Dumbledore deliberates
Hermione suddenly felt alert - no, nervous. It must have shown, because she felt a pat on her leg from the side Harry was sitting at. This was not the time, but Hermione was quietly thrilled. The hero of her books had actually initiated contact with her! To comfort her, but still. She probably jerked her head a little, drawing her attention back to Mr Dumbledore. Her mother gave her a curious, concerned look.
"First," began Dumbledore, "I must agree with the Lovegoods. Your insight into the future, and into things somewhat hidden from others, while unexpected for any witch your age, is nonetheless not what those gifted in Divination call 'true Sight.' I hope no offence?" he continued, quirking an eyebrow. Hermione, with Harry's hand still resting on her leg in a comforting way, shook her head.
"Therefore, as you advance your curiously precocious plans, I think you are well-served paying close attention to what the young Lovegood girl tells you, lest you go adrift without knowing what you are doing." He paused until he saw Hermione nod.
"That may be difficult at the moment. Unless I miss my guess, both you and Miss Luna, and perhaps Mr Potter as well, are currently preoccupied with the safety of young Pandora and her relative, Selene Trelawney?" He barely paused to notice Hermione's eyes get wide before continuing, "As it should be, of course. In fact, I believe you are showing even greater maturity than I had observed before in shelving your ambitious long-term goals to deal with a present crisis."
He sighed, then. "My brother is, actually, quite admired by Pandora Lovegood, nee Trelawney. He encouraged her studies without, of course, ever paying heed to her safety or even her sanity. It was much the same with Xenophilius Lovegood, in fact. It is always a delicate balance, but if you can be useful to Albus, you find yourself driven to achieve beyond what you had believed possible - the more useful, the more is expected of you. I think you have correctly surmised, however, that Mr Potter would not be useful in and of himself to Albus. He seems to be grooming him, in fact, to be some sort of sacrifice. He would not directly commit murder to invoke a dark ritual, of course, but he may have an insight that little ... no, young Harry here being removed by some other force - a follower of the late Thomas Riddle, Jr, for instance, someone like young Lucius comes to mind - would somehow aid him in one of his quests. Standing to the side while those around him perish or are imprisoned is one of Albus's trademarks."
"But back to the Lovegoods - Pandora never left her Hogwarts days behind. She was not very popular, but that just gave her more time to expand her studies. But now, she has a husband and daughter, and no one around to really remind her of her responsibilities. And she is, of course, tempted by what may be her family's last chance to avert a tragedy. Miss Granger, you are aware of the perils of tampering with the events of history?" He asked, suddenly.
"All I read was that 'bad things happen to people who mess with time, sir," she responded. The thought sprang into her mind that Mr Dumbledore never corrected her for addressing him with formality and respect. She had Headmaster Dumbledore figured for someone who would be all informality but then would get you back if you didn't defer to him. Meanwhile, Aberforth would always level with you. One was a diplomat, the other was actually reliable.
"They do, indeed. And when one has the power and knowledge to overpower the events of the past, as Madame Lovegood has, then the bad things become catastrophic things. She might succeed, then crumble to dust. She might undo centuries of wizarding history and cease to exist because she was never born. Or the power involved might turn on her before she even interferes, which is what I suspect is the likeliest outcome."
Since Hermione knew that was exactly what had happened in the books, she nodded.
"Can you guess why she believes she might be the exception to the iron laws of time, Miss Granger?" Dumbledore continued.
"Because ... well ... I've thought about it ... I just have these stray thoughts, really." Hermione looked down at her hands and surreptitiously glanced at Harry's hand, still resting in a comforting way on the outside of her leg. Met with silence from the old ... bartender, I guess, or perhaps farmer? she continued. "Whoever it is that attacked Selene followed her into the past and changed what happened. So any badness should eventually fall on him. If Selene interferes only with him, any calamity should logically fall on him, not her for restoring the events before he intervened."
"Yes, exactly!" was Dumbledore's response. His eyes didn't quite "twinkle," but it nonetheless brought that description of his brother in the books to mind. "Yet, unfortunately, Mr Malfoy, if it indeed was him, and not an earlier or later individual who merely resembles him, carried out his interference in secret, whereas the effects have become entrenched in history, known by thousands of people by now. Each and every one of them contributing to the security of those events with a piece of their magic, to boot."
"What I am sure Madame Lovegood plans to do is add her power in a dangerous runic ritual to the 'push', if we can call it that, of the original events wherein Selene Trelawney survived her time working at the curiosity shop, pitting it against the second history Mr Malfoy established, and banking on her version winning out. Gathering the necessary power is what is complex; actually pitting it against the channels of history is what is dangerous."
Mr Granger met Dumbledore's eyes and, receiving a nod, began, "Speaking of pitting oneself against the odds, our daughter is burning the candle at both ends and sticking her neck out to a degree we can't bear."
"She is, indeed," answered the old wizard. She looked over at Hermione and gave her a long stare. Hermione felt both embarrassed and frustrated. "I know that look, young lady. Your nemesis had it, often," he continued.
"I will leave it to him to keep his allies and those he mentors in the dark. That, I think, is where you stand with me, as well as with Xenophilius and Pandora Lovegood, correct?"
Hermione nodded, and at the same time, tried to wipe any expression from her face.
"Does it not seem that too many in the world of magic you've thrust yourself into are curiously passive? I, for instance, put up with the slander of my elder brother. The way he puts it, boldly, to his sycophants is not altogether wrong. I didn't dispute him vigorously, nor did I act ashamed, for that would have been taking caution too far. And no one, not his friend Remus Lupin, not his favourite teachers, not his head of house, Arcturus, called Albus out for conniving with the corrupt Minister Bagnold and the ruthless and self-serving Director Crouch in sending poor young Sirius to the worst part of the worst prison on Earth, essentially on a whim, without even asking him a single question, and leaving him there to rot forever. Nor did I."
"And it goes further, does it not," he said, as everyone there hung on his words. Clearly, not only Hermione had snapped to attention. As she looked around, she could see that Harry ad her parents wore quite grim expressions.
"Albus would, I have not a doubt, justify the torment he imposed on young Harry here by saying that either he hid with his aunt and uncle, or he would have been unprotected against the followers of Voldemort who remained and, for the most part, were unaffected by the law even though they were the very worst sort of criminals, in no way better than the Knights of Walpurgis. Indeed, they were either the same people, who transferred their loyalty from Grindlewald to Voldemort in secret before anyone had heard of him, or they were their children or nephews or even grandchildren. There were several instances where bringing the full weight of what passes for the law to bear on them would have benefited Albus, directly or by benefiting his subordinates. In many cases, it did: there was a great overlap between such cases and the ones who did not escape punishment."
"Nonetheless, the ones that remained have never ceased their efforts to erode Albus' power and reputation, and to harm his followers. This raises the question as to why he did not, at least, insist on proper legal proceedings, and at most, get rid of Lucius Malfoy, and perhaps Misters Nott, Avery, and a few others the way he, Crouch and Bagnold got rid of Sirius Black: simply incarcerate them and take their wealth, so they cannot defend themselves or get out of Azkaban?"
"Take the case of your more immediate menace, young Mr Malfoy. Had Albus forced his way into a conviction of Lucius, his father Abraxas would have greatly inconvenienced him. He had evidence, not only of Albus' long-running affair with Grindlewald, of his material support for Grindlewald's rise to power, of his helping Grindlewald covertly assist the mad Muggle that ruled Germany - and if a Minister of Magic informed the Muggle Prime Minister they were not only harbouring, but valorising, such a figure, what would their reaction be, I wonder? Worse, he had evidence that in the entire time before their duel, Dumbledore and Grindlewald were meeting covertly still. And they exchanged information. It would be up to an observer's judgement which gained the most from that exchange, but Abraxas' brief would have claimed that Dumbledore was on Grindlewald's side the entire time, still carrying on a Wizard's affair, until he double-crossed him after the German Muggle began to falter in his campaigns."
"Furthermore, all of us, myself included, had no love left for the Muggle world. Kendra, our mother, and I felt the destruction of Ariana's magical control most keenly, as her suffering face confronted us daily. Albus was, of course, angered greatly, and like the rest of us, he felt the somewhat unjust loss of our father, Percival, strongly. But in his case, additionally, there was the loss of status in having our family head in Azkaban, and for what eventually was his life."
"Because of this, Albus saw young Lucius as being more foolish than Abraxas, and perhaps Albus could make some concessions that would disadvantage Muggleborns, to which he was indifferent, and allow some Muggle-baiting, which was no more than they deserved. In exchange, he would let the pro-Voldemort side know, quietly, that he had protected them from the angry mob of wizards-on-the-street and what might have happened to them, otherwise. This is also the explanation as to why for so very many years he has allowed the worst pureblooded bigots the run of Hogwarts. In Harry's father's time, there were enough pureblooded wizards and people with social power whose children were victimised and harmed that his status was threatened by them. For that reason, he allowed their children to fight back in a quite limited way, and that established the "pranking" tradition at Hogwarts." The Voldemort faction was appeased, as the pureblooded bigots, who ran Slytherin completely, even in Horace Slughorn's tenure, almost never received detentions, and with the hiring of the Death Eater Severus Snape, never even came close to losing the House Cup. They saw that, not as a symbol of accomplishment, which it obviously was not, but as a symbol that they were the privileged and that everyone else was inferior in status. It also meant that the school experience of everyone else was tarnished by unfairness and petty harassment. I suspect, strongly, that many children of the dark faction and their families reconsidered what they would have to gain under Voldemort they didn't already have under Dumbledore, and that was part of my brother's plan. But it was to no avail - simple fear, or in some cases, the appeal to sadism no one could hand-wave away and keep a reputation as a good wizard, drew them all into the Knights, which were eventually called "Death Eaters" for the same reason the Muggle fascists in Europe and Latin America called their killers similar names."
No one there wanted to interrupt. It was almost soul-crushing to hear, though it vindicated Hermione's first impressions, for the most part. The idea that there were even greater villains, like Voldemort or the Malfoys, that even Albus Dumbledore had to step around, carefully, simply made sense. She looked over at Harry, considering him. When you looked at it objectively, her parents were giving up a lot of their old life for her. And Harry had, literally, nothing left but her. If she could get Sirius Black freed, and reunite him with Remus Lupin, well, the magical world had given them no reason to love it, either. At what point should she just suggest cutting their losses? If she and Harry and Luna and their families left Britain to its own devices, at least they'd be able to grow up and see what happened between her and Harry.
"As for myself? When I pointed out that Albus was slandering me in several ways, colluding with the Malfoys in the process, I did not elaborate. One day, still fuming over his slanderous nonsense and the way it threatened our family's livelihood, I had just brought in enough money with odd enchanting jobs to keep us going for a few months. My mother and sister (you should know she was often lucid, and she tried to keep up a brave front) insisted I allow myself to have a drink at the Hog's Head Inn, of which I am now the proprietor. At that point, we assumed Albus wasn't coming back from the Continent any time soon. Once I was in my cups, a very attractive witch who, apparently, did not speak any English, cosied up to me, and with gestures, indicated we should retire to one of the upstairs rooms. I tossed the barkeep a galleon, and ascended. That said, something about her expression alarmed me, so when we were alone in the room, I cast spells to end any enchantments on her. Her blank expression seemed to indicate someone under the Imperius curse, and I was even worried about my safety, since I thought I heard men gathering, shuffling their feet just outside the door. To my amazement, I found her turned into - or I should say, back into - one of our goats! Albus at that point opened the door, forcefully. He hadn't quite gotten what he wanted, but it was bad enough. Elphias Doge and Daedelus Diggle, of course, were there, along with a couple of men he'd enlisted as witnesses. I disarmed him immediately, and cast prior incantato to reveal he'd just been doing transfiguration. Unfortunately, he'd anticipated that, as well, and had been amusing the customers with intricate spells turning beer steins into badgers, goblets into gryphons, scotch into snakes, and Edradour into eagles. Outnumbered three to one, I stalked out without saying anything. Albus confounded the goat into following me out."
Harry's eyes met Hermione's. She shrank back a bit at how very angry they were. She thought about it, and decided he was remembering the way the Dursleys operated. Albus was a good Dudley, she thought, on reflection. Like a brilliant Dudley. She shuddered.
"And as for calling him out over Sirius Black? There were several reasons. First, no one wanted to defend him if, as was likely, he was, in fact, guilty. It might even be an excuse others who weren't slipping through the cracks would invoke to somehow bribe their way through a mock trial. Second, Albus hid behind Crouch, as did Bagnold. You would have had to literally attack Crouch magically to even raise the issue. Third, Albus denied the Potters had left a will, and he managed to bury it so well it remains unread today. Fourth, and this is perhaps the point of this whole discussion, young Hermione."
He looked over his glasses at her. She found it oddly more comforting than intimidating.
"Albus cast the Fidelius Charm, you know. And it was listed in the will he was a witness to that the Secret Keeper was the boy Peter Pettigrew. Herein lies my brother's genius. He convinced the Potters that even having him know the identity of the Secret Keeper was a risk."
Hermione gasped. Harry looked over at her, confused. Her parents looked thoughtful.
"He had someone cast a second Fidelius, Harry," she guessed. "And what he hid was ..." she looked over at Aberforth for confirmation.
"Yes. It was the identity of the Secret Keeper. And, of course, with the missing knowledge of Peter Pettigrew as the Secret Keeper ..." Aberforth said, looking at Hermione expectantly.
"The knowledge of who kept the secret was gone, including in your parents' will, Harry," Hermione said, sadly. "It's the perfect crime."
The fury was back in Harry's eyes. Hermione hoped her new girlfriend status gave her a little leverage to channel Harry into non-destructive channels for his anger. She then tried very hard to remember what the dolls' briefing on the Fidelius Charm had included.
"When the Potters died, why didn't Dumbledore remember?" she wondered out loud.
"No one can say for certain he did not, Miss Granger," was the reply, "However, giving Albus the benefit of the doubt, can you think of reasons why he should still be in the dark?"
"Wait a minute!" Hermione said, suddenly. "How do you know he's innocent - Sirius Black, I mean - if the secret's still secret? Doesn't that imply Albus Dumbledore knows, too?"
Aberforth laughed. "I wish it were that easy, though it is rather simple. If Albus insists young Sirius is guilty, I am morally certain he isn't. I have no special knowledge of anything but Albus' self-serving duplicity. So I didn't know for certain until you, with your arcane sources of information, confirmed it."
Bloody hell, Hermione thought. Back to square one. She forced herself to think. "If one of the Potters, or anyone else who died, was the Secret Keeper, everyone they'd told would become one, and it would probably get out. But it might not be anyone like that. It might just be a Dumbledore crony, misled just like the Potters. Even if it was someone that died, they might not have told anyone. Or none of the people they told want to come forward. So we don't know if he knows, or just suspects. We don't know who else knows."
"And there, in a nutshell, you have the situation," Aberforth said. His tone reminded Hermione of Mr Granger when she'd gotten the top grade in her year. "It is vital you know what you are going up against. And as for the Malfoy family, they are professionals at the skills that Albus is merely a talented amateur at."
"In that case, getting the Potters' will read is going to scupper him, won't it?"
"If it's not been destroyed, perhaps. It might simply be in his custody, with a note to himself that it must never be opened."
"That makes no sense," Hermione objected.
"Indeed, it makes all the sense in the world. It was not until you confirmed Sirius' innocence that I was even able to recall the existence of the will, a few minutes ago. I was one of the witnesses. Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Lily Potter insisted. After the suspicious deaths of Fabian and Gideon Prewett, who had challenged Albus repeatedly, and evidence that Marlene McKinnon might have been sacrificed to preserve Albus' spies in the Knights, only James Potter fully trusted Albus, and I was seen as a properly hostile counter-witness. It is even possible that the Potters themselves forgot their own last wills and testaments. The Fidelius is a tricky and unreliable form of security, but it is also very powerful. The upshot is that select people - starting with Director Amelia Bones - need to be convinced Peter Pettigrew was the Potters' Secret Keeper, and that will spread knowledge of the will. With that, if there is another copy of one of the wills, it may be found and opened."
"She probably already knows!" objected Hermione.
"I am very much afraid she does not," Aberforth retorted. "A second Fidelius would have removed the knowledge of the identity of the Potters' Secret Keeper from everyone but the second Keeper. Everyone. Including, therefore ..."
Normally, simply sitting in a cafe, periodically ordering more drinks and snacks, listening to an old man tell stories would have been an ordeal for all of them. But in this case, even Harry was fidgeting in his seat, not out of boredom, but excitement, like a male Hermione. Dumbledore explained to them that a runic bracelet he was wearing could be rubbed to confound nearby Muggles into forgetting how long they'd been there without casting obvious spells. If anyone noticed a privacy spell - and that spell only - in a Muggle area, it would probably be praised, not condemned.
Meanwhile, while they were getting drinks refilled and snacks replaced around the table, Hermione had been pondering. "Peter Pettigrew! He had Peter Pettigrew's memory that he was the Secret Keeper removed!"
Aberforth's eyes twinkled, making him look a great deal like his older brother.
"But that wouldn't work at all," Hermione added. "No one would have been able to visit the Potters. And Voldemort would never have gotten through the charm to attack them."
Aberforth silently pulled a smaller pouch out of his bag. He dumped its contents on the table. In various handwritings was written "The Potters live at _" and various guesses. Only one was correct. Hermione felt her cheek getting wet.
"And every step, every single step, would be seen as Albus checking and double-checking. As increased security for the Potters, not for himself. So he asked several friends of the Potters to write their guesses down. He didn't give Peter enough time to have more than a twinge when he accidentally wrote down the correct location. The others would have been prohibited from even guessing, and Albus hurried Peter along to the next guess. I say this because I, too, have studied the Fidelius Charm, and it's the only scenario that makes a whit of sense."
"But what about Voldemort?" Hermione objected.
"He had various members of his Order, including Pettigrew, show their slips to others. He made a copy of Pettigrew's slip. Naturally, it showed an incorrect address. He then had Peter show them the "top slip" of a pair which included the address. As they lifted it, they also saw the correct address under it. Then Peter requested they destroy the "secret," which they did. Finally, after the people he wished to know the secret were informed, he gave the slip he'd confiscated from Peter back to him, and had him read it. He told Peter he had plenty of time to memorise it (and confounded him not to be suspicious about it), and left him with it the day before Halloween, a significant day for wizards. Naturally, Pettigrew, already a Death Eater, kept it and showed it to Voldemort. He didn't know, still, that he was the Secret Keeper for the Potters. Thus, neither Voldemort nor the other Death Eaters knew, either. More insulation between Sirius Black and the truth. Albus probably confounded himself using a mirror. I can think of no other way not to have guessed Peter was the Secret Keeper. All he had to do was keep himself from recognising Pettigrew's handwriting on the slip that trial-and-error had shown was the correct one. And thus ..."
It was pretty clear Hermione was being tested, but to everyone's surprise, it was Harry Potter that responded. "No one knew!" he exclaimed. "Not Dumbledore, not Voldemort, not the Death Eaters, not the Potters, not even Sirius Black! Not even Peter!"
"Yes!" agreed Hermione, "Dumbledore (no offence, Mr Aberforth) just saw a slip he could use to lure Voldemort and the Potters into a confrontation. Pettigrew just saw the secret handed to him. Sirius Black was just glad he didn't know. Sirius Black ..."
"Mr Dumbledore, how did Sirius Black know to go after Pettigrew?" Harry asked. It was the logical question.
"At first? I think he merely suspected. It was someone, after all. That's why he went to Peter's house first. At some point, the preponderance of evidence overrode the Fidelius charm for him. The Black heir had always suspected Pettigrew more than anyone else, the attempts by Pettigrew, Fletcher and Dumbledore to cast suspicion on Remus Lupin had gone nowhere until the Fidelius on Peter's status confused people like Sirius. After all, no one told me of Peter's status. The Fidelius is not a god, it is not all-powerful."
He shifted his glasses on his nose. "If I may be allowed to speculate?" The rest nodded. "The precipitous haste with which young Sirius was prevented from asking questions was probably at Albus' instigation. We now can suspect there were magical reasons for that. It suited Bagnold - the sooner rid of the issue, the better. It suited Crouch - on to the next confrontation, and he hated the Black family for decades. It suited the Malfoys, who were angling their way into the Black family inheritance by the marriage of their scion Lucius to the youngest Black, Narcissa. After all, Sirius was a roadblock to several factions. And he was, more importantly, one of perhaps only two people who possibly knew who the Secret Keeper was."
"About that," asked Hermione. "Even if it was one of his, um, boyfriends, I guess? Why would they keep quiet about Sirius going to prison for nothing?"
"Two possibilities suggest themselves, Miss Granger," Aberforth said. "First, they are either just that loyal, or they believed that Sirius Black was guilty of everything else but being the Secret Keeper. And perhaps that he was sent by Voldemort to kill Pettigrew to cover the Death Eaters' tracks. But I think it's far more likely he found a powerful wizard who no one at all but Dumbledore would speak to, and who might be persuaded to take a vow of silence on the topic."
"There is no one like that, surely, or we'd have heard of them?" Hermione asked.
"That Nicholas Flamel guy you kept lecturing me about, would he do it?" Harry asked.
"Well," Aberforth interjected, "you have heard of him. We mentioned him in this very discussion."
Hermione looked at her parents. "Well, honey, I don't know how to evaluate wizards, but isn't that Grindlewolf or whatever his name is a really powerful wizard? And didn't you say Dumbledore had him in solitary confinement in some fortress he controls?" Mrs Granger asked.
It was like someone threw a bucket of cold water over Harry and Hermione.
"Indeed," said Aberforth, with a nod, giving an approving look at Hermione's mother. "I am morally certain Gellert was the one who cast the second Fidelius on the identity of the Potters' Secret Keeper."
At that, Aberforth fished a large pile of pound notes out and left them on the table. "I will use the facilities, I hope you don't mind settling up?" he asked, and didn't stay to hear their answer.
When he returned, they decided to continue the discussion with the Lovegoods involved, and at the Granger residence. Aberforth was competent at disguising himself as a Muggle, and with Pandora's help, would be able to bully Xenophilius into not standing out, he explained. Fortunately, the Grangers had a guest room and another room that was often used that way, as Aberforth believed their discussion would go into the night.
