Naomi: I don't think Ron has been cursed as such. He is not stupid, he plays chess, he can remember Quidditch stats. He is just lazy, selfish, entitled, yes, messed up by the interference with his family, almost certainly, a weak character who is perpetually jealous because he perceives his brothers as more valued, not to mention the long-awaited daughter. His one claim to fame is as sidekick to the-boy-who-lived. And had he managed to be a loyal friend, he might have kept that. He could be a successful quidditch coach and make it on his own if he could only keep his temper in check, and manage to use his brain to get at least passing grades without having to copy off Hermione. He is affected by Molly's brainwashed state, he has seen her get away with unbridled temper, and jumping to conclusions on judgement values on people based on the flimsy 'evidence' from the Prophet; and Arthur is largely to blame for never checking him and never drawing him out about his interests. Yes, he comes across as a caricature, because people locked into such bad behaviour unchecked and without help merely go from bad to worse. I don't know that he can be helped now. In ten years time, he's going to be Vernon Dursley.

Chapter 12

"I talked to Severus, Black, and if you can truly remove the dark mark, I'll vote with you and do as your godson suggested in return for lenience on the debts," said Lucius. "I'll be honest with you. I like being rich. I like being someone in society. I like power, money, and all the trappings of nobility. Severus believes that I have one choice to live. I want to live."

"What did you do to get the dark mark?" asked Sirius.

"Oh, please! Is that old chestnut still going round?" sighed Lucius. "Honestly, it's a load of Hippogryph dung, put about by some of the idiots who like to boast about how they did the worst thing you could imagine to get their dark mark. If the number of mudbloods – muggleborn, see, I am trying – had been raped to death as the claims that were made, Hogwarts would fall apart for a lack of fees. Yes, we indulged in mayhem to make a point. Yes, I've done things you wouldn't approve of, but only to make sure we were taken notice of. I haven't had to do anything while I had Fudge in my pocket. I even got bored when the wilder lads wanted to play at the world cup, though I went along with it all. And then Crouch junior's casting of morsmordre scared the shit out of all of us. Nobody ever expected the dark lord to come back, and as a lieutenant, for my wealth's use to him, I got to push the others around. You know what fun it is to push the sheeple around."

"I do," admitted Sirius. "I don't like you. I will never like you. But if you will come over to our side, I'll work around that, for Cissa's sake. And so long as you fulfil her desires for a full nursery."

"Very well. Show me you can do it."

"I'll set up the ritual room."

Sirius was fairly certain that with the potion he could undertake the ritual with the help of Regulus, and smirked as he explained that Harry had taught them.

Lucius was shocked enough to see Regulus, but stopped asking questions when Regulus explained that Harry had called him back and took the mark away.

That his own mark vanished shook Lucius to the core.

The Dark Lord was not the most powerful wizard in the land.

That was Harry Potter.

And Harry Potter was a kindlier master than Voldemort. Lucius did not know the muggle frames of reference, but if he had, he would have known that he had both dodged a bullet, and got out of Dodge.

He was forgiven the debts, but would pay a relative peppercorn rent1 on Malfoy Manor henceforth, and would have a team of goblins in to clean out all the dodgier items.

"Including those in the secret room under the drawing room floor," said Sirius.

"How do you know about that?" demanded Lucius.

"I know a lot of things about your house, some of which you do not," said Sirius. "And you hid Tom Riddle's diary there, and you will be very pleased to have come over to our side if he ever finds out what you did with it."

Lucius, educated in a hurry about horcruces, and suddenly aware of how naive and uneducated in the dark arts he was in comparison to family Black, went home very glad he had taken the decision he had taken.

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Dumbledore liked term to end after the 21st of December, to prevent the traditional families from celebrating the Solstice with their families.

"I can't make Dumbles out," said Harry. "On the one hand, he goes out of his way to make life difficult for muggleborn by failing to teach them wizarding customs – until Aunty Alice stepped up to it – and on the other he pisses off purebloods by trampling on customs like Samhain and Solstice."

"What he is doing is trampling on the use of ritual, and getting it declared dark," said Severus, to whom Harry was bellyaching whilst they worked on the basilisk. "Ritual enhances power, and various rituals are often specific to particular families. My family has rituals, I am overjoyed to find, which enhance potioneering ingredients, or correct problems caused by picking ingredients at the wrong phase of moon or time of year. But the Dumbledore family is a minor one, and he resents other people having secrets he does not know. Ah, Miss Dagworth-Granger, you blush."

"I understand better now," said Hermione. "Infinite diversity in infinite combination."

"I don't, somehow, see you as a Vulcan," said Severus, dryly. "But essentially, yes. And Dumbledore can't bear the thought that there might be anyone better than him at anything. That, I think, is why he was happy to pretend that the Philosopher's stone was destroyed, so that he was the only knowledgeable alchemist left. Old fool; as if Nicholas Flamel would give him the real one! I've read descriptions from one of my ancestors who was Flamel's apprentice, and the stone Dumbledore put in the mirror for you to find was far more flamboyant than the real thing."

"That relieves my mind," said Harry. "I always thought I had inadvertently murdered two innocent people."

"I doubt anyone that old is entirely innocent, but I take your point," said Severus. "But you see, he limits the purebloods, and he keeps favours in reserve for those half-bloods and muggleborn who grovel sufficiently. Why is Dirk Cresswell the only muggleborn in a non-menial job in the ministry? Because he ran errands for his former headmaster, that's why. It's about control."

"The Grand Moff Bumblekin," said Hermione. "The more systems he takes in his grasp, the more will slip between his fingers."

"Aren't you a little short to be a stormtrooper?" snarked Snape.

Hermione giggled.

"It's nice working here with you now Ron has finished doing it as a detention," she said.

"Nice for me, too, not having to watch him like a hawk not to kill his silly self or try to steal what he thinks Dumbledore would find valuable," said Snape.

"Harvesting a basilisk ain't like dusting crops, boy," said Harry with a straight face. "If you slip a tooth into your pocket and then sit on it, well, that will end your trip real quick."

"A generation of muggles and muggleborn going to the dark side in learning the atrocious art of how to kill their own language by failing to utilise adverbs," said Severus. "Quicker it is, more seductive. But a missed '-ly' as a suffix stultifies the language and attacks its richness."

"Don't blame me; it was George Lucas who wrote it," said Harry.

"Why do I think that Han Solo would get on well with your dogfather?" muttered Snape. "But anyway, that's why the old customs are trampled."

"He's as much of a dark lord in his way as Voldemort, in dumbing down magic, isn't he?" said Hermione.

"Yes," said Severus. "And reducing the curriculum, but allowing divination to continue, a travesty of muggle studies, a farce of history, and nobody able to handle the dark arts, to be any kind of opponent. And my orders to dumb down potioneers, with my dark mark held over my head."

"Ooooh," said Hermione. "Now I understand a lot."

"If you had come to potions' club you would have learned a lot more," said Severus.

"There's a potions club?" asked Hermione, nearly salivating.

"It's on your list of out of school activities you got in the first year."

"But I didn't," said Hermione. "We had no list of clubs, did we, Harry?"

"I didn't even get as much orientation as most muggleborn," said Harry.

Severus scowled.

"That... could account for why I only had Slytherin from your year joining the club. The vicious old coot! He deliberately did not send out the club lists!"

"Someone is going to find himself superfluous to requirement once Tommy Riddle is gone for good," said Harry, grimly. "In my opinion he has done more to promote the cause of Voldemort than any death eater, in failing to provide an education suitable to those who might oppose him."

"And thinking about it, I can't say you are wrong," said Severus.

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On the last day of term, Alice Longbottom distracted the headmaster by going against his express wishes in holding a solstice celebration for anyone who wished to join it, and to show the newbloods what it was like.

And the Greengrasses, their elves, Sirius, Regulus, and the Black elves slipped into the castle to perform the big ritual to cleanse the blood curse from elves. Malfoy, rather sulkily, ordered his elves to come, and Dobby and Winky hand picked some castle elves who would not snitch to Dumbledore. The more chanting, the better, and having part fae like Luna present also helped.

And Harry, who could feel the parselmagic in his bones, was the focus, chanting to remove the curse, and to call to him those whose change would put them in danger at their former homes. The rolling sibilants filled the chamber, and runes drawn to assist the ritual glowed golden. Several elves, changed, or in the process of changing, popped into the ritual circle beside Harry, retrieved by his three family elves, who had already changed and did not have that trauma to their bodies.

Harry was tiring; the ritual experts had calculated that he would have to chant from midnight to midday on the shortest day, when fae magic was at its lowest. And he had been too wound up to sleep well before the ritual. He felt a hit of power from those supporting, and smiled tired thanks, and kept chanting, the hissing drying his mouth, and vibrating his very being until he was nothing but the hissed words.

And the ritual was reaching its culmination, and Sirius was counting down for him, when onto the floor beside him popped out of nowhere a massive snake... one he had last seen in the churchyard! Which was writhing and changing, morphing into a lovely Asian woman, naked at his feet. And as the snake vanished, a smoky spirit arose from it, just like those from the other horcruces!

And Sirius was drawing her out of the circle, wrapping her in a robe, as the hour struck, and Harry could sink down onto his knees in exhaustion.

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1 Peppercorn rent: It's a nominal fee, traditionally the cost of one peppercorn. The reason behind charging anything at all is to maintain a rent being paid, which means that even if nominal as a favour to a particular tenant, it can always be raised at any quarter day.

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I just discovered this story s/13675863/1/Harry-Potter-and-the-Summer-of-Learning-and-Growth which hasn't gone very far yet, but it looks promising. Kelwin seems to have lurked for a while and started writing relatively recently