Hermione put the two galleons that were left in the safe in their bedroom and turned to Draco.
She took refuge in their usual night routine, which was to tell each other about their day. "I didn't have the best of days. Terry Boots absolutely botched his custody case. He took his son for an afternoon excursion to Muggle London, to the British Museum, when his ex explicitly forbade that. I have no idea how I can salvage this for him. And even if I do, he won't be able to pay."
Draco agreed. "I don't know what is so difficult about the idea of joint custody and agreement on some general principles."
"His ex shouldn't insist on having zero muggle interaction." Hermione scoffed. "She is a nightmare, stand offish, prejudiced, snobbish. You name it. She loves her son though. And Terry and she have signed an agreement."
Hermione started to brush her hair. "Do you think Terry is a case of OPUP?"
Draco took the brush from her and started to carefully work his way through her tresses.
"Definitely," he agreed. "You are too invested."
"Terry is such a mess. He just wants to see his son and I feel for him, but why did he have to botch it? He wants to claim, that the British Museum has magic artefacts and that he just wanted to show them to his son."
"Granger, represent Terry to the best of your abilities, continue to give him extension on his fees, but don't try to pick up his mess for him."
For a while, Hermione let herself be soothed by Draco's patient brushing and the occasional sorting of her tresses with his hands. Years of practice meant that she need not fear sudden tugging or scalp pains.
"Robert missed you. I barely managed to get him to bed with the help of the other children."
Draco hummed.
"Will you tell me what happened?", she asked.
"Well, the bureaucrat in residence was more obnoxious than usual," he sighed.
"Rina told me all about Percy Weasley. I knew something was wrong, when I hadn't heard from you by midday." She grimaced. "I had hoped you would just have to wait like the last times."
When Draco did not answer, she turned and looked at him. "Malfoy," she said. "tell me."
"Weasley had never seen the new plastic notes in his life and decided to let Fawley check them."
"Fawley?", Hermione asked, shocked.
Draco nodded and gave her a half-grin, that held little joy. "At least Rina had gone outside by then."
"What did he do?"
"Just bruises. The doc gave me some salve. Don't worry."
"I hate him. I hate him. Hypocrite, coward, bastard. This is illegal. I'll sue him."
Draco laughed.
"Why do you laugh?"
"Picturing your righteous anger helped me get through this. You know it is a SOPGEM situation though, Granger. You still have to pay your secretary with the fees from duty soliciting and we still have to buy school supplies."
"We could always collect evidence and sue him after Robert will have passed his NEWTs." Hermione suggested. "Or I fire my secretary? I can go back to managing my own calendar."
Draco scoffed. "And barely be at home, no thanks."
"Or maybe we could ask the indulgent godparents of our children to buy school equipment."
"No," he said, his face set.
"Why not?"
"You don't want to accept money from your clients when you know they can't afford your fees, Hermione. I don't want to accept money. Period. It's not in my genes."
He took her hand and entwined her fingers with his.
"My father has not taught me many wisdoms, but I think he was right about his assessment that borrowing or loaning ruins friendships."
Hermione pressed Draco's hand. She tried to picture Pansy buying the children's schoolbooks, Neville spending more than the occasional present. And Draco swallowing his pride. It would ruin his friendship.
"I reluctantly agree with your father, I think. Although I wonder if he really had friends."
"He might have had some when he was a young man."
"Shall I put the salve on your bruises?", Hermione asked.
"That would be nice."
"Lay down, then."
The view of Draco's chest made her angry all over again, but she tried to work in the salve carefully.
"So, after you had to deal with the pencil-pusher and a bloody hypocrite, you managed to run into Ron Weasley."
"The embodiment of 'Be careful what you wish for, you might get it'," Draco said.
Hermione had to laugh despite herself. She punched Draco's arm, very lightly and very playfully. "What are you then?"
"The embodiment of 'undeservedly getting what I did not know I needed and wanted'". He smiled at her, a warm smile that made her smile in return.
His face became thoughtful. "According to the Weasel I am the reason that you're not minister of magic by now."
"Did he say that?"
"He's not wrong, you know." Draco said, his eyes searching her face. "You certainly did not get what you deserved."
"I would be a terrible minister of magic." Hermione exclaimed. "I would try to change everything at once, and I probably would have a revolution and riots on my hands."
"You would be splendid, though. 'All would love you and despair'".
Hermione laughed, recognising the quote from 'Lord of the Rings'. "Galadriel, eh? I bet she didn't need someone to tame her hair."
She placed her hand on Draco's chest and began to circle her finger across it, touching the skin only lightly over the white fine lines of his sectumsempra scars that stood out.
"I worry so much about Colin," she admitted. "He is so unpredictable. I fully expected him to love 'Lord of the Rings', but I thought he would lash on the whole 'Hobbits find their courage'."
"Instead he decided that his new interest should be that Elves are so different in Muggle literature compared to House elves." Draco groaned.
Hermione nodded, unhappily. "He's already asked if he may come home on the first free weekend. At least, Neville has an eye on him."
"I know, but still…. If it's not any better by the end of the school year, we could always put him into a Muggle school, and you could just home school him in magic."
Hermione sighed. "We'll see how it is in summer."
She let herself fall at Draco's side. Usually she would curl into his arms, but she did not want to hurt him and kept a bit of distance, just taking his hand.
"There is something else, isn't there?"
The slight pause in Draco's breathing told her that she was right.
"Rina and I met Astoria after Gringotts." That in itself could hardly be what had him upset.
His voice became very soft. "Apparently, a recently widowed pureblood lady made a huge donation to Hogwarts and Astoria was entrusted with the transaction."
Hermione took Draco's hand and kissed his fingers. "Oh, love," she said.
"School equipment for the less well off…. From all houses."
"She is looking for loopholes in the C.O.C."
She felt more than she saw that Draco nodded. "Now, that…" he hesiteated shortly "…her husband is dead, she probably tries to get rid of as many things and money as possible without triggering an already erratic curse. The more she manages to spend, the less vicious the curse becomes."
His breathing became uneven. Hermione rose and propped herself on her elbow and studied her husband's face.
"The money can't be spent flimsily, she has to come up with valid reasons, that have no connection to the cut-out heir. The curse…. ", he stuttered. "… wants to hold it together for a worthy heir, only there is none, not in pureblood thinking anyway."
"Shh," Hermione laid a finger on his lips. "Do you feel the C.O.C.?"
Draco nodded. "Like tendrils brushing on my scutum. It might be just my imagination."
Hermione doubted that. "Would it help if I try to guess further? You seem uncomfortable."
"Be careful, there can't be any doubt that this C.O.C. is particularly vicious, and erratic."
Hermione had long suspected that the scutum was the only thing that kept Draco alive. Draco seemed to agree. 'Particularly vicious' could mean a curse to the death. It would be in line with the Malfoy family tradition to have a particularly nasty variant in place.
Hermione frowned. "The conditions were set by an esteemed ancestor, I assume? The one who set up a stupid house elf pact to prevent non-pureblood marriages for heirs within the sacred 28? He certainly did not lack imagination."
"I think it predates that, several generations is my guess."
"There is no distant cousin? Twelfth times removed? Someone the curse can settle on as an heir?"
Draco barked a laugh. "For the last ten generations or so, there has only ever been one son, and very often no sisters. I think this particular C.O.C. was set up way before the one heir only policy. It makes no sense otherwise. Which means that our house elf lover was not the one to put it in place."
Hermione's breath caught in her throat. "Are you telling me that there was only one heir on purpose?" Her voice sounded squeaky in her own ears.
"To keep the money together."
"That doesn't make any sense." Hermione was appalled. "If every pureblood family of the 28 would do the same, then there wouldn't be anyone left after a couple of generations." She counted quickly in her head. "after six generations."
"My dear Hermione, I thought we had established long ago, that logic is not the forte of pureblood thinking."
Hermione had to laugh and thought about an afternoon at the lake in Hogwarts. Despite the grim subject they shared a smile.
"So, the curse strives to keep everything together for a worthy heir, but there is no heir because the family had a one-son-policy? And the one and only son has been cut out. By a curse that was set up prior to the one-son-policy." And probably would be dead, if the curse had run its natural curse.
Very suddenly, Hermione felt great respect for Draco's mother. She had always known that her mother-in-law was a formidable witch, a powerful occlumens, but this was an uphill struggle of enormous dimensions. And she had to race against time.
"Well, this particular family certainly set up several strong incentives to prevent non pureblood marriages…. A Cut out curse, the house elf pact…. Which I think was meant to cushion the risks of the one-son policy by getting the other families to be invested in the survival of their line."
"It is enough to give me an intensive headache." Hermione sat up. "Since when do you know?"
"I've suspected ever since last November. I felt the C.O.C occasionally, before that. It always felt like malicious intent, but since then it has become more erratic, as if probing me." So, Lucius' death had shifted the curse.
He shrugged. "One more reason to be grateful to the talent of Severus Snape."
"Is Colin in danger?" Colin was the eldest son after all.
"For what it's worth. I do think you and the children are out of it. Speaking in pureblood traditions you are just my mistress and our children are…." He left the sentence unfinished.
"What? Our marriage was registered in the Ministry! And the house elf pact was triggered when our married was registered."
Hermione stared at him, shocked.
"The whole purpose of that house elf pact and the danger of rogue elves was to bring any errant pureblood heir back into the fold. It was meant to ensure that it was in the interest of every family of the Sacred 28 to keep their male heirs in the line of blood purity. Any marriage registered with the ministry is serious enough to be threat, but if it was not done with a pureblood ritual it was not a valid marriage and could be annulled."
"Your mistress", Hermione sputtered. "your mistress! And the children are bastards? By-blows? Merlin!"
"The sacrifices you made for the house elves cause." Draco grinned. "Living in concubinage for decades."
Hermione scowled. "I am heavily tempted to punch you. Your mistress!"
He laughed. "Please continue, Granger, you look marvellous, I love it so much, when you're angry."
"Malfoy!"
"Your eyes sparkle," he said. "And there is no need to punch me. Making me laugh already hurts enough."
"Oh Draco," she said. "You know that I don't do punches nowadays."
"Lucky me," he grinned. "Anyway, apart from the fact, that I could not perform such a ritual, I doubt you would be keen on a solemn magical ritual that would have demanded obedience from you."
"What? Obedience? What kind of outdated patriarchy mess is this …."
"See, there is a reason I never mentioned this to you." His face became serious. "And you know that this is not how I see our marriage."
"If it keeps Colin safe, so be it then." Hermione shook her head. "I am happy to be your disobeying mistress."
She let herself fall on her pillow, but bent her face, so she could still see Draco's face.
"He forbade her to see you," she whispered. "And now she has to keep the curse in check."
She thought she could see Draco's eyes glistening, his playfulness having left him entirely. "I don't really care about being disinherited. But I'll never forgive him for that."
Chapter 21: Forest of Dean (December 26, 1997)
Summary:
The Slytherin locket is destroyed...
And we see Hermione's and Draco's reaction.
Notes:
So, another flash back chapter!
Chapter Text
The moon painted pattern on the cover of the bed in the hospital wing, when Hermione visited him and sneaked at his side. A part of her knew that she was in a dream, that she had relived this particular scene many times in her dreams, so many times, that she barely knew if her talk with Draco and the kiss they shared was just a fabric of her own imagination.
Yet, somehow her dream felt more real than her visit in the hospital wing had felt when it had happened. As it happens in dreams, her talk with the injured boy in the hospital bed was different from the talk she remembered. They did not talk about Harry's attack or Draco's mark. Instead Hermione told him how lonely she felt, how the hunt for Horcruxes was a failure so far, how they had stupidly visited Godric's Hollow, how they had barely escaped the snake Nagini and You-know-who. Even in her dreams, Hermione knew better than to utter his name. In her dream, her tears fell freely on Draco's hand that lay on the cover. He raised his hand and softly wiped her tears away, and for a moment Hermione felt the anticipation she always felt in that particular dream. He bent down to kiss her. But this time, sweet oblivion was not for her.
The snake that was inked into his forearm within the Dark Mark suddenly came alive and hissed. It looked like it was writhing, freeing itself from the binds of Draco Malfoy's flesh. They both looked on in horror, when the snake grew, became huge and raised its head as if to strike and the hissing became almost unbearable in Hermione's ear. She woke with cold sweat on her skin.
She jumped out of bed and stumbled out of the tent and froze in shock, when she realised that Harry was not at his post outside the tent.
She was in the middle of the Forest of Dean, Harry had vanished and taken her wand and all she had were the remnants of Harry's wand.
Hermione tried to calm her erratically beating heart and refrained from shouting for Harry. Had he been so stupid as to leave the wards? What if someone had found him? She worked her way slowly to the boundaries of the wards they had set up, searching for Harry. She wondered if her dream was a bad omen, she wondered if it meant that she was in danger, that Harry had been taken.
"Your good luck wish did not carry us that far, Malfoy," she whispered. They had set out on the hunt in August, just after Harry's birthday and they still hadn't destroyed one horcrux. For a moment she stopped in her tracks. What if her dream meant that Malfoy had died? Had Voldemort killed him in a fit of anger after Harry and her had escaped yet another time? It was certainly not beyond him to randomly kill one of his own followers in a fit of rage.
She ventured briefly out of the wards, but could not see Harry, and she did not dare leave the camp before daylight came and she had a chance to look for signs. It felt like hours until the first flicker of light came over the horizon, and when Harry returned with Ron in tow, Hermione had worked herself into a shrieking frenzy.
She was so relieved and angry at the same time, that she barely knew what she shouted at the boys. In her state she almost asked them if Draco was dead before she caught herself. She still hadn't told either of the boys of her strange encounters with Draco Malfoy. She still hadn't told them about her talk with Dumbledore. Any questions about him would come out of the blue for Harry and Ron.
It was only in the afternoon, that Hermione really understood what they had accomplished. They had the sword of Gryffindor and they had destroyed a horcrux. And someone was on their side, someone who had sent a patronus.
When she went so sleep again, the dream of her visit to the hospital wing came again, but this time, they were not interrupted by the hissing of a snake. Maybe, just maybe, her dream had been a reflexion of the horcrux dying and not a bad omen for her or for the boy who expected to die.
(Draco Malfoy's memories, as retrieved August 8, 2020)
When Draco woke up, the sun was shining and for the first time in months, he did not have the feeling that it was only a bleak future that awaited him. The grass in the manor's park glittered with hoarfrost and in his heart, there was the tiniest spark of hope, a hope that at some day in the future, the world might be rid of the Dark Lord. He could even see, that the park of the manor was beautiful, a sight that had recently been blighted for him. It was as if a small ray of sunshine shone through the clouds of his fear. He tried to hold on to the fleeting images of his dreams, although he suspected that he probably should not try. Fleeting dreams of Granger better remained just that, fleeting dreams.
He did not understand his sudden sliver of hope though. Christmas was just as bad as anticipated if not worse. The Dark Lord was in a bad mood. The death eaters tried to tiptoe around him, and Draco heard the tiniest of whispers that Potter had escaped a trap.
He looked out of the window again and saw Severus Snape approaching. It was difficult to judge from the distance, but his step was not only brisk and fast as always, but Draco thought he saw a spring in his steps.
When they met in the entrance hall, his face gave nothing away though. Draco could see that his godfather's occlumency walls were as densely woven as a silk cloth. Thread upon thin thread, with no space in between. No legilimency dagger would cut through this. Severus just acknowledged him with a small nod, nothing more, on his way in, where the Dark Lord had summoned him. Draco did not follow, he avoided contact with the Dark Lord as often as he was able to.
It was only later that they had an opportunity to talk, when Draco accompanied his godfather to the gate of the manor where he could apparate back to Hogwarts. The hoarfrost was long gone, but even in Winter the sun made the park beautiful.
"I would like to return to Hogwarts sooner," Draco said. "I've done some reading and I have an idea, I want to test. I think the ingredients for the potion have to be prepared without magic."
His professor looked him straight in the eye. "You mustn't appear too eager to leave, but that idea sounds worth pursuing. You can't buy muggle cutting tools. I'll bring something from my own home. Try to be inconspicuous about leaving though."
"Do you think it would be a good idea to have some basic communication? Just in case, something comes up?", Draco asked. "I really had this idea since the beginning of Christmas break, and I would have liked to ask you."
"I would argue that the corresponding galleons have been overused."
"I rather thought about an alert for emergencies, like I have with Prudy."
Severus stopped for a moment. Then he nodded slowly. "Give me your ring."
"Do you remove that often?" he asked.
Draco shook his head. "Not any longer. I want to be able to call Prudy, whenever necessary."
His godfather took his wand and spoke a spell, silently of course.
"Remove it twice, and I'll know you want to talk, remove it three times, and I'll know you're in dire straits. When the stone turns black, you'll know there is no point in calling me."
Draco acknowledged the possibility of Severus' death with a small nod. He, himself, had after all expected to die multiple times already. He sometimes felt like he was living on borrowed time.
Severus waved his wand over the length of Draco's body as if he wanted to look after his health.
"If the stone turns red, try to contact me. I hope it won't ever be necessary though."
And then for a tiny moment, Severus Snape's face changed. He smiled.
"We're one step closer to our goal, finally."
"Really?" So, the strange feeling he had this morning hadn't been a mistake.
Severus nodded, but did not tell more.
"Is Granger….?", he asked.
Severus scowled at him. "She's alive. Don't dwell on that! Remember to occlude."
Draco flushed. "I know, I know. I thought, I could ask you."
Severus' face softened. "Just be careful."
"Yes, and I'll put this away," Draco said.
"That is probably for the best. I wish you were a better occlumens."
"The memory storing is a good workaround. I put a scutum on the memory vial. Nobody but me can access them now."
Severus gave him a tiny nod, which could be interpreted as praise and disapparated.
Chapter 22: Preparing observations
Summary:
Harry tries to make progress in the various cases that need the head auror's attention.
Notes:
So, some hints for the diverse mystery plots here (I hope). I am a bit torn. I don't want to be too obvious with my hints, but I also don't want for the solution to come out of the blue. So, if anyone wants to speculate, do that, although it is possible, that hints are not sufficient yet.
In this chapter we see some of the motivations of Percy.
Chapter Text
Harry had arrived early in his office, even though school would start in a couple of days, and he usually tried to make the most of the children's time at home. But Ron had been in such a sour mood, that he had fled. That he had to run into Malfoy of all people. Ginny had thought it such a good idea to send him to George with the children.
Pansy gritted her teeth, when Harry asked about what exactly had happened and murmured something about "men who behaved as they were still little boys in the playground." She gave Harry the gist of it, though. That is what had not made it to the prophet. "Are you a happy man?" was the headline of today's Prophet, together with a photo muggle style that showed Malfoy on the floor and a very red-faced Ron. All unmoving. Well there would have been no point of a wizarding photo with one of the main objects of this delightful gossip missing.
"I think they are even," Pansy summed up. "Ron got in a pretty good punch, and Draco will have a taped face for a week, but Draco's punchline was pretty on point."
"He certainly didn't lose his knack for vicious truths." Harry remarked. Ron wasn't a happy man, that was true enough. Harry wondered if Malfoy was, with his scutum and all, or if he had just claimed that to rile up Ron.
They discussed the reports on the attacks on muggleborn children afterwards. They were still discussing, how the spells had been applied. The spells themselves had been rather harmless, spells like a perpetual hick-up spell, a giggling spell, and a somewhat nastier easy bruising spell, but Harry shared Pansy's uneasiness. If spells could be applied without detectable wizarding activity, nothing said that they would limit themselves to relatively harmless spells the next time. And the spells had been very difficult to remove as well. They refined their working theory that the spells had been applied with a magically altered muggle device.
"Muggles call them drones," Pansy told him. "They are not very big, and you direct them with a muggle smartphone. If you then magically disguise them as a bird, it would be quite easy to let them drop a cursed item on a child, that is curious about a seemingly trusting bird."
So, Pansy had already gone to work and asked Draco Malfoy about Muggle technology. Probably when she had accompanied him to a Muggle doctor. She was a very efficient second after all.
"But we didn't find any remnants of cursed items."
"What if the spells were mixed with a potion, some lasting potion or durable potion?"
Harry frowned. "Spells do not mix well into potions. We still could search for vials or shards of vials of course."
"My gut tells me, that this is serious. Imagine if someone applies a lasting scutum on every muggleborn child."
Harry shuddered. "It should be impossible."
Pansy arched an eyebrow. "There is one case of a lasting scutum."
"And Severus Snape was an exceptional wizard. We still cannot reproduce some of his spells. And we still do not know, how he managed to apply a permanent scutum on a living person." He grimaced. "After his own death, to top it."
"As for the application…," Pansy said.
Harry waved impatiently. "Yes, I know the house-elf did the application with whatever Snape had chosen as a carrier. The house elf was questioned thoroughly on that. She did not know what it was at that time, and I doubt she is more knowledgeable now."
"What if they discovered or rather rediscovered the carrier? And that is why we had difficulties removing the spells."
"That makes too much sense for my liking," Harry admitted. "You do have a vivid imagination. I assume you don't want to insinuate that Draco Malfoy is behind this. The attacks happened in Wiltshire after all."
Pansy scoffed and rolled her eyes in annoyance. "You know he doesn't remember. It is such a pity that Severus Snape's memories on Draco never were recovered."
Harry looked at his hands and studied his nails. "Even if they were, he might not have inserted this particular information," he finally said.
"So, I guess, I'll look if I find any residues of what might have been a carrier."
Harry gladly left the field work to Pansy and tried to do some filing. In addition to the muggleborn problem, there had been several dementor sightings. Harry made a patrolling plan for the younger aurors. Dementors couldn't be destroyed, only dispelled. Harry was determined to drive them off as far as possible. The decision to rid Azkaban of dementors had been the right one, Harry was sure, but without being fed emotions in a closed setting, dementors had become very uncooperative. Harry wished he knew how to get rid of them permanently.
In the afternoon, Luna visited him. The smuggling of wild occamies was not very high on Harry's priority list, but he obliged Luna and promised her to have a look at it. He might have wondered if she wanted to make him reconnect with Hermione on a professional issue if it was anyone but Luna. From Luna he got yet another version of what had happened yesterday. Luna blamed it on an excessive invasion of wrackspurts that had entered the café at the exact same time as Malfoy.
"They must have lingered at the door," she said. "Ron was surprisingly wrackspurt free before."
Harry bit back a comment on wrackspurts possibly trailing Malfoy because of his scathing tongue that had not lost any of its edge over the years.
"Wrackspurt free?", he asked instead.
"Considering, Lucretia just left him, I had expected many more wrackspurts, but I think he might be secretly relieved. Or not so secretly," she mused.
"To be quite honest, Luna, we are all secretly relieved." Of all of Ron's wives she had certainly been the worst choice, a stunner lookwise, but her tongue could rival Malfoy's. And on his better days Harry could admit that Malfoy at least was occasionally funny. The song he had written for Neville's and Pansy's wedding had been hilarious, dropping with sarcasm, but hilarious.
In the early evening, Harry was about to call it a day, when Percy's patronus, a fox, arrived. Harry promised to drop in on his way home.
Percy's wife Penelope opened the door, Harry smiled and told her that he just needed Percy for a second. Percy told him that he would show him something in the garden, which was a very thinly veiled excuse, but Penelope did not question it.
When they were in the garden, Percy produced a list and gave it to Harry. "I managed to plant some of the observation galleons on some of the families that are the usual suspects for money laundering, but the minster will still have to sign before you can activate the observation."
Harry had a look at the list and almost dropped it, when he read the last two names.
He pointed at them. "You realise the last two are not prime suspects for money laundering?"
Percy grimaced. "I know, I know. Both happened to be in the bank yesterday, and I wanted to be thorough. I know that Astoria Greengrass has fallen out with her family and that her salary at Hogwarts is all she has. And my children say, she is a good teacher. But it could all have been a ruse."
He scowled. "Someone saw her talking with Malfoy just before she came. And she deposited a substantial sum from the Malfoy vault into the school vault with verified signature by Narcissa Malfoy. A very substantial sum. It seemed too much of a coincidence."
Harry scratched his chin. "Hmm," he said.
It would be a neat circumvention of the cut-out curse. Or was he too trusting, just because he owed his life to Narcissa and she had been so cooperative over the years, always helpful with cursed items, questions on dark curses?
"I'll look into it," he said. "If it's a real donation Flitwick will know about it."
"I said, I wanted to be thorough," Percy defended himself.
"So, Malfoy was at Gringotts?", he asked. That would explain the wrackspurts, Harry thought. It must be hard for the man to mix with the common customers at Gringotts.
"It was inconspicuous enough," Percy conceded. "He claimed his son needed a new wand, and it's not as if he ever exchanges much, certainly not enough for laundering on a great scale."
Percy looked somewhat contrite and Harry wondered about that. "I estimated what Ollivander would probably demand, and gave him a bit more. After I ensured that he would not suspect false play," Percy continued.
Percy sighed. "I managed to get my hands on the muggle money he handed in and prepared that as well, so that it can be used for observation. It's in Fawley's hands now."
"That was quick thinking, Percy, thanks."
"Wandless! I was frightened someone would realise. I was not made for this kind of spy work, Harry."
"Hopefully we'll get results soon and you won't have to do that again."
"I'd sooner not deal with Malfoy again. The nerve of the man, really. He asked me about Gringott's stand on blood suprematists!"
"How comes?", Harry asked, puzzled.
"He saw something on Fawley's arm, Latin numerals for four and seven. He hinted that it might stand for the sacred 28."
"Well, sacred 27 by now… It still sounds somewhat plausible," Harry argued. "And we suspect Fawley to have certain sympathies."
"That doesn't make it better!", Percy exclaimed. "To hear that from Malfoy of all people."
Harry laughed. "So, you're pissed because Malfoy actually gave you evidence that our suspicions might be right?"
"You must admit, that life would be easier, if people we cannot stand would be wrong all the time. And it is not as if you like the man. Nobody likes the man," Percy grumbled.
Harry shook his head. "Well, only a few. Hermione seems to like him well enough, if five children are any indication. I'd best make a note about it anyway, if Fawley is really involved in the money laundering. We might need him to testify."
He saw Percy's scowl. "That does not mean that I won't look into Malfoy as well."
On the way home, Harry walked. It helped him think things through. He wondered, if someone wanted him to suspect Malfoy. The fact that the incidents with Muggleborns were centred in Wiltshire did not sit right with him. Maybe he should observe Malfoy and ensure that the information was leaked. Not to Pansy though. Pansy would be livid, if he observed Malfoy. Someone from outside perhaps? It would be a complicated operation, but worth it in the long run. If people suspected him to look in the wrong direction, just because of old enmities, he could cover other tracks. He might be able to finally find the leak he suspected was in the department itself. It would also mean that he would juggle and exploit his friends.
When he was home, he passed the portrait of Phineas Nigellus. He seldom stopped to chat with him, but today he did.
"When you're next in Hogwarts give my regards to Professor Dumbledore. I think he would be proud of me." He wished he didn't sound so bitter.