Chapter 9: Revealing Secrets.
It was a week after the winter break, Harry, Ron, Ginny and friends were having their lunch. Harry had an uneasy feeling, something was telling him that things are going to take a wrong turn. Harry wasn't worried about Voldemort, his most loyal followers were all in Azkaban. He was worried of two people, the first one was Percy Weasley, Harry was worried that he was forming a club with the other traitors Granger and Longbottom, one of the Slytherin first years started to inform him about the occurrences in his club, for now it was a normal club, but Harry decided to keep constant vigilance. The other person he was worried about was Lucius Malfoy, during the break Lucius started his influence in Cornelius Fudge, and that would mean a lot of trouble. Harry glanced at the Slytherin table, and saw that Draco Malfoy was more smug than usual.
"Harry, look at the entrance," said Ginny.
Harry turned his head to the entrance of the great hall, and saw some familiar faces, those being the minister Cornelius Fudge and his undersecretary Dolores Umbridge.
Ginny whispered to Harry, "This smells bad."
Fudge approached Dumbledore and said, "An upstanding citizen from this community has reported to me some safety issues in this school, his son was sent to the hospital wing twice in a month. If that student is in the hospital wing again, we'll have to directly intervene in this school."
Umbridge said, "Minister, I think we should intervene anyway. There is too much filth in this school. Filth that doesn't belong to the wizarding world, and wizards that don't have enough wizarding pride."
Dumbledore explained, "Minister, that said student went to the hospital wing because of accidents caused by himself. You should tell that 'upstanding citizen' that he should educate his son better."
Fudge screamed, "You lie. My good friend told me about how you constantly favor Harry Potter over other students. He got on his house quidditch team on his fame alone, while my friend's son had to sit difficult tryouts for his place in his team."
Everyone that knew that Malfoy bought his place in the Slytherin quidditch team facepalmed.
Fudge continued, "And you allow," shows a copy of the Hogwarts times, "this gossip rag to circulate to all students."
Umbridge said, "Potter needs a lesson in humility, and he is not the only one that needs one. I'll make sure he receives it."
Both Fudge and Umbridge strutted out the great hall smugly.
"Oh, shit!" said Ginny.
"We need to call Sirius about this," replied Harry.
Ron ordered, "Wait a second! Harry, you are my best mate, but since the summer you have behaved strangely. My sister has been as well. I can't put a finger on it, but you both remind me of someone like Charlie than my best mate and my sister."
Gemma Farley noted, "I don't know you that well, but I've found suspicious that you seemed to know things you weren't supposed to know, like who were the teachers at that duelling club fiasco."
Tracey then continued, "There's also all that weirdness with that abandoned tower, or the fact it looks like you have some weird plan to take over the school but at the same time lay low."
Demelza observed, "Ginny, you seemed to know me, Natalie, and Colin, before I even talked to you."
Harry sighed, he told Ginny, "It looks like we have to reveal them our secret."
Ginny nodded in agreement, then she told the group, "We have a secret, a big one, we are going to meet in our tower after the last class today, we'll explain everything."
A few hours later the members of the inner circle of the Hogwarts renegades were gathered in the common room. Then a big black dog entered through the portrait that led to the shrieking shack and transformed into Sirius Black.
"What does Sirius Black have to do with your secret?" asked an annoyed Gemma.
"Everything," Harry answered.
"Our secret is so sensitive we hid it with a fidelius charm, that charm hides a secret in a person's soul who becomes the secret keeper," Ginny explained.
"This charm while it is active, only allows people in the secret to talk about it. People that aren't given the secret, would only hear noise when the secret is being talked about,"Harry continued.
"It also makes it impossible to figure out. The magic won't allow that. There are two secrets here, Sirius is the secret keeper of our secret, Harry is the secret keeper of Sirius' secret. Harry will reveal Sirius' secret to Ron, and Ron will try to talk about the secret to anyone else that isn't under the secret, that'll show that the secret is true. We'll do the same to our secret." Ginny finished.
Harry approached Ron and said something on his ear. Ron put a sceptical face. Ron then tried to say the secret out loud, but the people that weren't in the secret only heard noise. Ron's eyes widened in shock, having the realization that the secret was true.
Harry then revealed the first secret to the rest, "Sirius Orion Black is a time traveller sent back by Death."
"What has that to do with anything about you and Ginny?" asked Katie.
"It has everything to do with them. You'll be the secret tester for their secret." Sirius replied.
Sirius then told Harry's secret on Katie's ear, Katie then screamed and jumped around yelling, the people not in the secret only heard noise.
Sirius then did the big reveal, "Harry James Potter and Ginevra Molly Weasley are time travellers sent back by Death."
Most of the audience just screamed, "What?!"
Luna just commented, "of course! Now I know why Harry Potter recognized me."
Ron asked, "How long in the future? Were you two dating in that future?"
Ginny answered, "We were married. We come from around six and a half years in the future."
Angelina, Alicia and Katie all yelled in unison, "Our little sister is now our big sister!"
Fred inquired, "Hey! When did you come back?"
Harry replied, "The day before Ginny's birthday."
George then had a realization, "So, this is why you bought Ginny those Zonko's products! And why you knew we didn't let Ginny play quidditch with us."
Oliver then asked what he considered the most important question, "Did we win the quidditch cup, and who was captain after me?"
Harry laughed, "Well, this year in the other timeline, the cup was cancelled because of a conspiracy by Lucius Malfoy, next year we win, the person that became captain after you was Angelina."
Angelina commented, "It looks like I won't become captain this time around, I'll be passed over by you."
"That's funny because after you, I became captain and Katie was skipped over."
Katie asked, "Is Malfoy's conspiracy related with the minister's visit this lunch?"
Harry answered, "No, we prevented that conspiracy. But this reminded me of another thing that happened in my fifth year."
Sirius suggested, "Harry,I think they should see our memories of key events, I brought a pensieve for this. If they have any questions, they just ask."
Harry agreed, and with Ginny and Sirius they filled the pensieve with memories.
The group then all entered the pensieve, they stayed there for many hours until sunrise. They went into their respective classes and then returned to renegade tower to discuss the thing they learned.
"What the hell happened to Percy? We did all that teasing because we loved him, it was all for fun, we weren't laughing at him." Fred rambled.
"I already hated the Malfoys, but now they deserve to die! They traumatized Gin-Gin, they bought Percy, they destroyed our Harrikins' reputation." George continued.
"What the hell happened to Hermione? Was the friendship with Hermione always doomed, no matter the timeline?" Ron asked himself.
"So, of the ones here, the only ones that survived the other timeline were our new snake friends?" Fred asked.
"Yes," Ginny answered.
"So, this is why you are defending Percy from our pranks?"
"Yes, I'm trying to earn Percy's favour so he doesn't turn on us. We exposing Pettigrew in front of him was a plan to kill his worship of the ministry."
"What do we do about Malfoy?" Tracey asked.
"We just bide our time, for now," Said Gemma.
Leanne then commented, "I'm am the only Hufflepuff on this group, I think we should recruit more."
Tracey said, "At least from the memories, it seems that Cedric is a good candidate."
Harry had his realization, "Of course! And I already met Cedric in this timeline, in the Christmas party my godfather hosted."
"What about those objects with you-know-who's soul?" Ron asked.
"We are already handling them," Harry said, hiding his worry about the last soul fragment, but Death told him that it would be sorted by itself around a year after he travelled time.
Sirius then scolded Harry and Ginny, "You haven't taken the diadem from the school. I need to deal with that." Sirius transformed into his dog form and left.
"Harry, Ginny. Are you going to be more public with your relationship?" Ron asked.
"I don't know. We fear Percy, and your parents," answered Harry.
"Look, my parents like you, they won't have any problems with Ginny dating, even at age eleven," said Ron.
"About Percy, we'll handle him," said Fred.
After Harry returned to Hogwarts, Sirius claimed Bellatrix's vault for himself, he emptied it of its contents, both money and artifacts. He reserved the money for his businesses and took Hufflepuff's cup home. Then he went to the house where he grew up to retrieve Slytherin's locket. Then he helped Harry and Ginny tell their secret to their friends at Hogwarts where he took Ravenclaw's diadem as well. Now Sirius and Andromeda were at the Gaunt Shack in Little Hangleton to retrieve the Gaunt family ring and destroy it. Sirius also took the rest of the Horcruxes there because he decided to just destroy all the artifacts with fiendfyre.
"So, you retrieved the tiara," Andy said.
"Yes, now we have all the soul fragments, with the exception of the one in the shack," Sirius replied.
"I think we should destroy the shack in its entirety," Andromeda proposed.
"That's what we are going to do, none of use are curse breakers. But curse breakers are all about taking curses from thing without damaging them. This shack doesn't have any value," Sirius said.
"Let's do this."
Sirius opened the door of the shack and threw the four Horcruxes there. Then Sirius and Andromeda took a distance of about twenty meters from the shack and cast the spell, "ignis diaboli". Two fire dragons came out if their wands and attacked the shack. Andromeda and Sirius kept the flames for five minutes, until the shack and everything that was inside was turned into ashes. They turned off the fire and decided to examine the ruins.
"There's nothing left there, no trace of the artifacts we brought," Sirius said.
"Good. I think our job here is done," voiced a relieved Andromeda.
"Now, to check the biggest problem, Malfoy," said Sirius.
Andy asked, "What happened with Malfoy?"
"He is already making moves with the minister. In my last visit, I found out he sent the minister to threaten Dumbledore for Draco's dumb behaviour."
"That's a big problem"
"How is your potions mastery doing?"
"Good, by July I should be taking the test."
"So, that way we should be able to replace Snape when the time comes."
"I hope so."
The months passed and the Gryffindor vs Hufflepuff match came, where Harry caught the snitch winning the match 310-150. At the end of his victory lap, he gave his snitch to Ginny and kissed her. Percy Weasley, who was nearby with his girlfriend Penelope Clearwater approached the couple.
"Ginny, this is unacceptable behaviour and extremely inappropriate for a girl your age. What are our parents going to say?" said an angry Percy, while Penny was facepalming in the background.
The Weasley twins jumped to Ginny's defence.
"Look Percy, we have known since the summer." said Fred.
"And we approve, we pranked them together on her birthday. They looked so cute." continued George.
"So, those rumours are true, Ginny was become a scarlet woman." Percy said.
Penelope then approached and slapped Percy, "Your sister is not a scarlet woman. Don't eat those rumours. Most of those rumours are from the people you shouldn't be listening."
Ginny shouted, "Like Malfoy."
Penelope said, "Exactly, like Malfoy, Nott, Parkinson, Greengrass, Flint, Warrington. All people that don't have good morals."
Ginny then said, "Don't bother to tell our parents, they know and approve as long as I have good grades."
"Okay, but if your reputation falls, you must end your relationship," Percy said before walking away.
"I thought he was becoming mellower after he was disappointed in the ministry," Penny commented.
"We too," Said Ginny.
"Ginny, I suspect you have a hand in the mysterious newspaper that appears every weekend. I know this because you never seem surprised at what the newspaper says. I have some ideas for it, to make it more legit."
"Okay, I'm the head editor of the newspaper. But to participate in it, you must join the Hogwarts renegades. Also I think you must know a secret. Meet me at the troll tapestry in the seventh floor after dinner."
"Okay."
Some hours later Penny went to the tapestry of Barnabas the barmy in the seventh floor, when she arrived she found a Hufflepuff boy, who she recognized as the seeker from the Hufflepuff quidditch team.
"Did Harry send you here?"
"No, It was his girlfriend."
"Those two behave a little weird, like they were seventeen and eighteen instead of eleven and twelve."
"I also noticed that. They told me they had a secret they wanted to tell me."
"So, you are here." Harry said.
"You are ready for our secret." Ginny said.
Harry and Ginny made the induction speech to Cedric and Penelope and gave them the renegade coins. Then they told them Sirius' secret and gave them a piece of parchment with their secret to read. The Hogwarts renegades were starting to expand in Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw.