Chap. 22: Daphne reminisces, and Platform 9-3/4.
Daphne was sitting in her bedroom on the afternoon of August 31st and was looking over the last three Magic Eye papers that were published before supper. Tomorrow, of course, she would have to catch the Hogwarts Express, and she knew that she would be in the middle of a huge stink raised, by many, over Harry not returning.
Of course, Harry would be there to see her off, but she was on her own after that, and she would dearly miss him, as well as being able to see him or speak to him when she wished. Plus, they would not have any "alone time" together to quash their sexual frustrations like they had done twice since the 10th. Who would have known that the "69" was so enjoyable, but she and Harry found it to be utterly delightful, and she knew that he loved it when she swallowed. Of course, she loved his drilling tongue as well. The Kama Sutra was where she obtained the idea, which called it the "congress of a crow," but the old Whore's Catechisms from 1790s France called it the "soixante-neuf," which is where "69" originated. Oddly enough, she had found both books hidden away in their library, and she was fluent in French.
Here, she sighed out; already missing him, but then picked up the paper from the 17th, which had an exposè on the Carrows as the headline read:
"The Incestuous Carrows, You-Know-Who's Simpleton Minions"
Below this was a photo of an overweight and nude Alecto Carrow, with large saggy breasts who was bending over as her brother, Amycus, plowed her from behind in the Carrow's barn, while they were really gone on a trip to the mainland for You-Know-Who. Daphne and Harry had taken Polyjuice potion to pose for the photo, and she still laughed over it, as a donkey in one of the stalls looked at the two as if it was in shock, which the camera caught. It also caught two fake Dark Marks applied to their left forearms, but their most private parts were hidden with black thirty-two point stars placed over the areas.
Worse, was the still photo of Alecto posing in a standing position in a field, with a pet dog, which seemed to be awful randy, as it had latched onto her leg and had begun to hunch. Alecto, here, was played by Tonks, and they used a random shaggy male dog that Harry had struck with an arousal charm to take the photo. Tonks had wrapped her calf and thigh with two large plastic rubbish bags and put on a pair of warn-out large jeans, which she quickly discarded after the shoot. Harry, then, released the dog from the charm, but the thing was still excited, and tried to chase after Tonks, forcing her to apparate!
Of course, at the top of the first column, and just below this, was a photo of Mildred Knowes, who had a look of pure revulsion on her face as she looked up, and to her left at the headline photo.
.
.
"You read the headline correctly, dear reader, as we start another investigation into two of You-Know-Who's minions; a brother and sister duo known as the Carrows. What we uncovered is similar to the others, where debauchery and perversion rule supreme within their group, but this time, dear reader, it's incest!
"Yes, dear reader, you read that right, incest! It seems that Alecto and Amycus Carrow have been allegedly having sexual congress with each other since Alecto was ten years old, and Amycus was twelve, according to what the security and investigative firm from the states have told us. They are who provided the above photo, and they told us that it was taken by one of their disillusioned investigators hiding outside the Carrow's barn using a telephoto lens. If you look closely, dear reader, you will notice the shape of a fuzzy leaf in the lower right corner, which was picked up due to the investigator hiding in a hedge row across the way. The Carrows' big mistake was leaving the barn doors wide open for the investigator to have a front-row seat to this awful act of debauchery. In the photo, we allegedly see Alecto from the front, who is bending over to lean on a set of rusty Disc Harrows while Amycus has his dirty way with her from behind.
"The Carrows are another family, who we found to be highly inbred, that spout the same pureblood line claiming to be above muggles and muggle-borns. However, dear reader, the muggles nor muggle-borns do not have sex with their siblings!
"We, at this paper, wonder if the brother and sister have had any offspring, and if so, what happened to them? One can point to the King of Spain, Charles II, who was born from a line of severe inbreeding, where he had the mentality of a child as a result, and severe deformities. Could the Carrows be wicked enough to abort any offspring by Alecto drinking a special tea, or just wait for the birth, where they might smother the newborn, and be rid of it?
"No wonder there was an altercation in Hogsmeade between the Carrows and a group of witches and wizards visiting for vacation. It was said that the visitors roughed the two siblings up before they fled, where they left for the mainland only two days later. The MLE Squad arrived and took a statement from the visitors, but nothing came from the small scuffle.
"Yes, dear reader, these are the type of people that You-Know-Who has surrounding him, and they do his bidding. Our question is, why does polite society still associate with these people, as it was told to us that many within wizarding Britain know of the Carrows incest? Below is a photo that we obtained of Alecto posing at their farm, and we will let you, our dear reader, take from it what you will.
[Photo inset of Alecto]
"If we uncover more, dear reader, you will be the first to know, and we will publish all the news that's not fit to print!"
.
.
Daphne couldn't help herself, and she cackled out at the story. She had worked with Skeeter to write it, and she had enjoyed every minute of it, including posing with Harry under Polyjuice. They had poked fun at each other's looks the entire time, especially when she pointed out Amycus' jug ears and short todger. Of course, she remembered Harry pointing out Alecto's saggy breasts, which hang halfway down her belly, and he had said that her face resembled Churchill's bulldog, "Dodo."
Here, Daphne shuffled that paper to the bottom of the stack and looked at the next headline from the 24th, which was about Walden Macnair. Could it be any worse, she thought? "Oh, yes," she muttered, as she looked at the headline:
"Walden Macnair, Beast Executioner Or Beast Lover?"
"Or Both?"
Sure enough, at the top of the first column was Mildred's photo, who was looking up to her left with a scowl that showed total contempt for what she saw. In the headline's photo, Walden was standing on a wooden crate behind a mare, with both hands on its rump, and in the nude with his trousers around his ankles. The poor horse's eyes were so wide that they looked as if they might roll from their sockets.
Here, she had to stop and chortle, as when Harry had posed for that, while using Macnair's hair in a small phial of Polyjuice, and he had been wearing a cock sock, of course, he complained and cursed the entire time of the shoot, saying, "I do not want to be doing this!" Even in the photo, Harry held a scowl on his face.
In the photo beside it, they showed a side of beef cooking over the coals, which was turned to just the correct angle on the spit, where one could not tell which animal it came from.
Next, she went on to read the article.
.
.
"Walden Macnair, what can we say? He came up in our investigation a few times as being a marked follower of You-Know-Who, so we dug deeper by contacting our friends in the investigative firm, stateside, and they had much to tell us on Mr. Macnair, who was formerly employed by the Ministry of Magic's Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures. They also sent us a photo taken by one of their investigators, which is shown above.
"What we found, dear reader is that Walden allegedly seems to have a "love for animals," shall we say, and an intimate one at that. However, this goes much deeper, which we will mention in a moment.
"Walden was allegedly photographed having sex with a white horse, which is an illegal act that is known in common parlance as bestiality, dear reader. Worse, though, after he was finished, he supposedly lifted the horse up by its rear hoof, by magic, leaving it dangling in the air, where he slit its throat, and allowed it to bleed out in a tin tub. Afterward, we were informed that he skinned and gutted the beast, before he butchered it up, and ate it as a stew along with his friends, though they did have a rack of ribs from the spit along with it. Did they think that they were having beef ribs, one wonders?
"What we were told, dear reader is that Walden practices an ancient ritual once performed by Irish kings in Ulster during pre-Norman Ireland. It was said that for the king to become the sovereign, he had to have sex with a white mare, and then bathe in a stew containing its blood and flesh. It was written, long ago, that: 'When the whole people of that land has been gathered together in one place, a white mare is brought forward into the middle of the assembly. He who is to be inaugurated, not as a chief, but as a beast; not as a king, but as an outlaw, has bestial intercourse with her before all, professing himself to be a beast also. The mare is then killed immediately, cut up in pieces, and boiled in water. A bath is prepared for the man afterward in the same water. He sits in the bath surrounded by all his people, and all, he and they, eat of the meat of the mare which is brought to them where he quaffs and drinks of the broth in which he is bathed, not in any cup, nor using his hand, but just dipping his mouth into it round about him. When this unrighteous rite has been carried out, his kingship and dominion have been conferred.'
"Evidently, Walden supposedly sees himself as some sort of bestial Gaelic king, and one wonders how many animals he has done this with, besides using white horses, as a sacrifice? Just how far do the Death Eaters' debauchery and perversion go, one wonders.
"Yes, dear reader, you have read the above correctly. We could hardly believe it, either, but these are the people that You-Know-Who surrounds himself with, and they are considered his "inner circle" of loyal toadies. When we have more, dear reader, we will be sure to let you know, so keep your eye open for the next edition of our publication!"
.
.
Even though Daphne laughed, she also felt the revulsion spurred on by what was written, and wondered what their readership would think about Voldemort's followers afterward.
Daphne folded this paper and placed it on the bottom of the stack, where she retrieved today's paper for the 31st, which headlined Thadius Nott, Theodore's father, who was also, now, residing in Azkaban.
The headline read: "Not The Nott You Think You Know?"
The first headline photo showed a slave, with a very scarred back, which had resulted from many whip lashes being applied, and it had been taken during the 1800s. The second photo, beside it, showed Nott's scowling mugshot from his recent booking and incarceration.
Below that, just as always, was a photo of Mildred Knowes, who was scowling up toward the two photos with a look of pure disgust on her face.
Finally, Daphne began reading the article:
.
.
"As part of our ongoing investigation into He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, we now come to the Nott family, and Thadius Nott, who is a lifelong friend of Thomas Marvolo Riddle, and an old Hogwarts school chum. Yes, Thadius has been with You-Know-Who from the start and was one of the original members of the Knights of Walpurgis that eventually became the Death Eaters.
Thadius was not only rumored to have murdered his wife while his son was a toddler, but is from a family that made their wealth from the old slave trade, and the sale of untaxed and illegally distilled alcohol. They have relatives stateside, which is why our friends at the private security and investigative firm that we deal with in the states, know them well.
"What we found was that the Nott family have, allegedly, always thought themselves to be superior to everyone else, especially Africans and 'lesser beings.' One member of their family, during the 1800s, Josiah Clark Nott (March 31, 1804 – March 31, 1873), an American surgeon and anthropologist, was one of the inventors of scientific racism and was a believer in phrenology, (studying skulls and brain sizes), which was developed by Samuel George Morton (1799–1851), earlier.
"Josiah Nott, a squib, was born on March 31, 1804, in South Carolina. He was the son of the Federalist politician and judge, Abraham Nott, who was originally from Connecticut, and they can trace their line back to the Anglo-Saxons of England. Josiah received his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1827, and he completed his post-graduate training in Paris, which may have been where he picked up his radical ideology. He moved to Mobile, Alabama, in 1833, and began a surgical practice.
"In 1856, Josiah hired Henry Hotze to translate Arthur de Gobineau's: An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races (1853–55), which is a founding text of 'biological racism' that contrasts with Boulainvilliers (1658–1722)'s theory of races. Gobineau subsequently complained that Hotze's translation had ignored his comments on the 'American decay generally and slaveholding in particular.'
"In 1857, Nott and Gliddon co-edited a book, Indigenous Races of the Earth. That book built upon the arguments in Types of Mankind, which linked anthropology with 'scientific' studies of race while trying to establish a supposed natural hierarchy of the races. Their book included chapters from Louis Ferdinand Alfred Maury, J. Atkin Meigs, and Francis Polszky, as well as letters from Louis Agassiz, Joseph Leidy, and A.W. Habersham.
"While this was taking place, Thadius line was still purchasing slaves, and illegally exporting them from Africa, even though that practice had been banned by law. On top of this, they bred House Elves and sold them at high prices to Britain's magical aristocracy, as well as distilled illegal rock gut whiskey, which they secretly sold to several magical pubs throughout Britain.
"Along the way, they tried to hide their ancestry with their blood ties to the muggles, squibs, and muggle-borns, by publishing the book, the Pure-Blood Directory, authored by Cantankerus Nott. The book listed the twenty-eight supposed true pure-blood families with the aim of helping such families maintain the purity of their bloodlines. Cantankerus, of course, was Thadius Nott's father.
"Yes, dear reader, now we start to see the core principles of You-Know-Who's inner circle, and why the Wizengamot and ministry had so much rot and corruption within it. This, dear reader, is what our new Minister for Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour is fighting to stop.
"When we have more, dear reader, you will be the first to know, so keep looking for our newest Saturday edition."
Finally, Daphne folded the paper, placed it back on the stack, and stood with a smirk, as she had to get ready since Harry would be there at six o'clock for supper at seven. He also said that he had a present for her and Astoria, and she wondered what it was.
Hermione, Ron, and Ginny had just pushed their trolleys through the passage at Platform 9-3/4 and started to look around for Harry through the steam billowing from the Hogwarts Express.
As they pushed them on up the platform with the elder Weasleys following along behind them, they saw Harry board the train toward the rear coach, and he was lifting two trunks, with magic, which Hermione scowled at, and they noticed Astoria and Daphne hop aboard just behind him.
"He must be taking their trunks to their compartment," Ron said, "so, he'll find us later."
Ginny doubted that, as she thought that Harry would want to sit with his fiancée.
Here, the trio bid the elder Weasleys goodbye and boarded the train just as the first whistle sounded, which was the warning, and found them a compartment in the third carriage with Neville and Luna.
It wasn't long until the second whistle sounded, and they felt the train lurch. When Hermione looked out the window, she could have sworn that she saw Harry on the platform.
A/N: I had fun writing this, and there is some truth in the article about the Nott surname. I imagine that JKR might have known about this as well.