living tree, just to burn it, sorry Dudley."

"I think I understand exactly what you mean, it just doesn't seem right, I know all the wood we use comes from sustainable forests, but I might have an idea. Elrond are you willing to accompany me to the tree and try something?"

"Without knowing what your idea is, I can't say, but I am willing to help if I can."

"I want you to try and use your newfound elven senses to ask the tree if it is willing to give us some wood for the fire. Do you think you could do that?"

"I don't know, it certainly sounds as if it were something I should be able to do and am willing to make a try of it."

Gabrielle looked fascinated at the turn our conversation had taken and clearly wanted to see what if anything could be achieved. I made three cups of coffee and handed one to each of my mystified companions. "Slight distraction for the muggles in the square, it will look like we've gone to sit in the evening sunshine and enjoy a drink, a little rational explanation for them if they happen to see us in the square, rather than talking to a tree!"

I got a nod from them both and we made our way into the square with our drinks and sat with our backs to the oak tree, enjoying the evening sunshine, beside Gabrielle and myself; Elrond appeared to fall asleep leant against the tree, as he tried to make contact with the spirit of the tree.

The tree seemed to give a shudder and there was an excited chattering from the branches above us and I saw what looked like to be several bowtruckles in the branches looking down at us. Then there was a large crack and a thump on the ground on the other side of the tree. I glanced at Elrond who looked as if he was just waking up from forty winks. "The tree was surprised and gratified that we had asked for its help, there are several small logs on the ground behind us, it wishes us success in our ventures and hopes I will speak to it again at a later time. It was different, I must admit, when Dobson and I grew the grass on Kreacher's grave there was a feeling of growth and expectation, and almost childlike glee; communing with the tree was like talking with an older and highly respected individual, most strange."

I raised my eyebrows at this and stood up to leave, I placed my hand on the tree's bark and thought, 'thank you noble tree for your assistance and understanding,' there was a rustle of the tree's leaves and above us the bowtruckles sat watching us calmly as we made our way to the other side of the tree and picked up the three reasonably sized logs of wood that were lying on the ground. I gave a quick glance around the square and waved my wand at the wood, it vanished with a crack. "At least the neighbours won't see us carrying it in now!"

Back in the house, I carefully built up the fire with the oak logs and some of the ash from the woodpile, the rock which I assumed was cinnabar, and placed the rugby ball sized object into the middle of it all, resting my wand carefully in the front of the grate. I cut my palm with the goblin dagger and let several drops fall over everything in the fireplace. Took a deep breathe, "Incendio," the flames comfortably took hold of the wood and the whole thing began to burn merrily. Much to my dismay the first thing to fall to ash was my wand, so much for being able to use it afterwards.

Very quickly, the flames took on a brilliant yellow colour with hints of a deep blue or black deep within them and it seemed to me that the fireplace was singing to me, a rich almost haunting song of peace, harmony, sorrow and at the same time joy. I looked at Gabrielle and Elrond but they seemed totally oblivious to the music I was hearing and were having a conversation together about Henri. The flames in the fireplace flared up as the song increased in intensity and in a matter of minutes all the wood in the fireplace was consumed to a small pile of ashes which was moving slowly, as if something was trying to push its way up out of them. I knelt in front of the grate and was surprised to feel no heat coming from it, the ashes were cold. Some inner feeling made me reach forward and gently take whatever was struggling in the ashes. It was a small bird, entirely without feathers and shivering, acting on some unknown advice I took some of the cold ashes from the fire and placed them over the bird like a blanket, this seemed to stop the shivering, but I felt an intense hunger that was not my own for some fruit. I looked to the fruit bowl on the side and plucked a couple of grapes that were still clinging to the vine in there and started to peel an orange. The small hatchling popped its head from the blanket of ashes and gave a chirrup. On instinct alone, I squashed one of the grapes and fed a small part to the hatchling, it quickly made a meal of the grapes and still I could feel the hunger. I broke apart one of the orange segments and began to feed it. After it had eaten about half the orange, it seemed to have had enough and fell asleep, burrowing itself back into its blanket of ashes.

I looked up to see Elrond and Gabrielle asleep in the chairs they had been sat in earlier and looked at the clock on the mantel, it was three in the morning. No wonder they had fallen asleep, I tried to rise myself and felt a tiredness like no other overcome me and fell asleep in my chair myself.

I woke up later feeling strangely refreshed for having slept in an armchair, again I felt that feeling of hunger and there was movement in the small pile of ashes that I had covered the hatchling with. It popped its head out of the ashes and at once I could see an improvement, the head was covered in yellow and deep blue, almost black feathers, the same as the flames last night. I quickly broke up the last of the orange and fed it to the hatchling, although judging by its look I should now call it a fledgling it looked as if it had aged whilst it slept and almost ready to fly. As I watched the small bird, about the size of a budgerigar, shook the ashes from its feathers and looked at me. I felt feelings of intense happiness radiating from it to me; losing my wand was definitely worth getting what I was beginning to suspect was a phoenix. The fledgling gave a chirrup and straightened itself up in the ashes and burst into flames again. I gave a shocked exclamation when all of a sudden the flames vanished the bird with them and flames were sprouting on the edge of the grate. There completely unharmed was the small phoenix, I definitely knew it was a phoenix now, Harry had told me about this phoenix fire travel thing. The bird looked at the cold a grate and bowed its head over the ashes remaining there, and plucked a small feather from its wing which it dropped onto the ashes. I could see a tear in the eye nearest to me; it fell down the phoenix's beak and was joined by another from the other eye and landed on the ashes.

There was a slight stirring in the ashes as they absorbed this small amount of moisture and the phoenix gave another chirrup and hopped into the fireplace, grabbed something with its claws and flapping its newly fledged wings slowly made its way back to me. In its claws was a wand, it looked like mine, but with differences. The phoenix dropped the wand into my hand and flew up to land on my shoulder.

The wand was a darker colour than mine had been, and seemed to have a depth to the grain that I hadn't seen before, almost like the type of depth you see in metal that had been folded upon itself several times. It felt heavier as well. As the small phoenix rubbed itself against my ear, I felt the urge to clean the fireplace of the remaining ashes, as I thought 'evanesco' in my head, I could feel the spell happening even before I had cast it, so much different from last night when I had lit the fire wandlessly, this involved no effort at all on my part. I looked closely at the wand in my hand, it felt so much more mine than my previous one had; this wand was mine definitely. It almost felt like an extension of myself not like a tool the previous one had.

The phoenix gave a satisfied chirrup on my shoulder and leant against me and I could feel as it fell asleep again perched comfortably next to my ear. I glanced at the clock on the mantel again, it was just seven in the morning, I must have slept no more than 3 hours yet I felt strangely wide awake and energetic. I carefully got up, with the phoenix on my shoulder, not wanting to disturb it and made my way to the kitchen where I put the kettle on and proceed to start making some coffee and some porridge, enough for three.

I slowly crept through the lounge, not wanting to disturb Gabrielle and Elrond and made my way up the stairs to check on Henri, I checked and changed his diaper and carried him down the stairs with me, he must have slept through the night, the first time I think. I took a bottle from the fridge, warmed it with a spell and started to feed him as my own breakfast continued to cook.

As I made my way from the kitchen carrying a tray with three steaming bowls of porridge and a pot of coffee on a tray, placing it on the coffee table and gently nudging Gabrielle awake, the phoenix on my shoulder gave a contented trill and again rubbed itself against my ear, I could feel something rubbing against my back through my shirt, with a glance over my shoulder I noticed that now my companions tail feathers had grown whilst it slept, reaching past my shoulder blades.

Gabrielle stretched and stared at the phoenix on my shoulder. "What is your new pet?" my phoenix gave a slightly annoyed sounding trill at this. Gabrielle gave it an apologetic look and it gave a more positive trill in response. "Dudley, surely that's not a phoenix, I thought they were red and orange in colour, that's yellow and blue?" In response to this my phoenix grew warm by my ear and the next thing I knew, it was appearing in a flash of flame on the coffee table in front of Gabrielle, who gave a gasp. "I've never heard of a yellow and blue phoenix, it could be an entirely different species to the red and blue ones, or just a difference in colour, like we have different hair colours, but this is fascinating." The phoenix gave a pleased sounding trill and started to preen itself on the table, I swear it had a smug look on its face. "What's its name?"

I looked at the phoenix and back at Gabrielle, "I have no idea, if it has a name or if I can give it one, the only name for a phoenix I can remember hearing about was Professor Dumbledore's, I think it was called Fawkes, I assume after Guy Fawkes, of the gunpowder plot." The phoenix looked at me and quickly flew to my shoulder and rubbed itself against my ear, I could feel a sense of loss and wanting to belong, but the sense of belonging was different, as if the creature wanting to belong didn't know who it was. "I looked at the bird and asked, "do you want me to give you a name?" I felt intense happiness then and a sense of anticipation. I nodded to myself, now what do you call a phoenix?

"The normal names I have heard that wizards have named their phoenixes have always been associated with fire; feu, fuoco, tân, ignis, φωτιά, pyro, or something along those lines."

I like the idea of naming it something to do with fire, and the last name you mentioned give me an idea that will also show my muggle origins. I like the name St. john."

"Sinjohn, wherever did that come from, it's a little strange?"

"It's actually written as Saint John, the name comes from a muggle comic series I used to watch cartoons of on the television when I was younger. The character is a mutant, who has the ability to control fire, his mutant name is Pyro, but his real name is St. John Allerdyce, hence St. John."

I could feel the phoenix at my ear rubbing gently at me, I felt a sense of contemplation, I think if I could see and read its expression it would have been deep I thought. After a few seconds, it gave a happy trill in my ear and I felt a sense of happiness and true belonging. I looked at my shoulder, "do you like the name?" The sense of happiness I felt was almost overwhelming, as if I was on a high from something.

I looked to gabrielle and Elrond, "may I introduce me to my phoenix, St. John." Both of them looked extremely happy, as if they were on the same high I was.

Gabrielle recovered first, "pleased to meet you St. John, I hope we can be friends." I felt the phoenix give a positive response against my ear.

Elrond looked at the phoenix and gave a trill like whistle, and St john responded with a trill of its own. I looked at elrond in surprise, "you speak phoenix?"

"apparently, it just felt natural, the same way I could communicate with the tree last night. I wasn't even aware that I was doing it."

This day was full of surprises and it hadn't really started yet, what would be the response at work to my new familiar and what did it portend for my future. I could only wonder…

A/N Sorry this chapter has taken a while, I just don't feel comfortable writing for Hermione as a character, and then getting the phoenix birth sequence done took me ssome time. Anybody got any ideas what else is different about Dudley's wand, more in future chapters. Until then, please review and let me know what you think. Anybody recognise the languages?