The Corridors of Power; Chapter 2 – The Woman in White
A/N: Hello, here we are again. Five and a half years later and its July 2006. The muggle world has been rocked by a series of unfortunate events and the magical world is starting to change for the better. Welcome to Switzerland…
"Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if only you remember to turn on the light." - Albus Dumbledore
Friday 7th July, 2006
Quai Wilson, Geneva, Switzerland, 15:32 CEST
The British make the best luxury cars in the world and have done for the better part of a century. Rolls Royce and Bentley have a distinctively refined air around them, they appeal to the finely tuned taste of wealth. Aston Martin build the most elegant sports cars, the lines of each car flow like water. Harry Potter had an Aston Martin. It was a DB9, a cocoon of leather and glass with a twelve cylinder engine under the bonnet with looks and performance to die for. The car was a dark metallic silver, almost a glossy battleship grey. He'd bought it in London the previous year. By muggle standards, Harry was wealthy. 'What's the point of money if you can't spend it?' he'd asked himself, before going to a nearby dealership and falling in love with the car he was sat in.
The Aston was currently parked on the side of the Quai Wilson, one of the major roads in Geneva which runs alongside north side of the lake. Harry was only a short distance from the Palace of Nations, the headquarters of the forerunner of the UN. However, Harry was currently uninterested in the workings of international diplomacy, he was currently watching a woman. He wasn't being voyeuristic but it was a woman who he thought he recognised. A woman he thought he knew. A woman who had been his best friend for many years, and a woman who he had been searching for, for the best part of five years.
She looked different though. She was dressed in a white skirt with matching blouse and jacket. Her black bag sat next to her on the bench she was sitting on. She was puffing on cigarette while admiring the enviable view of Lake Geneva with the Swiss Alps in the background. Harry knew all about that view. The long, slightly bushy hair Harry remembered had disappeared, pruned back to shoulder length and looking considerably tamer.
The more he looked at her, the more he remembered. Stories of trolls, broomsticks and teaspoons, of house elves, dark wizards and periwinkle blue ball gowns. He remembered an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and an incorrigible desire for success. And then he remembered how she must have come to be here. A self-imposed exile after a self-perceived rejection by a world of undemocratic bigots.
This was followed by Harry's own memories of the changes that had occurred in Magical Britain in the past five years. Government practise had become more transparent, integration with muggles was now encouraged, Diagon Alley expanded, greater acceptance of muggleborns promoted, a democratic government elected, an independent judiciary appointed and a braver world created. All because of two things; The Daily Prophet and Harry Potter. Well technically just Harry Potter – he now owned a controlling stake in the main daily British magical tabloid which now had a broadsheet style of reporting. The Rita Skeeter and Barnabus Cuffe days of news reporting were looked back on with scorn and hatred. This was particularly ironic now seeing as Skeeter now worked as a 'senior investigative journalist' for the Prophet. Obviously she had misapplied her talents in her misspent youth.
Magical Britain was coming forward into the twenty-first century. It was a slow process but they were getting there. "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step," said the ancient Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu and "all that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing" wrote Edmund Burke.
Every minute he watched her, Harry became more convinced of her identity. Even despite the changes in appearance – the woman he knew didn't smoke. Harry made a decision, he got out of his bespoke cocoon and walked over to join her.
Hermione was still puffing on her cigarette when Harry approached.
"Those things are nothing but bad for you," he said, gesturing at the cigarette before sitting down next to her.
"I know, but when you're in my job, sometimes you need the relief. All I want is the nicotine, a couple of potions get rid of the tar and the bad breath and I've got a charm for the smell. I usually smoke herbal but I'm just having one of those days."
"Is that anyway to greet an old friend?"
"How did you find me?" Hermione ignored his question.
"I was passing and I saw a familiar face."
"You were just passing?"
"Just passing," Harry confirmed.
"Really? You were sat in your car for nearly a quarter of an hour before you came over. Is that anyway to greet an old friend or do gentle hugs and cheery greetings only occur in Hollywood romances?"
"I make a habit of not seeing them, so I couldn't tell you."
"Nice car by the way, Aston Martin?" Harry nodded, Hermione chuckled, "Dad would be jealous, as am I ever so slightly, I'm still driving a Mini."
"Would you like a ride?"
"We've only just met after over five years and you're asking me if I would like to get in to your car, how presumptuous Mr Potter!"
"I confess I have no ulterior motives Ms Granger, you are still Ms Granger, right?"
"Still 27 and single."
"But that could change."
"As I said, presumptuous."
"Seeing as you've asked me what I am doing here, why don't I ask you the same question?"
"I happen to work here. Or more technically I work just up the road at the UN."
"How come I haven't seen you before now?"
"Why would you have seen me? You are just passing remember."
"I happen to live just up the road on the lakeside. The Potters own a villa here."
"I didn't know that."
"Neither did I, until Gringotts owled me to ask me why I hadn't claimed my inheritance on my twenty-first birthday."
"You forgot about your inheritance?"
"Well what with everything going on, including your apparent disappearance off the face of the planet, it kind of slipped my mind. It was helped by the fact that I didn't know that any of this existed before the goblins helpfully decided to inform me."
"I'm sorry about that but I needed space and then I came to this place." Hermione gestured in the vague direction of the Palace of Nations. "Here I can actually change things for the better for millions of people around the world, I'm not constrained by a racist society which sees me as sub-human."
"Nobody sees you as sub-human, at least nobody is anybody in our world. And most certainly not your friends that you left behind without so much as a goodbye note. The pureblood bigotry of Britain has crumbled."
"I'm sorry about that, but at that moment I didn't feel like there was anything in the magical world for me anymore. I'd be wasting my talents and my time. Here I get to meet world leaders, talk to experts in their fields and change the muggle world, my world, for the better."
"You don't see the magical world as home anymore?"
"It was nice while it lasted," Hermione smiled wistfully, "but no, this is home now."
"I couldn't convince into returning?"
"I'd like to see you try."
"Let me try then."
"You were saying earlier about a ride in your car. You show me your world and then I'll show you mine."
"Done. But I'll have to call the office, some of us still have jobs you know!"
Hermione stubbed out her dying cigarette before discretely cleaning herself up with her wand and taking her mobile from her bag then making a call.
"Hermione Granger's, office. How can I help you?"
"Monique, it's me. I doubt I'll be returning to the office for the rest of the day."
"Don't worry, I've seen the date and I understand."
"Yeah."
"I'll stop all your calls, it's Friday and after what happened, people will understand."
"See you on Monday."
"Yeah, don't forget that there's that big fundraiser we've been planning on Tuesday."
"I haven't. I'll leave you with it then."
"Take care."
"Bye."
She then followed Harry to his car. Harry opened the passenger door for her before getting in himself.
"I just need to go and fill up, while you wait, take a look at this." Harry handed her a binder full of old Daily Prophet cuttings.
Hermione looked through it with interest; "Ten days to go until the second Wizengamot elections… Fraudster Graham Doyle was sent to Azkaban today after a two week trial… Britain in unsuccessful bid for the 2010 Quidditch World Cup… How many wizards does it take to install a light bulb; minimise the risks by reading our simple guide… Goblin Bill of Rights to come before the Wizengamot… Arrest of Thaddeus Avery for hate crime against muggleborns… Borgin and Burkes closed by Ministry officials… Parkinson Enterprises fined for muggleborn discrimination… Goyle Apothecaries to cease trading…firm went bust after a string of Ministry investigations into discrimination in the work place… G8 leaders meet in Scotland… British soldier killed in Iraq… Terrorist Attack rocks Muggle London…the bombing of four underground trains and a double decker bus have left 52 dead and hundreds injured…"
The last headline caught her eye and so Hermione read the article. It was the Evening Prophet dated exactly one year before; Thursday 7th July 2005. "Muggle London was rocked this morning by a series of terrorist attacks on three London Underground trains and a double decker bus. As we go to press, we do not know who did this, nobody has claimed responsibility. There were scenes of chaos as Central London shut down in the wake of these attacks…Prime Minister Tony Blair, speaking at the G8 summit in Scotland expressed his dismay and said that his thoughts and feelings along with those of the British people are with the families and friends of those affected…these events just go to show that although we, the population of Magical Britain maybe living in peacetime, the muggles in our country and around the world live with the threat of this occurring everyday…the events of today or as some in the muggle press are calling it "7/7" are surely stark reminder of the muggle "War on Terror" advocated by the President of the United States of America, George W. Bush in the wake of 9/11, when two passenger planes were flown by Islamic extremist into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Centre on September 9th 2001 killing over three thousand people…for more on the religion of Islam see page 15, for more on terrorism and its magical equivalents see page 18…"
And then the memories came flooding back and Hermione burst into tears.
Harry found her moments later, sobbing quietly. Harry, astounded at the sudden change in Hermione's change of demeanour asked her what was wrong. Hermione, sniffed, wiped her eyes and gave Harry the article before turning to look at him dead in the eye.
"I'm sorry," she sniffed.
"Don't be."
"I was there, it was a lovely summer morning, I was on the tube to work, there was a loud bang, and then all I heard was screaming. Everything went dark. All I saw was smoke, and then there were flames, coming from the back of the train. Some of us went to see what was going on and all we saw was smoke, there were some flames and there were bodies. It was like the battle all over again, we brought out the injured, the dying and the dead. Words can't describe it. And then memories of September 2001 came back to me. I was at the UN headquarters in New York for an interview. I saw the second plane hit the towers, they evacuated the building. You could see the plumes of smoke from all over the city and I've never heard so many sirens in one place. Then the towers collapsed and it was like they'd never been there before, all that was left was this huge cloud of dust. It was surreal and it was beyond the scale of anything I had ever seen before – crowds of New Yorkers fleeing Manhattan. It made Voldemort's activity look like child's play. They killed three thousand people that day and another fifty two a year ago today. It's why I wanted to work at the UN, it gives me a chance to try and stop the killing. In many ways it's like fighting Voldemort, you can kill the terrorists but then you are only killing an idea, if you change the environment they are in, then we can kill the idea of terrorism."
Harry had pulled away from the petrol station long ago and they were cruising along a lakeside road towards Harry's Swiss home.
"I had no idea." Harry said into the silence that enveloped the luxurious interior of the Aston as they cruised on the edge of the lake.
"I'm surprised this featured in the Prophet"
"It's one of the best pieces of muggle news we've ever produced."
"We?"
"I have a controlling stake in the Prophet now, I told them to actually find news worth printing rather than Ministry propaganda and they went to town on it. You'll often find that there are two or three 'muggle stories' in every edition. It's one of my ways of influencing the wizarding world. The power of the press."
"Seems we've both become politically minded."
"The difference is that you actually do the work while I just delegate it."
"After you've seen some of the things I've seen over the past five years, you'll be glad that you don't have my job. It can be awful, but it can also be very rewarding. It's the thought that you can get up in the morning and change somebody's life with a simple signature or a new idea that keeps you going."
"You get to change the world while I get to influence change."
"But it's damned difficult at times."
"Until I purchased a controlling interest in the Prophet I wasn't being taken seriously by anyone. I was the wartime hero who wanted to become a peace time leader."
"Like Winston Churchill to Clement Atlee."
"Exactly, and then I gained influence and then I could start changing the world."
"It looks like we are here."
"So we are, welcome Hermione to Lakeside, my home near Geneva."
A/N: So it begins…but what is "it"? I hope you've enjoyed reading and I'll post again as soon as I can. Please check out my other stories on my profile! In the meantime, the nice shiny review box is there down below, please use it. All feedback welcome; be it comment, corrections, criticism or praise! Until next time…