Ron had not been back to the island of his birth in some time. There were a few chances here and there when he could find an excuse to report back, as there was an Order base in the old Longbottom Manor once again, though the Lady of the house was no longer there. Under Hermione's remorseless sabotage, the Ministry's encroachments had more or less fallen apart, and it was apparently a struggle just to run day-to-day operations; the rest of the island was enjoying an unheard of degree of autonomy. This time, though, the reason for his return was different, and as he headed to the courtroom, down the elevator from the atrium, where it always was he was confident that he at least, if not the whole organization, had been removed from every watchlist the current government had. Dolores Umbridge was presiding over the Kiss hearing for Evan Snape, probably having seniority over a fair few other employees and having gone even further beyond the demonstrated mental capacity that the Department had alleged in order to justify the use of Inferi as functionaries.

"Ronald Weasley, are you a witness for the defense or the court?"

There were murmurs all around, but he ignored them. This was where he was to make his decision, if he still wanted to back out, he supposed. With what was left of the Order, and what they were adding to it with the passing day, they were fighting against dark wizards and corrupt officials whose only hope was the return of Voldemort. It would be a shame if he left the proverbial front lines only to disappoint them.

"I'm here for the defense," he said. I'm going to start sounding like a broken record.

"Excellent. Sit over there, if you will."

The undead had lost none of her polity, none of her concern for decorum, and none of her stuffiness. He supposed none of those characteristics required a soul. In fact, her behavior even just during the start of the hearing was so familiar, he wondered if she had ever used her soul at all, or if the Unspeakables had selected her specifically because she would miss it the least. The court seemed to have gotten over the fact that both he and Malfoy were in the court at the same time. It was easy to pick him out from his long hair, as if he was trying to imitate his late father, though really it was more likely he just no longer cared to cut it.

The witnesses for the court were allowed to begin. Their stories did not really have to do with Evan himself, but more with the war in general, which had been Voldemort's fault. The concept of a horcrux had been revealed by the Order to the general public in a controversial move to stand by the truth in its account of what had happened, regardless of what people might research. Each witness seemed to want to avoid making eye contact with the accused, which was fine, since he was staring daggers at everyone. Witnesses were asked to make things brief if they would only repeat what they had heard before.

None of the words of condemnation seemed to have an effect on the self-proclaimed Heir. Perhaps he was thinking his best bet was to be like Umbridge, and learn to live without a soul. If that was the case, though, it was not going to make much of a difference. Without the soul fragment from the dark wizard who killed his parents, he was really just leftover resentment from Snape and a crash course in trying to make a name for yourself in Slytherin, or that was the way Ron understood it. If he had his own soul still, and it had not been entirely subsumed by the fragment, then it was a wonder what it was doing. He thought for a moment and then shook his head. For his faults, Evan was still someone who tried to do the right thing, some of the time, at least he had a concept of doing right by his own friends, enough to moralize with others about it.

The court took a brief break to accommodate the number of its own witnesses. There was truly no point in having so many of them, but it probably had a subjective effect on the Wizengamot, assuming they were as pointlessly focused on the wrong things as they were when he last left them. As soon as the recess was announced, the defendant had eyes only for him.

"What do you want?" he asked when the Order member came over. "What does your organization want?"

"There's a lot of things, but-"

"Is it the soul fragment?" he asked. "Do you want to know how to detect them in case he made another Horcrux?"

"No, we were always pretty sure he didn't," Ron said almost immediately. "It wouldn't make sense, and there's no evidence he ever did. We're starting to think that other people might, though, so I would think there's some legitimate academic interest in the fragment. That's not why I'm here, though. I just think you really should have gotten a reduced sentence for services to the... world. I don't think the Kiss is an appropriate punishment."

"Oh, do you imagine that I can be redeemed?"

"I'm not worried about it. Either you will be or whatever happens is up to you. How do you think I should speak on your behalf?"

"You don't have anything planned?"

"I thought I'd take your input into account. Why do you want to keep the soul?"

Evan seemed stuck, and not even with the wording of his defense, but whether or not he wanted to go on at all. It had to be hard living with the soul fragment, even if he might have been interested in using it for power a while back, because he had to feel defiled by it all. There was no one in the world who would consider it a net gain. Was it worth the long shot of having a soul without having an evil fragment attached to it? Did he even know what that was like, or did he only have an idea of what he thought it was like.

"I've been through something similar," Ron offered quietly after a moment. "I promise you, it's worth it. I don't exactly know how to explain this, but it's worth going from being like this to being whole."

"How would I ever expect the rest of the world to believe that I want that?"

"Well, that's better than not believing it yourself," he said after a moment. "Everyone wants it. Umbridge might not know what it's like, but I'm telling you right now, she isn't really in charge of anything."

"I thought Yaxley-"

"He's been dead for months, mate. I found him myself. The way I think it happened, he was getting stonewalled in the Ministry back home due to a combination of an old friend of mine sabotaging him, and there were former Death Eaters who had it good with some corrupt officials who wanted him to come out and support them. I think they realized both their operations were propped up by Voldemort, and with him out of the way, it was work together or get destroyed that much faster."

"Who controls this government then? Who controls Burbage?"

"Well, no one controls it all that well. It doesn't do much of anything. The Minister's finding that out, I think. I'm not really worried about that. I leave those sorts of problems for the rest of the organization. I think as long as you make a good appeal, you have a chance."

"Is there any chance of having the fragment removed from my soul, though?" Evan asked, suddenly straightening. It was as if he wanted to conceal ever having had hope that he would be healed. Ron had never particularly thought about it, but after dealing with dark wizards long enough, they ultimately worked in similar, predictable patterns depending on how far gone they were. They never seemed to have that much individuality or deliberation; it was all bloodlust and impulsive greed, or something along those lines. He might have hated them for it when he was afraid of them, but now it was more sad than anything else.

"Neville could do it."

"And he would go that far?" The disbelief was palpable, and easy to forgive.

"Sure. He's not going to be upset about anything, not if you're going a different way from now on. It doesn't matter what you've done so far." He thought for a moment. "Ultimately, I think wanting to be healed is a sign that you don't want to do it again. There wouldn't be any point if you did."

They said nothing else to each other that was not explicitly necessary; they were planning out everything they needed to establish whenever Evan spoke for himself. The central problem was that he had never spoken in his own defense before, except possibly in Slytherin debates, and the ethic there was more about making fun of the opponent, not trying to demonstrate that he was good, and certainly not innocent. It was going to be even harder to make a rehabilitation argument without Neville in the room with them, but if Hermione pulled the right strings ahead of time, they at least had a shot. Was it too much to expect him to just appear in the courtroom and cure the defendant? Maybe as long as we can do something, he'll let us do it rather than doing it himself. If we can't do something, then we're overestimating ourselves by not asking him to do it.

Ron decided to let the details of their new reality work themselves out while the self-proclaimed and now self-effacing Heir spoke in his own defense when asked if he served a certain dark wizard insurrectionist who was not to be named.

"I am essentially being put on trial for having a part of Voldemort in my soul and having had a piss-poor upbringing," he opened, perhaps suboptimally. "Any crimes I may have committed as a minor have nothing to do with the charge for which I was arrested, but I think we can all acknowledge that I am suspected of being a pawn of the Dark Lord when I was as young as twelve. We can all go ahead and stop pretending that's a large part of why I'm here. Nothing that I've done as an adult is anything other than an act of war, and I would like to submit that I fought on the right side of that war. I fought against the dark wizard who killed my parents, as challenging as that may be. Secondly, I would like to submit that he was not an insurrectionist, in no way did he ever go against our island home or its government. Soon enough it will come out that the previous Minister was long since killed and replaced by Corban Yaxley; I should know, as I was the one who-"

"Even if it were the intention of this court to sentence your soul to destruction solely because it is infected by a dark wizard, what would be the problem with that?" a prosecutor asked, interrupting him. It was either a miracle or Hermione's setting everything up that no one stopped Evan from talking before that. In Ron's experience, it was sometimes hard to tell.

"The problem with that is that Neville Longbottom can remove the soul fragment. Effectively, I'm being treated like a werewolf, when it's been shown that lycanthropy is treatable-"

"Yes, through the use of dark magic such as the Unbreakable-"

"I'm sure the Phoenix could fix it himself as well," the Heir said. "The point is that sending me to the dementors is not the only way of destroying the soul fragment."

"Why has he not already destroyed it?"

"I have not asked him."

There was a pause.

"Why have you not asked him?"

"Until someone came to me and said that he could remove the soul fragment from my soul, I had no reason to believe that it was possible."

"Who was that?"

"Ron Weasley."

He waved.

"How is it that he knows? Did he, as a personal friend of Longbottom, ask him precisely that?"

"I have no idea. During the last stages of the war, however, dark magic had corrupted his own soul, and more recently, he is cured of the corruption."

There was probably no point in calling for testimony from the witness himself, so he relaxed as he watched the proceedings. He's not exactly being respectful toward the court, but he's making his points at least. He suspected that was only possible as long as Umbridge was not calling him on anything he was saying, which seemed to be a shock for everyone else in the audience. Should I act shocked as well? No, it's probably too late for that.

It seemed that the court had decided to accept it as possible that Evan could have the fragment removed from his soul. What remained to be seen was whether or not he merited punishment after the fact. It was probably not a good idea to have used the werewolf argument, because it was already a proven fact that there were werewolves who had lived and died without ever harming anyone, except in self-defense or as an act of war. Remus Lupin had come to be a well-known example, after the Order started putting out sourced and well-researched histories of recent events. This meant that even if the defendant was the victim of a dark curse, he or she would still be held accountable for the charges.

Essentially, he continued to deny that he had ever once served Voldemort and instead worked against him in the only way he knew how, which was to be trained by him, though he later realized he was only being set up as an attack dog to be set on Longbottom. Because his master had some amount of respect for Dumbledore and his plans, it was really only one child of prophecy that had his interest; Evan was simply a part of his own machinations. For some reason, his old Transfiguration teacher had decided to hide one of the boys from him, and that reason was good enough to send the other to the same place, to look for him, if at all possible, though he suspected rebellion from the beginning.

"Excuse me, and this was your... rebellion against your master?" the prosecutor asked. Ron would have learned his name, only he was indifferent. "You copied everything your master did, you followed his every command, and you plotted to kill him, which he wanted you to do- I'm sorry, I'm lost here, Snape. How is this a rebellion? If it is your claim that the Order was the only force that opposed him, then why not join them? Why match wits with a dark wizard born in 1926? Why try to overpower him with his own techniques?"

"It was fate," he said after a moment when everyone stared at him, some glaring, others fighting down a derisive laugh. "I chose myself for a role that had to be fulfilled in some capacity. Only one of the children of prophecy would defeat the Dark Lord, and by going along with his plans, he ruled out any chance that I would be the one, and I believed that was the only advantage that one could possess against him. I had no knowledge of the incredible majesty of the Phoenix; it was a power that neither my master or I knew. I had hoped that in his incredible arrogance, he would one day overlook any chance that I would kill him, and I would suffer whatever horror and whatever transformation it took until then that day came."

The mood in the court almost entirely shifted. The officials maintained their decorum, but in the crowd of gawkers, there was a more appropriate expression. It seemed that everyone had realized the horribly unenviable position that Evan had lived and breathed for years. Ron frowned. In all the years he even knew who the Heir was, he had not seen him in such a light, and if everything he believed had been true, he might well have been the hero of a dreadful story, one that had choices in front of him that he did not want to make, and were not simply immoral and disgusting, the kinds of choices a villain or simply one with no character would have no trouble making.

With that, the tone in the trial seemed to have changed. He could not say if it was Hermione manipulating Umbridge again, having her manage the court proceedings in a blatantly unfair way, or if it was a real miracle, if Neville wanted to cure Evan so badly he was, perhaps without even thinking about it, paving the way for his acquittal and release. There were discussions of services to prove that the defendant was reformed after the removal of the soul fragment, and though he seemed to be gritting his teeth through it, he said he would be content to demonstrate to anyone who wanted to know, the power of the great Longbottom.

That was more or less enough for Ron, and it was doubtful that anyone would get onto him about leaving. He had someone else he wanted to see, directly, not through anyone else. Having been before, he had no trouble finding her office; she even had a sign on the door that warned of a horrible mess within. As he opened it, however, he saw that everything was in order.

"Ordinarily, that sign is enough of a deterrent for passers by to ignore me." She smiled without looking up. "Having seen your desk at school, though, I was aware that it would make no difference to you."

"What do you do if someone does walk in?" he asked, taking a seat.

"I remove the memories of this place from his or her head. I haven't ruled it out with you; I'm having a bit of a bad hair day."

"Thanks for making Umbridge so amusing in the trial today. We got Evan off, I reckon."

She seemed to consider it as if she had nothing to do with it.

"That's probably for the best. He will know, at the least, that he is in the debt of the Order, and he should be able to help us going forward."

"At some point I should prob'ly apologize for thinking of him as just like his father." He took a deep breath. "Snape was ultimately for the Order, wasn't he? I don't like that I don't know."

"If he was, he never received an order to do anything differently from what he was doing at the time," Hermione said. "Did you ever hear how he died?"

"No," he admitted. "That's most of them, though. It was the same with my brother. I never tried too hard to find out."

"I was the same way," she said after a moment. "It was especially true of our friends. I never wanted to learn how they ended up. Silently, I always hoped that they just disappeared and are sitting on a beach somewhere. I never cared what happened to our enemies."

"I've learned to care less," he said after a moment. "I used to think that there had to be a balancing of the scales, and it all fell on me. It's ultimately a comfort that Neville... the Phoenix... is always going to be there. That was strange at first."

"It was only because neither of us grew up knowing about all this," she explained, with her usual expression. It was strange how little had changed, but they had not had the most normal of formative years. "We hardly ever thought to ask Professor Dumbledore why exactly he ran the school the way he did, or what system of ethics he was using."

"I thought of something a while back. Are you going to tell your parents?"

"I haven't decided. There's a chance that they already know," she said, smiling now. "I have a confession of my own. I never thought I would believe in Divination, but in my defense, Professor Trelawney did not exactly-"

He started laughing.

"Excuse me?"

"Imagine if you never met the rest of us and you never learned how to break rules or go against a teacher, and then you had to take her class."

"I suppose I would have thrown myself off the Astronomy Tower, what of it? Do you want to thank the train for the trillionth time for bringing us together?"

She had a way of amusing him even when she acted like she was completely unfazed. His smile faded a little. There was still so much work to do.

Next time.