May 10th, 1998
"Turns out he'd been doing this to her since January, at least," said Sally-Anne. She was sitting on Arun's desk, just outside the tiny office she shared with Sam, with her feet on his chair. She took another bite of her apple. It was difficult to eat, thinking about what had happened yesterday, but she didn't want Zhu to notice. In any case, acting normally was old hat to her, by now.
"He trusted the war, and this mess of an aftermath, to keep us distracted," said Zhu. By contrast, Zhu looked green. The apple Sally-Anne had tossed her earlier sat untouched on her desk. The girl was staring at it intently, her arms crossed and laying on the table, her head resting on her arms.
"And it worked," nodded Sally-Anne.
"If his friend, what was his name, hadn't screwed up, he would still be…" Zhu swallowed down what sounded like a gag reflex.
"Paul Church. We questioned him this morning. Innocent." What a bust that interrogation had been, thought Sally-Anne. But perhaps that was a good thing. After Arun had gone for a Healer, Mark had bled out and the Imperius had worn off. Mark had never bothered to Obliviate Susan; he'd just started with a Memory Charm and then layered Imperio. Watching her, alone, as she remembered everything he had done to her, over the course of months, then having to call in Arnold Peasegood to Obliviate her, partially out of a sense of mercy, but mostly because of the Statute of Secrecy — it had almost been too much. What else could she have done for Susan? And making her forget what had happened, surely that had been a mercy?
"Questioned?" There was a hint of humor in Sam's voice, but a heap of sarcasm. Sally-Anne twisted around to look at him through the open door. He was sitting at his desk, his eyes on his work, seemingly paying no attention. The usual. She took another bite of her apple.
"Here at the Ministry. Two drops of Veritaserum, Sam." He looked up for only a moment, but Sally-Anne rolled her eyes at him. "No, we weren't about to trust his story. No, we weren't about to torture him. And Peasegood from Obliviators confirmed he's not an Occlumens. Not evil. Just an idiot. Mark told Paul he'd lost his wand, but that the Ministry would never believe it."
"Anyway," Sally-Anne turned back to the still motionless Zhu, softening her voice, "you did well, Zhu. As soon as we had real data, you pointed us in the right direction."
Zhu sat up very straight in her chair, looking at Sally-Anne, but she didn't smile.
"How often have you had to deal with cases like this? How many times?" They didn't bother with robes at their desks; Zhu was wearing a grey pencil skirt and a blue collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up a turn. Black boots, designer probably. She was pretty, Sally-Anne admitted to herself, especially with those big questioning eyes and that outfit. Her own clothes, scuffed trainers, jeans, and an ill-fitting sweater, didn't warrant attention from the men at the office. Not that she was trying.
"Most of the cases we get are the types you've already seen. Petty crime, or using magic as a shortcut. But serious cases? Imperio? Or even Legilimens? Maybe half a dozen. But I've only been working under Mafalda for a couple years, now."
"Too young to have gone to Hogwarts, anyway." It was Sam again, Sally-Anne noticed with annoyance. But it hadn't been a question so she didn't bother to answer.
"Say three or four a year. That we know of." Zhu seemed too preoccupied to have been listening to Sam. "And Merlin knows how many have accomplices smarter than whatshisname."
But Sally-Anne shook her head. They had a couple minutes until Arun got back; he was finishing up with Mr. Church, putting the fear of god into him, hopefully, and then she needed to get down to the Minister's office. But she didn't want to leave Zhu with the impression there was hundreds of Marks out there, or, more to the point, hundreds of Susans.
"Situation isn't that bad. Think about it. How many students in a Hogwarts class?"
"Forty."
"And wizards tend to live to about 120, assuming a natural death. So say 4,800 wizards, assuming squibs don't attend. And only 4,000 or so adults. But it's a dangerous lifestyle, if you haven't noticed. Splinching. Failed alchemists. And, lately, wars. Even if you assume some percentage of wizards either don't get their letter or don't respond to it, you're still only talking somewhere between three and four thousand wizards on the loose in Britain. But what percentage of any population is capable of something like this? You pretty much have to check all the Dark Triad boxes, like Voldemort, although it sounds like he was more of a sociopath."
"Still." Zhu was quiet again, thinking. Sally-Anne looked back over at Sam, who was no longer pretending to work, but he didn't say anything. They'd shared that tiny office for more than a year now, but she still knew almost nothing about him. Why was he so cold? He didn't seem socially awkward, not particularly. She'd never picked up any overt hostility, although she didn't assign that data much weight. He must have been in his fifties, at least, she figured, judging by the lines on his face. It was weird he was that old and still just sending warning letters to students about improperly using their wands. Was he really without ambition? Did he have a family?
"When I joined, I thought Voldemort and the Death Eaters were the only problem." Zhu looked up expectantly, as though wanting Sally-Anne to say something; she didn't take the bait. "But there are a fair number of these," Zhu picked up her apple suddenly and laughed, "bad apples running around. And it's our job to stop them."
"Because that's the DMLE's raison d'etre. Saving Muggles." Sam leaned back in his chair, smirking. "Aren't you going to tell her why the Ministry actually cares about wizards like Mark?"
Sally-Anne shot him a look. He certainly was a Chatty Cathy today.
"Not quite," she said, trying to keep the bitterness out of her voice. "They just don't want someone accidentally revealing wizards to the Muggle world. Remember, we just said there are fewer than 4,000 of us. Muggles don't have a history of dealing well with minority populations."
"Especially when those minorities have magic powers." Sam said dryly. "The Statute of Secrecy isn't just some bureaucratic make-work invention."
"We should integrate. Look at what we could do for them, for the Muggles I mean," said Zhu defiantly.
Sam snorted, prompting Sally-Anne to swing herself off Arun's desk, toss Sam another apple from her bag, and then close the door firmly in his face. She pulled the chair up next to Zhu's.
"Look, Zhu. I happen to agree with you. But that is not an approach to be discussed at the Ministry. Wizarding institutions do not handle the idea of change well. And with something as fundamental as the Statute of Secrecy — and, remember, the Confederation is international; it's not just a question of Britain deciding it would be a good idea to show ourselves after all these centuries — well, that's just a brick wall."
"You tried, didn't you." Zhu's eyes were wide; it was a naive guess, but a right one. Sally-Anne sighed. Maybe it had been different for Zhu's parents back in Hangzhou; maybe the wizarding community there worked more broadly with the CCP than the Ministry worked with the British government. Maybe they'd given her the wrong idea, and no one at Hogwarts had bothered to explain the facts of life to a transfer student. It wasn't like there hadn't been enough else going on.
"Yes. It's why I joined the Ministry." A lie, Sally-Anne thought, but a safe one. "Sam has a point. If Muggles learned about us in the wrong way - from someone like Mark - then our entire community would be in existential danger. But that's why I believe a controlled integration is necessary; because it's going to happen eventually. Not every wizard lives in Hogsmeade or Godric's Hollow or Ottery St. Catchpole. We can't stop every bad apple, as you put it, before they do something terrible. We're firefighters, Zhu. I want us to be proactive. The Ministry thinks that's suicide. But I believe if we don't, in the long run we won't survive anyway." Sally-Anne stopped, realizing she might have said more than she'd intended. But sitting this close to Zhu was distracting.
"Anyway," Sally-Anne got up from the chair and sat back down on Arun's desk, tailor-style, "enough sad stories about battles lost." She tried to lighten her tone, pitching it to carry. "Why do you think I hired this joker?" She hitched a thumb over her shoulder at Arun, who was just walking down the hall towards them.
"Let me guess; because I clean up after you." It was meant for a joke, but Sally-Anne saw how exhausted Arun looked. She wondered if he'd managed to sleep at all, between getting back with the Healers too late to save Mark's life last evening and having to play bad cop with Paul this morning.
"You terrify him good and proper?"
Arun nodded. "He won't be lending his wand out anymore, that's for sure. I ran the script just like you told me."
"Not a pleasant task, but a necessary one. But that's not why I hired you." Sally-Anne smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "You know I had to fight Hopkirk over you. A Hufflepuff in tight with Umbridge, according to the grapevine?" Arun's face was tight, but she was impressed by his self-control.
"No," Sally-Anne said quietly, "I hired you because you're a survivor." She saw his eyes widen, just for a moment.
She hopped off his desk, chucking her apple core into the bin. "And for a laugh. I'm off; been called onto the carpet. You kids be good while I'm gone."
Inside the office, Sam tiptoed away from the door back to his desk. He tossed the apple up in the air several times.
"Specialis Revelio." Nothing happened. He shrugged. "Evanesco."
Macnair woke.
Immediately, he knew that it had been too sudden to be natural. Rennervate, most likely. He didn't do anything stupid like try to look around wildly or ask where he was. He kept his eyes closed and his breathing regular. He could remember the carriage, the feeling of helplessness when the ambush began. He'd been completely defenseless: bound, blindfolded, and without a wand.
He had been stunned; that much was obvious. But by whom? If he had been kidnapped by Rookwood or Rowle, he'd already be free. Unless there was a deeper plot at work. A disquieting thought; he filed it away for later analysis. But perhaps he had been hit by a stray stunner and the Aurors had managed to win. Unlikely. If they had, by now Dawlish or Proudfoot would already be "asking" him what he knew. No, the ambush had unfolded quickly and silently; it had obviously been well planned. Too well. The whole operation stank of inside information.
Someone inside the Ministry? Or even the Order of the Phoenix, unhappy with the closure of Azkaban and the soft treatment of the Death Eaters? But closing the prison had been the idea of one of their own, the golden boy. It didn't make sense.
"Hold him." The voice, vaguely familiar, came from directly behind him. One strong hand gripped his nose, pulling his head back painfully and cutting off his air supply. Another grabbed his lower jaw, forcing his mouth open. Despite his size and his strength, Macnair struggled helplessly against the grip, until he saw stars and his body forced him to breath. Instantly, a hot liquid was poured down his throat. Pepper-Up Potion.
The hands released him and the blindfold torn off. He fell forward, leaning against the Incarcerous ropes that bound him to the chair as he choked and heaved, struggling for air. He finally opened his eyes. There was a lean, old man standing to his right, looking at him almost with wonder. Directly in front of him now, straddling a turned-around wooden chair, his arms leaning on its back, was Arthur Weasley.
"What the blazes, Arthur! Where's Dawlish? Where's Proudfoot?" He continued to scan the room, but the lack of a response from the Muggle-lover unnerved him. There was a table to Arthur's right. When he saw what was there, he found he couldn't look at anything else for a while. It took a deliberate effort to wrench his eyes away and look back at Arthur.
The wizard met his gaze and smiled rather sheepishly. "I'm sorry, Warren. Four drops." Macnair looked back at the table. Next to the bottle of Veritaserum was his wand. Where had they gotten that from; surely Ollivander would have destroyed it by now? Next to his wand lay a military semi-automatic pistol.
Now that he had been told, Macnair could feel the Veritaserum under the reinvigorating heat of the Pepper-Up Potion. He didn't feel drugged, or desperate to tell Arthur the truth. But he knew he would; as soon as Arthur asked him a question answering it would not be voluntary, but a bodily process, like digestion. But why? He'd made a full confession. Well, almost full. Was this because of Bode? But not even Arthur, with access to all the information at the Ministry, could knew the truth about that.
"How did you recruit Golgomath?"
"By giving him what he wanted; free reign to kill." Answering the question was a physical relief, like passing water after a long night of drinking.
"Was Voldemort intending to integrate the giants into the ranks of the Death Eaters after the war?"
"No. That would be impossible. Giants cannot coexist in the same habitat as humans. Evolutionarily, humans and giants are subspecies; they occupy the same ecological niche. Giants can hunt humans but they are not human predators. Competitive replacement would be inevitable if integration were attempted." Macnair was confused; this wasn't the line of questioning he'd expected. Arthur had kidnapped him from three Ministry Aurors to discuss natural selection?
"What was Voldemort's plan for the giants after his victory?"
"Extermination. He would have no further use for them." Macnair twisted in his ropes. "Is Proudfoot outside? Why stage an abduction just to ask me this?"
"After his victory at Hogwarts, did Voldemort intend to conquer the Muggle world?"
"I believe so. Voldemort craved power and could not have been satisfied ruling such a small community, even absolutely, even forever. He intended to turn the entire wizarding world into an army."
"Did he see war with Muggles as inevitable?" Beside him, Perkins seemed to start.
"Yes. He believed isolation was not a sustainable strategy. If wizards were exposed, perhaps through the family of a Muggleborn, we would be annihilated by the Muggles. If not, our birth rate has been below replacement level for three generations. There is evidence in the size of the dining hall at Hogwarts. Voldemort described this as demographic suicide."
"What about assimilation?"
"He considered it equivalent to voluntary genocide." Of course it was. Even someone as dense as Weasley had to understand that!
"So his solution was to seize dictatorial power, murder any opposition, promote procreation, turn the entire wizarding community into soldiers, and launch an existential war against six billion Muggles." Arthur's voice was quiet and calm. "Is that correct?"
"Mostly." Macnair swallowed. "Voldemort believed he was immortal. Between absolute power and war, we believe he intended to legislate higher birth rates for a period of several hundred years in order to build the size of his army. At some point, he intended to conquer and absorb the international wizarding nations, before launching an attack against the Muggles. He made allusions to this, but never shared any specific plans with the Death Eaters."
"An absurd solution to a reasonable problem." Arthur looked at Perkins, who grunted, as though conceding something. Arthur then stood up, and carefully placed the chair back next to the desk. If they were in the Ministry, Macnair thought, it wasn't a room he was familiar with. And it didn't smell like the Ministry; the air was too clean. If the fool left it to Perkins to take him back to the Aurors, he had a chance.
"I want to thank you, Warden, for confirming my suspicions." Arthur reached towards the table and picked up Macnair's wand. Macnair watched him intently, twisting his hands again against the ropes. Arthur noticed the attempt and smiled softly."You don't understand, Macnair. You're not a villain. You're not even a minion. You're just not logical. And I can respect good intentions."
He lowered himself into a crouch so he was looking Macnair eye to eye.
"But, unfortunately, I'm the hero. Reluctantly, I admit," he looked ruefully up at Perkins, "but heroes rarely get a choice. We have to do what is necessary. I hope you can accept my apologies." Arthur pointed the wand at Macnair's chest.
"Avada Kedavra."
"Look, I'll talk to you after the meeting. Privately. But if I don't let them in, they'll tear the door down. For now, just sit in that chair there and pretend to take some notes. And don't engage! This whole thing is a mess and we need to stay calm."
Sally-Anne almost laughed in Kingsley's face at that. She'd never even met the Minister before, and had been genuinely nervous on her way to his office, fearing that word of what she's done to Mark Regan had somehow reached him already, but the man was clearly out of his depth in what was certainly a minor crisis; she's never imagined that in real life someone who was so panicked would plead with her to be calm.
She looked around the room; the place was a disaster, and she hoped the meeting would be small, as much of the floor was covered in scrolls and other work than he clearly hadn't gotten to yet. She wondered how far behind events he was. An open door led to a large, elegant conference room, but apparently that wouldn't be the venue for this meeting.
There was a bang, and she jumped. Someone had flung the door open, and it had crashed into the wall. Correction, not someone; Minerva McGonagall. Sally-Anne straightened up in her chair and tried to be even less noticeable than usual; there was no way the Hogwarts Headmistress could remember her. Hopefully. But the full force of the witch's will was focused on the Minister.
"Details, Kingsley! Your Patronus message was just this side of incoherent." Behind her, squeezing into the office until it was a question of standing either on a treacherous pile of paper or a tea tray, were several people Sally-Anne knew, or at least knew of, and several strangers. She recognized Professors Flitwick and Slughorn, also from Hogwarts, and Arthur Weasley was a colleague at the Ministry, in a different office but also under Ms. Hopkirk. He had the reputation of a lightweight, an absent-minded tinkerer who fetishized Muggle culture rather than trying to understand it. The last man in closed the door and stood like a bouncer in front of it; he had a haggard face, with thick, black hair but crooked teeth.
"There's not much to tell, but it needs to be told here, in private. Macnair escaped on his way to the estate where he was supposed to be held. And he had help," said Kingsley, nervously.
"And the Aurors?" asked Flitwick, who had commandeered the only other chair in the room and was standing on it in order not to be completely lost in the crush. Kingsleys' eyes flickered to the man at the door before replying.
"Proudfoot and Jacobs are dead. Dawlish is at St. Mungo's and was still unconscious, last I heard."
There was general confusion as Flitwick, Shacklebolt, and McGonagall tried to talk over each other, but all Sally-Anne heard was Slughorn remarking, under his breath, that Dawlish sure did seem to get knocked about a fair bit.
"We need to presume this was carried out by Death Eaters, I'm afraid." Arthur stated flatly, once the first burst had past.
"How!" McGonagall asked him sharply. They're under guard, by aurors and spells. Wandless."
"Not Rookwood," answered the man at the door.
"Yes, and you're put the rest of them together, where they can plot and scheme at their leisure. What a great idea that was!" Slughorn bellowed, throwing his arms up in the air. "And with Dawlish out, there's only Williamson guarding them. One Auror, vs. Dolohov. Yaxley. Rowle. And Travers." He counted the names off. "With Rookwood — and now Macnair — in the wind."
"My men have them strictly separated," retorted Kingsley. "They never so much as see each other. And without wands, they cannot pass messages, let alone plot and scheme at their leisure!" He exhaled a deep breath and his angry tone dissipated with it.
"What about the seventh years?" He turned to McGonagall. "I know how badly you wanted to give them a chance to redo their last year, or do it properly at least, but other than Savage here," he nodded towards the haggard man, "and Williamson, every Auror I had is now either in hospital or in the ground."
That caused a silence. McGonagall's face when she spoke was as pale as chalk.
"The Battle of Hogwarts hit us hard. I hoped we'd have years to recover. Not this."
"There's another problem we may be forgetting," interrupted Arthur. "Macnair was Voldemort's envoy to the giants. If he's free again, and able to reestablish contact…"
"Oh, Merlin," breathed McGonagall.
"Filius. I'm loathe to pull you away from Hogwarts, but at least until Dawlish is recovered, I need you to be on call, if something else happens. You're the strongest Dark Wizard fighter we have left, and we need you," pleaded Kingsley.
Flitwick inclined his head, and looked at Slughorn. "I'm thinking Granger, Longbottom, Goldstein, and Zabini."
The Potions professor nodded his agreement. "Give us two weeks, Minister, and you can have them, at least part time."
"What about the goblins, Flitwick?" asked Savage bluntly. "It may not be politic, but it needs asking. If Macnair's going for the giants, are the goblins next?"
Flitwick smiled slightly and shook his head. "I take no offense, Robert. It is a logical question. But the answer is no, goblins will never take sides in a wizard war. It would be an anathema."
"Why?" Arthur looked skeptical.
"I may have lived with wizards for most of my life, but with a little effort, I can remember how goblins think. The matters that concern you are of complete indifference to them. They are concerned solely with the precious metals, and the treasures they have wrought from them. But they cannot be bribed. They adhere to honor. They would watch a war, and Gringott's would profit, but their neutrality is absolute."
"Fine." Arthur turned back to the Minister.
"Kingsley, seventh years is one thing, and the departments will begin to recruit, which you agreed to yesterday, but if we're going to find Macnair, if we're going to catch Rookwood, if we're going to prevent any other plans the Death Eaters are hatching, we need the freedom to act! Now is the time to go to the Wizengamot, as discussed, and unbind our hands at the Ministry. Not just the Aurors, but my office, and Hopkirk's." He pointed at Sally-Anne.
"I see you've included one of her junior employees. Good. We all need to work together right now. No more political bickering. We don't have the time for the normal procedures, the normal oversight from an antiquated and unwieldy group that can't get half its members to show up when it meets and can't agree on the day of the week when they do, much less matters of substance!"
Kingsley opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again.
"Giants, Minister. Giants!" urged Arthur.
"I agree with Mr. Weasley," said Auror Savage into the silence. "The members of my office are dwindling at a rapid pace. We need to be able to do what is necessary, without trying to double-guess ourselves in the moment, fearing what Mr. Doge or Mrs. Longbottom will think."
All right," said Kingsley finally. "All right. I'll call an emergency meeting tonight. But from this moment, under my authority, you may act based upon your judgment."
"Trust us," said Arthur, "to do the right thing."
"And not a word of any of this outside this office. Not even to the seventh year recruits, or to junior members of staff." Kingsley sat down suddenly on the edge of his desk. "It'll be hard enough trying to keep Macnair off the front page. If the average wizard in Hogsmeade knows the situation, and the steps we think are necessary to deal with it, we'll have chaos out there."
"I'll lend you and Williamson a man to replace Dawlish for now." Arthur turned to Auror Savage. "That way, even if one Auror needs to be pulled off duty for something, there'll be an experienced wand on the Death Eaters."
Flitwick jumped down from his chair. "And I'll send my Patronus at least once a day to check in, Kingsley."
The Minister nodded. "Ms. Perks, if you could stay behind for just a moment."
Once they had left, the room seemed quiet and empty. Kingsley sank down in his chair behind the paper-strewn desk and sighed heavily. He didn't seem about to break the silence.
"Forgive me for asking, Minister, but why did you request I be here? This doesn't seem like a case of improper use of magic, and as for the rest, well it's rather above my pay grade, isn't it? More appropriate for Ms. Hopkirk, I mean, or even…" She wondered if Kingsley would take the bait.
"Yaxley?" he snorted. "I'm sure he'd accept his former post with alacrity. Have even less trouble putting me under the Imperius as he did with poor Pius." Kingsley made a face, then leaned in to look seriously at Sally-Anne. She hoped her deferential posture wasn't too blatant. She almost re-adjusted her glasses again, but figured that would be pushing it.
"Ms. Perks. The previous four heads of your department are either dead or in custody. I also happen to be the fourth Minister of Magic in four years. If it hadn't been for whatever in Merlin's name happened at the Battle of Hogwarts, Voldemort would be sitting here. I don't know how carefully you were listening just now, but to say we have a manpower shortage — no offense — would be a serious understatement."
"Yes, Minister."
"As for why you're here, specifically, understand that the information I am about to give you is known by no one other than Robert — and I suppose John — and Mr. Weasley. I myself told it to Arthur last night." He pretended to shuffle some papers, but his look was expectant. "Does that tell you anything."
It was clearly a test, and the most likely answer also helped explain her presence.
"Perhaps that Macnair's abductor used a Muggle tool."
"Tools. Yes. Correct. Therefore, and especially given the, uh, the personnel crisis, I have asked Arthur to take over the investigation." Kingsley looked down at something lying on his desk and then back at Sally-Anne. "You grew up among Muggles, actually, didn't you?" He asked the question as if it were awkward but obligatory.
"To an extent, Minister. My father is a Muggle." She sounded calm and natural, even to herself. Get asked the same question enough times and you're bound to answer it well.
"That may be helpful. Arthur, well, he's a reliable chap, well-liked. But," and here Kingsley began to over-enunciate rather theatrically, "perhaps out of his depths in a situation like this. He's also in a period of mourning, of course. He lost a son at the Battle of Hogwarts; you may not be aware of that.
"In any event," and his voice went back to being matter-of-fact, "I need someone who can step back from the problem, see the forest, all that. No risk of combat, of course," he went on hastily, "but Mafalda tells me your team focuses on finding patterns, finding the people who don't want to be found. Is that correct?"
"Yes, Minister."
He smiled cheerfully.
"Excellent. Well, that's all settled then. You'll be working independently from Arthur, of course. In fact, better if he doesn't know, I think. Might be misconstrued. Let me know when you have something."
It was an obvious dismissal and she showed herself out, rather confused. Clearly one or several of the Death Eaters had freed Macnair. But how, without wands? Was Ollivander involved? Unlikely. That would explain why the attackers had required Muggle tools. That was a rather vague term, she thought tangentially, why hadn't he clarified? Although perhaps the Minister couldn't be bothered with the minutiae of the case, especially the Muggle elements.
A smile twisted across her face for a moment there; the arrogance of wizards towards Muggles manifested as willful blindness and she had no patience with such deliberate ignorance. For now she would just assume they'd used guns, and maybe a grenade or two. Not difficult to get, even in Britain, when you were a wizard. Maybe Dawlish would be able to tell her more, if he woke up.
But that seemed too straightforward for Kingsley to ask her to help. She was three levels down in the DMLE. Granted, the pieces of the man who constituted the top level had still been smoking a week ago at Hogwarts. And Mafalda wasn't a field agent. Did he really trust Arthur's competence so little? But he'd be working with those Aurors, Savage and Williamson, when they weren't guarding the Death Eaters. Even if they couldn't see the forest, couldn't they go from tree to tree?
That was what really confused Sally-Anne. Why didn't Kingsley just Imperius the Death Eaters they still had under arrest to find out who was guilty? For that matter, with Azkaban off the table — and only Merlin knew what her potential classmate had been thinking there, or why the Ministry had jumped to obey, no matter how many white rabbits Potter seemed able to pull out of his hat — why were they still alive?
Assume any universe where the current scandal ended badly: leaving Voldemort supporters alive seemed like a mistake that would be obvious in hindsight. The Ministry didn't have the Aurors to adequately guard them, and search for whoever had freed Macnair, and deal with any other potential problems that might come up. Like, giants, apparently.
Was Kingsley so hesitant to use the Unforgivables? Was he worried what the Wizengamot would say if he executed men who a week ago had caused the deaths of over fifty — fifty! — wizards in an attempt to take down the last citadel of opposition to Voldemort?
Sally-Anne shivered. Was she being set up to fail? Was Kingsley Imperiused to act indecisively, perhaps somehow by Rookwood? No, impossible, one of the Ministry's first acts after regaining control had been to install Thief's Downfall in The Atrium on Level Eight and at key doorways. She'd personally seen Kingsley get drenched. Well, then, was the Minister in on it? That didn't make sense; what did he have to gain?
Reluctantly, she found herself back at Occam's Razor. Or, she told herself grimly, more properly back at Hanlon's Razor.
Fine. Assume incompetence and start over. The captive Death Eaters couldn't have acted alone. Either an Auror had helped them spring Macnair, which seemed unlikely since two of them were dead as a result, or Rookwood had been involved, or someone else was responsible, likely in conjunction with them. Someone who was trying to create disorder, where there was already plenty to go around. So who was helping Yaxley and the others, and why?
She heard a noise ahead and glanced up, only to realize that she was already approaching her office. Zhu and Arun stood there, looking at her expectantly. She was unexpectedly touched. Part of her wondered if they would survive the next week.