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The borough of Halton in Cheshire, a home south of Halton Castle just off the Northway, lunchtime…
"Is this true, Lisa? You're not trying to pull an old man's leg, are you?!"
A light smile crossed the face of the beautiful blonde woman with the dark blue-grey eyes as she gazed on her elderly host. "It's true, Ryan," Lisa Turpin stated, her voice strongly flecked with the Lowlands accent she had been born with. "The Schwarze Mädchen are all alive. Somehow — according to Luna Lovegood, Freiherr von Taserich might have been involved in this — their spirits were preserved from Death's embrace at the Battle of the Gates of Nurmengard and they were all reborn as Avalonians. However, due to some complication with the gestation chambers, they've been trapped in suspended animation since that fight. They were only just discovered this morning thanks in part to the Immortals; they gathered there today to pay tribute to their friends who died at the Battle of the Gates."
Hearing that, the aged wizard — in physical looks, Pierus Collins always reminded Lisa of the late American actor Jack Palance as he appeared in films like Batman and City Slickers — blinked before he slowly lowered himself into the lounger in the middle of his reading room. The Collins home — which was quite modern as wizarding homes came; Lisa had learned everything about her host after she had joined the Department of Mysteries in the wake of her graduating from Ravenclaw in 1998 with top NEWTs in charms and transfiguration, which she later expanded on to gain masteries in spell-crafting — was virtually no different than the other homes located around the sandstone hill where the normal Barons of Halton had maintained their keep until the Fifteenth Century.
Unlike other pureblood wizarding clans, the Collinses of Halton had never really lost touch with their non-magical neighbours and had, for the most part, maintained strong links with the normal world. Such relations had prompted the patriarch of the clan to make sure that everything close to him was shielded when Voldemort had begun to rampage across Britain in the 1970s; Pierus — who had been three years ahead of Tom Riddle — saw all of the modern-day borough of Halton layered with special wards that deflected everything from the Trace which tracked underage wand usage to portkeys and attempts at apparition by those magicals who had not been keyed into the wards to the Dark Mark itself. That ensured that — unlike some other families that had been torn apart by the First Purification War like the Blacks — the Collinses and their neighbours across the River Mersey, the Runcorns of Widnes, survived intact…and were able to effectively contribute to the success of "Death Eater Season" in the summer of 1997 when Harry Potter declared all-out war on Voldemort and his allies.
However, even if there had been no deaths in either clan, the Purification Wars had taken a toll on both the Collinses and the Runcorns. Albert Runcorn — who had allied with Dolores Umbridge when they moved to create a "muggleborn registry" when Pius Thicknesse was made to become Minister for Magic in the wake of Rufus Scrimgeour's assassination — was thrown into Gonebren in early July that year, which destroyed the man; he was currently incarcerated in Azkaban. His "betrayal" of his family's long-standing pro-normal-born stance broke the heart of his cousin Herodotus, Pierus' son-in-law. That effectively forced Pierus' daughter Napaeae to resign from a well-paying job in the Invisibility Task Force to care for her husband full-time. That ultimately wrecked the influence the Runcorns had in the Wizengamot…which — if what Lisa had recently learned about Pierus' elder granddaughter was even the LEAST bit true! — could help swing things back to the bad old days before the Battle of Hogwarts.
"Where are they?" he then asked.
"According to the last report I got before I came here, they've been most likely moved to the bioroid factory in orbit around the Moon," the newly-ennobled Baroness of Brechin replied. Like her year-mates Hermione Granger, Kevin Entwhistle, Dean Thomas and Justin Finch-Fletchley in concerns with what wealth their magical ancestors once possessed, Lisa had been able to claim her maternal family fortune on reaching her majority sometime after the Battle of Hogwarts. While she didn't really care at all about the Wizengamot — back when she was a student, she saw the legislative body as being SO broken, it only deserved to be consigned to the history books — she was glad that she could now add her voice to the reform movement that had been reborn when Pansy Black and Mandy Potter regained their magic. And while the traditionally "dark" lords like Draco Malfoy sneered at the "uppity half-blood upstart" when she swore her magical oath to serve in the Wizengamot in a special session the Wednesday after the Defunct Lords Act was tossed into the rubbish heap, others had been happy to welcome one of the brightest students to come out of Hogwarts in recent years among their ranks.
Especially since Lisa had possessed a powerful patron in Pierus Collins — who had sung her praises to the skies every chance he could — since her graduation from school.
Of course, there was nothing improper about their relationship. Pierus' wife Delilah — a Canadian from Prince Edward Island who came to Britain after her graduating from the Institute of Science and Magic, the Dominion's primary magic school on the Sibley Peninsula near Thunder Bay in Ontario, to help with the reconstruction of European magical enclaves after Grindelwald's War — passed on after the turn of the millennium. Pierus' loyalty to his beloved "Josie" — the nickname came from Delilah's middle name "Josephine" — was ironclad and all those who personally knew the man understood that he would NEVER contemplate betraying her even after she had died. Atop that, Lisa was simply too professional a magical researcher to allow a passionate affair with a dashing older man to get in the way of her work; it was only the influence of the politics of old that saw Daphne Greengrass — whom Lisa did respect and saw as a friend — become Ian Boot's number two in the Department of Mysteries in recent years. And while Lisa was permitted to call Pierus "Ryan" — his middle name — when they were in private, she respected and cared for the older man enough to honour his wishes.
He breathed out as he gazed up at the chandelier-covered ceiling of his reading room. "Well, if there was any person on the planet who could have saved Lizzie's people, the Rittmeister would have done it," he said as he reached over to a small box on the table beside his lounger. "I never told you that, did I?" he then asked.
She hummed. "Brigadier Gibbon…" — she always addressed Elizabeth Gibbon by the equivalent British title to her rank in the Magische Reichsarmee — "…graduated from Hogwarts in 1938. You were a second year in her NEWT year." Her eyes then twinkled as she gazed upon him. "You had a crush on her?" she teased.
"On both her and her twin sister," he admitted as he opened the box, drawing out a beautiful pendant. "Take a look at her," he bade as he handed it over.
Noting the pendant was of the type that enclosed a picture, Lisa flipped it open…and then gaped in awe. "Oh, Morganna…!" she breathed out. "She's gorgeous!"
"And given that she'll have an Avalonian body now, Lizzie and Jess will be even MORE beautiful," Pierus said with a chuckle. "Who knows! When you meet them, you just might become soul-bonded to one of them!" As her cheeks flamed in embarrassment, he winked. "Or is there something you haven't told me yet," he teased back.
The Terran-turned-Avalonian magical researcher smirked as she handed the pendant back. "No, I haven't found the right person to become marei'cha with," she stated. "I told you this just after Alice Holmes arranged for my body-swap in March, Ryan! The instant I get a soul-mate, you'll be the first to know!" She wagged her finger at him.
He mock-ducked that scolding stare before taking a deep breath as he put the pendant away. "I do worry about you, Lisa," he then admitted. "You know I promised your father that I'd watch out for you." As she nodded — David Turpin had died in the same attack that had killed his wife Tasha; Lisa's pureblood father had been targeted for his "blood treason" — in understanding, he then smirked. "Maybe…"
"Maybe what?"
He took a deep breath. "Maybe it's time to force a few things," Pierus mused. "Much that Kingsley and Harry and Percy have worked their arses off to force some necessary changes on our society, as long as the Wizengamot is still the way it is…"
"I've known that for years," Lisa admitted. "Yes, I was glad to take my oath to serve in that chamber last week…but I've secretly long wished that the Queen had used one of those Magical Royal Proclamations she issued in 1997 to disband the Wizengamot to clear the way for something more egalitarian." She then smirked as she added, "Once that was done, idiots like Malfoy would have had to WORK for a change!"
Pierus cackled as he recalled the small monthly stipend paid to him and other members of the Wizengamot as a sort of "salary" for their public service to the magicals of the United Kingdom; that had been voted into place in the wake of Grindelwald's War. While he did honour all the good work his family had done as one of the "Seven and Ten" in both the modern Wizengamot and the old Wizards Council since the Norman invasion of 1066, he understood where Lisa was coming from. The Wizengamot's normal counterpart in Parliament, the House of Lords, had undergone many reforms in recent years, especially in 1999 when the dead weight of many hereditary peers had been legislated away to cut down the numbers who could sit in the Lords Chamber at the Palace of Westminster. Even more, the judicial functions of the upper house of Parliament were stripped away the previous October when the new Supreme Court of the United Kingdom began its work; prior to that, a group in the upper chamber called the "Lords of Appeal in Ordinary" served as the final court of appeal in the United Kingdom. And while the Wizengamot was nowhere near as bloated — at full strength on its modern founding in 1705, there were sixty-nine members of the magical legislative body — as their counterparts up the Thames, the magical lords of Britain were also often forced to perform administrative or executive functions in the Ministry of Magic…and that didn't count the fact that the Wizengamot ALSO served as the ONLY magical judicial court in all of Britain!
"What do you have in mind?" Lisa then asked as she sensed something inside her friend.
Pierus took a deep breath. "Is she committing treason against the Crown?"
Hearing that, the young researcher felt a chill run through her bones on sensing the finality in his words. She knew Pierus was asking about Achelois. His younger granddaughters — Cassotis and Albunea had been a year behind Achelois; the former was a Ravenclaw, the latter a Hufflepuff — hadn't given a damn about the blood politics that had fuelled Voldemort's two attempts at conquering Britain. But Achelois had been a member of the Serpents' Den when it had been under the effective control of Draco Malfoy and his clique; before the Battle of Hogwarts, one couldn't be a Slytherin without at least paying lip-service to the pureblood agenda. Yes, there were people from that house who had risen above such nonsense; one only had to look at Daphne Greengrass and Blaise Zabini, even Pansy Parkinson-Black. But even if the Death Eaters had supporters in all the houses of Hogwarts during the 1980s and 1990s, the heart of what Voldemort had championed for years had beaten the strongest in Slytherin…and Lisa knew Achelois hadn't really developed the emotional strength to think for herself and give vent to what ambition and cunning had seen her sorted to the Serpents' Den in the first place.
"Willingly, no," she finally declared. "But she's always been more of a follower than a leader. She never could really resist Draco Malfoy's influence. Atop that, she's like Harry himself: The heiress of two top-tier seats in the Wizengamot. She's been wooed and courted by prospective mates since before she graduated. That makes her feel quite privileged, practically in the same vein as how Malfoy himself felt thanks to his father spoiling him like he did. If Malfoy's planning something — and no doubt, he is; he's not going to stand seeing the Wizengamot swing fully over to Harry's side thanks to Mandy and Pansy getting their magic back — she'll support it. Even at the risk of drawing the Queen's wrath all over her like what happened to her cousin."
Hearing that, he weakly nodded. Despite how upset he was at Achelois, Pierus knew how much she had cared for her "Uncle Albert." Learning that the DMLE special investigator had been imprisoned in Gonebren for his acts of treason to the Crown had nearly destroyed her. "A pity that when she blew up Azkaban with that meson bomb, Aesup didn't permanently wreck the island," he mused. "I always believed Gonebren was the better place to deal with criminals and traitors; it was a more efficient deterrent against that sort of behaviour." He then took a deep breath. "I may not have much time left, Lisa. You know that. And I am disappointed in Achelois. While I'd never do what that idiot Crouch did with his traitor son in the 1980s, I don't want to see any of my grandchildren incarcerated for being stupid." His dark eyes then focused on her. "I think you can figure out a way to save Achelois from herself, can you?"
She blinked before nodding. It wasn't as profound as a magical Life Debt, but she did owe the man before her a lot. "I'll think of something, Ryan," she promised…
London, the Ministry of Magic, fifteen minutes later…
"Welcome back, Lisa."
"Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod…!"
Lisa blinked on hearing that mile-a-minute chanting from Hermione Granger before she looked over to watch the female member of the Golden Trio pace around her private office, acting almost akin to how she behaved when Gilderoy Lockhart had been their DADA teacher in their second year. She then took a deep breath before she gazed on her co-worker from the Department of Mysteries. "She got the news?" she teased.
"Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod…!"
"What the hell do you think, Lisa?!" Daphne Greengrass moaned as she, Lì Sǔ, Luna Lovegood, Susan Bones and Hannah Abbott watched in amusement as Hermione endured a panic attack, complete with pulling of her bushy hair and pacing to and fro. "She's been a fan of the Schwarze Mädchen ever since she first learned of them thanks to Tsukiko-sensei. Finding out that some of her greatest heroes are ALIVE…!"
"Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod! Ohmygod…!"
Lisa moaned. "PETRIFICUS TOTALUS!" she barked out.
Hermione screamed out before her body suddenly locked up and she collapsed onto her back, unable to move anything — even her jaw — thanks to Lisa's wandless use of the Full Body-Bind Curse; mastering their magic without the need of wands had been one of the things the members of the Defence Association had learned in Lisa's sixth year while Harry Potter had been under the personal tutelage of Yomigawa Tsukiko and Nekane Springfield. As the other women gaped in awe at the blonde Ravenclaw — it was a VERY brave person who ever tried to curse Hermione Granger! — Lisa walked over to stand to the normal-born woman's side. "Finite!" she barked out the cancellation spell before she put her fists on her hips. "'Mione, I personally don't think that Brigadier Gibbon would appreciate you acting like some screaming fan-girl around her!" she scolded as Hermione angrily glared at her. "Get your bloody act together, you idiot! If you want to go to the factory and meet the woman, act like you did when you were the brains that made sure Harry survived his fights with Riddle, for Morganna's sake!"
A jolt ran through Hermione…and then she breathed out. "Thanks, Lisa. I needed that."
"She learns," Luna stated as Lisa leaned down to help Hermione back on her feet.
"So what's the news?" Susan then wondered as the others came into the office, Hannah moving to close and lock the door behind them. As Hermione moved to sit at her desk — the others knew that the anti-animagus and other counter-eavesdropping wards she had put around her place of work were always active; there was just no way in hell that Rita Skeeter could ever penetrate into THIS place — and sip a soothing cup of tea, the others relaxed in the guest chairs. "Has Kingsley made a decision?"
"No, not yet," Hermione stated. "He's going to meet with Ambassador Holmes later today to discuss the issue. Thanks to the Vinur Drekar, every Avalonian on the factory most likely know that 4,400 of their missing sisters have been found alive and well."
"Oh! You call her that?!" Luna asked.
Hermione smirked as she tried not to roll her eyes. "It's a lot better than just using a simple pronoun to describe that woman. Besides, wasn't she involved in that incident with those thirty girls that were on that Niphentaxian destroyer that came to Earth last week? The ship that was controlled by some android son of the man who wanted to own all the Haida's and Yamato's commissioning crews?"
"True, she was," the daughter of the owner of the Quibbler stated with an approving nod; she personally hadn't cared for that poor woman to just be called "her" in the first place…but had been forced to play along when the Daily Prophet and other European daily broadsheets began using that simple pronoun to describe that person. "And I hope she will finally be able to persuade her friends to stop hiding themselves. Especially given the fact that our friend's bonding programming has activated and she now views Moroboshi Ataru as her future soul-mate," she added with a grin.
Silence.
More silence.
Still more silence.
And then…
"Merlin! You're kidding us, right?!" Sǔ exclaimed.
"It's true," Luna affirmed. "She even wrote him a beautiful letter confessing her heart to him. I won't say anything more, of course; it IS private correspondence between Ataru and our wonderful dragon-lover, after all." As the others giggled on hearing that — even if Luna had long earned the nickname "Loony" because of her odd worldview, she had ALWAYS adhered to proper press ethics when she did her work for her father's news magazine…which put her heads-and-shoulders above muckrakers like Skeeter — the magical naturalist from Devon sighed. "So, Hermione…when will you go up to the bioroid factory to meet your favourite heroines? Today, I hope."
Hermione gaped. "Luna! I just can't barge up there and…!"
"Hermione, think about it," Luna cut her off. "Much that I'm grateful to Freiherr von Taserich for what he probably did to save all their lives, those poor women have been effectively cut off from the outside world for SIXTY-FIVE years! Never mind the shock of finding out they're literally ALIENS on their own home planet now! How will they adopt to things like computers, cell phones and everything else we take for granted?!"
"What if they're charged for war crimes?" Hannah demanded. "Yes, what they did when it came to the loyalty stones they destroyed in the 1940s was the right thing, but…!"
"Hannah, the organization the Schwarze Mädchen fought to destroy in that war has been effectively gone since early 1946," Luna cut in. "The organization that replaced the ICW passed a private member's binding resolution in 1950 that exonerated their actions in that war. Yes, most of the countries of Western Europe — even neutral nations like Ireland, Switzerland and Sweden — voted against that, but that resolution was PASSED! The Ministry is legally bound to respect that resolution. Atop that, they were declared dead at the end of Grindelwald's War! Yes, their spirits survived as Avalonians…but as I just said, it's been SIXTY-FIVE years since the Battle of the Gates! Why on Earth should we try to drudge up all that silly nonsense…even if, to Brigadier Gibbon and her friends, it practically was yesterday?!"
"They were reported to have helped hunt down senior Nazis after Hitler killed himself and they were free of the loyalty oath they were forced to make to him," Hermione added; she had learned that from Gellert Grindelwald via Yomigawa Tsukiko. "People like Bormann and Himmler, for example. So they certainly weren't the racist idiots that some people who've long loved to draw connections between Master Gellert and the Nazis have always painted them as. Yes, they didn't care for the cultures they were blindly dragged into when they were invited to attend schools like Hogwarts…but that didn't mean they wanted to slaughter every staleblood idiot who crossed their path."
"Atop that, there is the issue of the vampires," Luna breathed out.
Hannah tensed. "WHAT vampires, Luna?!"
"Well, when the Vinur Drekar came down to Nurmengard to get the Schwarze Mädchen out of their gestation tubes, a whole slew of daywalker vampires tried to attack her." As the others gasped in shock, Luna added, "Of course, the Vinur Drekar was a 'crystal-blood' and didn't care to deal with such creatures, so she disintegrated them with her lovely staff." She then nodded. "She was very neat in doing that, I have to say."
"Oh, Merlin…!"
Eyes locked on Hannah. "What is it?" Susan asked her best friend.
The blonde café worker took a deep breath. "We have to go to the Leaky Cauldron."
"Why?!" Sǔ asked.
"Abraham Lincoln's here," Hannah replied.
The others all gaped at her, even Luna. "President Lincoln?!" Hermione croaked.
"Yeah! He came in last week and has been staying at the Cauldron since," Hannah stated with a shake of her head. "He didn't tell Tom or me why he was here…but given what he did during the Score and Four, it's quite bloody obvious."
The others exchanged looks. Hermione then stood. "Let's go!"
The City of Westminster, the Leaky Cauldron on Charing Cross Road, minutes later…
A knock echoed on the door of one guest room. "Yes?!"
"Mister Lincoln?!" a voice called out. "Can I come in?!"
The door was telekinetically unlocked. "Come in, Miss Abbott!"
The door was opened, allowing Hannah to step inside. Standing by the window of his room — he had been gazing out into Diagon Alley when the goddaughter of the Cauldron's owner had knocked — the nearly-immortal sixteenth president of the United States smiled…before an eyebrow arched. "You know I don't care to be hounded by autograph seekers, Miss Abbott," Abraham Lincoln said with a teasing smirk. "Reminds me too much of all the damned office-seekers I had to deal with when I was in Washington years ago."
"We wouldn't think of doing something like that after all you've endured, Mister President," Hermione Granger said as the others came into the room. After Hannah closed the door and magically locked it — which made the vampire hunter blink — the normal-born from West Sussex proceeded to do introductions. Once that was done, she then asked, "Sir, was there some reason you came to Britain?"
He gazed at her before he walked over to sit down at the work desk set close to his bed. "Your reputation has preceded you, Miss Granger. The most brilliant student to have graduated from Hogwarts in recent years; you even outstripped Mister Potter's late mother when it comes to masteries." As he waved his guests over to relax themselves on the bed or the small couch set off to one side of the room, that lanky grin of his came back. "Then again, you had Lady Tsukiko to help teach you some things when the ICMC decided enough was enough in 1996 and asked her and young Miss Springfield to help your friend properly prepare himself for his final confrontation with Tom Riddle."
"Which I was more than grateful for," Hermione stated as she tried not to blush on sensing the powerful yet friendly empathic aura the man was projecting. She knew Abraham Lincoln wouldn't ever dream of taking advantage of other people with the psionic powers the meson — originally ebony, later de-crystalized to ruby thanks to Dean Raeburn in 1889 — in his bloodstream gave him. After the agonies of the Civil War, a lifetime hunting the undead to assuage a childhood desire for vengeance at the murder of his mother Nancy in 1818, plus his being made near-immortal thanks to Josef von Taserich just before he "died" at the hands of John Wilkes Booth in 1865, the Rail-Splitter couldn't bring himself to do something so heinous. "Sir, I know I've no right to intrude on your personal business, but it's known — thanks to Luna — that you rarely travel beyond your home in the Greasy Grass Settlement these days unless you feel that some daywalker vampire like the one who killed your mother has stepped way out of line and needs to be put down. Luna has some information that might help you."
Lincoln perked. "Miss Lovegood?"
"There was a platoon of daywalkers spotted at Nurmengard this morning," Luna announced.
Silence.
"Nurmengard?" the vampire hunter breathed out. "Why there? Mister Grindelwald is getting on in years and he's not as blessed as I am with meson in his blood."
"The Schwarze Mädchen were the true targets; they survived the Battle of the Gates, but were kept in cryogenic suspension in a cave on the west side of Nurmengardberg," Luna stated. "However, when the vampires came on the scene, they discovered that all those women were now Avalonians. No doubt, Brigadier Gibbon and her friends were saved by your own patron in 1945 with the unwilling help of the Niphentaxians who were in Europe at the time. His sympathy to normal-borns is well known to you, I believe." At his nod, she then smiled. "Before they got the chance to taste their blood and suffer a very fatal form of meson poisoning, the Vinur Drekar came down to destroy the vampires, then whisk the Schwarze Mädchen away, most likely to the bioroid factory."
More silence.
"Ah!" Lincoln said. "So she's still doing good deeds. Good for her!"
His guests gaped. "You've met her?!" Hannah demanded.
He chuckled. "She came to the Settlement in mid-April when she discovered a plot by some idiot to capture sasquatches who were visiting my friend Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake from their village in northwest British Columbia and have them exposed to normal people to settle the whole 'Bigfoot' debate once and for all." As all the witches gasped — sasquatches and other such near-humanoid beings like the yeti of the Himalayas were protected magical sentient species under ICMC law as they were distantly related to the frost giants of the Arctic — on hearing that, Lincoln smiled. "She appeared out of nowhere, blasted this fellow and his friends before they could launch their ambush, then tied them up for the law enforcement authorities to get their hands on."
"Did you learn anything about her, sir?" Lisa asked.
"Pretty much what Miss Lovegood and her father have long concluded about her, Miss Turpin," he answered. "She's an Avalonian, Terran-turned. Originally Japanese, from northeast Shikoku given her accent. She's a Zoroastrian in all aspects, which struck me as quite odd, but she is respectful of other faiths. I hear Mister Hagrid really likes her."
"She stopped five attempts at dragon poaching known to Father and his staff," Luna provided. The daughter of the owner of the Quibbler met the former American president in the summer of 1994 when she and her father Xenophilius had gone to hunt down a snorkack sighting at the Greasy Grass Settlement. There, they learned of "He Who Slays Walking Carrion," who resided in a remote corner of the magical native American village straddling the tri-state border between the Dakotas and Minnesota on both shores of the Minnesota and the Bois de Sioux Rivers around the area of the Traverse Gap separating Traverse and Big Stone Lakes. Knowing the phrase "walking carrion" was the native American term for vampires — and knowing that true Slayers were always women! — Xenophilius and Luna went off to investigate…and got a chance to meet an immortal legend. That had been quite the expose in the Quibbler and publications for non-human magicals such as The News of the Magical World…though many readers of the Quibbler found it hard to believe that a MUGGLE MAN of all things could be so feared by vampires of all stripes, even the demon-powered beings like the infamous Angelus. "She's done a lot of things, both here on Earth and on Nerio."
"Not surprising," Lisa mused.
"What do you mean?" Hermione asked.
"It's the basic creed of Zoroastrianism, 'Mione. 'Good thoughts, good words, good deeds.'"
The normal-born from Crawley blinked before she nodded. "Right…" She then hummed. "Odd that a girl from Japan of all places would embrace that faith."
"That struck me as odd as well, Miss Granger," Lincoln noted. "I asked her about that. After a little prodding, she confessed that — where she comes from — she first learned of Master Zaraϑuštra's philosophy via a copy of the role playing game Dungeons and Dragons." As Hermione and Luna gaped and the other women blinked in confusion, he chuckled. "That surprised me. She was embarrassed to admit that, but she then said that when she came here from wherever she hails from, she learned there were many others who worship Ahura Mazdā and she went out to look in on them. Soon enough, she began reading the Avesta and started seeing the truth behind what she had first learned in a role playing game. Soon enough, she converted over — she said her parents were Christian Scientists — and desires to undergo a proper navjote when she can get the chance. However, her friends…" He shrugged. "It all depends on them and whatever is happening to them."
The others nodded before Susan perked. "What's a 'role playing game?'"
"It's…a long story, Susan," Hermione advised after taking a deep breath, once more finding herself wishing that the old Muggle Studies course at Hogwarts when she and her peers had gone through the school had not been so backward and out of date.
Then again, she mused to herself. Is it wise for people to learn that…?!
Sutton Coldfield (outside of Birmingham), a house on Streely Lane in Sutton Park, an hour after lunch…
"Dear God, Pierus! Are you JOKING?!"
"I wish I wasn't, Orion. I wish to God I wasn't…"
Staring at the older man now seated across from him in his living room, Orion Matthews tried not to scream in outrage over what had just been revealed about Pierus Collins' granddaughter…which, as the current Viscount of Sutton knew, would automatically involve his oldest daughter. "So that brat Malfoy isn't going to just lay down and die finally?!" the balding brown-haired man with the pale blue eyes snarled before shaking his head. "I wish to God that Narcissa had poisoned that idiot when she found out about her daughter…though it took her bloody long enough to do that, for Merlin's sake! Even if Raven is now lovers with Arthur Weasley's youngest son, she's got a much better head on her shoulders than her brother." He then chuckled. "Then again, the teachers at Meridiana were always a better lot than what we dealt with, eh?"
"Oh, there're good and bad teachers no matter where you go," the older man mused before he sipped the wine that had been offered to him by Orion's wife Diana. The latter — who had been ennobled as the Baroness of Coldfield after the Defunct Lords Act had been removed from the magical law rolls — was a normal-born Hufflepuff who had been a peer of the Marauders, Lily Evans and Severus Snape, attending Hogwarts from 1971 to 1978. She attracted the attention of Orion — he was a year older than she — early on even if he had been a Slytherin pureblood. Showing friendship to a "mudblood" back in those days could have earned him the ire of the Death Eaters hadn't Pierus' daughter Napaeae — who had also become close friends to the-then Diana Faulkner — arranged to have her father shield Birmingham from Voldemort as he had done to northern Cheshire.
That hadn't spared the Matthewses from the ugly ravages of the Purification Wars, however. Orion's oldest son Charles — despite his half-blood status; his ancestry made him effectively the same as Harry Potter himself! — had been marked in his seventh year at Hogwarts, recruited thanks to Draco Malfoy at Voldemort's prompting to find a way to get through the magical shielding that sealed off all of metropolitan Birmingham from the reach of the Death Eaters. Unfortunately, he never got the chance to gain control of those wards. Within an hour of Azkaban being rendered lifeless thanks to Mun Aesup at the start of the summer holidays in 1997, the Queen's proclamation declaring a state of magical rebellion was read out over the Wizarding Wireless Network — seized by Orion and Diana with help from Pierus, his wife Delilah, daughter Napaeae and son-in-law Herodotus, not to mention some friends — which galvanized the wand wizards in Britain into action and turned them wholesale against Voldemort and his people. Atop that, the news of the reopening of Gonebren — thanks to the imprisonment of Dolores Umbridge and Albert Runcorn by the Boy-Who-Lived, who had been given the keys to the Maze Among the Rocks by the Queen for the duration of the emergency — marked the raising of the black flag by Voldemort's enemies. From that point on, no mercy or quarter would be shown to those who bore the Dark Mark or those who supported them.
Death Eater Season had been declared "open."
And there would be no bag limit.
Even worse, an old enemy of traditional British wizarding society — one who had been training the Boy-Who-Lived and his allies during the 1996-97 school year despite all of Albus Dumbledore's attempts at blocking access to Harry out of some mistaken belief that the lad's power of love ALONE would be enough to deal with Voldemort once and for all — decided to add a little spice to the Second Purification War…
…and demonstrated yet again how ultimately stupid it was to piss off the Dark Lady of the Orient…
Chalcot Wood (ten kilometres east of south from Birmingham), just northeast of the M40/M42 interchange, Sunday 13 July 1997, after dawn…
"Have you got through to that thing yet?!"
A grunt responded from the former Unspeakable who was trying to lance through the layers of protective spells that blocked him from destroying the ward stone located close to the wide sweep of concrete and asphalt that allowed muggles in their ghastly, noisy automobiles to move on and off the motorways that connected metropolitan Birmingham north to Worcester, southwest to Bristol and southeast to London. "This thing is a lot harder than the normal run of ward stones, Charles," Augustus Rookwood growled as he tried not to glare at the idiot half-blood who had been recruited into Voldemort's forces at the spring solstice thanks to what the Death Eaters and their Snatcher allies were being forced to do here and in a few other places across the United Kingdom now to get at those they wanted finally destroyed. "Didn't you learn ANYTHING from your father as to how these damned things were set up?!"
"No!" Charles Matthews admitted. "I wasn't able to corner Father about these wards before the Dark Lord ordered Scrimgeour killed! He didn't speak much to me since I took the Mark!" He then blinked as his pale eyes widened. "No…!"
"He probably knew you were marked," Nicholas Scabior stated from nearby. The current leader of the Snatchers, he barely escaped either being killed or sent to That Place when several of his friends had dragged in a large group of mudbloods to the Ministry at the start of the month…only to be caught when allies of that Korean bitch Mun Aesup — including Charles' blood-traitor father and mudblood mother! — seized the Wizarding Wireless Network to read the Queen's proclamation declaring Pius Thicknesse's ministry illegal and unworthy of recognition either by the Crown or the International Conference of Magical Communities. At that time, Scabior and his team had been up north in Scotland searching for mudbloods to send them to Azkaban…which had been DESTROYED by Mun thanks to a MESON BOMB of all things, killing off all the Dementors along the way! "These wards must be attuned to the Dark Mark!" he added. "Augustus' friends couldn't get into this damned town twenty years ago and they're still…!"
A horse's bray then echoed through the thick trees of the wood.
Everyone paused on hearing that before they looked around to find where that noise had come from. Of course, given the density of Chalcot Wood, visibility was restricted even if the noise from the nearby motorways echoed through the trees. "There's no horse farm close to here!" David Bancroft, Scabior's second-in-command in charge of the Snatchers, said. "Where the hell did that come from?! Can anyone see anything?!"
"I can't!" Jennifer Clegg stated as she drew her wand…
…just as a miasmic fog began to seep between the trees towards them.
As the Death Eaters and their allies all blinked in confusion — being British-born, they were used to the rapid changes of the weather in their homeland…but THIS was too sudden even for the English Midlands! — the braying noise of more horses echoed all around them. Listening to that sound, Rookwood blinked as he tried to determine what sort of equine it was…before his skin paled as the snarling echo in that braying clicked in, making him remember very dark tales from his childhood…
…and what happened to his granduncle Algernon in India during Tsukuyomi's War.
"Nightmares…!" he hissed out.
Everyone gaped at him. "What?!" Clegg cried out.
"Nightmares, Jenni!" Rookwood exclaimed as he stood, scanning around for the source of those hideous noises, now accompanied by the thunder of hoof beats on soft ground indicative of a troop's worth of riders coming their way. "That means…!"
"POTENTIO MUTIPLO MORSMORDRE CRUCIO!"
All the marked Death Eaters, including Augustus Rookwood and Charles Matthews, howled with agony as faint bolts of crimson energy lashed out from a half-dozen places all around them. As they collapsed to their knees, grabbing their left arms as they tried to fight off the horrid, scalding pain ripping through their bodies through their Dark Marks, the Snatchers all levelled their wands at the possible source-points of those Cruciatus curses. "SNATCH THE BASTARDS!" Scabior snarled out. "STUPEFY!"
Bolts of stunning energy lashed out…to no apparent effect; the torture curses on the Dark Marks continued on as the Death Eaters screamed out in agony. "Where the hell are they?!" Bancroft snarled. "I can't see a damned thing in this soup!"
"You weren't supposed to, staleblood."
The balding, middle-aged man slowly turned…
…before the business end of a rather LARGE key struck his chest.
"GONEBREN, 'A' BLOCK!"
Bancroft howled as he vanished in a flash of light. Hearing the name of That Place, the other Snatchers screamed out in mortal terror as they realized they were facing someone who had the magical keys to the darkest place in all the British Isles…and were willing to use them to unleash Hell Itself on Voldemort's allies. "WHO'S OUT THERE?!" Scabior screamed out. "COME OUT AND FACE US, YOU COWARDS!"
"Why should we oblige staleblood, inbred filth like you, Nicholas?"
He tensed. "Loony Lovegood…!"
"Excuse me, but that's a friend of mine you just insulted, Scabior!" another woman's voice challenged from somewhere else, making the Snatchers spin around.
"WEASLEY! STUPEFY!" Clegg screamed out.
Several of her friends did the same thing…but again, it was to no effect. "What idiots!" a third woman's voice sneered from elsewhere. "Don't you know your magical history and what Tsukiko-sensei used to put down so many during the War of Liberation while you inbred stalebloods competed with Grindelwald for control of Europe?!"
"GRANGER!" Scabior snarled. "SHOW YOURSELF, MUDBLOOD! HOW DARE YOU…?!"
A gunshot echoed from somewhere as a geyser of blood and torn flesh exploded from Scabior's abdomen. He gurgled in shock as a storm of pain flooded his mind before he dropped to his knees, a look of disbelief appearing on his face before he collapsed to his side. The other Snatchers gaped in horror on seeing their leader SHOT like that — a wizard or witch using muggle weapons against other wizards or witches was seen as the lowest creature on the planet…which clearly showed that Undesirable Number Two (as Hermione Granger had been termed by the Thicknesse ministry) had to be caught and eliminated as soon as possible — before tendrils of the fog surrounding them snared their wand hands to yank away their primary means of defending themselves. Several moved to activate their portkeys to teleport away from Chalcot Wood to safety…only to find that they now didn't work. As the beams of cursing energy that had burned through the Death Eaters slowly faded, people began to emerge from the fog, all mounted on jet black horses with burning manes and hoofs sparking on the ground.
As they took in the people now gazing without pity on them, the Snatchers were quick to recognize five of them: Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, his sister Ginny, Luna Lovegood and Neville Longbottom; they were people who had been involved in defeating the Death Eaters at the Department of Ministries the previous spring. Accompanying the members of the "Ministry Six" were five unknown women their age, dressed in the white-and-red robes of Japanese Shintō shrine maidens despite their clearly being European. As they emerged into the light, the Snatchers then gaped on recognizing two of those women.
Raven Malfoy and Cassiopeia Lestrange.
Two women who should be DEAD…
…but, thanks to the Curse of Helga Hufflepuff and the help of someone — neither Raven nor Cassiopeia had revealed who to the Quibbler when they and their friend Rose Potter were interviewed by Luna after the Battle of the Department of Mysteries as to how they had been given new life in the first place; when pressed by Luna, Cassiopeia attributed such an act to an "angel of the stars" — who had discovered their living spirits and the spirits of many others across the British Isles in the mid-1980s, now lived…and had gone to Meridiana in the hills of northern Wales to learn their magic.
And — after their graduation and promotion to the rank of Discipula Magi — had been apprenticed to the most feared Dark Lady in recent history.
Remembering that factoid about Draco Malfoy's sister and Bellatrix Lestrange's daughter, Clegg blinked as her eyes focused on the dark-haired witch riding beside the newly-ennobled Marquess of Holdenhurst. Noting the physical similarities between this woman and Neville, the Snatchers quickly realized this was his once-lost sister Grace Longbottom, who had been stillborn in St. Mungo's thanks to the Lestranges and the younger Barty Crouch…but was clearly alive and well.
And was obviously ready to help her blood-traitor brother ensure the mudbloods would conquer wizarding Britain and wipe out a thousand years of culture once and for all.
"Don't expect any help from your friends in the Forest of Dean, by the way."
Eyes locked on Hermione. "What the hell does THAT mean, mud-…?!" one of the other Snatchers snarled…before his voice caught in his throat on seeing her level a silver gun at him. "Y-y-y-you can't u-u-use th-that…!"
"Shut up, you pathetic waste of staleblood flesh!" the normal-born from West Sussex snarled as she cocked the hammer of the specially-modified Webley Mark VI .455 revolver; the weapon had been provided to her by goblin gunsmiths to help protect her against the hordes of Fenrir Greyback. "If it hasn't sunk into that empty cesspool between your ears by now, staleblood, you have NO Ministry and NO Wizengamot to support you, much less the half-blood bastard child you ultimately serve!" As the Snatchers all snarled on hearing Hermione call Voldemort "half-blood" and "bastard child," she gave them a mirthless smile. "That was wiped out two weeks ago thanks to the Queen! As for your friends in the Forest of Dean, our former classmate Sally-Anne Perks and the Meretrice sisters — who, by the way, are all Meridiana alumni thanks ultimately to Riddle and his friends years ago! — wiped out that camp and freed your hostages. All your friends are now in Gonebren entertaining the Hollows!" As her foes quailed on hearing That Name, she then smiled. "Oh, watch this!" she then teased before she, Ginny and Luna exchanged looks.
"VOLDEMORT! VOLDEMORT! VOLDEMORT! VOLDEMORT! VOLDEMORT! VOLDEMORT!"
Hope bloomed among the Snatchers on hearing them chant the Dark Lord's battle name…which then turned to knee-weakening despair on seeing nothing happen. As the Death Eaters who had come with them continued to moan in agony from the multiple doses of the Cruciatus that had been applied on their Marks by Raven and her friends, the female member of the Golden Trio shrugged as she pulled her revolver back to hold it close to her shoulder. "The Taboo is gone," Hermione said. "The Trace is no more. Even the kids who just finished their first year at Hogwarts can defend their homes and families from your friends. All they have to do is call out Gonebren's name…and the Hollows take the trash away!" As the Snatchers gargled on hearing that, she smiled. "I figure that by the end of next month, Riddle's forces will all be BRAIN DEAD!"
"It won't be much of a loss, 'Mione," Ron added. "Given how inbred these losers are…!"
"Damn straight about that!" Ginny sneered.
"How could you, Weasley?!" Clegg then challenged before she glared at Neville. "And what about you, Longbottom?! You're PUREBLOODS! You're much better than mudblood filth like Granger, to say anything of Potter's bitch mother…!"
"Oh, you shouldn't have said that," Neville teased.
"Agreed," Luna breathed out as she looked off to her right towards the east. "Tsukiko-sensei doesn't like it when people insult her students…"
Horses hooves echoed through the fog as the Snatchers all spun around…
…just as a form dressed in solid white samurai armour complete with protective helmet and a crimson horned oni mask over the face swept in at full gallop on the back of a well-muscled nightmare, drawing back a glowing silver katana…
…while Augustus Rookwood — who, thanks to his having endured the after-effects of his lord's mercurial mood swings for years, could recover faster from prolonged or multiple exposure to the Cruciatus than any of his current companions — staggered to his feet.
He didn't see his death coming at him until his head was cleaved right off the neck!
As the Snatchers watched in mute horror on seeing one of Voldemort's senior fighters literally become a head shorter, Luna turned and let out a shrill whistle with her lips and fingers. The air around them then chilled to near-freezing as the fog seemed to transform into barely humanoid figures dressed in clothing that spanned the ages…and whose eyes glowed with righteous fire. "All the unmarked traitors, my friends…GONEBREN, 'A' BLOCK!" the daughter of the owner of the Quibbler bellowed as she held out the sword-sized glowing skeleton key that would unlock the gates of That Place.
«Consider it done, Milady!» a cackling male voice then responded from somewhere.
The Snatchers — even the badly-wounded Nicholas Scabior — croaked out in mortal terror before they were literally encompassed by the Hollows and made to vanish, teleported to the dark moors of Cornwall and the hellish prison deep within. As the air temperature slowly returned to normal, the rider who had just beheaded Rookwood calmly came up to gaze without pity at the other Death Eaters. As Charles tried to grab his wand, a gloved hand reached out to wandlessly yank it — and the other dropped wands — into the grasp of Rookwood's executioner. With a slice of the katana, the wands were cut in half before the pieces were tossed contemptuously aside. While the other Death Eaters blearily looked up at the ghastly image looming over them, the rider calmly sheathed the katana before reaching up to pull the mask away, revealing…
"P-p-Potter…?!" Charles sputtered out in disbelief.
"Good morning, Lord Potter. A pleasant morning, isn't it?"
Harry looked towards the ward stone that Rookwood had been trying to destroy, nodding his head. "Lady Matthews, good morning," he said as Diana Matthews came up out of the fog, escorted by another nightmare rider in the robes of a Shintō miko…and who looked very much like a reborn Lily Potter save for reading glasses over her eyes. "I'm glad that Rose was able to find you and bring you here to see this. Seems you have a bit of a pest problem." He waved nonchalantly to the Death Eaters on the ground nearby.
"So I noticed," the silver-haired woman with the dark eyes hummed as she gazed in contempt at the half-dozen people who had come here to break into the protected zone her husband's family had established years before in and around Birmingham. Her eyes briefly stopped on her eldest son, whom she had given birth to right out of Hogwarts, before they gazed on the others. "Emil Hostina, Courtney Fearon, Penelope McGhie, Caroline Dorvas, Peter Reed…and Charles Nomen Nescio," she declared with a cold voice. As Charles croaked on hearing the Latin term for "I do not know the name" applied to him — which indicated he had been legally disowned and disinherited from his family; such people were often called with the mocking term "No Name" by people who knew of such a ghastly fate…which made him lower than a mudblood in the eyes of pureblood traditionalists as a family name meant EVERYTHING in British wizarding society — and the other Death Eaters paled, Diana turned to leave. "Kindly remove this trash, Lord Potter. We don't want the normals to have to deal with them."
Harry nodded. "As you wish."
"Mother…!"
Diana stopped before she coldly gazed on the young man who was her son now only in genetics. "For your treason against the Crown and Magic Itself, you are dead to us all, Charles. If my eldest daughter defies her father's wishes, she will join you among the Nameless." As Charles paled on hearing what his parents were prepared to do to his beloved sister, she shook her head. "Lord Potter, kill him first," she then asked as she indicate her former son. "Behead him and deliver the head with my husband's sincerest complements to Miss Turpin in repayment for the loss of her parents."
"M-mother…!"
"No problem at all," Harry declared as magic billowed in his right hand.
"ANIMAE GLADIUM!"
A second later, multiple shrieks of agony echoed through Chalcot Wood…
…though Rose Potter was quick to see Diana Matthews turn away from the scene of her son having his soul being burned out of his body, the older woman's eyes glistening with tears…
"So what do we do?" Orion wondered before sipping his wine. "I don't want to lose any more of my children to that bastard Riddle…even now, thirteen years later!"
Pierus sighed. "I don't blame you, my friend…"
The City of Westminster, the residence of the Ambassador of the Republic of New Avalon to the Court of St James's on the second floor at 221B Baker Street near Regent's Park, that moment…
"Didn't this bother you, Alice?"
Alice Holmes perked on hearing that amused question from the Man-Who-Won before she giggled. "Actually, no," the dark-haired tomboy with the sorrowful brown eyes — she reminded Harry Potter of a picture he had seen of the famous singer Lillie Langtry, the once-lover of the future King Edward VII who was believed by some to be the inspiration of the character of Irene Adler from A Scandal in Bohemia — mused as she proceeded to prepare tea for her guests. "Father was a big fan of Sir Arthur's works; that's the reason he took the family name 'Holmes' when he first was assigned here on Earth in 1972. When the Society learned that after I made my first public appearance after the Liberation, they wouldn't HEAR of me living anywhere else but here."
"At least the museum on the first floor's not been altered," Percy Weasley noted as he gazed out onto the busy street that served as part of the A41 trunk road that connected downtown London with Birkenhead. On seeing his host gaze in surprise at him, the Senior Undersecretary smiled. "My father's fascination with normals infected all of my siblings and I to one extent or another," he explained. "Like your father, I came to like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's works. I was actually surprised to learn than when those stories were set, this part of Baker Street wasn't actually named that."
"What was it named?" Kingsley Shacklebolt asked; he had also read some of those stories, but he wasn't a Sherlockologist by any stretch of the imagination.
"'Upper Baker Street,'" Percy answered. "Separate house numbers from the main street, which only extended up to Crawford Street four blocks down from here. The part between Crawford and Marylebone Road was called 'York Place' for the longest time before they decided to name the whole stretch as 'Baker Street.'" He nodded his thanks as Alice handed him a cup of English breakfast tea. "Actually, this part of the building should be properly numbered as 239 Baker Street. But they decided to tweak the numbers when they set up that museum downstairs, not to mention the bookstore on the ground floor."
The others laughed as they were served. After that was done, Alice took her chair. "I received a report from the watchmistress aboard the Freedom; that's one of the Kashin-class ships that was seized in the Liberation," she reported. "Roughly around the time of that incident at Nurmengard this morning, a total of 4,400 gestation tubes with fully templated bioroids appeared on the ship's main hangar deck. The gestation units themselves had been removed from the factory between 1930 and 1935 for deployment to places in Europe, northern Africa, the Soviet Union and the Middle East. Forty-four separate observers with a hundred bioroids each…though none of them were templated and woken by the time World War Two started and all contact with them was lost." She shrugged. "It was seen as an accepted hazard of the time. The Great War saw dozens of observers — though fortunately, without bioroid assistants as this was in the early days of our race's enslavement — killed off because they were in the wrong places at the wrong time."
"Thank Merlin for that," Kingsley noted. "Has President Otako said anything to you or your counterparts about what will happen with Brigadier Gibbon and her people?"
"Right now, we're more concerned about helping them adjust to being in the year 2010 when they last were awake and active in 1945, Kingsley," Alice stated. "They've missed out on sixty-five years of life being frozen in those gestation units in that cave. Even if they fought as allies — effectively unwilling ones at that because of the magical loyalty oath that they were forced to make to Adolf Hitler as part of Thoughtmaster-prime Grindelwald's alliance with that man — of the Nazis, they deserve to enjoy something of a normal life under their control."
"If it was only that simple," the Minister for Magic breathed out. "Much that I personally — and I'm speaking for Percy and Harry here — would agree to that fact, Madame Holmes, there are people still alive in this country who did suffer from what the Schwarze Mädchen did during that war, such as relatives of those killed when Margareta Hecht led her team to the Ministry to destroy the loyalty stones used then to keep the colonial magicals under the ultimate control of the Crown through Minister Fenwick."
"Not to mention those families who lost fortunes when their businesses in the colonies were wiped out after Grindelwald's War and the War of Liberation," Percy added. "My own family was one of them, in fact." He then smiled. "Personally, after meeting up with some of my grandfather's old playmates from India and learning of what they felt like after Sergeant-Major Hecht and her friends did what they did, I wouldn't care about that."
"Nor would I," Harry added. "My own family had interests in Asia and Africa as well. My great-grandfather owned farms in Tanzania and Kenya; he lost everything when local ministries of magic were formed after 1946 and declared themselves independent from the Ministry here in London. From what I've learned over the years, he didn't mind it that much even if his income dropped considerably because of what happened. He didn't care too much for the Ministry's approach to the colonies in Africa and Asia."
"So there might be private moves to seek redress?" Alice asked.
"Effectively yes," Kingsley noted. "Officially, the actions of the Schwarze Mädchen were exonerated in 1950 when the ICMC passed a binding resolution concerning them." He then chuckled. "All the nations of Europe — save the Soviet Union, their client states, Iceland, West Germany, Austria, Yugoslavia, Italy, Spain and Portugal — voted against that, but the rest of the world passed it and made it binding on all members and the societies they represented. Atop that, there is the Statute of Limitations Act passed in 1999. That was forced on us originally by the leaders of the families who supported Voldemort as a way of helping people avoid Azkaban, but we were able to work it around to make it run parallel to the normal system. Thus, since it has been sixty-five years since the Schwarze Mädchen were active fighters, there's no way those who would seek redress for lost revenues and income to get their day in front of the Wizengamot."
"As for whatever deaths were caused by the Schwarze Mädchen, that falls under the very hazy rules of warfare," Harry added. "Yes, Master Gellert was a Dark Lord by every definition of the term. But he was ALSO the Reich Minister of Magical Affairs acting under the ultimate authority of the Führer — who was Germany's head of state and head of government at the time — when he launched his war against European magical societies in 1939 parallel to the European side of World War Two. And since we didn't and still don't require wizards and witches to make some binding oath of loyalty to the Crown as that violates clauses in the Separation Act, we can't really view Brigadier Gibbon and her friends as 'traitors.'" He shrugged. "After all, they came from Depression-era normal Britain — where their parents were mostly on the dole — to spend seven years at Hogwarts, then were literally thrown to the dogs because of the hiring practices of the time period. It's no wonder that when Master Gellert began espousing his Greater Good theories, people like the Gibbon sisters flocked to it. They felt they had no life to live here and wouldn't want to go back to a normal life without being able to use magic openly."
"That remained true in a lot of ways even after that war," Percy added.
Harry nodded. "What about other nations?" Alice asked.
"Save for Germany, Austria, Italy and Spain, all the other nations whose citizens fought as part of the Schwarze Mädchen find themselves in similar situations legally," Kingsley noted. "Supreme Mugwump Ramirez has been on the floo all day reminding my counterparts in Paris, Brussels, the Hague and elsewhere about the 1950 resolution that wiped the slate clean concerning those girls. There's been the odd grumble or two, but the laws on the Continent were restructured effectively by the Americans after the war to follow their views on personal liberty; what we FINALLY were able to catch up with in many places here after Voldemort was dealt with." He sighed. "But…"
"There are chances that people might want to seek them out personally," Alice finished.
He nodded. "Yes."
"What about Germany, Austria, Italy and Spain?"
"Since it was discovered that the Schwarze Mädchen — after they were finally freed of their loyalty oath to Hitler — helped track down senior Nazis like Martin Bormann and Heinrich Himmler to ensure they died or were caught by normal soldiers serving the Allies, the Magische Bundesrat in Bonn and the Magische Volkskongress in East Berlin passed laws endorsing the ICMC resolution in 1950 that wiped the slate clean concerning those of Brigadier Gibbon's subordinates from Germany," Harry answered. "The Magische Bundesrat in Vienna, the Magico Senato in Rome and the Corte Mágico in Madrid eventually did the same thing at the same time for those girls who came from Austria, Italy and Spain. They also agreed to allow the West Germans — and the unified Germans after 1990 — to hold onto what artifacts remained from the Schwarze Mädchen for posterity's sake. Including their wands." He then held up a finger in emphasis. "I will note that the medals those girls won during the war were all altered in 1957 to conform with the laws passed at the time that forbade the wearing of a swastika on any medal awarded during World War Two. Any pure Nazi Party decorations are considered illegal and can't be worn. Proper military medals and decorations such as the various classes of the Iron Cross and wound badges can still be worn, though they were normally replaced with insignia bearing oak leaf clusters on the crosses."
The others chuckled. "So what about this matter with the daywalker vampires I was told about?" Alice asked. "Why were they there in the first place? What purpose would they have in attacking a whole group of helpless witches in cryogenic suspension?"
"Unfortunately, thanks to her, we can't ask any of them," Harry noted, which made Alice roll her eyes. "I know! Given how many titles got slammed on me over the years, just limiting the title to 'her' for that girl is rather overdoing it!" As more laughter filled the room, he added, "I do know that President Lincoln is in Britain at this time; he's staying at the Leaky Cauldron now. I don't know what brought him here, but given that he never leaves North Dakota without reason, it's easy to conclude. Some of his old sparring partners from the time of the Civil War that escaped the Score and Four are in country as well."
"What purpose would they have in gathering here?" she wondered. "We've encountered many vampires since the Liberation. We've no problems with them."
"But they might have problems with you."
Eyes locked on Kingsley. "What do you mean, Kingsley?" Percy asked.
"When Harry spoke about the Score and Four, I remembered that some of the vampires who escaped North America to get away from Mister Lincoln always called him a 'crystal-blood,'" the minister mused. "Albus told me this once when I found a book on vampires in the library at Hogwarts in my fifth year and read about the Rail-Splitter — even if his real identity wasn't publicly known outside America at the time — and what he did between 1865 and 1889. Being called a 'crystal-blood' implied there was mesonium in the blood stream."
"Like the ebony meson Freiherr von Taserich and Master Hosan — not to mention all the people the former loved to experiment on…INCLUDING President Lincoln until General Raeburn got to him! — had in their blood," Percy stated before his eyes widened and he gaped in shock at his host. "Not to mention…"
"Every Avalonian — Terran-form, Terran-turned and Terran-adopted — on the planet and in orbit," the Elder Mother of the Avalonians in Britain said with a nod before she sipped her tea. "They're afraid we're taking away their primary source of food."
"Which you wouldn't ever contemplate doing by force given what happened to your people before February," Kingsley noted before he sighed. "However, all it takes…"
"Is one lunatic to start up a terror campaign," Harry breathed out. "I…" He then perked as his cell phone rang. "Excuse me, please," he said as he pulled his iPhone it out of the pouch on his belt before holding it to his ear. "Potter."
"Hey, Harry! Where are you?"
"I'm at Alice's flat on Baker Street, 'Mione. What is it?"
"I just spoke to Mister Lincoln," Hermione replied from her office at the Ministry. "He was advised to come to Britain by Elder Tȟatȟáŋka because of a vision the elder had about a whole metric tonne of 'walking carrion' moving to kill off the Space Angels with stolen magic. Given what happened this morning at Nurmengard…"
He moaned. "Oh, great! 'Mione, what's your opinion of the Schwarze Mädchen when it comes to overall magical power? They didn't have the Neuwied Test back then…"
"Given how good and how thorough their training was — which the non-Germans like Brigadier Gibbon were quick to catch up on when they got the chance — before they were sent out into the field, I'd say that even the privates in that group could easily have given Tom some serious problems," his best female friend answered. "Atop that, they're a properly-trained military force with six years of hard battle experience against all sorts of opponents — even the War Hawks! — under their belts. If you're with Alice right now, you should advise her to pass on to President Otako to hire those girls on as the core element of the permanent Avalonian Defence Force."
He nodded on hearing that. While a separate defence force for those Avalonians who remained now on the bioroid factory hadn't been set up — given the more pressing need to have the United Nations Earth Defence Force stood up, especially in the wake of what the Urusians and the Niphentaxians instigated after the start of the month — there had been talk from time to time to allow a permanent security force to be established there. While many Avalonians still in space held dual citizenship with whatever nation on Earth welcomed them in, there were those who wanted to establish a separate Avalonian colony under Otako Meinyak's direct control. A prospective location for such a colony was a Class M planet not so far from Spotak that was in unclaimed space between that world and the territory of the Seifukusu Dominion which was being eyed for eventual takeover by the joint Earth-New Avalon alliance due to lack of colonization from Dominos and its older colonies. Such a planet would become the "New Avalon" in the Provisional Republic's official name and would be open for immigration to those Terrans who might want to get away totally from any sort of Terran rule. However, any plans to actually settle that planet were on the back burner for the time being. Still, the chances were there that some attack on the inner part of the solar system could press through to the factory itself, so having an "Avalonian defence force" answerable to Otako was seen as logical.
So why not let it be magical as well?! the Man-Who-Won mused before he asked, "Could they survive full-time up there, 'Mione? I know there's magic in that gestation fluid they use to create and template new bodies, but would that be enough for them?"
Hermione sighed. "I think so." She then chuckled. "I wanted to go up there to meet them. You know how I think about them, Harry." As he laughed, she breathed out, "But I want to clear it with you first. I know their legal status is questionable at this time, but they deserve to know that much of what they fought for did come to pass."
Harry nodded. It had always been the basic theme when he and his friends elected in the wake of the Battle of Hogwarts to do the right thing no matter what obstacle got in their way to make their society the best place they could for future generations. Part of that included respecting where the basic attitudes that had driven Voldemort's allies into launch the Purification Wars in the first place came from. Yes, there was simply no way that what political, economic and social gains had been won after 1997 would be allowed to be taken away by the pureblood traditionalists…but there WAS a unique British wizarding culture that had evolved separate of the normal world since 1692 and its good points deserved to be protected and honoured. Of course, opinions on what was "good" and what was "bad" in wizarding Britain varied from person to person and generation to generation…and given how stiff and inflexible the Ministry of Magic and its component organs had been for so long — compounded by the total LACK of general public input into the magical government save for when a Minister for Magic was elected every ten years — any attempts at serious change was always bound to make the traditionalists balk. Atop that, the scale of the violence that rocked the First Purification War in the late 1970s and the early 1980s — topped by the bloody one-sided nature of the Second Purification War as shown during Death Eater Season — made even neutral traditionalists wary of any newfangled thing normal-borns and normal-raised wizards and witches like Harry Potter and Hermione Granger introduced. Yes, Harry had the advantage of being the Man-Who-Won to influence public opinion to his way of viewing things…but he didn't want to have the potential power and influence that title could force on him overwhelm him as the power and adulation showered on Albus Dumbledore after 1945 clearly overcame him.
Then again, that's part of the reason he wanted me raised away from the magical world, he mused as he reflected yet again on his early childhood with the Dursleys. "Okay, go ahead, 'Mione," he stated. A quick glance to Kingsley got him a nod of understanding in turn. "Make sure you make it clear to Brigadier Gibbon that any decision concerning them is still pending here and elsewhere save in Berlin, Vienna, Rome and Madrid," he added. "Tell them about all the legal changes we've made over the years. I doubt they'll have any living relatives alive today — especially the British Black Maidens — but that can be checked on if necessary."
"Alright, Harry," Hermione replied. "Oh, President Lincoln told me that if you wanted to see him, he'll be at the Cauldron for the rest of today."
"Fair enough."
In space aboard the Freedom, an hour before supper (London time)…
"My God…this turned out even better than we ever dreamt…"
"It is that, Mon Général. Save for Britain, of course."
"Well, they are coming along slowly."
"The fools there still need swift kicks in their collective arses, Jessica."
"True," Jessica Gibbon breathed out as she placed the dataPADD down on the table.
The senior leaders of the Black Maidens were seated around a circular coffee table located in the former captain's meeting room, enjoying drinks and soft snacks while they scanned through the incredible amount of data that their new hosts had procured for them concerning the post-1945 history of Earth's magical societies. Thanks to the wonderful ease by which information could be shared via mind-melding — as taught to them by the healers as they were helped through the Awakening over the last few hours — learning how to operate the hand-held computers and navigate the HyperNet had been child's play. Despite the understandable sense of dislocation all of them felt — it had come to the point where Elizabeth Gibbon ordered all the junior officers and ranks to go find places to sleep; fortunately for the Schwarze Mädchen, the living quarters of the Freedom had yet to be stripped of their furniture — on learning that sixty-five years had passed since their last conscious moment on the grounds of Nurmengard, the love and loyalty all of the Black Maidens felt for each other was as solid as diamond.
That had been Gellert Grindelwald's original intention when he began gathering the first recruits into his special battalion — later expanded to a brigade — of combat sorceresses in the mid-1930s. Seeing that the cronyism and arrogance of traditional magical enclaves across Europe was squeezing out skilled normal-borns as they graduated from places like Hogwarts, Beauxbâtons and Durmstrang, the then-master of the Elder Wand concluded that the best way to make his vision of the Greater Good — where the Statute of Secrecy would be done away with once and for all and magical and normal would be united once more as one society…with magicals, of course, ruling over normals — more acceptable to the masses was to recruit people who could effectively operate in both worlds. While the Magische Reichsarmee he raised was filled with wizards and witches of all origins — normal-borns, half-bloods, disenfranchised or normal-sympathetic purebloods and hybrids with various magical creatures — who wanted a chance to launch a world-wide revolution, the Schwarze Mädchen was unique both in the origins of its members and the fact that all of them were women.
Unfortunately, it was around that very time that one critical development in normal society was starting to be noted: The rise of the so-called "mystery men," the first widespread generation of non-magical metahumans. Because of that — tacked onto the loss of the Steel Angels in 1937 thanks to their sensing the coming of World War Two and their adamant unwillingness to harm organic humans — Grindelwald had no choice but to make compromises with the Nazi hierarchy to get normal support to ensure his vision stood a good chance of actually coming to fruition. The one compromise that impacted the Magische Reichsarmee the most was the imposition of the Führerprinzip and a magical oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler. That — which had been suggested by the leader of the Schutzstaffel, Heinrich Himmler, as Germany began preparing for war — ensured that with a quick reminder of that oath, no magical warrior obeying Grindelwald would do anything to topple the normal power structure or rebel against the Führer.
Fortunately for the Black Maidens, Hitler didn't use them in long-distance strikes against normal targets; that was the basic mission given to the Übermenschen Gruppe on its founding in 1940. As the Nazi war machine rampaged across Europe, elements of the Magische Reichsarmee advanced with them to suppress local magical resistance to the invaders. While the majority of the magical fighters serving the Dark Lord of Europe were busy keeping resistance down, Grindelwald — honouring his alliance with Yomigawa Tsukiko — directed the Black Maidens into destroying powerful artifacts in Paris, Brussels, the Hague and London that allowed the French, the Belgians, the Dutch and the British to maintain overall control over the magicals in their colonial empires. Once that was done by mid-1943, whatever power various magical ministries or ministries-in-exile could summon from the colonies — those that hadn't been liberated by Tsukuyomi's forces — was gone.
While the European side of World War Two was starting to go bad for Adolf Hitler, the magical war happening at the same time appeared to be going Gellert Grindelwald's way.
However, by the time the Allies landed at Normandy, the Übermenschen Gruppe operating in North America had been effectively wiped out by the War Hawks and the Liberty Legion. Now free to be used as an offensive force, Dean Raeburn's team came across the Atlantic and, basing themselves at Hogwarts, began launching raid after raid across occupied Europe to brutally whittle down whatever metahuman forces the Nazis still had active that could oppose the Allied advance on Germany. That eventually brought them into direct conflict with Grindelwald's forces, including the Schwarze Mädchen. And while the Black Maidens survived their encounters with the War Hawks with no fatalities, they DID endure many injuries that knocked down the brigade's total combat strength to a quarter by the start of 1945.
Ironically, the sheer brute power that Dean Raeburn, Heather Thompkins and Jessica Dover — supported by the deadly marksmanship of Martin Larsden — could bring to bear against their foes eventually began to terrify the very people they were trying to liberate! It finally got to the point where Albus Dumbledore — who had pretty well stayed out of active efforts to put his old lover down while he taught at Hogwarts — pleaded with the Protector of All Life to allow him to muster an all-magical force to deal with Grindelwald in a final winner-take-all strike to end the magical war in Europe…especially with the rampaging hordes of Soviet magicals charging towards Germany from the east under the command of the infamous Siberian She-bear, Marshal Svetlána Múromeca. Raeburn — with profound reluctance and an unwillingness to split the magical and normal sides of World War Two apart in her own mind; because of that all-encompassing worldview, she only desired to have the damned war in all its aspects done and over with! — eventually agreed. By then, a desperate Grindelwald — who couldn't really depend on Josef von Taserich anymore; the losses in the Übermenschen Gruppe and the several times the Rittmeister had fought Raeburn personally had taken their toll on the man — contacted the Mage of the Beginning on Nerio and brokered an alliance. It was a risky thing; many among the therianthrope tribes on Mars' sister planet had little cause to like Earth humans — especially magical humans! — and the Life-Maker's own designs for Nerio would eventually spell the end of all magic on Earth. But it was done.
That agreement was immediately noted on by the War Hawks' ally from Russia, Vladímir Rúsalovič Tayčéško — the immortal Praetorian Guardian known commonly as "Lord Rjazán'" — which prompted him to take a more active role in dealing with the Nazis beyond keeping the various Germanic and Greco-Latin deities and demons from multiple dimensions from openly interfering in mortal affairs. At his suggestion, Raeburn put Dumbledore through a personal combat training program that sharpened the transfiguration master's already excellent duelling skills to an unprecedented degree. Tayčéško also contacted Duncan MacLeod to gather a force of Immortals to help out in the attack at Nurmengard; until then, the undying foundling swordsmen had stayed out of any magical or metahuman battles even if many were serving as soldiers in various armies across the planet. One of them had been a white Australian named David Wisden, who had endured a Dark Quickening in late 1944 and — by the time that V-E Day came around in early May of 1945 — was barely able to keep the tsunami of violent urges he had absorbed from his last kill at bay.
It would turn out to be a very wise move…
"Mon Dieu! Even after we poured out magic into the World-Gate, it wasn't enough to stop the Nerioites?!" the French-born commander of the brigade headquarters company and Elizabeth's brigade major, Lila Fontaine, breathed out. "Raeburn had to behead one of the Immortals and use the power of the Quickening to destroy the World-Gate!"
"Well, I've always read that whenever Tayčéško makes a suggestion, it's for a damned good reason," Margareta Hecht noted as she crossed her arms. By now, all of the Black Maidens were dressed in basic utility uniforms from the armies of their homelands, with equivalent rank insignia on their tunics. "What do we do now?" she then asked.
Eyes locked on Elizabeth. Noting that, the Yorkshire-born brigadier tried not to blush too much on sensing all of her senior staff gaze expectantly on her. She hadn't really aspired to become the leader of the Black Maidens when she had travelled to Germany almost a year before the invasion of Poland. Like her twin sister and the thirty-six other British witches that had jumped across the North Sea to fight for Grindelwald during the 1930s, Elizabeth had become very disenfranchised by the hideously corrupt society she tried to become a part of after graduating from Hogwarts. She really had no bonds to home anymore and was willing to try something new and exciting; after all, none of the teachers from Headmaster Armando Dippet on down had shown any of their normal-born charges the hidden truths of what British magical society was really like once they were free of Hogwarts.
When Elizabeth — who had graduated with top NEWTs in 1938 — found out she couldn't hope to apprentice with a local transfiguration master to gain a mastery of her own because of her "muggle" origins, she was soon contacted by Enid Geraint. The first British witch to travel to Germany and join the Black Maidens, Enid — a Welsh woman who had been four years ahead of the Gibbon twins at Hogwarts — persuaded Elizabeth and Jessica of the righteous nature of Grindelwald's cause and the need to finally destroy the International Confederation of Wizards…especially when they got the chance to go on a trip to Japan to witness first-hand how European magicals had so badly enslaved local magicals in Asia and elsewhere thanks to Yomigawa Tsukiko.
Thanks to some excellent combat training thanks to Grindelwald and the best magical duellists in Germany, Italy and Japan available at the time, Elizabeth soon made a name for herself as a quick thinker and a skilled warrior. She had been the one who led the mission to Paris in late 1940 to ultimately destroy the loyalty stones enslaving thousands of innocent colonials. Originally assembled by Napoleon's magical advisers from a stele dating all the way from the Twenty-sixth Dynasty of ancient Egypt which found at Rašīd during his campaign there in the late 1790s, those particular loyalty stones had helped the French colonial authorities wipe out several traditional enclaves in what today was Cambodia and Vietnam. During that particular battle — while the rest of her platoon of foreign volunteers were busy laying waste to the Ministry headquarters and seizing whatever objects that might interest Grindelwald's own researchers — Elizabeth personally duelled several experienced French hit-wizards to the death, escaping with only a few bruises. That — tacked onto missions in Poland against magical partisans in the winter of 1940-41, then later personally leading a platoon of Black Maidens into Serbia in the spring of 1941 to wipe out a rogue coven of demon-possessed vampires killing German soldiers and civilians alike — would see Elizabeth Gibbon become the first foreign-born magical warrior to be awarded the Iron Cross for bravery in action; she would eventually end the war with the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds, which had been awarded to her by the Führer personally in late 1943.
Remembering that afternoon at the Berghof with Hitler and his advisers, Elizabeth fought back tears of shame as she sat back in her chair. It had been so innocent back then. The Führer — an avowed vegetarian who loathed smoking and drinking and enjoyed simple things…even if there were rumours of sexual deviancy; she had heard of what had happened to his niece Geli Raubal in 1931 — had been a kind host to those Schwarze Mädchen who had been invited to the slopes of the Obersalzberg that day to receive what German soldiers often derisively nicknamed the "tin necktie."
Remembering that, Elizabeth gazed on her brigade sergeant-major. Margareta Hecht — then ranked Oberscharführerin der Schwarze Mädchen und Oberwachthexe der Magische Reichsarmee; she would be made Sturmscharführerin und Stabswachthexe at the start of 1944, the same day Elizabeth succeeded Livia Dietrich as the Reichsführerin — would be promoted within the order of the Iron Cross to receive the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds for her leading the attack on London to destroy the British colonial loyalty stones at the Ministry of Magic while Elizabeth was busy in Serbia.
That same operation, Elizabeth mused, also earned Margareta the thanks of the Heavenly Sovereign of Japan as well as the Military Medal of Honour and the fourth class Order of the Sacred Treasure; that had been at the recommendation of Yomigawa Tsukiko. That attack on London, the Black Maidens later learned, ultimately snapped the bonds forced on Gurkha hit-wizards by the Ministry of Magic who were making life hell on the Greater East Asia Liberation Brigade. This had allowing those poor fellows to return home to the mountains of modern-day Nepal…and permitted Tsukuyomi's best warriors to sweep unchecked across the Subcontinent all the way to Iran!
Yet, after Hitler had taken his own life at the end of April in 1945…!
"Don't feel so bad about it, Liz."
Elizabeth gazed over at Jessica. While the former always adopted a very serious look when it came to styling her hair — she had been a Ravenclaw at Hogwarts — the latter always allowed her blonde locks to flow free. Recalling how Eva Braun had admired such beautiful hair — Jessica herself had been a Gryffindor — when they had been at the Berghof, the leader of the Black Maidens could only moan. "Why, Jess…?"
"We felt ourselves facing the choice of living in one of two different types of Hell," Lila answered on her best friend's behalf. "At the time we put on the black suits, we believed our societies were the worst of the two. We learned differently."
The others ruefully nodded. When the loyalty bond to the Führer had died with him under the garden of the Reichskanzlei in Berlin, the Black Maidens were — like many other Germans — confronted face-first with the horrid revelations about what happened in places like Dachau and Auschwitz. Sickened and ashamed that they — who had fought for the eradication of racism in magical societies — had been associated with the mass murder of millions of innocent people in normal society, the Black Maidens burned their Party uniforms on the grounds of Nurmengard. In abandoning the swastika of the Nazis, they gladly took up the timeless symbol — the circle-in-a-vertically divided triangle sign marking the combination of the Cloak of True Invisibility, the Resurrection Stone and the Elder Wand under the control of a supposed "Master of Death" reminded the only American Black Maiden, Third Battalion's Hauptscharführerin und Hauptwachthexe Regina Mitchell, of the logo of the Civil Defence services which came into use in 1939 — of the Deathly Hallows Grindelwald had sought for his whole life. At that time, they simply had no choice but to remain at their master's side even if they were free to disappear into the ruins of normal Europe. Even if the Dark Lord of Europe knew a lot about what his allies had unleashed across Europe, he was still determined to fight to the bitter end…especially since he had learned through sympathetic friends in Britain that his old lover was coming for him. Still, in the period between V-E Day and the Battle of Nurmengard, there had been time for the Black Maidens to atone for their being forced to fight — even by proxy! — for the genocidal monsters that had launched the European side of World War Two in the first place: Margareta hunted down Hitler's personal secretary Martin Bormann and tortured him to death in the ruins of Berlin two days after the Führer killed himself…while Elizabeth and Jessica teamed together to track down Heinrich Himmler and expose him to the British three weeks later.
And then…
"Excuse me."
Elizabeth and her friends turned to gaze on the shy-looking woman standing at the doorway to the meeting room. "What is it?" the commander of the Black Maidens asked.
A deep bow responded. "Please forgive me for disturbing you, Thoughtmistress-prime, but there's a small delegation from Her Majesty's Ministry of Magic here to see you."
Everyone blinked before Margareta sighed. "They're not here to cause trouble, are they?" the native of Gardelegen in modern-day Saxony-Anhalt wondered.
The younger woman rapidly shook her head. "No, ma'am. The leader of the delegation is a normal-born woman named Hermione Granger. She's the Special Adviser on Normal Affairs to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Also with them is a Miss Luna Lovegood, the daughter of the publisher of the Quibbler."
Nods from the leaders of the Black Maidens. As they spent the morning and afternoon catching up on the many years they had been forced to miss out on, Elizabeth and her friends had taken note of the various events in Britain and the people involved in them. Thanks to the island nation mostly escaping the ravages of the Magische Reichsarmee, its traditional culture had survived intact even if Albus Dumbledore — using the influence he gained thanks to his leading the successful attack on Nurmengard and personally winning a hard-fought duel against his former lover — had worked to make sure that many of the harsher attitudes that forced two of his prize transfiguration students to fight for Gellert Grindelwald wouldn't have sway over future generations. Dumbledore had made a good attempt at it, especially after his promotion to headmaster of Hogwarts in 1956…but the purebloods who controlled the Wizengamot — and through that organ of government, most other elements of wizarding Britain — fought him openly and covertly as they prayed for someone to come along to lead the traditionalists in restoring things in their society to what was truly "right" and "proper" in their eyes.
Such a leader finally came in the person of Thomas Marvolo Riddle.
When Lila Fontaine had read the self-created battle name of the last known living descendant of Salazar Slytherin, she had nearly laughed herself into a heart attack. However, what Voldemort and his allies had done in the 1970s and later in the mid-1990s had been no laughing matter. Despite the vicious nature of the war the Schwarze Mädchen had fought between 1939 and 1945, they had done their best to NOT target defenceless children — to say anything of the UNBORN! — when they had run rampant from the Pyrenees to the steppes of Siberia and from the gates of Alexandria in Egypt to the northern mountains of Norway where the Durmstrang Institute was located. The Death Eaters — hearing that term had also caused the Black Maidens to laugh derisively at such a pathetic moniker — hadn't cared a damned bit about who died and why; if their Dark Lord wanted someone to die, that person was killed with no questions asked. What was worse, given that there were many sympathizers to Voldemort's cause across Britain, attempts by the Ministry of Magic to put down the First Purification War never really got anywhere…until a brilliant normal-born witch named Lily Potter sacrificed herself to destroy Voldemort's body in 1981 to save her son Harry.
Of course, given the fact that a baby of fifteen months had survived the KILLING CURSE of all things quickly painted a huge target on the head of the "Boy-Who-Lived," thus necessitating his being hidden away in the normal world until it was time for him to go to Hogwarts in 1991. When he did go to that grand old castle in Scotland, Harry hadn't been the least bit prepared for what fate and prophecy would ultimately force on him. Dumbledore was of no help in the long term; the horrors of Grindelwald's War and his steadfast belief in the better angels of human nature — even in the face of what Voldemort's supporters had gladly done years before — would have eventually set Harry up to become a living sacrifice without making said sacrifice ultimately MEAN something. It actually took the direct intervention of the International Conference of Magical Communities via a Meridiana graduate named Nekane Springfield — not to mention Yomigawa Tsukiko herself! — in the summer of 1996 to see Harry trained properly to deal with Voldemort. And once the Boy-Who-Lived was seen as ready to take to the field, he wrecked the Death Eaters in a two-month search-and-destroy campaign that Voldemort's people could not stop until the latest Dark Lord to plague any part of Europe was killed in the Battle of Hogwarts mere days before the start of the 1997-98 school year.
Harry hadn't done it alone, however. Starting from his first year, he had a small circle of friends and allies at his side. Prominent among that group were two women named Hermione Granger and Luna Lovegood. The former was a normal-born from West Sussex whose intelligence outmatched even Lily Potter's and whose sense of justice was something Elizabeth Gibbon herself could admire. The latter was the only daughter of a minor pureblood family from Devon who was reported to have Seer abilities and who had pursued careers in magical cryptozoology and reporting for a monthly magical news magazine her father Xenophilius published. And while Hermione and Luna weren't the only allies Harry possessed even to today, that both of them were here right NOW…!
"Send them in," Elizabeth bade.
The younger woman nodded before she headed out. A moment later, a group of seven women appearing to be in their early twenties walked into the room, dressed in casual business wear. Leading them was a stunningly attractive woman with wavy dark brown hair and brown eyes full of both knowledge and curiosity. Remembering what she had read of Hermione's biography on the HyperNet, Elizabeth hummed as she and her friends got to their feet. Amazing she was a Gryffindor, the leader of the Schwarze Mädchen mused to herself. With the intelligence she has, she should've been a Ravenclaw.
Hermione's hand immediately came out. "Generalmajorin Gibbon, I presume?"
Elizabeth tried not to snort. "Yes," she responded on grasping the offered hand, her blue-grey eyes twinkled in amusement. "I feel thankful that I am here to welcome you."
The other woman gaped in stunned shock at her before she roared with laughter, making all her companions gaze in confusion at their friend while Elizabeth's friends all rolled their eyes at that odd replay of an historic encounter between two explorers on the shores of Lake Tanganyika in 1871…
To be continued…
WRITER'S NOTES
1) Notes on the various lordships spoken of here:
The Marquessate of Halton (Pierus Collins) — As indicated above, this is named after the borough in Cheshire located at the place where the River Weaver flows into the River Mersey about twelve kilometres east-southeast of Liverpool.
The Marquessate of Widnes (Herodotus Runcorn) — As indicated above, this is named after the village of the same name on the north bank of the River Mersey across from Halton itself.
The Viscountcy of Sutton (Orion Matthews) — As indicated above, this takes its name from part of the element of the small town where the Matthews Clan currently lives, Sutton Coldfield; this town is located seven kilometres north-northeast of downtown Birmingham. The Barony of Coldfield (Diana Matthews) is also named in part after Sutton Coldfield.
2) The Invisibility Task Force (ITF) was an element of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes (DMAC) with the specific task of ensuring all magical creatures resident in the United Kingdom remain invisible to normal discovery. As noted in the first part of the second Wizards and Avalonians story, the whole of the DMAC was made subordinate to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement in the post-1997 reforms at the Ministry of Magic.
3) The reforms done to the House of Lords in the House of Lords Act, 1999 saw the total number of members in the upper chamber of Parliament cut down from a staggering 1,330 lords to a more manageable 669 lords. Of the surviving members of the House of Lords, only ninety-two are hereditary peers who could pass on their seats to their children; all others were life peers, who cannot pass on their titles to their children.
As an aside, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom was established by law in the Constitutional Reform Act, 2005 to become the supreme court in all matters under English, Welsh and Northern Irish law as well as Scottish civil law; when it comes to criminal cases in Scotland, the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh still serves as the supreme court. The Supreme Court also is the highest court of the land when it comes to devolution matters between Parliament in Westminster and the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, the National Assembly for Wales in Cardiff and the Northern Ireland Assembly in Belfast.
4) Translations: Vinur Drekar — Friend of Dragons; Navjote — Literally "new invoker," this is the ritual through which an individual is inducted into the Zoroastrian faith; Sherlockologist — An expert in Sherlockology…which, in essence, makes such a hardcore fan of Sherlock Holmes; Magische Bundesrat — Literally "Magical Federal Council," this is the name of the post-1949 version of the Wizengamot in West Germany (and after 1990, all of Germany) and the post-1955 version of the Wizengamot in Austria; Magische Volkskongress — Literally "Magical People's Congress," this is the name of the 1949-90 version of the Wizengamot in East Germany (which would be folded into the Magische Bundesrat after the reunification of the country); Magico Senato — Literally "Magical Senate," this is the version of the Wizengamot in Italy; Corte Mágico — Literally "Magical Court," this is the version of the Wizengamot in Spain; Mon Général — My General; Führerprinzip — The "leader principle" that prescribed the fundamental basis of political authority in the governmental structures of the Third Reich, which can be most succinctly understood to mean that "The Führer's word is above all written law"…which made Adolf Hitler the supreme legal authority in the land, unable to be challenged by any proper process of judicial review; Reichskanzlei — Literally "Imperial Chancellory," this was the headquarters building of Germany's head of government in Berlin from 1871-1945.
5) The incident Hermione notes of concerning Haida's plank owners was covered in A Nice Quiet Place.
6) The reason I made Abraham Lincoln a meson-powered quasi-immortal in this story is that in the Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter novel, Henry Sturges went to his grave site in the Illinoisan capital of Springfield on the day of his funeral and turned him into a vampire. Lincoln's funeral — as also indicated in the novel — was held on 4 May 1865, which was almost a month after the president had died thanks to a wound in the back of the head courtesy of John Wilkes Booth (1838-65); in the novel, Booth himself had been turned into a vampire sometime before he launched his plot to avenge the downfall of the Confederacy by assassinating the Great Emancipator and his senior cabinet staff. Since it doesn't sound right to me that a corpse that had been dead for almost a month could be reanimated as a vampire, making Lincoln one of Josef von Taserich's "experiments" seemed more logical; the mesonium injected into Lincoln's bloodstream — this would have been done just prior to that fateful night at Ford's Theatre — would keep his soul anchored to his body and eventually repair the damage to his skull and brain tissue.
7) As noted in the second part of the first W&A story, the Greasy Grass Settlement — and its spiritual leader, Tȟatȟáŋka Íyotake — are based on situations that appeared in the fanfic story The Mandatory Marriage Contract Fic by Itsme66. Again, many thanks to that writer for the use of his interpretation of Elder Tȟatȟáŋka in my stories.
8) The Snatchers who appear in the flashback scene here all appeared in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Only their leader, Scabior, was named in the novel; the given name used here is my invention. The names of the other Snatchers caught by Harry and his friends — as well as several of the Death Eaters who had gone to Chalcot Wood to deal with the ward-stone blocking off Birmingham to Voldemort's people — were taken from the actors and actresses who appeared in the movie version of Deathly Hallows; other names are my invention.
9) Hermione's position as "Undesirable Number Two" when it comes to the ministry of Pius Thicknesse is my invention. In Deathly Hallows, only Harry earned the appellation "Undesirable Number One"…though others who opposed Voldemort were also referred to as "undesirables" by the Ministry of Magic.
10) As noted before, the Meretrice quintuplets — Libera Meretrice and her sisters Juno, Vesta, Bellona and Fauna — all first appeared in The Icemaidens and the Philosopher's Stone. Atop Libera being a VERY close friend to Sally-Anne Perks, the quints were all blood-cousins of Blaise Zabini. Their home village of Rhosan Green — located in the north end of the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire — had been blocked off thanks to house elf magic in the mid-1800s; this resulted in all the villagers at the time losing their magic…though in the universe of this story, the descendants of such people were able to interact somewhat with outsiders; this is how Voldemort would find them in the late 1970s.
11) Vladímir Rúsalovič Tayčéško (Lord Rjazán') first appeared in my fanfic Wanderers. Jessica Dover and Martin Larsden were both introduced in Phoenix From the Ashes; the former first appeared in Part 60 while the latter first appeared in Part 54.
12) Rašīd is the proper Arabic name for the Egyptian city in the Nile River Delta sixty-five kilometres east of Alexandra known more commonly in the English-speaking world as Rosetta. As is well known, this is where the famous Rosetta Stone was found in 1799 by the French soldier Pierre-François Bouchard (1772-1832). However, the Rosetta Stone dates from the Ptolemaic Dynasty that ruled Egypt from 305-30 B.C.E.; the Twenty-sixth Dynasty noted above ruled over the desert kingdom from 685-525 B.C.E.
13) The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (in German, Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes) were elevated levels of Germany's highest award for military valour in wartime, the Order of the Iron Cross (Orden des Eisernen Kreuzes). The various versions of the Knight's Cross which were instituted by the Nazi Party leadership in 1939 to mark exceptional acts of bravery that would be seen as going above and beyond what even the normal Iron Cross would represent. Unlike other awards for valour, the rules surrounding the awarding of the Iron Cross was structured to recognize that a winner could engage in further acts of bravery that would win any other soldier an Iron Cross; this is akin to what happens to Victoria Cross winners in the British Commonwealth when they're given an additional bar worn on their medal ribbon to indicate a subsequent award. Thus, the original Iron Cross as established in 1813 for the Napoleonic Wars and later revived in 1870 (for the Franco-Prussian War) and 1914 (World War One) was awarded in one of two standard degrees, the Iron Cross Second Class (Eisernes Kreuz zweite Klasse, short-form E.K. II) for the basic bravery award and the Iron Cross First Class (Eisernes Kreuz erste Klasse, E.K. I) for exceptional acts of bravery or additional acts of bravery for those awarded the lower class of the Iron Cross…as see the example of Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) himself; he was awarded the Iron Cross Second Class in 1914 and was elevated to First Class in 1918.
The Knight's Cross elements of the Iron Cross introduced after the start of World War Two were ranked as follows from lowest to highest:
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes, RK d. E.K.) — First authorized 1 September 1939;
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub, RK m. EL) — First authorized 3 June 1940;
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub und Schwertern, RK m. EL u. Schw.) — First authorized 28 September 1941;
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Eichenlaub, Schwertern und Brillianten, RK m. EL Schw. u. Brill.) — First authorized 28 September 1941; and
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Golden Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds (Ritterkreuz des Eisernen Kreuzes mit Goldenem Eichenlaub, Schwertern und Brillianten, RK m. G. EL Schw. u. Brill.) — First authorized 29 December 1944.
As an aside, there have been special variations of the Iron Cross awarded over the years to high-ranking generals and admirals. However, the Order of the Iron Cross was the first top-level award of valour in wartime that was granted without recognition of rank or noble title…and this occurred LONG BEFORE the Victoria Cross was instituted in 1856 in the United Kingdom or the Medal of Honour was instituted in 1861 in the United States.
14) The play-off on the famous quote "Doctor Livingstone, I presume" as asked by Henry Morton Stanley (1841-1904) on his meeting the famous David Livingstone (1813-73) on 10 November 1871 has appeared again and again in stories of all types since that fateful encounter on the shores of Lake Tanganyika occurred. However, no one — at least to my knowledge — has EVER used Livingstone's reply to Stanley's question, which was quoted by Elizabeth Gibbon above: "I feel thankful that I am here to welcome you."
