Title: Harry Potter: Four In One
Author: Joshua
Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling created Harry James Potter, Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Hogwarts, the whole gosh-darn HP-universe and wrote the 7 "Harry Potter" books that we all love and enjoy. Spoilers for Book 1, and Book 7. In fact there may even be some direct quotes from Book 7, so be warned. I'm not writing this for profit, I may not even let anybody but my dearest and closest friends even read this and they'll get it for free, so thankfully this won't get me sued or anything. Everything AFTER Chapter Nine in Book 7 is going to be changed anyway and even those chapters that I do quote, they won't be quoted very well or for very long as I'm changing EVERYTHING after those points. Assume, for Wizard-Harry, that everything between the stated timelines in Book 1 and Book 7 is identical to what happened in the rest of the Books and the HP-universe. Tamora Pierce is the awesome author of the "Circle of Magic" books that 'Mage-Harry' is taken from, and of course I don't own Winding Circle nor the concepts of Academic and Ambient Magic. Any future Spy-Magic you might see is going to be exactly like the Battle Magic so far, an amalgamation of numerous sources that might not even be 'magic' on their own, but have been twisted in such a way by me. You have been warned.
Summary: A mysterious stranger interferes in the timeline and in Harry's life, splitting the young wizard into four and giving each a different magical education. Wizard, Warrior, Mage, and Spy.
Story:
Next Morning
The Burrow
Molly Weasley was working the day away in her new modernized everything-a-witch-could-ever-desire kitchen, mostly just trying not to linger on the fact that all of her children were in mortal danger every single second of the day. And what made it worse, all of them had left the nest. So to speak.
It had been a week since the wedding, since Harry faced off against... against You-Know-Who and his army, since he'd turned them away and defended their home, and it had been a week since he'd taken Ron, Ginny, and Hermione with him on some fool's errand, and saying something about having to go into hiding. If she weren't so scared for them, she'd almost be proud of the boy she thought of as another son. And if she weren't so proud of him, she'd probably wring his neck from being so angry at him.
It had also been a week of hell for those in the Order of the Phoenix. The leaders, Mad-Eye especially, had likewise gone into hiding, but everybody else had to start watching their toes in almost everything they did. A day after the wedding, the wards around the Burrow were reinforced back to what they should be, and the wards Harry had left in place had expanded so they could take the place of all that reinforcement if ever needed. That was the good news.
The worst of it wasn't that they were in hiding, or even the constant fear and uncertainty about the future. The worst of it were all the new laws being passed and what they meant. Arthur and the children were safe. Well, as safe as they could be, but at least they were ever last one of them a registered "Pureblood" by the new Ministry. Even she herself was "safe" by that law. And thankfully they couldn't go around and start gathering all of the "blood traitors" the same way they were even now gathering the "impure" from the magical population. That was just the first, and worst of it all.
Oh, if only Harry hadn't run off with Ginny, then they might have a chance at saving her at least...
"Hi, Mrs. Weasley," Harry said from behind her.
"Hello d—Harry!" she spun on the spot, her eyes wide with panic, until she saw that it was just his head sticking out of the Floo instead of him standing right behind her, but it was almost the same in many ways. "What are you doing?! We're being watched and that most certainly means that our Floo connection is being monitored as well! Are you trying to get caught?"
"Don't worry, don't worry Mrs. Weasley," he chuckled. "I wouldn't have even tried this if I didn't have protections in place. Provided neither of us says the V word. Still working on protecting against a Taboo... Anyway, how are you? How are things?"
"Well how do you think things are?" she only just prevented herself from bursting out into tears. "All my children are gone, there's a chance any of them could be killed any day now, we've lost the war..."
"We haven't lost the war," Harry sharply corrected. "The other side simply won a battle. The war isn't over by a long shot. As for your children, Hermione and I included, we're as safe as we can be, I promise you that. Which also brings up the primary issue I'm calling about."
"Has something happened to...?" she gasped.
"Nothing has happened," he assured her. "But Ron has a very good excuse for not going to Hogwarts, and in fact not being seen anywhere by anyone. The excuse that Ginny is being shipped back and forth between her brothers will only fly for so long, however. So, we've worked out something that should take care of that."
As soon as he said this, the door to the yard opened and before the Weasley matriarch's eyes in walked her only daughter. "Oh Ginny!" she squealed and raced forward to embrace the young girl.
"Uh..." Harry winced as he watched his transfigured copy get squeezed by one of Molly Weasley's infamous 'Hugs of Death' and tried to interrupt long enough to say, "Mrs. Weasley? Mrs. Weasley. Molly! That's not Ginny. That's one of my... er, that's a Copy of Ginny."
"What? But..." the overwrought woman looked back and forth between the Floo and her 'daughter'.
"Let me explain," Harry said to her.
"What is the meaning of this?!" Mrs. Weasley finally shouted.
"It's our plan. Ginny, or rather this Ginny will stay with you until September 1st when you and Arthur will take this Ginny to the Hogwarts Express at Kings Cross Station. She'll get on board the Express and everybody will see her, a few people will even speak with her. Sometime between the Food Cart distributing snacks and the arrival at Hogsmeade station, this Ginny will dispel herself and that begins the real plan."
"What plan? This... you aren't really Ginny?" Mrs. Weasley was still looking back and forth between.
The Ginny-Copy shrugged sheepishly and grinned in more a 'embarrassed-Harry' manner than anything like how Ginny would act, and said, "Sorry about this, Mrs. Weasley. Oops. I mean, well, I guess I'd better start calling you 'mom' until it's time."
"Time? Time for what? What is this plan?" Mrs. Weasley demanded to know.
"Until it's time for me to disappear," the Ginny-Copy answered.
"And the plan is for the Death Eaters to blame each other for kidnapping her," Harry also answered.
"What? Ginny's been kidnapped!!"
Harry sighed.
The Ginny-Copy sympathetically shrugged at the wizard in the fire, then went about calming Mrs. Weasley down and then sitting her in front of the fire so Harry could properly explain. "No. Ginny has not been kidnapped, and she actually won't be kidnapped either. But. When everyone sees Ginny board the train and then not get off the train, the logical conclusion is that somebody got her off the train in between. That's only possible for fully trained or specially trained wizards, such as Aurors, Death Eaters, or somebody in the Magical Transportation Department."
"I don't understand," Molly was shaking her head.
"Ginny is my girlfriend Mrs. Weasley. At the end of school last year, or rather a few months ago, we started openly dating, and while it was only for a month and a half, pretty much all of Hogwarts knows that we were dating. And it wasn't a single, first and last date either. Even when I 'broke up' with Ginny after Dumbledore's funeral, she was and is still a target because of association with me. Just as much as Ron and Hermione are. That's why Ginny came with us instead of staying behind."
"Oh." She was clearly overwhelmed, but Harry didn't have the time to call back later to finish this.
"If Ginny disappears in a way that the only explanation is that somebody took her from the Hogwarts Express with advanced magic, there are only three suspects. The Death Eaters. The Order of the Phoenix. Or me. I'm in hiding and when you take 'Ginny' here shopping for her school supplies in a couple days, everyone will 'know' that I left her behind, like they 'know' Ron is sick with an incurable disease. With me?" he asked.
She nodded her head, her eyes focusing just a bit, but still a bit in shock.
"Good. In me leaving her behind, it will momentarily reinforce that we broke up and she's going back to Hogwarts while I'm still in hiding. Then, everybody sees her board the Hogwarts Express. They'll see it with their own eyes. She'll speak to several people on the train, remaining in public sight at all times and will not drink anything so that nobody can blame it on Polyjuice potion or anything like that. Then, maybe an hour, maybe a few minutes out from Hogsmeade, she disappears."
"With the only possible explanation being that she was magicked away by somebody else," Mrs. Weasley repeated his earlier words, receiving a nod from Harry.
"Right. Here's the thing though; who would want to kidnap Ginny Weasley? While they can't make it as illegal as being a Death Eater used to be, it is known that the Weasley family were all members of the Order of the Phoenix. If the Order did not want Ginny to go to Hogwarts this year, they wouldn't have let her get on the train in the first place. So the Order has no logical reason to kidnap her from the train, even if they have the means. As for me... well, I'm in hiding and I broke up with her. I know she's going to Hogwarts, but if I broke up with her, why would I kidnap her from the train? Also, there's the question if I, while in hiding, even have the means of doing it in the first place."
"Then, we have the Death Eaters, aka the 'new' Ministry of Magic. Every single last one of them has both the motive, the means, and the reason to kidnap Ginny Weasley. Because every single last one of them is hunting me down and the best way to catch anything is with bait. Part of the Death Eater mindset is even if we did break up, I'm a 'goody-goody' and will want to save her. Another thing about Death Eaters, they really don't trust each other. When they realize that a girl that could be used as collateral for capturing Harry Potter has been kidnapped, they'll wonder why it was done, then they'll start to wonder who could have done it, followed very shortly by who did it. And when each single Death Eater realizes that he, or she, did not kidnap her, it must have been one of their fellow Death Eaters."
Mrs. Weasley's eyes suddenly lit up with understanding. "Then they'll start to ask around, then argue, and it may even lead to outright accusations, furthering the divide between them. Oh, that's brilliant Harry!"
"Except about the part where it involves my daughter," she growled at his head in the Floo.
"She's safer with me than at Hogwarts, as while it might not be done on the train, it might eventually be done that some Death Eater really does kidnap her to draw, if not me, then somebody from the Order out. Hence, the Copy," he gestured for the Ginny-Copy still sitting next to her.
"I could have explained all this in a letter sent with Hedwig, like those notes from last night were," he pointed out. "Still, I felt it was better to do this face-to-face. So you understand. Ideally, I'd rather be off on my own, but your children, and Hermione, have made the choice to join me, and I'm not about to imbue my will over theirs. Neither should you. Unfortunately..."
"Yes?" she asked, getting nervous rather suddenly.
"Unfortunately, the atmosphere is getting rather heated. And I'm not talking about the fireplace. The political climate and general attitude in the Wizarding World at the moment is like a wand charged to fire an Exploding Curse. We can't maintain regular communications, but Ron and Ginny promise to write when they can, and when it's possible, I'll try and set up face-to-face meetings, but that's going to be rare. I'm taking a rather large risk using the Floo as it is, as it's still a Ministry controlled service, even if I managed to hi-jack a single connection, it took a lot of power."
"Well, put my babies on the Floo right now then, I want to talk to them!" she demanded.
Harry sighed again. "Unfortunately, that's not how this works, and you know it, Mrs. Weasley. To do that, I'd have to sever this connection and then set up a full-body Floo transfer, or another two head-transfers. Any one of which would require more resources than you are aware of. I'm sorry. I'll have Hedwig deliver some letters tonight." Suddenly, he jerked his head as though hearing a sound that no one else could. "Damn, that was fast. Sorry, Mrs. Weasley. Gotta go!" And with that, and a swirl of green flame, he was gone.
She couldn't believe it. Just like that, they were so close to her, she could have spoken with them, and then they were just... gone. Again. She broke down crying right there in her kitchen. She pulled the false-daughter close to her, not caring that it wasn't her real flesh and blood, instead a bit of magically-empowered shadow, but still... Like a toddler holding a teddy bear close, Molly Weasley openly cried to the Ginny-Copy.
12 Grimmauld Place
One Minute Later
'I am never doing that again, no matter how much, or who, begs me!' Harry thought to himself as he pulled his head out of the fireplace and turned back to the kitchen to face his friends.
"Next time, I am not doing that, understood?" he growled.
"Thanks mate," Ron sincerely spoke. "I don't think any of us could have actually pulled it off there."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. I should make it a requirement of your training," he complained. "No cool spells until each one of you faces down an upset Molly Weasley."
All three teens' eyes went wide with open terror. Ron said, "Cold. That's cold, man."
"Live with it," he snapped back.
"Well, at least that's over with," Ginny quickly tried to change the subject. "Now we just have to deal with where we're going to find out what's going on, and how we're doing it. And while it's great learning a useful spell, none of us are good enough to keep it going for long. Certainly not to the degree where we could be seen in public without worrying about somebody seeing and recognizing us."
"Which is exactly why Hermione stole Moody's supply of Polyjuice potion, which all of you will be using in turn. And it just so happens..." he brought up his hand and held between his fingers were three individual hairs. One brunette, one blond, and one black. "Don't ask me how, but these are hairs from Andromeda Tonks, Luna Lovegood, and Viktor Krum. Hermione, got the flasks?" She nodded and held them up, each holding 10 oz. of untouched Polyjuice potion.
One by one, Harry dropped each hair into each flask, saying, "Now, a single swallow of the potion keeps you changed for one hour. So, no matter how bad it tastes, so long as you keep this flask with you, and take another sip just before your hour is up, you won't change back and the clock starts anew. Everybody has a watch with them? Good. We'll walk out the front door and Disapparate to different locations and meet back here around lunchtime. Maybe a little later. If, and I stress if one of use gets found out, captured, or winds up in a sticky situation, I'll take care of it, and everybody else just come straight back here, all right?"
"Are you sure, Harry?" Hermione hesitated to ask. "I mean, surely there's greater strength in numbers..."
"In battle, yes, undoubtedly. When you're trying to remain hidden and you don't want anybody to know who you are, what you're doing, or where you're going, it's best to remain alone and the fewer involved, the easier it is to handle." Harry explained.
"Now," he handed a specific flask to each of them, "Ron, you'll be Krum, cause there is no way in hell I'm letting you be a girl for any reason whatsoever. Therefore, you're going to Diagon Alley and just hang out and see what it's like to be a celebrity for once. I give you two hours tops."
"How come I have to come back so soon?" Ron whined.
"No, you can stay in the Alley as long as you want, and for however long you have potion. I give you two hours before you're crawling back thanking Merlin that you're not a celebrity yourself," he answered with a laugh. "Trust me mate, it's not all it's cracked up to be."
"Yeah right," Ron scoffed, but still looked a bit less eager than before.
"Hermione, while I would love to give you a lesson in why Luna is the way that she is, now is neither the time nor the place for such. Mrs. Tonks is known to visit Diagon Alley, the Leaky Cauldron, and ironically enough, Tonks once told me that she sometimes visits the Ministry just to see her daughter. It's up to you where you go, but if you're going into the Ministry, please tell me ahead of time so I can go with you as either Tonks, or some other Ministry employee."
"How am I supposed to do that?" she asked. "We're going to be in disguise, and knowing you, you're going to be changing your disguise every few minutes!"
"Simple," Harry shrugged, then brought out a device that had never before been seen in the Wizarding World. Ever. "Just call me before you head there, I'll meet up with you, then we'll go, OK?"
Hermione reached out, unable to believe it, even as she took the device from Harry's hand.
"Harry," she whispered, "where did you get a cell phone? And how is it even working? Doesn't magic make electrical things go haywire?"
Harry rolled his eyes. "To answer your first question, I actually conjured the physical cell phone. But the calling plan that allows it to work cost a nasty knut or two. Suffice it to say, just hit 'Send' and it will auto-dial my own calling device and it works as good as advertised, I can promise you that. As for the latter... we're in downtown London, Hermione, not at Hogwarts anymore. While there's more ambient magic indoors than out at the moment, it's not nearly enough to truly bother electricity on the scale that Hogwarts does."
"Oh," was all she could say to that. "Aren't cell phones extremely expensive, though?"
Harry shrugged. "Not really. Just have to know who to talk to. The American companies have really started to mass produce them in recent years, not to mention miniaturizing them with each new generation. But I found one or two British companies that were willing to help me out with that. Look, don't worry. It's not like the Ministry is going to finally catch a clue and start tracing my money through muggle companies and such."
Finally, Hermione relaxed and accepted the gift for what it was and pocketed the phone.
"What's a cell phone?" Ron asked, him and Ginny with looks of utter perplexity on their faces.
Harry chuckled and briefly explained as they finished getting ready for their day out. After he explained cell phones, in very general terms using lots of wizard and magic based comparisons, he snapped his fingers and then held out the last flask of Polyjuice potion.
"Almost forgot there, Ginny, you'll of course be going as Luna. I would suggest not going back to Ottery St. Catchpole, even if people wouldn't really notice a Luna that doesn't behave as she usually does," he said.
"Actually, it would probably be a good idea for me to go to Diagon Alley and the Leaky Cauldron instead of Ron. Ron can go to Hogsmeade or Knockturn Alley and still get his lesson, I'm sure," she teased her brother. He glared at her, but she just stuck her tongue out at him.
"No, actually, I'm the one that'll be going just about everywhere else. Just... everyone try and go only places where these people themselves would go on a normal day. Well, a normal day considering the political climate that we're facing right now," he trailed off. "Anyway, I'm pretty much going to be teleporting all over the country, but like I explained to Hermione, just keep your eyes open and keep your wits about you and this will be like any other day going out. Don't forget to pick up every bit of news you can. Hermione, get as many newspapers and books and other tidbits as you can. Ginny, be sure to pick up every issue of the Quibbler that you can, and Ron... don't get caught, and remember to take your potion every hour, on the hour."
"All right, all right, you don't have to keep reminding me!" Ron exclaimed. "I'm not stupid you know!"
Then he looked around at their things and stared for a minute or two. "Uh, which one is mine, and where am I going again?" It was all the rest of them could do to keep from laughing.
Hogwarts
Headmaster's Office
Professor Severus Snape sat back in the big chair. It had been a long time coming, and while he regretted the means with which it had been obtained, it was extremely satisfying to finally be on the other side of the Headmaster's desk. He'd taken out most of the old man's trinkets, keeping only a few things. Fawkes, the phoenix had disappeared the day of the funeral taking it's perch with it. There were also the Portraits.
That was the real kicker however. The man was dead, he was in the Dark Lord's good graces and given actual responsibility, actual power. He had effectively gotten away with murder and even been rewarded for it and was now the Headmaster of Hogwarts... and he was still taking orders from Dumbledore!
Not that he really had to complain about much, the man was bloody mad brilliant, and at least the Portrait didn't go on and on about lemon drops every five seconds. Still got a bit pushy when it came to completing the man's final plans though.
"Is something troubling you Severus?"
"Not at all, Headmaster, what gives you the idea that something would be troubling me?" he sneered.
"Well, much as I appreciate the compliment, aren't you supposed to be the Headmaster now?" a voice he thought would be long behind him by now said in place of Dumbledore's elder drawl.
Spinning around abruptly, he raised his wand and aimed it at the one person that he didn't expect to see back at Hogwarts. Ever again.
"Potter!" Snape snarled at the tall, dark-haired, green-eyed wizard. "What are you doing here?"
The youth actually had the gall to shrug and smile at him. "Could ask you the same question, but I already know the answer to mine. The answer to yours, unfortunately, is that I need to talk to you, and get some answers. Dumbledore was good, I'll give him that. He had something over you that kept you loyal to him despite absolutely everything. I also was with him, in private, in public, and in passing, and. I was there when he died. I would say, when you killed him, but that's not entirely correct, is it?"
"What are you blathering on about now, Potter?" said Snape, while privately very glad that he managed to keep up his sneering disposition. It was something he had perfected over the years, being able to hide his thoughts and emotions from both magic, and his face.
Walking forward until he was in front of the desk, despite Snape still standing behind it pointing his wand at him, Harry stared at the new Headmaster for a minute, then he smiled again, and sat down in one of the chairs in front of the desk of course, but it was the fact that he was still smiling even as he had a wand pointed in his face that put Snape even more on edge.
"You know, I could capture you, or even just report your whereabouts and put myself in even more favor with the Dark Lord," Snape threatened, hoping to get a better reaction out of the boy.
"Please do, I'm really looking forward to our next rematch," Harry grinned. "Also, there are no students here yet, so the only thing I really have to protect is the castle from damage, and that's easy enough to do. Sides, I've got a bet going on with myself, about just how much of a coward Moldy Shorts really is. And who do you think you're kidding anyway? If you were going to turn me in, at all, you would've done it ten times over by now. Since you haven't, I now know you're just as much Dumbledore's man as I was."
Scoffing, Snape lowered and put away his wand, and sat back down in his chair. The big chair, the Headmaster's seat. That's right, he had the power here, he just needed the reminder. "What are you doing here, Potter? Do you realize the risk you're taking, just by being in my presence? After everything..."
"Yeah, I hadn't expected Big V to actually allow the Death Eaters to go on with their plan to take over the Ministry," Harry frowned, although it was more of embarrassment than anything else. "Why do you think it was that I made such a show when I fought him? If I could've done all that, single-handedly, don't you think I also could've gotten myself, and all of my guard away, completely undetected by the Dork Lord or any of the other poofters on broomsticks out there that day? I wanted to get him obsessed with me. So obsessed that he would spend every single waking hour having his Death Eaters hunt me down and not getting a wink of sleep."
"Well, sorry to disappoint you, but the plans of children are hardly foolproof. The Dark Lord saw through such a petty means of challenging him and decided to up the schedule, so to speak. He lead the raid on the Ministry himself, and the first task, after ensuring control was to gather a fighting force strong enough to hunt you down no matter where you go."
"Oh," Harry grimaced at that. Shoulda seen that one coming.
"Where have you been hiding yourself, by the way?" Snape asked.
"Tore down the Fidelius and put up a new one, made myself Secret-Keeper," he answered.
"You mean...?" Snape's eyes went wide. Harry just nodded.
"Clever," the man complimented him. For probably the first time in like... ever.
Harry let it pass, and moved on. "Now, what I'm doing here, as I said, is looking for answers. And a couple of other things, but I want you to tell me everything you know, then we'll move on to Dumbledore's Portrait over there. For starters; what does he have over you that makes you this loyal?"
"What makes you think I owe you anything, Potter, let alone answers?" Snape shouted at him.
Harry just stared at him until he finally broke. They spoke for over half an hour, Snape finally admitting to the truth, and giving Harry a perspective he'd never been granted before, of both his Potions Professor, his mother, and his father and the man's friends. He also learned the details of what Dumbledore had Snape doing all of these years, both as spy and in other regards. Finally, Snape woke up Dumbledore's Portrait.
"Hm...? Harry? What are you doing here?" the Portrait of Dumbledore mumbled as it woke up.
Sighing, Harry slowly turned from Snape to the Portrait and answered, "I'm here to get some answers, Professor. As Phineas might, or might not have told you, I have been speaking with him about the current situation of things. As well as Mrs. Black to get a better picture of what is going through most of the Purebloods' minds right now. I've got to say, I think I've figured out most of what your plan was, Albus, and it's really rather brilliant when you start to peel back the layers."
"What are you blathering on about?" Snape asked, rather exasperated by this point.
"Well, let's go back to the beginning, shall we?" Harry sat back and propped his feet up on the desk.
"I don't suppose you know this yet, or maybe you do, Professor, but Rita Skeeter is writing your biography. Seems she found one or two people that knew a few things about your past that not everyone did. Oh, everyone knows about your tenure at Hogwarts, and how you fought and defeated the Dark Lord Grindelwald and your fabulous, fabulous career. Seems there's even more to your past however. Such as whatever it was that you were seeing the night you died, while you drank a potion crafted and brewed by Riddle himself."
"Harry, I..." the Portrait tried to say something.
"No, no, no, it doesn't even matter, really. The past is the past. But things really begin with the fact that your career didn't even really start until after you fought Grindelwald. Before then, you went to Hogwarts, you went on record, on record that you planned to go on a grand tour of all of magical Europe. Only, after you graduated... you didn't go. Public record shows you just went home instead. Then Grindelwald left the North to come to England, he openly challenged you several times during his attacks. Finally, you fought him, and then you come to Hogwarts as the Transfiguration Professor in the very early half of the century. Then, you're sent to collect a new student, and orphan named Tom Marvolo Riddle."
Harry frowned when he saw the Portrait struggling to stay aware of the conversation, but Snape was paying very close attention. Turning to his former Potions Professor, he continued, "As Dumbledore showed me in our... private lessons, Tom came to Hogwarts and quickly gathered his Death Eaters, released Slytherin's creature and played at being the Heir of Slytherin, then graduated a year or two before Dumbledore became famous for finally defeating Grindelwald in 1945. Over the next few years, Riddle worked in Knockturn Alley, then, very abruptly, Tom Marvolo Riddle disappeared... and ten years later, Lord Voldemort appeared with his Knights of Walpurgis, his Death Eaters and some people suspected that he'd been trained or was the heir of the last Dark Lord, Grindelwald. He was actually something much worse, as we all know."
"Wizards are fascinating creatures really," Harry suddenly stood up and started pacing the office, growing agitated. "I mean really, the power to control and use magic, to make anything they desire happen with just a bit of concentration and a flick of a wand. And they're the biggest herd of sheep in England. Even those in charge are just in doing what the 'law' tells them to do, and those that don't follow the law, well they're worse than sheep as they just do whatever the hell they feel like."
"So, the Dark Lord starts gathering followers, those that agree with him, those that want his power, or even just a piece of it, and the sheep that swell the ranks and are just plain too stupid and fearful to do anything else but follow along. I mean, really, how long can anyone keep an Imperius going for anyway? It would need to be reapplied daily, as sleep allows the subconscious mind to rise up and fight off the control. Unless there really is some kind of Death Eater boot camp out there, it's not very likely that everyone that had been under the Imperius curse back then stayed under the Imperius curse for any much longer than they were useful."
"And we come to the crux of it, as that means everyone claiming to be under Imperius, and was following along with the Death Eaters for more than a few weeks at the most, had to fall into the other groups. Wanting power, and fearing the Dark Lord's too much to do anything else. You never really planned to have me stop him until after he'd taken over, did you?" he directed the question to the Portrait.
"It was the only way," came the tired reply.
Harry nodded. "Wizards are sheep, but even sheep eventually get tired of being pinned in too much if the wolves are in there with them. Which is why I was given my choice," he whispered to himself.
"What are you doing here, Harry?" the Portrait asked yet again. "Besides seeking answers that is."
"I'm changing the plan," he answered.
"What?" both man and Portrait asked in unison, shocked.
"Tommy-boy has gotten too big for his britches, he never should have been allowed to get as powerful as he is. Not without someone or something to keep him in check. In your efforts to change the world for the better, Dumbledore, you've allowed him to become the defacto ruler of Magical Britain! If you thought Hitler with Grindelwald was bad, just killing muggles, gypsies, and Jews, how bad do you think Moldy Wart is going to make it with the way he and his followers ridicule those that are still magical? Muggle-born, half-bloods, and blood traitors? I'm not about to let that happen!"
"And what, exactly, do you think you can do about that, Potter?" Snape snarled.
"Killing him, or even getting him to kill himself is not enough," Harry answered, still pacing, but sounding more introspective than angry as he'd been before. "And getting him pissed enough to come at me with everything that he has will take too long, and too many lives. Which means, getting him to be a bad enough leader that everyone hates him, even his most loyal supporters, without raising the death toll in the slightest. Not a coupe, not a revolution, not even an uprising. We need an evolution."
"What? What does that even mean?" Snape asked, utterly confused.
The Portrait of Dumbledore let out and audible sigh. "I had been hoping for so many years for such a thing, Harry. If you can evoke such a change in the people, I would wish you all the power to do so, but I cannot see how it would even be possible..."
"Simple," Harry told them as though he were merely reciting factual text in the classroom, "You start with the youngest and teach at least three full generations how to live better lives as better people. Just so we're clear, that means a full one hundred years, with no less than fifteen fully graduated classes all taught the better way. But that's if we were to start over. Which is what your plan had us doing, Dumbledore. My plan is different. Not better, but different. And faster."
"Oh, and just what is your faster plan?" asked Snape.
"Start with one, and spawn the rest," came the straightforward reply.
"What?" they both repeated again.
He hesitated, which was clearly noticed by both of his former teachers. When he finally spoke again, it was with a resigned tone to it instead of the same factual recitation he'd been speaking with so far.
"I will make myself into the Magical world's Savior, and then purge out the bad elements and make it so everyone follows my example directly," Harry explained.
"You arrogant, little—" Snape started to insult him, only to find himself across the room, held a full foot off the ground by Potter's hand, which happened to be around his throat. The boy didn't even look like he was trying, just really, really, really annoyed.
"I am not my father, Severus," he said quietly. "If anything, I am my mother's son. I just happen to have my father's dashing good looks. But I will not have you insult my mother by calling me 'arrogant' anymore, all right? Given what she had to deal with, growing up and going to school, and what I've been through myself in my own lives—life, I know that neither she, nor I, were ever at any point in our lives, arrogant about anything at all. If anything, I have a bit of an inferiority complex, no thanks to you and your lot of Slytherin trash."
Continuing to hold the older man up against the wall by his throat, Harry continued to speak, only allowing the man enough room to breathe as he explained. "Saviors are not heroes, they're not celebrities, or glory hounds, or even all that popular, Professor Snape. Saviors are martyrs. They give up absolutely every single thing they have to become something needed for everyone else. Sometimes it's an image or an icon, sometimes it's a sacrifice, literally giving up their life so that countless others may live theirs."
"When I say that I'm going to become the Magical world's Savior, I mean that I am going to give up my normal life to make sure that every witch and wizard in the world can have their own normal life. I'm not about to actually have the gall and try and sacrifice myself against Riddle, weakling that he is. I might as well just commit myself to personally killing every dark wizard and witch on the planet to save time and effort. What I'm actually going to do is become an icon, a symbol. Something pure and untouchable that will make every single magical creature of the world wish to emulate me and look to me as an example. Think about it for a second."
"Right now, the Death Eaters are the wolves, and You-Know-Who is the Alpha of the pack. The sheep are cornered in their pin. For the past few hundred years, they've had nothing but wolves, or at best dogs to guard and guide them. Time for the Shepard to tend his Flock."
With a casual gesture, Harry tossed Snape back across the room, and almost magically, he landed seat first in his chair behind the desk. Slowly walking forward, Harry stepped up to the desk and placed both fists in the middle as he leaned forward so he was an inch from poking his face with the man's pointy nose. He sounded like an upset parent rebuking a child that had just said or done something they were too young to know about, as he continued to explain things to the Headmaster.
"I just wanted to see what it was that Dumbledore actually had planned here, and I got my answer. Something you should be aware of, young Malfoy defeated Dumbledore with a simple disarming and stunning combo, then took his wand from his own hand. Less than one hour ago, I stole myself onto the Malfoy property, cornered Draco, and did the same thing. I defeated the defeater of Dumbledore and took his wand as a trophy." Harry reached into his robes and pulled out a black wand that had no clear marks about it, save for something that looked like a triangular eye at the base of it.
"Shortly after that, I snuck onto the grounds, and used Draco's wand to open up Dumbledore's tomb so I could get this. On my way up here to speak with you, I had my owl return Draco's wand to him and decided to keep this one, as I am now it's master. You have no idea what this is, Snape, but Riddle does. Or at least, he will. When he comes to claim Dumbledore's wand, he will find an exact match laying where I picked this one up. Exact, except for the fact that it's just a piece of wood and not a real wand. If he asks you about why it is not responding to him, tell him the truth. I was there with Dumbledore when he died, and I took his wand."
"W-w-why sh-should I t-tell him this?" Snape stuttered.
"Other than the fact that it will save your life?" Harry shrugged, sounding like he really didn't care wither way if Snape lived or died. "It will infuriate Riddle even more and I am hoping that it will do what I wish for it to do, and make him angry enough to come after me directly. The next thing that you need to do, Headmaster," he put his face right back into Snape's, "is do what needs to be done. Tommy-boy trusts you, enough to give you some actual power, such as being Headmaster of Hogwarts. But Riddle does not truly trust anyone. He will be sending people, other trustworthy Death Eaters here to watch you and to add a bit of... dark culture to the lives of the students here."
"I want you to kill them the day they get here," Harry told him, standing back up.
Harry had never seen Snape go pale with shock before. It was an interesting sight, to say the least.
"HARRY!" the Portrait shouted in outrage.
"Have you gone mad!!" the Headmaster tried to stand up, but Harry immediately forced him back into his seat. "Are you even really Potter, is this supposed to be some kind of test?"
"No test. I told you," he said, "that you need to do what needs to be done."
"Let me explain before you fly off the handle." Harry tried to placate the man. "The Death Eaters that will be sent to Hogwarts, no matter who they are, will have three missions; watch you and spy for Big V, teach and encourage the Dark Arts and recruit more Death Eaters, and torment, torture, and abuse every muggleborn, half-blood, and blood traitor or non-Death Eater wannabe they can. Your job, as Headmaster of this school, is to protect the students and ensure their proper education."
"I don't care how you do it, the details are best left to you," he said encouragingly. "You can even keep them alive and under Imperius and Veritaserum for the first week of the term. Either way, they need to be dead. Not out of the way, not contained, not even near-death in hopes of redemption. The ones that will be sent won't be wanting or capable of redemption as it is. They need to be dead." He gave Snape a meaningful look, then stepped back and made sure the man understood him. When he was sure that he had, he merely nodded back.
"Oh!" Harry cried just as he was turning to leave, "Almost forgot that. Ginny Weasley is going to be kidnapped from the Hogwarts Express on its way from London. If anybody starts asking questions, either about her, or the dead Death Eaters," he shrugged, "blame them for the kidnapping. If replacements are sent at any point, kill them too. Or, make sure their stay is very temporary. Keep the Death Eater presence here to the absolute minimum at all times, otherwise, I'll hear about it and come by and do a little... purging of my own."
"What makes you think I'm going to follow your orders, Potter?" Snape shot at him as he left.
Only to blink and find himself on the floor with Potter holding an emerald staff capped with a very sharply tipped gold spear point to his neck.
"They aren't orders," Harry casually remarked, removing his Rod as he did so, "They're directives. Orders can be ignored or forgotten. A directive cannot be either, and if it is disobeyed without due cause, there can be... dire consequences. Such as me coming to do the job myself and making a mess of the situation."
"Understood," Snape coughed as he slowly got back to his feet. When he looked again, Potter was gone.
12 Grimmauld Place
Later that night
"I can't believe it, we've got them all?" Hermione blurted out, looking at the small collection laid out on the kitchen table in front of them.
"Yep, well," Harry shrugged, "except for Nagini, Moldy Short's pet snake. But so long as he doesn't know all of these are kaput, it shouldn't be too difficult to get close to the thing and finish the job. Have to make a point not to fight him until after we get it though..."
On the table were three distinctive items. A golden locket with a snake shaped into an S on the front. A large, ornate gold cup with a badger etched into it. And a crown-like jeweled tiara, though the technical term for it would be a diadem.
"Where did you find them all?" Hermione blurted out.
Harry sighed and rolled his eyes at her.
"You mean they were actually all there?" she seemed shocked.
"Yes, the Diadem of Ravenclaw was in the Room of Requirement. I had Kreacher hunt down Dung and caught him with it just before he sold Slytherin's locket to Umbridge of all people. And I transformed myself into Bellatrix Lestrange and removed Hufflepuff's Chalice from her vault at Gringotts. Also had time to read a few books and do some other stuff while I was at Hogwarts. Dobby says hi, by the way."
"I cannot believe you did all that and went to all those places, Harry!" Hermione exclaimed. "You told us to keep it under the radar and not attract any attention!"
"I'm pretty sure I did not use those words," Harry teased her, "but you'll also recall that the reasons I gave for why you shouldn't act unduly is because at this moment in time, all three of you can barely perform basic self-transfiguration, whereas I can change myself into anything I want, teleport directly into Hogwarts, the Ministry of Magic, and even Moldy Wart's bathtub without being detected, and I can summon dragons and even an all-powerful phoenix if I so choose to. Not to mention do a bunch of other stuff that I haven't even revealed yet. Even if I got myself surrounded by the entirety of the Dork Lord's army, I can handle myself and at the very least could get away if not come out on top. Not to say that I doubt your skills or anything, but it's a guarantee that I could, and to be perfectly honest, neither of you three can say the same."
At first they'd all been glaring at him, but when he said that, they had to concede the point and reluctantly nodded their heads in agreement. Thankfully, Kreacher was just starting dinner, so the uncomfortable atmosphere quickly dissipated.
"So, while I know the generals, I was not paranoid enough to follow you lot around all day," Harry said as they cleaned up for supper. "What all did you get up to during the day?"
"What else?" Ron beamed, "I was Viktor Krum! In Diagon Alley! I was actually mobbed! By Fangirls®! Twice! It was the best bloody day of my whole life!"
Harry sighed and rolled his eyes. So much for Ron learning a lesson from his experience. Wait a minute... "Wait, you, as in Viktor, got mobbed?" he asked.
"Yeah, it was great!" Ron enthusiastically gushed.
"Did anybody actually show up to, well, stop the mob?" he asked.
"No," all three of them answered. Ron still gushing, but both Hermione and Ginny looked... well, annoyed would be the closest term for their expressions really.
Sighing again, Harry rubbed the bridge of his nose in hopes of relieving the tension headache he felt coming on. "All right, moving on, Hermione, how about you, how was your day?"
"Well, considerably less... eventful, than Ron's was, but I believe I obtained some, useful information," she shrugged with an evasive expression. Sighing again, Harry turned to Ginny with hopeful eyes.
"She didn't take her eyes off of 'Viktor' for the entire day and almost drank all of her potion in the first half hour!" Ginny admitted to him. "Usually she was standing back from the crowd, scowling at all of them like some kind of jealous stalker."
"I was not!!" Hermione screeched.
"Girls," Harry said warningly, thankfully heading off the impending argument.
"I wasn't," the brown-haired witch put in the last word on the matter.
"After listening in on the gossip around Diagon Alley," Ginny continued her story with nary a shrug at Hermione's dismissal, "I hung around the Leaky Cauldron and had lunch. Picked up some more interesting bits. Saw you and Kreacher corner Fletcher in the early afternoon. Nice tackle by the way."
"Thank you," Harry grinned at her.
"Then I took the Floo to the Ministry and actually managed to talk my way into several sections just by mentioning various conspiracy theories Luna's shared with me over the years, as well as talk about nargles and wrackspurts anytime somebody looked at me too closely. Ran into Dad, too," she admitted.
"How was he?" Ron asked, suddenly much more subdued.
"Worried, stressed, and still as overprotective as ever. The minute he saw me, he grabbed me and took me down to his office and kept me there for as long as he could. Umbridge is in charge of the reforms the Death Eaters are bringing to bear. The notices will be put out tomorrow, Dad said. It would've been done already, but I overheard a lot of different people speaking over how the 'new regime' has been having a bit of trouble cementing it's hold on certain departments. Especially the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and the Department of Mysteries."
"Get the newspapers and everything?" Harry asked.
"Yeah, left them in the sitting room though," Ginny sheepishly answered. "I can go..."
"No, that's all right. Kreacher," he called. The ancient house elf appeared instantly.
"Yes, Master?"
"Ginny brought home a stack of newspapers and magazines with her and left them in the sitting room. After you've served our dinner, I want you to please bring the entire stack in here so we can read them, and then I want you to do what you most want to do, all right?" Kreacher actually smiled and hopped to and fro on his feet, his droopy ears even twitching a bit in excitement. Then he immediately disappeared, only to reappear with supper, and the stack of newspapers and magazines a second later.
"You're too good to him," Hermione smiled at him, while secretly scoffing that Kreacher enjoyed being told what to do, and the fact that what he most wanted to do, was clean!
"He doesn't have a lot of years left," Harry told her. "I'd rather he enjoy his time while he can. Then, I'll honor his last wishes, whatever they may be. Anything from chopping off his head and mounting it on the wall, to rejuvenating the 'Most Ancient and Noble House of Black' to freeing every house elf in the world. Sirius was unfair to Kreacher and I plan to make it up to him. To be quite honest, Sirius was a bit of an arrogant prick, particularly when it came to his family for some reason."
"So what are we doing tomorrow?" Hermione asked, hoping to change the subject.
"More training," Harry replied. "Until you're good enough that you can hold a transformation without need of Polyjuice potion. After lunch, however, we'll go out and start getting more intel. In pairs this time, instead of all over. Maybe visit some of the Order of the Phoenix, as other people!" he almost had to shout when they all started to protest at once. "Just to get some communication and to take advantage of their own sources of information as well."
"Sound good?" he asked.
"Yeah," they grumbled, turning back to their meals. Harry sighed and just picked up an issue of the Daily Prophet as well as the Quibbler, Witch Weekly, and Wizarding Journal.
TBC...