ccxxviii. storyteller

When the Aurors finally arrived, Harriet was beyond exhausted.

She barely registered them opening the door nor ordering her forward to accept the pair of magicked shackles upon her wrists. Her knees shook as Harriet mutely followed the two maroon-robed wizards into the corridor, and they held her by the arms as they marched to the prison's entrance. The bracing wind helped wake her up, though she still staggered forward like a stunned Inferius on uncooperative legs.

The larger Aurors hefted Harriet up and nearly dropped her into the boat before boarding themselves. Harriet blinked dumbly at the frigid, gray spray that flecked her glasses and soaked the sleeves of her jacket. A few complicated incantations later, and the rickety dinghy zipped off against the tide through the perilous field of jagged rocks. When they reached the guarded dock on the mainland, she was transferred to another pair of nameless Aurors and Apparated away.

Harriet had a vague sense of space and noise—voices in an open hall, smooth stone under her too-tight trainers, Charmed magelights illuminating the way. They boarded a lift, her stomach swooping, then disembarked through a long passage. Harriet had very little idea of where she was until the left Auror opened a perfectly normal-looking door and pushed her into the new room. Harriet stumbled into a pair of arms, breathing in the smell of roses and gardenia.

"Oh, Harriet," Perenelle Flamel said, the relief evident in her voice as her grip tightened on the tired teenager slumped against her front. Harriet knew she probably smelled like nervous sweat and body funk, but she didn't care. She pressed her face into Perenelle's shoulder and sighed. After a minute, she found the strength to step back.

"If you could remove these from my client," said a dark-skinned wizard Harriet didn't know, indicating the shackles on her wrists as he spoke to one of the Aurors. The Auror did as told, and Harriet winced as she rubbed her skin. "Some tea as well."

"What?" the Auror sputtered. "I'm not a servant."

"Well, today's your day for promotion. Tea?"

The wizard had a manner of asking questions so they came out as demands, and though the Auror had to be two stone heavier and a good half a foot taller than the older, slightly pudgy man, he nonetheless grumbled and went off as commanded. The wizard smirked, then turned to Harriet. He wore familiar pin-striped robes and a plum-colored ribbon on his lapel.

"Good evening, Miss Potter. I'm Dorian Dirigible, and I've been hired by your guardians to serve as your representative."

"My—?" Harriet's gaze drifted to Perenelle, finding Mr. Flamel and Professor Dumbledore completing the group waiting for her. The room was quite cramped, what with five people, a table, and assorted chairs cluttered inside. Harriet quickly embraced Mr. Flamel, and then Professor Dumbledore, who seemed surprised by the action but nonetheless patted the top of Harriet's messy hair.

She let the Headmaster go, and the barrister cleared his throat, indicating the chairs. Harriet sat between the Flamels on one side while Professor Dumbledore joined Mr. Dirigible on the other. A quick flick of Dumbledore's wand added extra cushions to their seats and a second light in the otherwise drab, dingy space. The Auror glared at it when he returned with a tea service.

"There we are," the barrister said as the door snapped shut. "How do you take your tea, Miss Potter…?"

Harriet blinked. "Oh. Uh, just plain is fine. Thanks."

Mr. Dirigible scooted the cup over to her, and Harriet took it, blowing the steam from the surface. After the first drop hit her tongue, she couldn't stop herself from guzzling the rest down, scalding or not. Mr. Dirigible poured her another cup—and another, after which Harriet felt more aware and less like a dried bit of jerky found in the back of the pantry. A plate of ginger newts appeared, and Harriet quietly accepted one. Her stomach ached after only one biscuit.

"What's—what's going to happen now?" she croaked, folding her hands together in her lap. She fidgeted a moment later, reaching up to tug on her oily hair and ensure it covered her neck. She didn't want to talk about what Gaunt had done. Not right now, not while she was sitting in what must be an Aurory interrogation room.

Mr. Dirigible produced a folder from a hidden pocket, a pad of parchment, quill, and ink set joining after. The wizard tested the quill's edge against his thumb, then gave it a delicate dip in the open inkwell. "Now, Miss Potter, you will tell me all you can remember about the evening of June twenty-fourth." At Harriet's blank expression, he explained, "The night of Mr. Boot's death."

"Oh." Harriet looked to the Flamels, then Professor Dumbledore. Black spots peppered the edges of her vision, and she forced a breath, her hand shaking as she adjusted her glasses. She should have anticipated this. They needed this for the investigation, right? She would've thought the Aurors were meant to interrogate her, but things were different in the Wizarding world, and they seemed to differ even more when it came to Gaunt's whims. "I—I don't know where to begin."

"Perhaps from the last place your presence was noted?" Mr. Dirigible suggested. "The Great Hall?"

"Okay. Professor Dumbledore had just—well, it was time for the third task, in the Triwizard Tournament. Most everyone left the Great Hall to go down to the Quidditch Pitch."

"Why weren't you among them?"

"I had gotten covered in grease paint and glitter, so I went to the dormitory to clean up and—." Feed my familiar, she nearly added before common sense kicked in and she shut her mouth. No need to bring her accidental felony theft into the mix. "Can't they just ask me these questions with Verit—Veriterserum? They'd know the truth then."

"Veritaserum. And no, they cannot," Mr. Dirigible answered. "It is against the law in a criminal case. You went to clean up, as you say, in your dormitory. You are in Slytherin House?"

"Yeah. Why does that matter?"

"It will put into perspective how long it took to journey from the Great Hall to your common room. Continue."

"Err—I got the rubbish off of me and changed my shirt, then I went back upstairs." Harriet looked over to Professor Dumbledore, who sat quietly without interrupting, just like the Flamels. "Sir? Can't they use—memories? Like how the Pensieve works?"

"Unfortunately, no," the Headmaster told her. Mr. Dirigible kept writing in his parchment pad. "The Ministry added an addendum making memories inadmissible, deeming that—as memories rely on personal perception—such things unduly swayed the court. They had to change the law in, oh, the eighteenth century or so, after Everest Eglet was charged with assault against two Muggles and was nearly acquitted after his memory showed him attacking two Inferi. Witnesses couldn't corroborate his story, and it later came to light Mr. Eglet had consumed a great deal of very curious fungi. They altered his perception of reality, and because it was deemed possible for memories to be tampered in such a manner, the Wizengamot ruled their usage unreliable and leading."

Harriet slumped in her seat. "The memories would prove everything. Are you telling me I can't use them because some arsehole—sorry, Professor—got sozzled on mushrooms three hundred years ago?"

"Basically, yes." Professor Dumbledore exhaled through his nose and tugged on the bottom of his beard. "I can tell you from my own prior experience as Head of Wizengamot, the law does not always make perfect sense, and there are those who take its weaknesses for granted to twist it to their own aims."

Gaunt, Harriet supplied, nervously patting her hair against her neck.

"Even if the court would accept your memories, I worry certain parties would twist them to, perhaps, slander your person."

"They would claim you're une folle," Mr. Flamel grumbled. "A madwoman."

Harriet stared at him, hardly daring to believe he was telling the truth, but Mr. Flamel's stern expression didn't falter. He reached out to touch her arm, warm fingers curling around her wrist.

"If we could return to our current task?" Mr. Dirigible asked in that same polite but no-nonsense tone of his. "You returned upstairs, Miss Potter?"

Harriet swallowed, wishing she was anywhere but here. She'd almost rather be back in the cell, waiting to leave. "I returned upstairs. I think most everyone had already gone on ahead."

"You think?"

"Well, it's not like I knew where every person on the grounds was," Harriet replied more testily than she meant to. Mr. Flamel's fingers tightened ever so slightly against her skin, and Harriet muttered a quiet apology.

"It's quite all right, Miss Potter. I understand it can be frustrating to be exact in the details," Mr. Dirigible replied, unperturbed. His quill whipped across the parchment without issue. "To your best estimation, the majority of the staff and student body had left the main castle for the Quidditch field. Is that correct?"

"Yes." Harriet fidgeted. "So I started toward the Quidditch pitch. It was getting late—I dunno, just around sunset? I hadn't gone all that far when Krum showed up out of the dark. But it wasn't—."

"Please recount the events as you remember them at the time."

Harriet released another peeved breath. The law does not always make perfect sense, Professor Dumbledore had said. Getting annoyed and angry wouldn't help her right now.

"A person I thought to be Viktor Krum approached me."

"And what was your relationship with this person?"

Harriet fidgeted again. "We'd gone to the Yule Ball together. I thought we were friends, of a sort."

"Was this relationship romantic?"

"No," Harriet snapped. "I—no. It wasn't."

Mr. Dirigible continued writing. "He approached you on the grounds?"

"Yeah. I was confused because I thought Krum was supposed to be getting ready for the task. I could hear the school song and everything in the distance, so I knew it was about to begin."

"Did he say anything to you?"

"He was mad about a letter he'd given me. I didn't read it."

The wizard asked her to explain, and Harriet removed her spectacles to rub at her eyes as she backtracked through the story, telling how Krum—or, well, the bloke she'd thought was Viktor Krum—had handed her a letter in the library one day, in what she'd assumed was a misguided attempt to rekindle their defunct friendship. That, in turn, forced Harriet to go back even further and discuss how "Krum" had approached her, how Skeeter's article in the paper had incited a flood of harassment, how his behavior during the Yule Ball had—in hindsight—made her quite uncomfortable.

"You never mentioned this," Mr. Flamel said, almost sadly, Perenelle rubbing small circles on her back. Harriet flushed and shrugged one shoulder.

"And what were the contents of that letter?"

"I dunno. I didn't read it. I chucked it in the fire." She shivered, and added in an undertone, "Probably bloody cursed anyway."

Mr. Dirigible paused in his writing and tapped the quill's nib on the page. "The court will find that difficult to believe."

Harriet's brow furrowed.

"That you, a fourteen-year-old witch with a reported prior attachment to Viktor Krum, a celebrity of some renown, would destroy—let alone disregard—a letter from him."

"But why would that matter?" she asked, unable to help how her mouth gaped. "It's the truth. It's not believable I might not read a letter from a bloke I didn't want to talk to? Why? Because I'm meant to be a silly, twitter-patted ninny?"

The barrister didn't react to Harriet's tone, only moving to cross out something he'd written. "We won't mention the letter. Mr. Krum, or the person you took to be Mr. Krum, approached you on the Hogwarts grounds as you made your way toward the Quidditch pitch. He was seemingly upset about a failure between you to communicate. Continue."

Harriet slowly shook her head, an unpleasant ache pinching in her temples. "He pointed his wand at me."

"And you can verify this was the wand of Viktor Krum?"

"Well, obviously not." Again, Harriet couldn't help but be tart. "Since it wasn't Viktor Krum."

Mr. Dirigible lifted his dark eyes from the parchment pad and leveled Harriet a long, blank stare, waiting.

"No," she said. "I don't think I'd ever seen him use his wand outside of the Tournament's tasks, and that was always from a distance."

"What happened next?"

"The bloke had a wand on me. He said—no, I said, 'what are you doing?' and he answered, 'whatever my Lord bids of me.'" Harriet's mouth dried, and she reached again for the teacup, ignoring the slight tremble in her hand. The dread started to reach through her like a prickly bush growing through her bones. "That—that was when Terry showed up."

"From where did Mr. Boot appear?"

"The school. Err—so, that was behind me."

"Why was Mr. Boot not at the task with the others?"

"I don't know."

"Next?"

Harriet drank more tea. "And then Cr—Krum, wanted me to go over to him, kept demanding it. I—I tried—I told Terry to go ahead, but he wouldn't. He could tell something was wrong."

"Did you pull your wand?"

"N-no."

"Did it not occur to you to do so?"

The wizard's words hit Harriet like a bucket of ice water. No, she hadn't pulled her wand. She hadn't done anything at all. And Terry died.

Mr. Flamel's hand enfolded her own, squeezing, pressing his warmth into her ice-cold fingers. "It is many a great witch and wizard who are taken unawares, never thinking to use their wand for 'elp. Would you not agree, Monsieur Dirigible?"

"Yes," the other wizard agreed, still unmoved by Harriet's pallor or glassy, stricken eyes. "Please don't mistake my manner for lack of personal affront to your plight, Miss Potter. It is simply best to be emotionless when collecting facts that will be challenged and picked apart by the Wizengamot. When I question whether or not it occurred to you to pull your own wand, it helps establish your character and the spontaneity and speed of the event." Mr. Dirigible took a sip from his own doctored tea, patting a napkin against his mouth. "The record of the Reverse Spell applied to your wand when it was confiscated will go a long way to proving your innocence."

Harriet could only nod. Her head hurt. Her eyes stung with exhaustion; how bloody late was it? Had it been night outside? It had, hadn't it? She couldn't remember. All she could recall was the sound of Terry's last words and the ghoulish flash of green.

"Continue, Miss Potter."

Her heart thumped in her chest, loud in her ears despite the stifling silence. "Um—."

"Go, please."

"No, I don't think I will. What do you think you're doing, Krum?"

The sudden twitch of a wand. "Avada Kedavra!"

"I—I asked Terry to go ahead. He said no. Krum used the—the Killing Curse."

How fast it all fell apart, how simple it was to summarize. Terry said no. Crouch killed him. There was no monologue, no culmination of action—just the single motion of a wand and two words.

"And then?"

And then, and then, and then—. "And then he was dead," Harriet snapped, voice bordering on shrill. The words barely made any sense anymore. They drummed against her forehead like drops of water.

"No time for spares—."

The quill scratched against the parchment. "You're familiar with the Killing Curse?"

Harriet's eyes flicked toward Professor Dumbledore, unsure of how she should answer that. She had more familiarity with the spell than she'd ever wanted to have.

"Professor Slytherin teaches about the Unforgivables in Defense Against the Dark Arts," she replied, which was technically true—though not until fifth year.

"So, familiar enough to recognize the spell. What color was it, if I may ask?"

Like acid, like rot—like poison curdling everything good into decay—.

"Green," Harriet told him, hoarse. "It's green."

The quill scratched indifferent letters. Harriet wanted to break it into pieces.

"Continue."

He said it as if it were simple. Terry was dead. Continue. On to the next page.

"Do I have to?" she asked, her voice strained. "Isn't this—isn't this all about what happened to Terry?"

"I need the entire story, Miss Potter."

She squeezed her eyes shut. Perenelle's hand kept rubbing circles, but the offered comfort didn't reach the coldness that lurked in Harriet's heart like a troll hunkered beneath a bridge.

A part of her screamed how unfair this was, how unfair her whole bloody life was, all while people kept expecting her to act mature and take it on the chin. No matter that Mr. Dirigible was meant to help her, Harriet wanted to tell him to bugger off and storm out of the place. Why couldn't she be normal? Why did everything in her life have to go to shite? Why did she have to sit there and relive this—this—.

Harriet pressed the heel of her palm into her temple and closed her eyes.

"What about Krum? The real Krum. He was at the Tournament, wasn't he? Being controlled? Can't he—I don't know, corroborate anything?"

"Mr. Krum was found to be under the Imperius Curse and glamoured to seem in good health. Unfortunately, he never saw his attacker and was, as far he understands, kept drugged or blindfolded for the length of his incarceration. The witnesses at the task cleared his name in this crime, but his testimony on your behalf has been thrown out."

Harriet's nails sank into her skin. Goddamn Gaunt.

"He—the person I thought was Krum grabbed my arm. He used a Portkey." She could remember his clammy skin on her wrist, the flare of blue light in his closed fist. "We appeared in a graveyard."

"Do you know where this graveyard is located?"

"No. It's by a house that used to belong to some well-off Muggle toffs called the Riddles before Voldemort killed them." Harriet opened her eyes in time to see the hand on the quill flinch, splattering ink. She took some sick satisfaction in that. "By then, I'd started to realize Krum wasn't Krum. His skin was moving, like it does when Polyjuice Potion starts to fail."

"Do you have much knowledge of Polyjuice Potion?"

"I know what it looks like." Harriet refused to say more on the matter. "He tried to use the Imperius Curse on me, but I shook it off."

Mr. Dirigible's brow rose.

"We struggled. He managed to get ropes around me, then floated me into the house. The Riddle house." She lowered her hand from her face to stare at her filthy fingernails. Throwing herself around that grubby holding cell, bird form or no, had covered her in grime from head to foot. "He dragged me up a set of stairs. There was a room with a cauldron—a big cauldron—waiting."

The barrister stopped writing to reach into the folder and withdraw several photographs. "Could you perhaps identify the cauldron from these images, Miss Potter?"

Harriet thought it a funny thing to ask, but she bent her head to have a closer look. At the time, she hadn't given the cauldron much thought, but the scene from the manor was so starkly engraved in her memory, she could recall the unique scrolling on the lip, the impression of special runes gilded in the firelight. "That one there, I think."

"You think? Can you be certain?"

"No. It was dark, and Crouch had just bounced my head up a flight of stairs. Sir."

Mr. Dirigible's mouth twitched. "I would refrain from mentioning the prospective head injury. The court will use it to cast doubt upon your recollection." He cleared his throat and returned the images to the folder. "We suspect the cauldron to be the Pair Dadeni, an artifact stolen from the Blevins family in 1982. But that is neither here nor there. Continue."

"By then, the Polyjuice had worn off fully."

"Did you recognize the man?"

"No. But he said who he was—said he killed his father, Barty Crouch Senior, earlier that year."

Mr. Dirigible nodded along with this as he found more photos in the folder, laying three face down before Harriet. "So, prior to this incident, you had no familiarity with Bartemius Crouch Junior's appearance?"

"No."

A tap of his finger flipped the photographs over, startling Harriet. "Is the wizard who attacked you and Mr. Boot present?"

Harriet blinked at the images—three different mugshots out of Azkaban, no names attached, just the stark, unhappy faces of prisoners in their rough robes, holding placards with their identification numbers. Harriet's hand went to her neck, playing with her hair. "He's was that one, there."

Mr. Dirigible shared a look with Professor Dumbledore, nodding. "That is indeed Barty Crouch. The court will, of course, attempt to say you had familiarity with his countenance from old trial papers, but this will surely help." The photographs went back into the folder. "Go on."

Harriet detailed the scene further, her voice growing toneless as she pushed back the phantom stirrings of panic and distress licking at her mind. She told them about the chair, the bindings, the cauldron. She told them about the second wizard.

"I don't know who he was," she said, shaking her head. "He never gave a name." And she couldn't very well say, 'oh, he was just another bit of the Dark Lord, mate. A Horcrux, innit?'

More photographs got laid out, then flipped over. "Is he pictured here?"

Harriet looked down the line of Azkaban mugshots, almost losing her tea and ginger newts when she saw Snape. Pale, bruised as he'd been in Professor Dumbledore's old memory. Her gaze lingered on the photo for several long moments.

"No, I don't see him."

Back into the folder the haunting images went. "You were bound to a chair?"

"Yes. Crouch tied me up—said I was going to have to watch. He took my wand—but not my—my necklace." She didn't mention the second wand. She didn't mention Crouch's cold, lingering touch against her thigh or her own horrified terror. She didn't owe that to the Ministry. She didn't owe them anything.

"Your necklace?"

"It's a little glass trinket I picked up in France on holiday. It comes in a set of three. Just a pretty amulet. You know, the kind of thing a silly, twitter-patted ninny would like. That's believable, innit?" The sarcasm dripped from Harriet's mouth. "I gave the others to my best friends."

Dumbledore and the Flamels said absolutely nothing to Harriet's blatant lie, though she thought Mr. Flamel might have smiled for a moment.

"The other bloke told Crouch to get on with the ritual—."

Mr. Dirigible made a soft, interrupting noise. "I was led to believe you were hurt by Mr. Crouch?"

Harriet ground her teeth. "Yes. I was tortured."

"How so?"

"In the usual manner. How do you think?"

"Miss Potter, we must keep the story consistent. Even small deviations to spare sensibilities will be torn apart in court."

"Does the Wizengamot get a laugh out of hearing how a girl screams under Cruciatus?"

"'arriet," Mr. Flamel said in gentle reprimand, leaning closer to her ear. His hand on her shoulder felt warm, grounding. "Pretend you are telling a story as it 'appened to someone else. Someone fictional."

"But it didn't happen to someone else. It happened to me."

"These people are not your friends. Zey do not deserve your emotion."

Harriet swallowed, forcing her jaw to unlock, though she couldn't bring herself to look at Mr. Dirigible and his wretched quill. "I head-butted Crouch and broke his nose. He punched me in the face, and I hit the floor. Me and the chair. Then he used the Cruciatus Curse. I don't know for how long. It's not like I was counting."

Professor Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Hogwarts' healer has documented these injuries, Mr. Dirigible."

"Yes, I have a copy here."

"The second bloke told Crouch he was wasting time and to get on with the ritual."

She described the ritual as it had happened, including the appearance of the shambling horror comprised of dead flesh, the smell, the agony in her scar, the coffin, the dagger plunging into her still-aching arm.

"Evidence of its use in a Dark ceremony," Professor Dumbledore explained as he came around the table and knelt to inspect Harriet's arm. "The magic is connected to not just the blood, but to the injury itself, inflicted upon an unwilling victim. The pain will subside with more applications of Equill-Emollient."

She told them the words, told them about Crouch's finger going into the cauldron. She told them about the blazing surface of the water, the final burst of steam—and then the pale, wet body rising to stand.

"It was him," Harriet whispered, rough. "It was Lord Voldemort."

xXx

Hours passed. The worst night of Harriet's life was retold in exacting detail, and she relived every moment as it was birthed again by her own voice. If she wasn't exact enough, Mr. Dirigible asked her to clarify—and he questioned her, pressed, came at the story from every angle to seek weak spots in its telling.

Harriet knew he did so because it was his job, because the Wizengamot would do worse—but she couldn't help but despise the wizard for his clinical cruelty.

She left out very few details. She confessed Voldemort had taken her because he failed to kill her as a child, that he saw her as an enemy because of what had happened then, and because of what had happened in ninety-two. She said he clearly had designs on the Ministry and on Hogwarts, with a particular hatred of the Headmaster. She gave every word of his stupid, self-aggrandizing speech and recanted every spell he'd cast upon her. She outlined every harried, terrified memory of her harrowing escape.

Two things, in particular, Harriet did not tell Mr. Dirigible. She pointedly kept her status as an Animagus secret, adjusting the story to suit, and she did not mention Mr. Malfoy, instead claiming the sixth Death Eater hadn't been named. She didn't do it out of loyalty for the priggish arsehole, but rather because she couldn't understand why he'd helped her. There was no misunderstanding his clear assistance in getting her out of the graveyard, and though the Malfoy patriarch might be able to shake off her accusations of being a Death Eater, if word got back to Voldemort of what he'd done that night, he'd be dead. His whole family would probably be dead.

Harriet held her head in her hands after the last of her story had been told. Her throat hurt and her body ached, fatigue like a boot heel digging into the middle of her back. Mr. Dirigible continued writing for quite some time, and when the quill finally ceased its incessant scratching, he released a long, exhausted sigh.

"I will be honest with you, Miss Potter," her representative said. "It is my professional opinion you should not mention You-Know-Who or anything beyond your kidnapping from the grounds of Hogwarts. In solidifying your testimony, we will claim you were rendered unconscious and returned via use of the trinkets you explained to have. Or, we will redact names and certain allusions to clarify these Dark wizards had no known affiliation to You-Know-Who or his organization. Quite a bit of editing will need to be done and memorized."

Slowly, Harriet lifted her head to stare at the wizard. "What?"

"Frankly, it is fantastical." Mr. Dirigible watched her, his eyes heavy, almost sad. "You're a fourteen-year-old witch claiming to not only have escaped the Darkest wizard of the age, but to have also outwitted a contingent of his most loyal Death Eaters. Even I struggle to accept it, and I am not a wizard who doubts the word of Albus Dumbledore." He sighed again. "It will be difficult enough to claim Barty Crouch, a Death Eater recorded as imprisoned and deceased, was behind Mr. Boot's death. Stories of a re-born Dark Lord will not be believed."

"But it's the truth."

"I am not here to beat about the hedges, Miss Potter. I was asked to represent you by the Flamels and to see you released from incarceration before all else. The Wizengamot adheres to the law of parsimony. Do you understand what that is?"

"No."

"It is also called Occam's razor." Mr. Dirigible folded his hands against his middle. "The simplest explanation is more probable than the complicated one. A story of dead men, Dark Lords, and dashing, midnight duels is less believable than a story of you and Mr. Boot getting into a scuffle, and Mr. Boot ending up dead."

"But we didn't! That's not what happened!" Harriet cried. "And—and my wand! I never used the Killing Curse!"

"And that is our best piece of evidence of your innocence. As it stands, Minister Gaunt is staunchly against all speculations of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named still being alive and has been since rumors began circulating some years ago. His party makes up a substantial voting body within the court, and they will vote with him if he proclaims you addled or an insurrectionist. Furthermore, you named a reportedly upstanding member of the Wizengamot itself as a Death Eater. Bringing Mr. Yaxley into question might very well be the final nail in your case's coffin."

Harriet could hardly believe what she'd heard. It barely made sense in her tired, angry mind. "'Whenever you have eliminated the impossible,'" she recited. "'Whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.'"

That got a smile out of Mr. Dirigible. One of his teeth was plated in gold. "You won't get out of this by quoting Muggle literature to the Wizengamot, Miss Potter."

"Merlin-forbid they learn something." Harriet returned her head to her hands.

"It is not our goal to teach old wizards new tricks. It is our goal to see you cleared of all charges. If you wish to be free, Miss Potter, do not tell the Wizengamot that You-Know-Who has returned."

Harriet merely nodded, blank eyes glued to the table.

It shouldn't matter, really. Being free and getting home was all she should concern herself with—but Voldemort's final, parting remark lived on in Harriet's head. She told him the Wizarding world would never submit, and he said, "Then it will be just me."

Voldemort did not care if they all burned to ash so long as he could be king of the ruins.

If Harriet lied to the Wizengamot, she wouldn't be able to go back and claim Voldemort had returned. No one would believe it. Maybe that seemed an unimportant thing, but if the public simply assumed Harriet a documented liar, they'd think everyone who believed her a fool or a liar as well. They'd discount everything they were told. What did that mean for the Wizarding world? If she couldn't warn them about Voldemort—.

Gaunt intends to keep everyone blind. He would rather let people die in ignorance than let anything affect his leadership—.

"I will arrange with the Aurors to have her released into your custody, Mr. and Mrs. Flamel," Mr. Dirigible said as he gathered his documents once more. "I will submit a plea of not guilty, and we will hammer out the details of testimony later. Pending trial, she will need to be placed under monitor and kept in house arrest. I understand the premises is under heavy enchantments and as such the address cannot be spoken aloud, only recorded in legal documentation?"

"Oui," Mr. Flamel answered. "Only by residents or people held in esteem by residents."

"Very well. If she leaves the property or fails to appear for her trial—."

"We are aware of the consequences, Mr. Dirigible."

The wizard nodded, getting to his feet. "I will see that the proper paperwork is pushed through so we can all return home. It was a pleasure meeting you, Miss Potter. We will speak again soon."

Harriet barely took notice of Mr. Dirigible's departure, and he was wise enough not to wait for her to say anything further. The room returned to silence, and she could not bring herself to move or make a sound, waiting for whatever happened next. Some time passed with quiet conversation exchanged between the Flamels before Perenelle rose to find a loo, and Mr. Flamel decided to see if he could hurry things along with the Aurory.

That left Harriet alone with Professor Dumbledore, and when the door clicked shut once more, she turned her heavy head to look at the older wizard. She caught him when he wasn't watching her, instead peering into space, lost deep in thought, and Harriet studied his tired, worried face. She wondered if he, too, was thinking about what horrors an unchecked Voldemort could unleash upon a misled, unsuspecting world.

"What am I going to do, Professor?" she asked.

For once, Professor Dumbledore had no answer for her.

A/N:

Harriet: "The worst part of prison was my cellmate. Prison Mike."