The one, and only thing I like about anonymous reviews is the fact that they can be deleted, because for at least 99% of them, that's the only thing they deserve. Like many writers on here, I wish I could block them.
In case anyone missed it, we have now seen who's behind the Purebloods, ex-Minister Millicent Bagnold. Also, as Fleur needed to get married to Harry because her pregnancy was now progressing, Hermione went ahead with the marriages for the betrothal contracts she had with Harry. Millie went forward with her marriages as well, because she was the only other one of the girls who had completed a bonding ritual with Harry, and they all accepted that she had no hope for a happy future other than with the family.
This might be a good time to add more definitions of how things go in this world. For the purpose of the story, the powerful old Houses all have have family magic. When someone is accepted as the Head of the House (and to a lesser degree, the Heir) and the family magic accepts them, it comes into them and if it is strong enough, it will correct any deficiencies in them and boost both their magic and their development. To a lesser degree, a similar thing happens when someone marries the Head or Heir of the House, their spouse is accepted by the family magic and they gain some degree of benefit from this. This was why Harry and Hermione changed at the start of the story, why Millie and Sue changed when they were accepted as the Heads of their Houses, and why Harry and the girls changed again when they married. Also, access to the family knowledge and secrets comes with the family magic, this was how Harry and Hermione had known how to work Dumbledore and the Noble Houses as soon as they were accepted as the heads of their houses. For another thing, there's no such thing as Half-Veela or Quarter-Veela here, Veela are born of the union between Veela and Wizards, full stop.
There is a rather unpleasant section about two thirds of the way through, the beginning and end are marked if people wish to skip this. It relates to what was done to Ginny (and to a degree Ron) to make her like she was, and while it's part of the storyline, it's not essential to understand the main storyline. It's mainly there to explain why she's being accepted and supported again.
Usual disclaimers, no rights to any characters portrayed and this is neither the real world nor a Disney Princess tale.
As Apolline had noted, the Veela change that wasn't supposed to happen in Gabi until she was fifteen or sixteen had been triggered by being involved in Fleur's transformation. This meant that she had started showing mature Veela traits at ten and she had been going through considerable mental as well as physical development since January.
Anne and Apolline discussed this with Harry and Hermione at various points along the way as Gabi was changing, and they explained how Veela developed so much faster than humans once they went through the change. Anne explained that Veela usually tended to develop slower than normal human girls before the change, but their development accelerated rapidly when the change came. Apolline grudgingly admitted that as Gabrielle was now more physically developed at eleven than Hermione and the other girls were at nearly fourteen, she was physically ready for a bonding, but as her mother she couldn't stand the idea of her little girl going through that yet. Harry and Hermione quite agreed with that sentiment, though Anne, as a more essential Veela, held to the opinion that Gabrielle would be fine with it.
Hermione had pointed out that they hardly needed to tell them that Gabi was changing faster than them, because in the time that she and the other girls had grown a couple of inches in height and a little less in bust measurements, Gabi had shot up and filled out, so the little girl had become a fully grown woman. She could see that Apolline wanted to say something else but was holding back, so she addressed what she thought Apolline was holding back.
"Yes, I understand that Gabi has already bonded to Harry and she cannot be separated from him without causing her harm, rest assured that I wouldn't dream of causing anything of the sort. The only ones in the bond who are at all in question at the moment are Daphne and Astoria, but I am almost certain that they will fully bond when they mature as well. Tracey is the only thing like a close link either of them have outside of our immediate family and the link Daphne has with her is nothing like she has with us."
Apolline gave her a grateful smile. "You really are the perfect head wife Hermione, you look after all of them...I couldn't have asked for a better family for my daughters to be bonded into."
Hermione snorted as she leant back into Harry. "I don't think that it was fated that way from the start. We expected that Luna might have joined us, as she was closest to us in the last cycle, but this time Luna didn't need us, she is happy in the family environment we had in the Tower and has other people she can turn to. Millie, on the other hand, did need us, she couldn't get through a night without nightmares thanks to that bastard of a father of her's, and to a lesser degree those bastards who raped her. Harry and I were sharing a bed to keep the nightmares away so it was only natural to invite her to join us for the same reason. The only time she was free from the nightmares was when she was with us, so we made it permanent, and we all got very close through that. Daphne and Tori are probably the most like me in the group, so we got very close too. Anyone who's close to me is close to Harry, and anyone who's close to Harry comes to love him, so it was inevitable really. And you know how Fleur and Gabi joined us."
Apolline had to laugh at the matter of fact way that this remarkable young witch explained how and why she had come to share her man with five other witches, including two Veela. She was comforted by the conviction that even when they grew older and became sexual (yes, four of them had had sex, but that was a requirement of the rituals rather than them being sexual), Hermione would be quite able to handle it so that this didn't become a problem between them.
It was obvious that the one thing Harry had needed was a loving family, which was quite understandable after they learned of the nightmare that had taken the place of a childhood for him. It was just as obvious that these two could never love anyone else as much as they loved each other, but they both had enough love to share with the others who held a special place in their hearts, and that was what made this unconventional family of their's work.
By the end of the summer break, Gabi was looking more like fifteen or sixteen than eleven, and she'd been going through the work so fast that she had actually done her OWLs before they went back to Hogwarts (getting at least 'E's in every subject, 'O's in many of them), so she was starting in Sixth year with the others. Gabi's very close bond to Fleur was part of the reason she had gotten through the course work so quickly, because she had been picking up the background information she needed from Fleur's memories. Much like Harry and Hermione, she had only needed to skim through the theory and do the practical work to pick it up.
When they started back at Hogwarts, the fact that Fleur had transferred from Beauxbatons to Hogwarts attracted a lot of attention, and if anything the addition of Gabrielle, who was obviously her sister, attracted even more. The male students were quite disgruntled to see that Gabi was wearing a Betrothal ring, and they fixated on her ring so much that they missed the fact that Hermione, Millie and Fleur's rings had changed from Betrothal rings to Marriage rings. At least no-one who recognised the difference noted the change.
People did notice that Hermione and Harry seemed to have had another growth spurt since last year, as they looked a couple of inches taller and about a year older, but no-one outside of the family knew that this came from the family magic that accepted them when they were married (and when Harry had been accepted as Head of the British House of Flamel). Those who were paying attention (this was mostly girls keeping an eye on the competition) had noted the lesser change in Millie as well.
Because it had been happening since January and it had been less obvious than Gabi's rapid growth, few people had noticed that all of the immediate family had been developing faster since they were part of the experience of Fleur's transformation into an Elder Veela, but as Hermione had noted, they had all grown a couple of inches or more and filled out, so they appeared about a year older than they were. Outside of Harry's immediate family, Sue was the only one who had been accepted by the family magic as the Head of her House and received the development boost from that. This had the effect of making Harry's family appear older than the others (even Tori, who was actually the youngest after Gabi), but luckily the age spread in the group meant that this didn't become an issue.
As was the norm now, Harry loaned Merlin back to the school to act as the Sorting Hat for the sorting ceremony (Merlin had been one of the items listed to be recovered when Dumbledore was sent to Azkaban), and once the First years had been sorted, Professor Sprout called Fleur and Gabrielle forward to be sorted. None of the family were surprised when both girls were sorted into Ravenclaw (after all, Merlin had gotten to know Fleur and Gabi quite well over the past ten months because it was involved in many of the discussions in the common rooms), but there were a lot of pissed off looks from the male students in the other houses when they lost the chance they thought that they might had had to charm the pants off these two beautiful young women.
Minerva had a couple of announcements to make that surprised many of the students. The first wasn't too bad.
"Professor Kettleburn has decided to retire while he still has the limbs left to enjoy his retirement. I am pleased to announce that Hogwarts' Keeper of Keys and Grounds, Rubeus Hagrid, will be taking over from Professor Kettleburn as the teacher for the Care of Magical Creatures subject. Please join me in wishing Professor Kettleburn well in his well earned retirement and welcoming Professor Hagrid."
There was a mixed response to this at first, but a lot of the others were quick to jump on the bandwagon when the Nobles group gave Hagrid a standing ovation.
The next announcement was different, and it was a worry because Ted had confirmed that the law that the Ministry was using was valid, even if they were stretching their interpretation of it quite a bit. This law had been implemented hundreds of years ago to allow the Wizengamot to oversee teaching practises at the schools of magic that had started to crop up more frequently, with a view to stopping those which were more likely to harm the young witches and wizards in their care than help them. Unfortunately, this overseeing role had been allocated to the Ministry of Magic when it was created around seventeen hundred, and they were staying within the letter, if not the spirit, of the law by enacting it now.
It was obviously an attempt to derail the changes that they were making to the way the people of Magical Britain viewed what was happening in their world. What was still in question though was who was behind it. If it was Fudge grasping at straws they didn't have much to worry about, but if it was Bagnold behind it, they would have to be very careful and watch every angle.
The title for the role and the choice of the person who had been sent to fill it seemed to be good signs though, because they were both so stupid it almost had to be Fudge who was behind it. Giving the representative of the government of Magical Britain who was looking into how witches and wizards are being educated the title of 'High Inquisitor'? Really? Were the Purebloods like Fudge the only witches and wizards who had forgotten that the Inquisition had been the tool that was used by the church to torture and murder at least a hundred thousand (and quite possibly many more) witches and wizards on the flimsiest of excuses right across Europe from the late fourteenth to the early nineteenth centuries, and that over ten thousand British witches and wizards were tortured and slaughtered in the same period as well?
The witch that the Ministry had sent for this was just as bad, Mafalda Hopkirk, she had been in the Improper Use of Magic Office up until Amelia had gotten rid of her. Unfortunately, whoever had been behind her orders there (probably Bagnold) had been cunning enough to make sure she stuck to the letter of the law, so there had not been enough grounds to fire her and ban her from the Ministry, which was why she was back to haunt them now. Hopkirk was a rabid Pureblood bigot who had taken a great deal of enjoyment out of twisting the requirements of the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery and using her version of the rules as an excuse to hound Muggleborn and Half-Blood students out of Hogwarts and the magical world, while giving children from traditional Pureblood families a free pass on everything.
If there was anyone perfect for a witch hunt like this though, it was her. Harry and the others in the bond suddenly burst out laughing when they realised just what he had been thinking, so they had to explain to the others what they were laughing about, and what the term 'witch hunt' had come to mean in the contemporary Muggle world. When the others got what had cracked them up, they burst out laughing too, which irked Hopkirk no end as she was in the middle of some pompous speech that no-one was listening to.
Knowing that the Ministry would most probably try to fabricate evidence against Hagrid, Filius and anyone else that they didn't approve of, like the Muggleborn Muggle World Studies teacher, they had made arrangements as soon as they heard about this for every lesson and probable meeting with Hopkirk to be recorded, so that they could refute whatever lies that Hopkirk made up.
After she arrived, the more shite Hopkirk spouted, the more they were convinced that this was Fudge's idea, because the first thing she demanded of Minerva was copies of all of the current students' files. Minerva managed to remain calm and asked what she wanted the students' files for, and when the answer was. "I need to confirm that they're actually learning something in these new courses of your's!" Minerva just smiled condescendingly at her.
"Then you should have gone to the Wizarding Examination Authority before you came here Madam Hopkirk. They can supply the results of all examinations that they have conducted, and I cannot give anyone access to our students' files without both the Hogwarts Board and their parents' approval."
Hopkirk started to bluster. "I am here with the authority of the Minister for Magic! You are required to give me full co-operation so give me those files now!"
Minerva dropped the pleasant façade at that. "You don't have any authority inside of Hogwarts Madam Hopkirk, and the only co-operation I am required to give you is to allow you to observe the agreed classes to report to the Ministry that the students are being properly educated. As I have already informed you, the Wizarding Examination Authority can supply the test results for our students, and that is the only part of our students' records that the Ministry has any right to see. Given your approach here however, I am forced to call for an immediate meeting of the Hogwarts Board so that you can present your demands to them directly. Wait while I do so."
With that, she stood and walked to the fireplace, floo calling each member of the Hogwarts Board and having them some through straight away. Hopkirk was trying to stop her up until the first Board member came through, and then she shut up. When the Director of the Wizarding Examination Authority came through after the Board members, Hopkirk went to say something but clamped her mouth shut straight away, because she suddenly realised that this wasn't going to go her way at all.
Minerva started by sharing Hopkirk's demands that she hand over all of Hogwarts' students' files to her. Hopkirk tried to claimed that that was not true, so Minerva put the memory of the event into the pensieve for the Board. Putting that false accusation aside for the moment, Griselda weighed in then and confirmed that all that she needed to verify the education standards, and all she had any right to see, was the exam results, and the Examination Authority should be the ones to provide them.
Hopkirk was getting desperate, and she really put her foot in it then, because she shouted. "No, that is not enough! We need their whole files to confirm that those results are real! Potter and other students in his group have skipped up to four years in the last two school years, they can't have done that legitimately!" This gave both Griselda a chance to pounce, and Amelia (who was there as a member of the Hogwarts Board) the opportunity she needed to get into Hopkirk's mind.
Amelia knew that what she was doing, going into the minds of Hopkirk and others like her to take and alter their memories without their permission or orders to do so, was totally illegal, but what she had seen in Harry and Hermione's memories of what happened last time had been enough to convince her that if they did not actively fight this, and stop their kind, thousands would suffer and die and their world would probably be destroyed. That was justification for her actions in her mind, and she could sleep easy with what she was doing.
Griselda was raging at Hopkirk about her accusing the Examination Authority of falsifying results and pointing out in simple words that before Dumbledore took over control of Hogwarts, many talented students had skipped over years when they had covered the course material faster than other students. She added that that just of the people presently in the office, she, Professor McGonagall, Madame Longbottom and Lord Moody had all done this, and made a point of comparing these achievements with the abysmal results that Hopkirk had managed to achieve at Hogwarts, pointing out how she had barely scraped through with 'Acceptable's for most of the small number of subjects that she did pass in her OWLs, and that she had then only managed to get two 'A's in her NEWTs, failing the rest of her subjects.
With Griselda ripping Hopkirk apart and humiliating her like this, Hopkirk was wide open to Amelia's probes, and Amelia had little difficulty confirming that Fudge was indeed the one who was behind this, and that her primary purpose in being here was to get information that could be used to attack Harry and the Family. Hopkirk had been specifically tasked by Fudge with finding the location of where Harry was living, as he wanted to eliminate Harry as a threat, and had apparently decided that the only way to do that was to kill him. It was fairly easy for Amelia to insert the location of one of the disused estates that they maintained for this purpose (while the Death Eaters had gone down faster and easier than they thought they would, they had kept these active in case other threats presented themselves), along with the memory that an angry Minerva McGonagall had let this slip while she was ranting at her, into Hopkirk's weak mind.
Amelia discovered that Hopkirk had also been tasked with getting the details of all the better Pureblood students at Hogwarts and Hogwarts' new lesson plans, because apparently Fudge hadn't given up on his idea of starting a Ministry school for the Purebloods, and he wanted to make it look better to prospective parents by filling it with the best of the Purebloods at Hogwarts and using Hogwarts' lessons. They all believed that Fudge's school had little chance of getting off the ground, but Amelia and the rest of the family had been heavily involved in turning Hogwarts around, which meant that she had been involved in many discussions with Minerva and the staff about the students. This gave her an idea so she had a bit of fun planting the names of most of the Pureblood students who were struggling, or who's attitude meant that they had no real hope of doing well without their results being twisted to help them in Hopkirk's head, with added digs that they were being held being back because they were Purebloods.
She had been tempted to add Ronald Fudge to that list of names, but decided that that would be too obvious, and everyone (except Fudge probably) knew that he was the bottom of the barrel anyway. Amelia had a quiet word to Griselda to ensure that the results that Hopkirk was told for those students matched the memories that she'd planted. This ruse would be uncovered if they actually checked the Examination Authority's records, but that was the beauty of it, because it was Fudge's game that they were playing here and Fudge's short sightedness and laziness meant that he would never waste time or effort on bothering to check something that they'd been told by the authority on the subject. Besides, those digs about holding them back and the courses being changed would explain the discrepancy if any of the parents had bothered paying attention to the reports that they had received about their children's performance. And for that matter, most of those Pureblood families would never believe that their children could be in any way inferior to Muggleborn or even Half-Blood children.
Amelia also left the memories of the rejected lesson plans for the subjects that they'd changed (and others) in Hopkirk's head, along with a fantasy that she had managed to get access to the files that she needed while she was at Hogwarts without McGonagall finding out. She tied this story to the names that she'd planted in Hopkirk's mind to explain how she had those names. A planted memory that the files had been spelled to prevent copying and a compulsion to write and then forget what she had 'found' would explain why it was all in her handwriting, including the list of names. That compulsion also caused her to forget much of what was said in the meeting afterwards. Amelia had plenty of time to do this, because Minerva, Augusta, Andi, Griselda, Alastor, and the other Hogwarts Board members as well, were all haranguing Hopkirk whenever she opened her mouth.
Most of the Board members ripped into Hopkirk and demanded to know why she was trying to get copies of their children's files, because none of them believed for a moment the answer she had given. Minerva and some of the Board were demanding to know why the Ministry wanted the lesson plans for the current Hogwarts courses. Minerva also demanded the justification for reviewing all the classes when only a few of them had changed substantially from what had been taught at Hogwarts for decades. Andi and Alastor waded in when Hopkirk said that she had to observe the classes for the Nobles Group, but it was Augusta who shut that down.
"No! The law that was used to send you here states that the Wizengamot, and later the Ministry, were given the authority to observe the teaching practices at new schools to ensure that the students are getting the education that they require to become capable witches and wizards. Even though Hogwarts is most definitely not a new school, we have allowed the Ministry to come to Hogwarts to review those courses that have been substantially changed in recent years. Interfering with the private tutoring group that is made up of the highest ranked and best achieving students at Hogwarts is totally outside of the scope of that law and will not be allowed!"
Hopkirk proved yet again that she wasn't too bright by trying to argue the point. "That isn't what the law says at all! The Ministry has the right to review the education of all students! You will give me access to the classes of all students at Hogwarts! And the files that I require as well!"
Minerva just sat and looked at her with an expression of marked distaste on her face for a couple of minutes, then she stood without a word and walked to the fireplace. Less than a minute later, Ted came through with a bundle of parchments in his hands.
Hopkirk didn't manage to get more than "What's that Mud..." out before Minerva cut her off viciously. "We do not allow the use of that term at Hogwarts Madam Hopkirk!"
When she had calmed herself a little, she continued. "As for what you were asking so inappropriately, Lord Tonks is the Primary Legal Representative for Hogwarts, as well as for the Noble and Most Ancient House of Potter, who are the sponsors of the private tutoring group that you are attempting to illegally interfere with..."
Griselda cut in with. "And he's the legal consultant to the Wizengamot as well!"
Minerva nodded with a little smirk to Griselda, but shot a brief glare at Alastor, because he'd snorted when she referred to Ted as Lord Tonks, no doubt remembering how she'd basically told Martin Abbott that he had no right to refer to himself as Lord because his family had held a title for barely a hundred years. With that addressed, she continued.
"As you are making false and unfounded claims as to what this law says and what rights it grants you here Madam Hopkirk, I deemed it to be in the interests of Hogwarts to bring in our legal expert. Lord Tonks, could you enlighten us as to the specifics of this law and what Ministry officials are entitled to do under its auspices please?"
Ted nodded, addressing her by her title as etiquette required when he had been addressed formally. "Most certainly Countess McGonagall. As you have requested, I have brought the original law, along with the amendments that have been approved by the Wizengamot since then….."
He went on to describe the various versions of the law to the Minerva, the Hogwarts Board, Madam Marchbanks and Hopkirk, who had made no attempt to hide that she'd stopped listening almost straight away. This pissed Ted off, so as soon as the Board had a grasp of the law and its limitations, he directed a statement at Hopkirk. "So that is why you will not go anywhere near the Nobles Group, the Hogwarts student records or the lesson plans for any Hogwarts courses unless you want to end up in Azkaban Madam Hopkirk!"
It took a while for Hopkirk to register that he'd said her name, and even longer for to dredge up what he'd said, and then she started to bluster. "You can't threaten or order about a representative Mud..."
This time it was Alastor who shut her up, by the simple mechanism of casting a silencing spell over her. When Augusta asked whether he was going to cancel the spell, Alastor glowered at Hopkirk and shook his head. "No Madam Longbottom, I am not. Yon daft witch will not listen to anyone else so long as she is able to speak herself. I do not know whether this will be enough to make her listen, but at least we will be spared having to listen to her. If she shows a real indication that she's learned something from this by tomorrow I'll consider lifting the spell then, otherwise she can stay like this."
Even those Board members who weren't aligned to the family agreed with this, because they had all found the stupid and bombastic witch to be infuriating.
Hopkirk was panicking as she stared at him, she was trying to speak but nothing was coming out. She suddenly realised that with no voice, she couldn't call for help or cast any spells, so she was trapped here at their mercy until they decided to release her, and that thought terrified her.
Ted started explaining the rules of the law that she had been sent here under again. Alastor whacked her chair to get her attention and pointed at Ted when he did, this time she paid attention to Ted, nodding frantically to say that she agreed to the conditions that he was stipulating. With that, Minerva called for Pomona to escort Hopkirk to the chambers that they had assigned to her for the duration of her visit to Hogwarts. After she had left Alastor told them that he had replaced the original silencing spell with one that would disappear overnight, and that hopefully she'd have a better attitude once she'd had time to reflect on what was said, though he doubted it.
With that, they wound up the meeting and the Hogwarts Board members departed.
As expected, Hopkirk went after Hagrid, Filius and Charity Burbage, the Muggleborn Muggle World Studies teacher, harder than anyone else, trying to find anything that the Ministry could use to demand that these half-breeds and Mudbloods be removed as teachers and banished from Hogwarts.
It surprised them that it took three months for Fudge's crowd to do anything with what they thought they had gotten out of Hopkirk's visit, but they understood when they saw the play that was made in the Wizengamot. The play that the other side made really surprised them, because it was much too clever for Fudge or his cronies to come up with, until they realised that Bagnold must have fed the strategy to them, because she certainly had the ability to come up with something like this.
That in turn led to the question of why she hadn't picked up on the discrepancies in the figures that had been fed to Hopkirk, but they decided that, while intelligent, Bagnold must be infected with the same single minded bigotry as the other Pureblood traditionalists, and therefore also blindly accepted that the only way Mudbloods and Half-Bloods would beat Purebloods was by cheating.
Minerva and all of the Hogwarts Board ensured that they were at the Wizengamot session that was called for this, because it specifically referred to deficiencies in the Hogwarts education practices. For this reason, just about every Wizengamot member who had a child at Hogwarts also made a point of attending the session.
The session started with Hopkirk and Fudge's supposed 'education experts' railing about the lack of teaching ability of the Half-breeds and Muggleborns who were employed at Hogwarts, presenting the lower scores in their classes as evidence of this (taking care to cover up the fact that they were new or revised classes that people were getting started in, or extremely difficult classes like Charms). They also claimed bias against Pureblood students, citing selected Purebloods' lower scores than others in the classes as proof of this bias. The sudden drop in Purebloods' (well, Slytherin Purebloods') scores and the improvement in other students' scores in Potions after Snape was sent to Azkaban and Slughorn was brought in to replace him was trotted out as further proof of this anti-Pureblood bias.
At the end of the presentations, Fudge called for the immediate dismissal of the Half-breed and Muggleborn teachers from Hogwarts, and the dismissal of Professor McGonagall as the architect and perpetrator of this travesty of an education system.
The Hogwarts Board members and other students' parents in the Wizengamot looked to Professor McGonagall and the Potter Alliance for the lead on how to address this, and on this point, there was no surprise in the emphatic refusal on all points. They all followed suit and the matter was summarily rejected by the Wizengamot.
This, however, was where the surprise was introduced, because Fudge stood up and said that if Pureblood students' rights to a proper education at Hogwarts would not be upheld by the Wizengamot, he called for the immediate recognition of an alternative school where the Pureblood students would be protected from the inferior teachers and anti-Pureblood bias that were currently prevalent at Hogwarts. He called for the recognition of the Pure Magic Academy and the immediate transfer of all Pureblood students from Hogwarts to the Pure Academy. He also demanded that all school fees that had been paid for these students be transferred from Hogwarts to the Pure Magic Academy.
Most of the Wizengamot was shocked when Minerva and the Potter Alliance supported what Fudge proposed, with the caveats that both the transfers would only be allowed to happen when both the students and their parents agreed for the students to be transferred to the Pure Magic Academy, and that only half of the school fees for those students would be transferred, because Hogwarts had already expended quite a bit of that money to set up for this school year with the expectation that it would be carrying the full student load for the year. Augusta, Arthur and Max Greengrass all stood and stated categorically that their children would not be going to the Pure Magic Academy and half the money was more than reasonable under the circumstances when these caveats were proposed, and more than a few of the other parents did as well.
Fudge and his camp weren't at all pleased about these caveats, but the majority of the Wizengamot agreed that they were both reasonable and in the best interests of the students, so the motion was passed with the caveats attached. Over the next week, almost half of the Pureblood and Half-Blood students left Hogwarts, but the staff, the family and most of the students were celebrating, because few of the ones who had left had been strong students, but they had been behind much of the trouble at the school.
There was an almost immediate improvement in the progress in all classes at Hogwarts, because the students who left had been holding up the rest of their classes, either through needing extra help or just causing disruptions. Strange as it was, it appeared that though the school only had two thirds of the students that it had had before the exodus of the traditional Purebloods, the number of high scores that they were expected to get in the end of year exams seemed almost certain to increase.
There was one student who remained at Hogwarts who had made the family happy, or at least it made Narcissa happy and they were happy for her. Draco had been given the choice of whether to stay at Hogwarts or go to the Pure Magic Academy, and he didn't even hesitate before saying that he wanted to stay at Hogwarts.
While all this was going on, Fleur was getting steadily bigger, luckily the Hogwarts robes had concealed her condition much more than the Beauxbatons robes would have, but in December, after the other students had left for the Pure Magic Academy, she stopped covering herself up and people started noticing that she was pregnant. There was little chance of hiding the pregnancy with her lithe frame, especially when she was carrying twins (which was yet another thing of note with the Veelas, because twins were something that had rarely been found in Veela history). Many of the girls at Hogwarts were frustrated that she would say nothing more about her husband (they'd noticed the marriage ring now) than the fact that Vicomte Flamel was the heir to one of the oldest Magical Noble families in France.
Anne was finding that her petite filles were turning everything that Veela believed to be immutable rules that defined what they were on its head. She hadn't said anything to anyone yet, but she had the strong suspicion that when Gabrielle had her bonding ritual (with the same mate as her sister and four other women), she would become an Elder Veela as well. Anne did not know what this would do to the rest of those in the bond and their familiers, but she was fairly certain that they would become even more extraordinary.
Their mother, the young man who would be all the girls' husbands and their head wife were all adamant that Gabrielle must wait until she had had a chance to mature emotionally and be able to enjoy being a teenager before they went there. Anne was of two minds about this, because on one hand she was incredibly happy that Gabrielle's new family cared about her happiness and well being so much but on the other hand, she wanted to shout at them to stop treating her as a human! She was a Veela and human rules didn't always apply to her, especially in matters such as this!
The end of term exams just before the Christmas break were already showing improved results for those who'd remained at Hogwarts, and the staff were wondering whether those at Pure had worked out what had happened yet. Minerva and Filius pointed out that they'd probably cover it up with elevated marks and test scores until they had to involve the Wizarding Examination Authority for the end of year examinations, and then it would all fall apart. Alastor derailed the agreement to their comments with a simple statement.
"Will it? I can see Fudge's cronies in the Ministry's Department of Magical Education authorising their school to do their own examinations. The only exams that they couldn't get away with that for because the ICW oversees them are the OWLs and the NEWTs, and I'm sure that they'll find a way to blame us for their failures when the results of those come out."
They all had to agree that that was a distinct possibility.
They had another event at the start of the Christmas break, because there was an attack on the estate that Amelia had slipped to Hopkirk in the meeting in Minerva's office. They had been expecting this, so Kingsley had a squad of trusted Aurors ready at all times, and they went in with a Goblin made port key (the wards blocked wizard made port keys and wizard apparation) as soon as they received an alert to say that someone was trying to interfere with the wards.
None of them could understand how Fudge thought that these dregs of wizarding society that he hired to do this could have succeeded. Sixteen Aurors port keyed in, half in front and half behind the two dozen wizards in full Death Eater regalia, and all of the supposed Death Eaters were down within about thirty seconds or so.
None of these ones were protected by any secrecy oaths though, and they quickly uncovered the fact that Fudge had set this up and gave the orders himself. The family put it down to the fact that Fudge was desperate and stupid, and they all agreed that they'd never have this good a chance to depose Fudge and replace him with Arthur again, so they went in hard.
They had had more time to build up Arthur's image than they had expected, due to Bagnold's keeping Fudge in line to support her plans. As a result of this, it had been two and a quarter years that Arthur's star had been on the rise now, and a year and a half since he really started making a name for himself with his achievements as the Head of the Department of Foreign Affairs. The fact that the vast majority of the Wizengamot had voted for him to also assume the role of Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic nine months ago could only strengthen his position. Arthur seemed to be doing something of note every nine months, so it was time for his next step.
The trial for Fudge didn't take long, as the false Death Eaters' testimonies that Fudge had specifically ordered them to go to the estate and kill Potter, Granger and everyone else they found there made it easy to get the go ahead to question Fudge under Veritaserum and it all came out. It was obvious from the way that some of the traditionalists were clamouring for Fudge to go through the Veil of Death straight away that they were afraid of what else he'd let slip if he was allowed to talk, but the family's best Legilimens were in the Wizangamot chamber, probing him for whatever was in his head.
Whenever they found anything that could be used against Fudge in the trial, they sent Amelia a message to ask the questions needed to bring it out in his testimony. They were mainly hoping to find a tangible link between him and Bagnold that they could use to deal with her, but the witch had been too clever to allow anything like that to exist, so for the most part they were just collecting clues to tell them where to look for other information.
At the end of the trial, Fudge, a few associates at the Ministry and the two dozen false Death Eaters were all sentenced to be put through the Veil of Death, everything their houses had was seized for Harry and Hermione's houses and their family names eradicated. Before anyone had a chance to call for the session to be closed, so that they could try and prepare their candidates for the Minister for Magic's role, Max Greengrass called for leave to speak.
As soon as Griselda recognised him, Max launched into his prepared spiel. "Madam Chief Witch, esteemed fellow members of the Wizengamot, we have another matter before us now that we must address as a matter of priority. We no longer have a Minister for Magic! Furthermore, after witnessing just what Minister Fudge has been doing since he was elected to the role, it appears quite obvious to me that Magical Britain is in considerable trouble and we can not afford to allow this to continue any longer than is absolutely necessary! As a member of the Wizengamot for the past several years, I have been privileged to witness an admirable wizard regaining his proper place over the past few years. We all watched as he handled the embarrassment of his ex-wife's actions being being aired in this very chamber with strength and nobility."
"We watched him accept the challenge of taking on the new Department of Foreign Affairs at the Ministry and go on to address the centuries of neglect of our relations with other races. I, for one, have certainly profited from this 'interest' that Gringotts is now offering as a result of the Department of Foreign Affairs' negotiations, and from dealings with the Muggle world, which was also negotiated by them under his direction. Then, nine months ago, this wizard also accepted another role on top of his duties as the Head of the Department of Foreign Affairs, to serve Magical Britain as the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic. From what we have seen, he appeared to have been performing many of the Minister for Magic's duties for him since then."
Max looked around the chamber. "As he is already handling many of the requirements for this role admirably, I hereby nominate Lord Arthur Weasley to formally assume the role of Minister for Magic for Magical Britain!"
They were surprised by what followed then, because before Alastor could second the nomination as planned, someone from one of the neutral factions jumped up to second it, just as a couple more from the Muggleborn factions tried to do the same. Griselda called for other nominations, but while the traditionalists scrabbled to put up a couple of names, they failed to get more than a few votes. Even the traditionalists seemed to be accepting the inevitable and jumping on the bandwagon to vote for Arthur though, because it was almost unanimous.
In the weeks that followed, Bill and Dora completed their bonding ritual and had the weddings for their two betrothal contacts, and then the Houses of Prewett and Weasley formally assigned their voting proxies to Bill's mother-in-law, Andi, because as the Minister, Arthur would not be in the position to cast their votes in many sessions.
There was another wedding that day, because Remus had finally accepted that the potions and ritual that Harry had discovered in Salazar Slytherin's notes had indeed cured him of the curse of Lycanthropy and it wasn't coming back, so he asked Narcissa to marry him. Narcissa had said "Yes!" the moment he asked and demanded that they get married before he had a chance to change his mind, so when Bill and Dora got married, they had a second ceremony that day. Even Draco came to support his mother at her wedding and appeared pleased for her.
Molly's Aunt Muriel became Ronald No-Name's new guardian after his father was put through the Veil and the name of the Family Fudge was eradicated, because Fudge's now disinherited and almost broke widow had cast him out. She had no intention of spending any of what little money she had left feeding, housing and educating her ex-husband's disgusting little bastard. They didn't know what what Ron's great aunt wanted with him, but she was granted guardianship on the understanding that he would be kept away from the rest of the family.
Even though those behind the Pure Magic Academy wouldn't admit that it wasn't a patch on Hogwarts, many of the students and their parents had already determined that by the time they brought Fudge down, and Minerva had had quite a few of the parents of the ones who had transferred there contacting her to demand that their children be allowed to return to Hogwarts.
These demands were easily addressed by a rule in the Hogwarts Charter that explicitly stated that when a student left Hogwarts, they would not be allowed to return until the next school year. There was another requirement attached to this, for a separate rule in the Charter to be enacted in these circumstances. This rule required the majority of the Founders' (or the Druid's Council if the Founders were at a stalemate) agreement to allow a prospective student's entry into Hogwarts.
Merlin told them that this had been decided when Hogwarts Charter was being written to give them a mechanism to refuse entry to anyone who was deemed to be a potential threat to Hogwarts, its students or the aims of the Druids' Council. It was agreed that the Hogwarts Board and the Wizengamot could take the place of the Founders and the Druids' Council.
This was important, because they had no intention of ever letting most of the students who had gone to the Pure Magic Academy back into Hogwarts. Most of them were beyond redemption, as their parents' foul teachings were too deeply engrained and they lacked the strength of will or character to throw them off. There was no way that they were letting that kind of corruption back into Hogwarts, if they could learn the skills they desired in their school, so be it, but they would not get them from Hogwarts.
Very unpleasant section begins.
Those students were part of the world that believed what Molly No-name had done to her daughter was acceptable, and none of them wanted any part of that world to touch Hogwarts again if they could prevent it. The mind healers at St Mungo's had eventually extracted what had been done to Ginny Prewett (Charlie had accepted her back into the Prewett family when Arthur became her guardian) from her memories, and they were sickened by what they found.
Molly had not only fed Ginny stories about Harry Potter and how they were fated to be together from when she was a toddler, she had been conditioning her to do whatever she needed to do the ensnare him from when she was seven or eight. Ginny had been forced to practice this with boys that her mother brought in, and her half brother Ronald, and she had lost her innocence and virginity before she was ten. All the while, Molly kept telling her that she had to be very good at this if she wanted to have Harry Potter because all the other girls wanted him as well, so she had to make sure that she was better than all of them.
When Amelia heard this, she had her daughter's memories of what had been done to her inserted into Molly No-Name's head and ordered that the magic suppression be turned on permanently for her Red Letter mark. That foul creature deserved death for what she had done to her daughter, but they couldn't get that ordered without dragging Ginny through everything that was done to her and further harming her, so the best retribution that they could enforce on Molly was to make her live out her miserable existence in Azkaban, with those memories, the Dementors, no magic and a constantly burning mark. It had been bad enough for Amelia to hear that in the last cycle, a sweet girl like Dora had become hardened and accustomed to having sex with men who expected it after she left Hogwarts, hearing that Ginny had been forced down that path before she had even started Hogwarts broke her heart.
It took the mind healers over nine months of intensive work to scrub all of what had been done to her from Ginny's memories, replacing them with memories of a more normal, acceptable and happier childhood. They allowed the less traumatic memories of what happened while she was with her father to remain, to provide the basis of an explanation for what happened later. When they were confident that the new memories had taken and she would be OK, Ginny started back at Hogwarts, taking up her studies at the same place she'd been when she had been expelled a year before. Only the Nobles group, Madame Maxime and some of the staff knew what had happened to Ginny, or what she'd done to be expelled. Harry and Hermione, as the heirs to all four Founders, approved her return to Hogwarts to keep her story from anyone else.
Though she wasn't made part of the Nobles Group, they took her under their wing, much like they had Padma's twin Parvati. The twins used the excuse that she was their half-sister to include her whenever they could, and the few boys who were still at Hogwarts who wanted to take up with her where they had left off before she was expelled very quickly got the message from all of the Nobles Group that Ginny Prewett was untouchable, and they would be hurt if they tried anything with her. The other students were also warned that taunting Ginny about anything had happened previously would result in punishment.
They realised that this also explained why Ronald had turned out the way he did to a degree, but it was agreed that he was incorrigible, from Ginny's memories he had believed that it was his right to do those things to his half-sister, and their experience with him showed that in his mind the same thing now applied to any other girls that he wanted. No, Ronald Fudge would not be allowed to set foot in Hogwarts again, and he certainly would not be allowed anywhere near Ginny or the other girls. If he tried anything with any of them, they would destroy him. They removed his memories of what had happened with Ginny and left him in his world, they also did the same with the other boys involved that they could locate.
Very unpleasant section ends.
Because there was no way most of the students of the Pure Magic Academy would be getting back into Hogwarts, Beauxbatons was closed to them and many of the didn't make the grade for Durmstrang (it may have shared the Pureblood philosophy, but it would not accept students who could not add to the glory of Durmstrang), the Pure Magic Academy had to stay open. The traditionalists weren't at all happy that they were locked into supporting a school that had proven to be as second rate as they had originally suspected it would be, and they weren't sure how they'd been conned into agreeing to support the creation of this school in the first place.
They had accepted the evidence and proposals that Fudge had presented because they knew that Fudge wasn't capable of making that up, so they took them to be real. What they were seeing after just a month of operation though was that they were supporting a second rate school being run out of an old mansion, where their children were not learning anything. What many of them were hanging onto was the belief that their children would be returning to Hogwarts to get a proper education again in the new school year. Of course, most of them were fated to be in for major disappointments when they approached Hogwarts over the Summer break.
Her advancing pregnancy was slowing Fleur down more and more as she worked on her studies through January, February and March, but the twins' delivery came relatively easily to her. She was a year younger than Hermione had been when she had her son, but thanks to her Veela heritage, she was more developed, so it was easier for her than it had been for Hermione. Hermione was only half joking when she pointedly said that having her babies a few months before her NEWTs instead of a few months after her NEWTs was also much easier for her.
Harry, Hermione, Fleur, Penny and Hagrid all did the last of their NEWTs in nineteen ninety four. Harry was thirteen, Hermione was fourteen, Fleur was seventeen, Penny was eighteen, and Hagrid was in his mid sixties, but he was no less excited than the teenagers. They would all be staying on to work on their masteries the next school year (and Hagrid was teaching, of course).
The other fourteen had all done the NEWTs for most of their core subjects and easiest electives. Penny and some of the others were having a hard time not feeling too inadequate when Gabi and Tori, at twelve, got results that were as good or better than their's, but they were none the less happy to celebrate their achievements.
Once the ninety three, ninety four school year finished, the expected deluge of demands for the Pure Magic Academy students to return to Hogwarts commenced. One of the criteria for sitting on the Hogwarts Board was to have a child currently enrolled at Hogwarts (an interesting caveat on this being that once a child started at Hogwarts, they were enrolled for eight years unless they were expelled or transferred elsewhere, this had been written into the rules to allow for advanced students who were remaining at Hogwarts while they were studying for their masteries), so none of the traditionalist Pureblood families held a seat on the Board any more. For this reason, it was a simple matter for the Hogwarts Board to reject most of these requests immediately.
The only requests which received any real consideration were from families who claimed that they had been pressured into sending their children to the Pure Magic Academy, and of these, only a dozen families managed to convince the Board with proof of this and got their children back into Hogwarts. It was no coincidence that these were the Wizengamot members who had abandoned the traditionalist factions and joined the neutral factions in the Wizengamot as soon as Fudge had been arrested and it appeared to be safe to do so without repercussions for their families.
This was a further blow to the Pure Magic Academy, because those fifteen students had been among the best and brightest at the school, and most of the rest of the cream of the crop were transferring to Durmstrang, because they could manage to get in there. The people running the Pure Magic Academy were being threatened to improve the quality of the education being offered by the time classes started in September or else by the parents who had been forced to accept that their children would have to remain at the school, and they couldn't run because they were being watched by the parents.
These same parents were enraged when they were hit up for sizeable 'donations' to improve the facilities at the school, and then had to pay four or five times what the school fees had cost them at Hogwarts because there were so fewer students at the Academy and it didn't have the funds behind it to soak up some of the costs like Hogwarts did.
Between the debacle of their Pureblood school, and the fact that they had lost both their figurehead, and their influence in the Ministry when Fudge was arrested and put through the Veil of Death for ordering the attack on Harry and the others, the traditionalists were not having a good time of it.