A/N: Well, yet another chapter here. It almost wasn't posted today - I have a very important exam tomorrow. The last one! Hopefully, I'll be off to grad school afterwards!
It was fully dark when Sirius and Mia apparated right in front of their home followed by Remus and Tonks, several hours having passed since Bill and Fleur's wedding had been ruined by the Death Eater's sudden appearance.
Everyone was rather numb, unsure of where to go from there, now that the ministry had been taken over by the dark side of that war. And with the Weasleys being among the most shaken up of all, having had their home invaded, every member of the Order reached the silent agreement that they'd leave any joint-efforts for some sort of resistance planning for another day.
Still, though, any prospect of just returning home and pretending for one night everything was fine was unrealistic. Everything was changing and they were all lucky they'd been allowed to go back home that night at all. If everyone had already been in constant danger before, it had only gotten worse now that Death Eaters had free reign over Wizarding Britain. The need to discuss the events that had taken place in the past few hours and maybe figure something out of all the question marks filling their head was just too much – and clearly Sirius and Mia weren't the only ones feeling that way since, when they had suggested Remus and Tonks came over so they could try and figure some of it out, they hadn't wasted a second before agreeing with them.
"Home sweet home," Sirius mumbled under his breath as door opened after he'd tapped his wand on the lock. The house was awfully quiet and dark but not in a bad way – for some reason, that was actually a relief for them after the insane mess they'd just been put through at the Burrow.
The four of them stepped in in a hurry, wanting to shield themselves behind the thick wall of wards that the house offered, and Remus, as the last one to enter, closed the door firmly behind them.
Before any of them could even utter a word, though, Lulu came hurrying from the stairwell leading down from the basement kitchen, a very unusual look of anxiety on her face. "Oh, finally," she said as she started to make her way to them, Gabe quickly joining her. "Are you alright? Are you hurt?"
Mia shook her head. Lulu wasn't like her when it came to worrying – it took a lot to get her mother in that state, she knew. "We're just fine, Lu," Mia assured her. "Exhausted in many ways but fine."
Lulu sighed in relief. "Well, what's going on, then? Izzy showed up hours ago saying the ministry had been taken over and that there were Death Eaters at the Burrow. Gabe tried to go there but couldn't get anywhere near…"
The older man nodded. "They were just starting to put up a massive wall of wards. A minute earlier and maybe I'd have manager to infiltrate…"
Mia shook her head. "It wouldn't have made any difference, Gabe. You were better off outside."
"What do you mean? You can always use one more in a battle."
Sirius huffed as he hung his coat. "You'd have an excellent point there if the battle had lasted more than five minutes."
"What?" Lulu asked in confusion.
"We had to stand down," Tonks provided, her hair now showing a dull brown tone instead of the vibrant auburn one she'd worn at the wedding. "Didn't stand a chance, numbers-wise. Or in any other way, for that matter, given their current position," she declared with a stressed sigh as Remus, trying to offer his wife some comfort, placed an arm around her waist. "They took the ministry and got the upper hand. And Mad-Eye…" She pursed her lips together and her face visibly paled, unable to cope with her former mentor's fate.
Her husband cleared his throat. "Why don't we head upstairs, Dora? Maybe we can hear some news on the radio… find out what's happening out there," he said, mostly just looking to get a few moments alone with her.
Sirius nodded from where he stood. "Yeah, you two go along and make yourselves at home. We'll meet you there in a few minutes," he urged them.
Giving his friend a short thankful nod in return, Remus gathered his wife and guided her towards the stairs so they could walk up to the first floor together as they spoke in hushed tones.
Alone with her husband and parents seconds later, Mia sighed and turned to face her mother, who still looked uncharacteristically tense. "Where's Izzy now?"
"Downstairs in the kitchen," the older woman replied. "She fell asleep waiting for you by the fireplace. That is, after she nearly dug a hole on the floor with all the pacing she did while waiting. A kid her age has no business worrying herself into exhaustion." She didn't say that in an accusation fashion but instead like she was just stating a fact. A fact that showed just how wrong a state their world had gotten itself into.
Sirius pursed his lips together in a frustrated fashion. At least, he thought, his daughter hadn't been in the Burrow at the Death Eater's mercy as he and Mia had… That alone would have been enough to get him to do something stupid like plotting some sort of poorly planned escape that definitely wouldn't have led anywhere good. "We couldn't get away until now. We figured you'd have closed the floo connections, anyway," Sirius stated.
"We did for any incomer but you two," Gabriel replied. "Just in case you needed to use it."
"But how did you escape from there, anyway? Tonks said you had to stand down," Lulu stated. "Seems unlikely that they'd just let you go…"
"Well, believe it or not, they did," Mia responded.
At her parent's incredulous looks, she and Sirius proceeded to give them a short account of what had happened at the wedding after the two of them had left, starting with the moment when Kingsley Shacklebolt's patronus and ending with Death Eaters's exit, led by Snape. By the end of it, it was clear Lulu and Gabe found the Death Eater's behaviour just as odd as everyone who'd witnessed it first-hand had.
It was only when they heard the old clock in the library announcing it was midnight that they realized how late it was and, despite their insistence for Lulu and Gabe to stay the night just in case, the older pair quickly made up their minds to go back to their own flat, with Lulu, back to her own no-nonsense ways, pointing out that, unless a battle was taking place in the middle of their living room, she and Gabe would be just fine on their own.
"She's as stubborn as a mule. They'd be safer with us!" Mia said with a huff, just after her parents apparated together from the house's front steps. "I know they have good wards at their place but…"
"The Burrow's wards were broken today," Sirius finished for her.
Mia nodded. "Do you think we're safe here? I knew they don't seem to be out to get us for now but if they change their minds…"
Sirius sighed. "Look, as much as I hate even the memory of my father, I have to admit that, thanks to him our wards are probably the strongest in the country after Hogwarts'. I'm pretty sure he was paranoid enough to have made sure the wards would have protected him even against his own side's precious dark magic if they ever turned on him. I'm sure we'll be fine, love."
Her husband's words relieved her a bit and she deeply hoped he was right about what he'd said. Now that Death Eaters were free to use their dark magic without having to worry about answering to anyone, only Merlin knew how far their ability to break so many families' protection could go…
Recalling their daughter's whereabouts, the pair made their way downstairs to the kitchen, where they quickly spotted Izzy, snoozing clad in pyjamas on one of the armchairs by the fireplace, her neck bent in an awkward position that was bound to cause her trouble in the morning.
"You think we should wake her?" Mia asked.
Sirius shook his head. "Let her sleep. I'll carry her upstairs," he said, quietly approaching his oldest daughter's sleeping form.
"But your shoulder…" Mia said, reminding him of his little flight against a kitchen cupboard at the Burrow little more than an hour before, courtesy of Snape, to his own annoyance.
"Barely feel it now, love," he said, moving it to prove his point, yet noting it felt more than a bit stiff, which he promptly ignored as he picked his daughter up from the armchair.
Just as she felt herself being carried, a half-asleep Izzy mumbled a few words of protest under her breath. "No. I want to wait for them," she said.
"We're already here, Izzybel," her father replied. "Go back to sleep."
Doubtful at first, she hazily opened her eyes and let out a relieved breath when she realized her father was the one carrying her, promptly letting her head fall against her father's shoulder and obliging by going back to sleep.
By the time Sirius reached Izzy's room little more than a minute later, his shoulder stung, protesting the effort of carrying his daughter's weight, yet he made an effort to hide it in order to avoid a well-deserved 'I told you so' lecture by his wife.
"Is the shoulder okay?" Mia asked, noting the tense look on his face after he'd placed their daughter on her bed and pressed a soft kiss to her forehead.
"Hum-hum," he replied, nodding stiffly. "I'll just go upstairs and check on Alex and Mary." Maybe find some bruise cream for the damn shoulder too, he thought to himself.
Shaking her head as she watched her husband walk away, she allowed herself to give him the satisfaction of pretending she believed checking on their kids was all he was going to do. No doubt his pride was bound to ache more than his shoulder, simply at the thought of having let Snape, or all people, wound him, Mia thought, making her way to Izzy's bed in order to pull the covers over her.
Izzy immediately stirred, though, hesitatingly opening her eyes and shielding them with one arm against the light coming from her bedside lamp.
"Mum? What it time is it?" she asked, yawning tiredly as she shifted her position, plopping herself against a few pillows.
"Far past your bed-time, young lady," Mia replied simply.
Izzy gave her an annoyed look. "I'm not a little kid anymore, Mum."
"No, but it doesn't mean your body doesn't require a decent night of sleep," her mother said in return. "It's past midnight, honey."
Oh her spot, Izzy sighed and looked around for a moment. "Where's Daddy? He was here just a while ago, wasn't he?"
Mia nodded. "He went upstairs to check on your brother and sister. Probably to nurse his wounded pride too…"
"Hum?"
"Long story, sweetheart," she said.
"Oh, okay…" Izzy said, rubbing her eyes. "Did everyone make it okay tonight?" she hesitantly asked, hoping not to get bad news as an answer.
Mia let out a tired breath before sitting on the edge of her daughter's bed. Now more than ever, 'okay' was a relative notion. "Everyone is fine, honey," she informed her daughter
Izzy eyes her mother suspiciously. "Are you sure?" she asked.
Her mother nodded. "Yes. No one got very hurt. A few minor curses. Some cuts and bruises… nothing that can't be solved."
"So everyone is okay?" she asked one more time.
Mia raised an eyebrow at her daughter's insistence, guessing there might be more to it than the question itself transmitted. "Are you asking about someone in specific?"
"No!" she replied, all too quickly, immediately looking away from her mother.
"Izzy," Mia pressed, reading right through her. "If it's about Ginny or Luna or any of our friends, they all seemed okay too. Scared but okay. Mostly everyone is: Remus and Tonks, the Weasleys…"
That caught the younger girl's attention, making her look back at her mother, though forcing herself to do it showing as little eagerness as possible. "So… I take it George made it back just fine."
Mia raised an eyebrow softly. "Yes, he did," she answered slowly. George, she thought, slightly intrigued. Something in the way her daughter had asked about him, so forcefully casual, fully reminded her of her teenage self, struggling with accepting her feelings for a certain boy with her daughter's eyes. "You know, it was a very… noble of him to get you to safety before anyone else, Izzy."
Izzy felt her cheeks redden at that and looked at away again. She was still annoyed at George and yet, there she was, being all girly about him 'saving her'. Like she couldn't have handled herself through a battle. "Funny, I seem to see classify entirely differently in my mind…"
Her mother sighed. "Yes, he shared that with us. He also asked me and your father to tell you that you can be angry all you want because he's not sorry."
Izzy sighed and sunk down to a more horizontal position, arms crossed in a pouty-like fashion. "He really is an idiot," she mumbled, rolling onto her side, facing away from her mother, whose look was too knowing for her taste.
Mia smiled a little as she pulled the covers over her daughter. "They always are," she said, softly caressing Izzy's long dark hair and allowing herself to think that everything was normal for a moment. To think that she was just a mother talking to her daughter about boys… that she didn't have another child out there on the run, but instead pretending to sleep in his bed as any seventeen-year-old boy should in a regular Summer night.
"Mum?" Izzy said again, turning back to her after a few seconds. "Was it really bad out there? Why did it take you so long to come back?"
Mia sighed, quickly decided that was not the time to inform Izzy of the whole ordeal at the Burrow. Instead, she gave her a short, softer version of it. "It could have been worse, honey. We'll talk about it in the morning. Now go to sleep. You can see you're tired."
She was, Izzy thought, so she didn't really bother to protest. Her parents were okay and her friends too… she could live with just knowing that for now. "He's probably okay, you know? Harry. I saw Hermione apparating away and bringing him and Ron along. The three of them are together, so they're gonna be fine… they always are."
Mia gave her a little smile. "I hope so," she replied before leaning down and kissing her daughter's forehead. "We'll talk in the morning, honey. Good night."
"'Night, Mum," Izzy said in reply.
And, with that, Mia turned off the bedside light and got up, only looking back once before walking out just as her husband was already making his way down the stairs. "Everything okay upstairs?" she asked.
Sirius nodded, much more comfortable now that he's managed to at least partially heal his own shoulder before having checked on his youngest children. "The little ones are out like lights," he replied. "The wedding seems to have drained them both. What about in here?" he asked, nodding at Izzy's room.
"She woke up. We just talked a little," Mia said, taking a deep breath as her eyes landed on the door leading to Harry's room. It was the oddest feeling – somehow she'd imagined it would be harder, letting him go, but, between the ministry getting taken over and the Burrow being invaded, she'd realized he was better off staying underground than staying with them. As much as she already missed him, his safety spoke louder. "Where do you think he is?"
Sirius shook his head. "I don't know. I don't want to know in case those bastards find it fitting to question us again. Today was too close, Mia. Too damn close."
"You don't think I know that?" she replied, huffing. "I almost blew everything. From answering that question truthfully to revealing Harry knew about the Horcruxes… it was just a little leap. I could see myself ruining Harry's chances right then and there."
"Well, you didn't. You held yourself over there and managed to lie against all the odds," he said, wrapping one arm around her waist as they started making their way down to the floor below in order to join their friends. "If being determined to protect Harry and his mission had anything to do with that… well, not even I would have done any better – no one would."
With that reassurance in their minds, the two of them resumes making their way down the stairs. When they entered the living room, they found Remus and Tonks sitting by the table where the radio rested, the first patting it repeatedly with his wand as he tried to try and find a working station in one of the magically controlled frequencies, yet only getting alternated sounds of silence and static out of the device.
"Anything?" Sirius asked as they joined them.
Remus shook his head. "Only Muggle stations," he told them, putting his wand away as he gave up on finding any news about what was happening to their world. "Ours seem to have gone completely silent."
"And I don't think this time the saying that 'no news are good news' applies," Tonks added with a weak sigh while absently stroking her belly with the thumb of the hand resting on it, as if she was trying to seethe the child inside, still far too small to know what was going on outside. "Odds are the Death Eaters have already taken over the stations and are using that to keep the news of the takeover from spreading and buy themselves some time to set their game up."
"It seemed pretty set up to me at the Burrow, if you asked me," Sirius commented dryly, taking a seat at the sofa, followed by his wife. "Bloody bastards might as well have captured us all."
"Sirius!" Mia scolded. "We're lucky they let us go!"
"I know we are, love. I'm just saying that it would have been less confusing if they hadn't. When bad guys don't stick to only doing bad things, it usually means they're up to something," he explained.
"Sirius has a point there," Tonks agreed. "They wouldn't have let us go if they didn't expect to get something out of it – I mean, they could have very easily taken a number of people at the wedding hostage to lure Harry back, yet they didn't. I'm not sure what they're planning… maybe they just trying to trick us into giving their rule a chance although that's unlikely… The point is that they're being unpredictable and that's not good for us."
Remus nodded in agreement. "Still, we can be sure of something: catching Harry is still their number-one priority, now that they have the ministry. They were clearly expecting to find him at the wedding. Thankfully, when they shattered the wards, they also gave him the quickest possible way out through apparition. I imagine that's how he managed to escape," he concluded.
"Yes, Izzy just told me she saw Hermione side-along apparating him and Ron out of there," Mia offered.
"Hum, so by going after him, they provided Harry with a quick way out," Sirius said. "Good. That's got to sting for them."
"Yes. But it was also a risk they had to take," Tonks pointed out. "I mean, no one was going to just let them walk through the wards as guests. Not even under disguise – the Weasleys were very cautious, despite everything, using every way from wand-inspection to passwords to confirm people's identities. Their only way in was by breaking the wards. Badly. I can only imagine the amount of Dark Magic they must've used to do it."
"Yeah, well, I don't imagine they were at all bothered by that since apparently now they have no one to answer to but their lovely Master who's admittedly the dark arts' number one fan," Sirius replied bitterly. "I can't even begin to imagine how badly they'll turn the wizarding world upside down now that they're in power."
"Yes, no doubt in the morning there will be a pile of new laws being applied," Remus agreed. "And no doubt they won't benefit any of us even slightly."
"Hopefully people won't settle for it since Bones is still out there. For all intents and purposes, she's still the real minister," Mia pointed out.
The werewolf sighed. "Maybe… But it's clear they will paint her as an enemy. Plus, people will be scared. We all heard Snape's speech – resistance is not tolerated. Many won't even consider risking it just to protect themselves and their families. Not until the Death Eater's rulling gets to a point when it's too oppressive to ignore. And it will, sooner or later."
"So, basically, now we have two big things to worry about: whatever the hell the Death Eaters decide to do while they're in power and Harry being on the run. And let's not forget whatever else comes up because it always done," Sirius concluded. "Things are just building up to become a toxic mess of huge proportions."
"You can say that again," Tonks agreed, getting up from the chair she was sitting on, which was becoming painfully uncomfortable to her beyond tired body, and occupying an empty armchair by her husband's other side. No doubt in the morning the baby would take its revenge on her for driving herself to near-exhaustion by sending a boatload of morning sickness her way. "Anyway," she said, changing the subject, "you never got to sharing what had happened when Snape questioned you. You mentioned Veritaserum… did he use it on both of you? And did he manage to get anything out of you?"
Sirius and Mia's eyes met for a moment before the latter answered for both of them. The thought of how close she'd been to messing it all up for Harry, no matter how much Sirius assured her it wasn't her fault, still made Mia's whole body chill. "He only questioned me. I offered, actually, since Snape and Sirius were too busy knocking heads together like two little kids over the veritaserum and it was clear Snape would never let us go before he got to question one of us at least," she said, turning to glare at her husband for a moment.
"Look, I'm sorry, Mia. I guess I went a bit too far but that bastard deserved every verbal blow he got," Sirius said. "He killed Dumbledore. He's after Harry, for Merlin's sake."
"No one's questioning that," Mia said, admitting to herself that, had she known at the start of the questioning how far Snape was out to get Harry, she might have been the one pushing too far before the questioning instead of afterwards. "Anyway, I…I suppose it didn't go as badly as it could have…We didn't really give Snape anything that could help them finding Harry – he was careful enough not to tell us where he was planning to go in case something like this happened. Still, there was a moment there… he asked me a question that I knew the answer for but… look, I'd tell you what it was about but we promised Harry…"
Remus immediately shook his head in understanding. "I think this afternoon had already proven that there are some things we'd better not know about."
Tonks nodded in agreement. "Just go on, Mia."
Relieved they understood her point, she did so. "Well, Snape asked a question that I knew the answer to but I couldn't give it to him because it would harm Harry. So, when I was supposed to answer, I… I lied."
Remus and Tonks just stared at her for several second. "Lied, lied or… somehow misled him while still telling the truth?" Tonks asked just to be sure.
"Lied, lied," Mia confirmed. "As in denying knowing something when I actually did know it. Just like that."
"That… that's not possible. Not under veritaserum," Remus stammered. "It defeats the whole point of the potion. I mean, there are brews that can counter the effects but I highly doubt you had any of these lying around."
"She didn't," Sirius confirmed. "She just lied. I heard it with my own ears. It was unbelievable." He turned to Tonks, then. "You deal with Veritaserum a lot at the Auror office, don't you? Did any of this ever happen to you?"
Tonks shook her head. "Not really. Just flatly lying without a counter-potion… I never heard of it. But I suppose, in theory, it's not completely impossible. Not if the Veritaserum had been brewed incorrectly – it's a very temperamental potion when it comes to brewing. Its effects could be severely compromised just by stirring it the wrong way once or throwing in an ingredient out of the established order. That's why it always needs to be tested before used. Just a couple of days ago we got a new batch of Veritaserum at the office and had to try it before approving it for official…"
"Wait, you went around testing an unapproved potion while pregnant?" Remus asked her in alarm.
"What? No. Do you think I'm mad?" she said, instinctively bracing her arms around her still very flat stomach. "I never said I tested it. The usual procedure is that we write our names on a piece of parchment, throw them into a box and leave it up to luck. Yet," she added when she saw her husband, once again, giving her a panicked look, "no one ever writes their own names in. We all have a silent agreement to always write Dawlish and Savage's because they're idiots. Oh, the amount of things I could tell you about them…"
Remus raised his eyebrows. "And Kingsley just lets you get away with that?"
She shrugged. "Just as long as his name doesn't come out, he pretends he doesn't even know it," she said. "But, anyway, Veritaserum is a tricky potion to brew. True, Snape is an excellent potion-maker but I suppose even he could make a mistake, especially when he's too busy sucking up to his precious master to properly measure his ingredients or whatever else he messed up."
"It did taste a bit… watery," Mia admitted.
"Well, there you go," Tonks said. "The potion probably wasn't strong enough to completely block your mind from lying."
"So, all in all, we owe it to Snape's sloppily brewed potion that Mia managed to lie," Sirius concluded, sounding slightly disgusted. "I'm not sure I like that…"
"Regardless, you should be thankful for your luck," Remus point out. "Getting a dose of badly brewed Veritaserum from a Potion Master is highly unlikely. Everyone can make mistakes but still… the odds had to be very low."
Tonks raised an eyebrow, recognising her husband had a point there. "You don't think he did it on purpose, do you? For some twisted leftover sense of loyalty or something…"
Sirius gave her an incredulous look. "You're joking, right? He hates Harry's guts, Tonks. And he's proven which side he's on by killing Dumbledore. I can't think of any reason why he'd even consider helping us."
Mia sighed. "Sirius has a point there. Severus had lost every sense of loyalty he could have possibly harboured for our side. He's even letting Harry be implicated for Dumbledore's Death, for Merlin's sake! That's beyond forgiveness. As much as I'd like to believe there had to be some good in him for Lily to ever consider him a friend, I just can't anymore."
"Wait, Lily Potter was friends with Snape?" Tonks asked in confusion.
"Practically a lifetime ago," Remus simply replied. "They had a falling out in our fifth year – never made up again after it… it was a sore subject for Lily afterwards."
"Hum… never would've…"
Before she could finish her sentence, though, Tonks was interrupted by a sudden sound of frantic banging on the front door of the house, which had them all jumping to their feet in alarm.
"Are you expecting someone?" Remus asked, already reaching for his wand cautiously.
"Guests at bloody midnight, Moony?" Sirius replied, equally alarmed.
Mia gulped. "You don't think it could be Dea…?"
"Death Eaters don't usually knock, love," her husband replied.
"They do when the front door is the only way in," Tonks pointed out, already stepping into auror mode. "Maybe we should stay here. I'll go check."
Remus raised an eyebrow. "How about I go instead? In your state you shouldn't…" He stopped talking, though, when he saw his wife drilling a hole between his eyes with her glare.
"Excuse me?" she asked in outrage before pointing at herself. "Me – trained auror," she declared, promptly pointing at Remus afterwards. "You – joke-shop manager slash accountant slash part-time babysitter for the twins. How does that make you more qualified than me to go down there and make a recon?"
"You're forgetting the former DADA teacher slash member of the Order part in what comes to me and the pregnant part in what comes to you," Remus added as there was another bang on the door.
"Oh, I'll give you the pregnant part…"
"Dear Merlin, you're like ten-year-olds fighting over a broomstick!" Sirius impatiently said. "My place, so I'm going. Feel free to follow if you'd like, as long as you get it together." And, with that, he promptly exited the room, making his way down the stairs while mumbling something under his breath about people saying he was the one always acting like a big kid as Mia and, seconds later, Remus and Tonks joined him.
The banging got louder and louder as they approached the door and actually seemed to grow frantic. It didn't cease until Sirius approached it enough to ask who it was.
"It's Kingsley Shacklebolt," the person on the other side replied.
Puzzled, Sirius turned around to face the rest of them just to see they looked equally confused, Tonks quickly stepping ahead of everyone.
"What on Earth would he be doing here?" she asked, surprised at her boss' alleged presence.
"No idea," Sirius replied. "You ought to as him not me," he said, nodding at the door.
And so she did, stepping closer to the door and clearing her throat. "Kingsley?"
"Tonks?" he replied in recognition. "What are you doing in there?"
"I should be the one asking you that," she replied, rolling her eyes. "Is it really you?"
"Is it really…What sort of question is that! Don't tell me you're going to make me review identity-verification procedures with you through a door, Tonks! Get it done!"
"Fine! Let me think… What did you tell me at the end of the first day you spent as my trainer?"
There was a moment of silence on the other side of the door as the man seemed to be thinking. "That you'd either end up blowing yourself to pieces because of your clumsiness or become one hell of an auror despite it."
"You never did give me a follow-up to that statement," she replied.
There was a moment of silence. "It's still to be seen but so far you haven't blown yourself up, have you?"
On their side of the door, Tonks had to roll her eyes before she gave Sirius a nod saying it was okay to open the door. Holding his wand out just in case there was some nasty surprise outside with Kingsley, Sirius reached for the doorknob and pulled the door open, allowing the large, dark-skinned man to step into the house, quickly closing the door behind him.
"I'm afraid I need to take Potter," the man announced, quickly skipping the greetings before any of the others could say anything. "He needs to be placed in a safe-house and remain in hiding for the time being."
"Kingsley…" Mia started, being unable to finish as the man interrupted.
"I know it's not a pleasant arrangement, Mia, but things are too unstable now for Potter to completely rely on your protection alone. You-Know-Who and his people are clearly out to get him now more than ever," the head-auror explained. "So, where is he?"
"Harry is not here, Kingsley," Remus supplied for them all.
Kingsley frowned. "What do you mean he's 'not here'? Didn't you get my warning before the Death Eaters came? Did he get captured? Do they have him now?"
Mia shook her head. "No. It's none of that. He just… Harry left."
"You mean he ran? From the Burrow, that is, to escape the Death Eaters?"
"Yes… and no," Sirius told him. "It's hard to explain… let's just say him leaving isn't exactly news for Mia and I, although we didn't exactly plan for it to happen mid-invasion. The point is that he's gone now and he managed to escape those creeps, Kingsley. And, before you ask, no, we don't know where he went."
"Merlin…" the auror mumbled. "So this was planned?" he asked, receiving a nod in return from Mia. "What is he doing out there?"
"We can't tell you that," Sirius replied. "It's not that we don't trust you, it's just… we made a promise. The most we can tell you is that he's on a mission."
"A mission?" the man asked in return. "From Dumbledore?"
"A mission," Mia simply said.
And, following, that, came a long moment of silence, during which all of them mused about Harry's mission, some knowing more about it than others. It was only when Tonks cleared her throat that the silence was broken
"What exactly happened at the ministry?" she suddenly asked her boss. "In your message you said it had been taken over, that Mad-Eye had… There's just no way, right? It's Mad-Eye. Faking his death would be like taking breakfast for him. He once called it the ultimate way of going underground…"
The look Kingsley gave her after that said everything and Tonks suddenly went very pale. "I'm sorry. I saw them hauling off his body… maybe trying to cover it up. They definitely didn't want anyone to see it. But I could tell… he was gone."
"How?" Remus asked, taking a step forward and wrapping an arm around his wife's speechless form.
"He was personally protecting Bones's office – we found a cursed object in her mail last night. It had already passed through most of the security checks so we figured it was an inside job and Moody thought they might so straight to her office and mine it with curses when they figured the package hadn't reached its destination. But then the Death Eaters came and took the place over awfully fast – they had much more people under the Imperius curse than I'd initially thought… they even got to Proudfoot. In my own department, for Merlin's sake."
Tonks gave him a disbelieving look. "You're kidding. You checked us all over for mind-control yesterday!"
"I did," Kingsley confirmed. "It appears they got to a lot of people last night. Anyway, after they had most of the building under their control, they went to Bones' office probably trying to find her there but instead they found Mad-Eye. Word around was that he'd given them quite the fight before they…" He paused and gulped, unable to say it because it sounded so unreal. "From what I heard, he cursed the hell out of Rookwood, cracked a bunch of Bellatrix's ribs… pretty much left Nott eating from a straw for the rest of his miserable life if he makes it out alive. One of the Rosier brothers wasn't so lucky to survive."
They all went silent for a moment after Kingsley's description. Mad-Eye, of all people, gone. The bloke who'd lost more body parts than any of them could guess cheating death.
"He went fighting like he'd have wanted to," Sirius sombrely said, breaking the silence.
"And took at least two of commission," Tonks said, trying to wipe the wetness from her eyes before tears could start running freely. "The old idiot would have found it a victory, believe it or not," she declared, already sniffing. "Bugger, he'd never let me hear the end of it saw me crying for him. Can't seem to help it these days."
Sighing, Remus wrapped one arm around her and she buried her face on his chest, silently weeping for her late mentor's end as her husband just rubbed her back.
"Well, not sure if you heard but at least Bones managed to escape," Sirius declared.
Kingsley nodded. "I know – Dedalus Diggle contacted me after he placed her at a safe-house. From what I heard, she's already trying to figure out a way to get through to her international contacts and ask for their support. Some had already offered asylum if it turns out to be necessary but that's as far as they're willing to go…"
Mia nodded. "Last time around, they also hesitated in intervening in the war. They were afraid Vol…"
"Don't say his name!" Kingsley shouted before she could finish.
Sirius gave him an odd look. "Oh, for Merlin's sake, what's the point on fearing the name at this point?"
"It's not that, Sirius! They've made his name a taboo," Kingsley explained.
Tonks immediately pulled away from her husband and stared at her boss. "What? That's insane. Taboos haven't been used since the Middle Ages."
"Apparently now they decided to bring them back," the man replied.
"Wait. What exactly is a taboo? In that sense of the word, that is," Mia inquired in confusion.
"It's a spell – a very dark spell," Tonks explained. "It has been banished for centuries – barely known around civilians these days. Rumour said the Department of Mysteries had even found a way to completely eradicate it but apparently they were wrong… Basically, the spell jinxes a word and whenever somebody uses it, it sets off a series of alarms."
"Like the trace does when underage magic is used," Remus concluded.
"Only it's worse," Kingsley explained. "It gives away the speaker's location, destroys any wards protecting them… basically, it leaves them completely unprotected and ready to be captured. It's extremely dangerous. It's safe to guess that everyone captured over activating the taboo won't be judged in a valid court…"
"But why Vol… the V-word?" Sirius asked, barely stopping himself in time. He really needed to get a hang of his tongue or else he could cause a tragedy.
"Because anyone with the guts to say it has enough to potential to become a threat against their regime. Basically only us in the Order use it," Tonks said before looking back at Kingsley. "Are you sure it really is a taboo?"
Kingsley nodded. "Sturgis Podmore managed to spy on the Death Eaters from under an Invisibility Cloak Mad-Eye had loaned him – he heard them mentioning it. They said someone on Tottenham Court Road had activated the taboo by uttering their master's name. I have no idea who – by the time they were allowed us to go home, no one had been captured, so I guess, whoever it was, escaped. We're already spreading the word about the taboo but people are bound to slip sooner or later."
"Is there any way to shield us from it?" Sirius asked.
"Only one as far as I know," Kingsley said. "The Fidelius Charm. The taboo may still give away your location but the charm will keep anyone from actually finding it and will probably keep the wards under wraps. It's a very extreme measure, though. You'll want to think twice before using it because, I'm not sure if you realize it, but it would basically lock Harry out unless you have any way of letting him know about the secret."
He had a point there, Sirius thought. The Fidelius charm would leave them completely protected but, at the same, it would put a wall between that house and Harry if he needed to come back sometime before the end of his quest. True, if the kid was smart, he'd stay away from the house just for the sake of being underground but still, there was no guarantee he wouldn't need their help one of these days…
"Maybe we can find a way around the taboo," Tonks suggested. "Some sort of selective silencing charm or object… like profanity blocks. Mum threatened me with those a lot… I'm pretty sure it was something she just made up to scare me but the idea is basically that."
"It does sound like something worth trying," Remus agreed. "In fact, it actually sounds like something the twins would be interested in creating… maybe I could mention it to them…"
"I guess we'll just have to hold our tongues for now," Sirius said. "But if we don't find anything else… Let's be honest – the baddies are bound to come for us sooner or later. Eventually they'll get tired of chasing after Harry and will want to use us as bait, so sooner or later we'll need to hide behind a foolproof barrier of wards. Sooner or later we'll need the Fidelius charm. Not just us – everyone intending to fight back."
"Yes, Sirius has a point," Kingsley agreed. "The Death Eaters won't always keep their game clean – or as clean as they're keeping it for now. We have to be prepared to go underground too at some point. They have the upper hand now – the game has changed."
"So, what do we do until then?" Mia asked, uncertain of their path through that new reality that the ministry's takeover had created. "Wait and see?"
"No. We hold out end of the fight for Harry," Sirius replied.
Kingsley nodded. "Yes. Because if Dumbledore meant what I thought he meant when he called Harry out best, all our fates are in his hands from now on."
A/N2: Well, I hope you liked this one :D Feedback is welcome! Review!