The Naked Truth

The dark is generous. Its first gift is concealment: our true faces lie in the dark beneath our skins, our true hearts remain shadowed deeper still. But the greatest concealment lies not in protecting our secret truths, but in hiding from the truths of others. The dark protects us from what we dare not know. Its second gift is comforting illusion: the ease of gentle dreams in night's embrace, the beauty that imagination brings to what would repel in the day's harsh light. But the greatest of its comforts is the illusion that dark is temporary: that every night brings a new day. Because it's the day that is temporary. Day is the illusion. Its third gift is the light itself: as days are defined by the nights that divide them, as stars are defined by the infinite black through which they wheel, the dark embraces the light, and brings it forth from the center of its own self. With each victory of the light, it is the dark that wins.

The dark is generous, and it is patient. It is the dark that seeds cruelty into justice, that drips contempt into compassion, that poisons love with grains of doubt. The dark can be patient, because the slightest drop of rain will cause those seeds to sprout. The rain will come, and the seeds will sprout, for the dark is the soil in which they grow, and it is the clouds above them, and it waits behind the star that gives them light. The dark's patience is infinite. Eventually, even stars burn out.

The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins. It always wins because it is everywhere. It is in the wood that burns in your hearth, and in the kettle on the fire; it is under your chair and under your table and under the sheets on your bed. Walk in the midday sun, and the dark is with you, attached to the soles of your feet. The brightest light casts the darkest shadow.


A week passed after the battle of Hogwarts this event would haunt the darkest corners of Harry's mind for a long time, he wasn't the only one Hermione witnessed firsthand the wanton destruction of countless lives beyond her own comprehension, the misguided goals of one fallen dark wizard Voldemort brought to the wizarding world on a massive scale paled compared to the first wizarding war.

Three days before their trip to Buckingham palace, Harry abruptly woke up in the dead of the night screaming his lungs out, his eyes bloodshot shaking uncontrollably akin to those under the power of the Cruiatus curse.

Named of one of three unforgivable curses used extensively in both the First and Second Wizarding wars by Voldemort and his followers, against the members of the Order and muggles or non-magical folk, for the sake of pure enjoyment and mostly interrogations, the feeling of thousand extremely hot knives piercing through the skin, the victim would've preferred a quick death than to suffer any longer under its painful effects.

Harry frequently mentioned in his dreams of a lady dressed in black holding the elder wand in her hand, desiring to finish what Voldemort left off to a much greater degree.

Hermione stated no one could achieve what the deceased dark lord achieved, with his followers scattered or captured the likelihood of such vain ambition would be delusional, yet it did little to comfort him much to Hermione's dismay.

The visit to Buckingham Palace nothing less than spectacular watching from outside the gates as the king's guards in their glorious splendour, stood to attention as the gates opened allowing the oceans of tourists in, so many years of British heritage all in what once was the central seat of power for the vast British Empire when it once dominated the world.

Ai Sha and Qixia sisters who had been with both Hermione and Harry from the very beginning occasionally at Harry's side, after fending repeated assassination attempts by the death eaters, the quartet stood in front at the gates of Buckingham Palace.

"Hermione, Harry and Ron, we would like to invite you two to the Forbidden City coming this October first, for our, GRAND INAUGURATION!" handed them metallic glittering golden envelopes.

"Wait a second, non-party members aren't allowed how did you get approval for this seal?" Asked Harry, looking at the seal of the Chinese Communist Party.

"Party policies dictate as Presidents the unlimited power in our hands grants us the authority to invite anyone we want, all three of you are our special honoured guests." Replied Qixia, giving Harry a smirk.

"There are going to be changes just you wait and see," said Ai Sha, her mouth a short distance away from Harry's ear.

"Our new empire would be nothing humanity in all our history seen before, you Harry may find yourself right at home, in… our warm embrace." Planted a kiss on his left cheek before leaving with her sister into the crowd.

The priceless artefacts greeted their eyes in awe, the jewellery on display the tour guides giving detailed explanations of their origins, the trio wasn't part of the tour but of the private tour detoured to their preferred destination, as the doors to the private royal room opened feasted their eyes on the portraits of previous monarchs.

But their tour will be cut short by the white porcelain door opposite of them, a man clothed in a black business suit wearing glasses and his laidback hair fix his eyes on the trio.

"The famous trio this has been a long time coming, Harry Potter, I presumed, the poverty-stricken Ronald Wesselly~"

"Ron Weasley!" Ron interjected.

"Right, your name slips my mind… and you must be Hermione Granger, the brightest witch for your age your peers call you doubtfully I question their wisdom."

"Who are you?" Harry spoke first.

"Special Agent Matthias Smith from the British Intelligence Mi6, we tracked for you since the day you arrived at the Dursleys, nasty folk I might add odd they denied any existence of magic~we know otherwise." reached for his pocket within his black blazer, reaching out in his hand a wand not just any wand.

"The elder wand! How did you… where did you find it?" Hermione demanded.

"Miss Granger did you play us for fools, the strange occurrences of Pivet Drive drew our attention, bizarre white lights coming from Harry's room strange.. No other lamposts lights shine brightly than from his wand." Matthias smirked taking a step closer to Harry.

"You like the attention do you not Mr Potter? This is your doing," Stole a glance at the lightning scar in the centre of his forehead.

"Lily Potter gave her life whilst destroyed this deceased dark lord Voldemort, fascinating! Ancient magic is plentifully useful."

"What do you mean useful? Muggles can't learn magic the elder wand is no use to you than a stick." Said Ron.

"Not too shabby Ronald the sorting hat made the right choice by putting in Gryffindor, frankly the word muggle is offensive… we muggles would not use magic yet, all of you are going to birth new children whom will be ale to use magic."

"NO! We will not be slaves to muggles~"

"So be it, you chose this Hermione not just you… but Harry and Ron as of this moment, you are enemies of the state reaper one commence fist of the heavens, confirmation code triple-six." sheathing his smartphone back in his pocket.

"What did you just do?!" Demanded Ron, his face turning red.

"Taken out the greatest security threat to mankind, your world from your precious society, Hogwarts you loved so much~ down to your smelly run-down home, is obliterated in nuclear fire~" Ron withdrew his wand his blood boiling in absolute rage wanting in every fibre of his being to kill him.

'"CRUCIO!" before Matthias could do anything to defend himself, before he could even move, he had been hit by the Cruciatus curse. The pain was so intense, so all-consuming, that he no longer knew where he was... white-hot knives were piercing every inch of his skin, his head was surely going to burst with pain; he was screaming more loudly than he'd ever screamed in his life.

"Expelliarmus" Ron's wand knocked out his hand landing two feet away from him.

Both Hermione and Harry grabbed his arms in a vain attempt to restrain him, yet it was far from enough broke free grabbed his wand ready to unleash another round of pain, the doors opposite of him burst open as two agents pointed their submachine guns at him.

"Expel~" the words barely left his mouth bullets tore through his chest like knives through hot butter.

"RON!" swiftly withdrew their wands rage filling their eyes.

"Confringo!"

"Incendio!"

One of the agents felt his body ripping itself apart from within exploded into countless pieces, the other screamed in agony as flames engulfed his entire body fire eating away at his clothing penetrated into his skin, threw himself out of the window straight to his death.

Special agent Matthias had taken the time to recuperate taking advantage of the opportunity presented to him shot his taser at Harry, knocking Harry out as his numb body fell to the floor.

"Hold it right there ms Granger." pointing his handgun at her, his finger on the trigger Hermione held her wand firmly wanting every inch of her to inflict him with every kind of spell and charm.

"This is how we muggles win the war against your kin ironic isn't it? Voldemort set out to subjugate the wizarding world and mine… here you are following in his footsteps."

"No, I am nothing like him a psychopathic murderer wanting to rid the wizarding world of pure bloods~"

"Are you? You already took a step you killed one of my agents without much of a thought, do not tell me the brightest witch lacks the knowledge of disarming charms."

"Speaking of bright, we found your parents you'd be proud of them putting up a brave fight, but after awhile the drugs kicked in they began spilling secrets about you, your whereabouts and so forth-in the end they ended up committing suicide."

Tears streak down her eyes coupled with the surging anger manifesting in her eyes, but then the thought occurred to her why the secrecy every attempt of ministers for magics put in tremendous effort to hid the wizarding world from the prying eyes of muggles such as him, is this the potential future of how they will treat magic as but just a tool, the apparent disregard? Man like Matthias would definitely see wizard kind enslave or worse killed, no longer the time had arrived for someone to stand up firmly putting these muggles in their place.

"Avada Kedavra!" Hermione's tip of her wand glowed green the venomous jetstream directly struck Matthias in the chest, his lifeless body fell to the floor like a rock. The full force of her tears broke kneeing at Ron's lifeless body no spell or charm she ever knew can bring him back no matter how much she wanted it.

Hearing footsteps coming from behind immediately grabbed Harry by his right arm, placing it on her shoulders apparated. Apparition, the means of instant transportation from one location to another, This was accomplished by having the user focus on a desired location in their mind and then purposely disappearing from where they were, to reappear at the desired location. Apparition was by far the fastest way to get to a desired destination, but was tricky to pull off correctly and disastrous if botched.

Reappeared in the hospital much to the hospital staff and patients shock, for the moment couldn't believe their eyes placing Harry on the stretcher called for the doctor to tend to him, while she had unfinished business to settle one she certainly knew she needed to do, Apparated once more back to the Buckingham palace this time however wanted a word with the king himself.

After spending three minutes going back and forth after Hermione told him the simplified version of the wizarding world, the king came to an agreement yet his health deteriorated too much suffered a stroke, tried her best to save him her efforts in vain briefly before he passed on crowned her the new queen.

Not wasting any time aware of the potential opponents were in parliament itself, both the House of Commons whose six hundred and fifty members of parliament wrote new laws and the House of Lords, whose process of examining bills took far too long to get anything done, investigating government policies and public policies sought one way to kill two birds with one stone.

Before Queen Hermione could issue her first order to disband parliament, what will be known as the great awakening as three primary buildings starting from the prime minister's office, the House of Lords and the House of Commons were subsequently bombed, levelled to dust.

With all the members of Parliament including the prime minister killed, Queen Hermione assumed absolute power reformed the monarchy into an absolute monarchy that held the power she needed.

The bombing did not stop there series of bombings occurred across Europe, including Russia the prominent members of each government were dead, their parties as well as their families with nobody to take charge, the nations were heading towards anarchy until Queen Hermione stepped up to assume her leadership across all of Europe.

Taking her stance on the pulpit of the massive flight deck of the first class of the new airborne carrier, commonly called the Leviathan class soared above the clouds gave her first speech.

"Gentlemen, we stand on the precipice of the start of our grand new world, neither by force of arms nor by political manipulation, but by united cooperation, our cultures coming together as one, singular in our vision for a better world starts today! I assure you these who sought to sow chaos WILL be brought to justice! Any nation who seeks to undermine us soon will learn the price of such delusional fantasy."

"Furthermore, allow me to introduce our newest member of my cabinet this individual has toiled day and night putting his life on the line, singlehandedly foiling the attempt assassination of my life, his bravery renown in all Grand Pax Europa, let us pledge our allegiance as you did for me, to our Prime Minister, HARRY POTTER!

Hundreds of eyes turned towards him in no time broke into cheers, their exuberant smiles followed by their thunderous rounds of applause, Harry in brief shock steadily made his way through the crowd shaking hands of prominent dignitaries.

A week already passed without him seeing Hermione her royal outfit consisted of her silk jacket, long jet-black pants, cotton collared white long-sleeve shirt and one of the famous heels called the Esatto, known for being the most comfortable heels on earth delicate and timeless these heels would for years.

Putting into action what he practised thanks to his tutor Elsa in lessons of royal etiquette, within three meters of Grand Empress Hermione did a neck bow, going on bended knee. The cheering ceased as she wave her hand as the world watched through the lens of cameras the grand inauguration of the boy-who-lived, to the man-who-saved-the-empress.

"Harry Potter," said Hermione fighting the anxiety while overjoyed at this wonderous moment.

"Do you swear on your life to give your utmost to uphold the duties and responsibilities of the office of Prime Minister?"

"I swear."

"Do you swear to be the eyes and ears of our citizens, guiding them and leading them beneficial to the empire?"

"I Swear." Conviction rang in his voice.

"Alas, do you swear on your life impartiality and absolute loyalty to the Crown, despite your feelings including your personal opinions?" For a brief moment thought if he could be worthy of a lofty position, now however wasn't the time to debate.

"I Swear!" Looked into her eyes, the fire of conviction burning like the sun.

Both worked together back in the days when they were hunted by lord Voldemort and his band of death eaters wanting nothing less than their deaths, after spending weeks in isolated regions battling the cold, Harry and Hermione relied on each for emotional support, shared each other's concerns also comforting each other when situations became too tough to handle alone,

Deep within them feelings building up over time, their bond became stronger relying on each other to get things done efficiently, the cold and isolation could not dent the power of their friendship, neither did the lack of food nor water.

"By my power as Grand Empress and my blessing, today, I pronounced you PRIME MINISTER HARRY POTTER! ARISE!"

Harry steadily rose to his feet as he did so the air shifted unexpectedly a powerful gust of wind knocked Harry behind his back hard, losing his footing knocking him body first colliding into Hermione both fell backwards, their lips met much to their surprise and horror.

Immediately apparated in sheer panic Harry hastily distanced himself from her, Hermione did the same, however, her hidden feelings from the time she laid eyes on Harry as a child for the first time, never thought beyond the boundaries of friendship up till her potential boyfriend Ron in the fourth broke her heart by dating Lavender Brown, not to mentioned the uncountable number of times Ron hurt her feelings over the years.

"Harry, we… there was nothing you could do it was just an accident." She said barely a meter away from him.

"Really? You think?" Harry replied critically.

Hermione placed her hand on his right shoulder pulling him gently, his face turned to meet hers abruptly his heart started beating wildly, she fell short of breath the world around them grinding to a halt.

The immense gap Ron left her devastated for the past six days buried herself tending to internal state affairs when the day was done retreated behind closed doors crying her eyes out. Until this moment the touch of Harry's lips reignited the passion she once felt rekindled.

Harry had never been sceptical or critical of her methods, in fact, she devoted so much of her time to helping him why didn't she notice herself gravitating towards him? Perhaps she had once or twice then again suppressed those feelings inside her.

She ought to feel guilty she should feel anything more than for Harry, should it matter now? The space between vanishing like it never existed, Ron is dead nothing in the world can bring him back, there's no guilt any longer there's nothing but want and need to feel his breath, the chosen one lip pressing against hers.

Time eventually resumes its course Hermione found her back pushed behind a tall oak tree as Harry pins her, he swallows her gasp of surprise sounds along with other sounds she makes as his lips collide with hers. Clawing at his back desperately, to bring him closer using the wide space to her advantage, his hands caressing her face, her neck and her throat.

Still, it was far from enough, the buttons on her shirt unbuckle one after the other her jacket fell off her shoulders, her shirt followed suit revealing her black bra hanging from her skin, his lips going down her neck down her shoulder blades, she didn't care as Harry's fingers running through her hair felt just so good.

"Harry… stop, this is too soon." pulling him away although every part of her body demanded to pull him back.

"We're not to speak anything of what we did here to anyone, promise me, Harry." Harry agreeably nodded, his body too wanted to pull her again longingly for the chance to feel her breath in his lips but resisted the urge.

"Come with me, there's something important we need to discuss."

Taking his hand in hers apparated into one of the private conference rooms, designed for confidential meetings with her high government officials and prominent dignitaries occasionally used for other world leaders.

Harry entered the conference room admiring first the golden oval table, followed by the crimson red seat office chairs, the upside down lamp triangular shape and the wall lamps finally, two wine cups standing behind the wine bottle and opposite of them laid seven A4 sized paper stapled together.

"Accio wine cup!" said Hermione, one of the wine cups flew straight into her hands facing Harry holding it to him.

"Harry this is to you! Congratulations, you're my new prime minister, we're going to be working together. Here you are." The second wine cup landed in her hands once more their eyes fixated together.

"Cheers!" Harry took a rather large sip of the wine that tasted bittersweet, Hermione on the hand consume the entirety of the red wine itself, not thinking too much of it took a seat at the head of the table, Harry did the same at her right.

If only she knew the wine was no ordinary wine after finishing mountains of paperwork, accidentally choosing the strongest red wine.

"Alright Harry, first and foremost your role as prime minister will be my eyes of the Crown, you play the most pivotal than anybody." Said Hermione, the wine starting to take hold of her.

"What am I supposed to do?" asked Harry curiously, glancing at the first page of his new contract apart from the prestigious salary of five hundred thousand per month, even his own private security force of well-trained bodyguards even well-armed motorcade.

"Manage the team of other lower-ranking government officials, you are now in charge! The police force plus the public relations office throughout Grand Europa is the ideal place to start." Hermione pour more wine into her wine glass, the red liquid close to overflowing.

"Hermione, I think you really had enough wine." Ignored him and drank the whole glass of wine down her throat without much thought. Harry stared at her eyes her dilated pupil including the strong fruity odour coming from her mouth.

"I know… that look… you… why can't you pay attention for one minute, why are you so determined… running off with Ginny?!" shouted Hermione, taking Harry by surprise the second time she lashed out like this.

"Hermione, calm down you~" those were the very words he wished he never spoke, angered her further rising to her stood right in front of him, her wide furious eyes glaring at him, launching herself forward started slapping the life out of him the power of her slaps akin to the punches of a pro wrestler.

"Hermione~ what the-? OW! St~ Get off!"

"You - complete - selfish - bastard - Harry - Potter!"

Her words punctuated him blow after blow, Harry tried grabbing her hands the ongoing onslaught hitting him harder than the previous.

"Every time, every class, the scapegoat always me supplied with my notes~ you~"

"You merrily went with Ron for quidditch! WHY HARRY? WHY DID YOU STAND IDLY BY~ LAVENDER BROWN DATED RON, YOU DID NOTHING BUT LET HIM DATE HER!"

Harry finally managed to grab hold of her hands holding her firmly, Hermione struggled to get free her efforts in vain.

"Hermione, will you please~"

"Don't you tell me what to do, Harry Potter! Don't you dare! I am in complete control here not you!"

"If it weren't for that stupid scar on your forehead, you'll be a worthless nobody, what Dumbledore, Ginny or Ron saw in you~ is a pitiful excuse for a wizard, you'd die at Voldemort's hands WITHOUT ME!"

Those words stung him harder than the slaps he received, Harry's face blistering red.

"I know," Harry said, "Hermione, I'm so sorry, I really~"

"Oh, you're sorry! Laugh a high-pitched out of controlled sound.

"After seven years, you think it's all going to be all right if you just say sorry?"

"Hermione, when I first saw you on the train… you were my true first friend." Hermione upon hearing those words widen in absolute shock, her rage subsided enough to regain her senses.

The sudden realisation of the pain in her hands adding to the fact she potentially could injure Harry in her drunken rage, she lost her parents and Ron would Harry be next?

"Harry," she said, tears trickling down her eyes embracing him in her arms locking him in a passionate embrace, Harry wrapped his own arms around hers.

She swore mentally she would do what she can in her power keeping him close to her, hearing his heartbeat music to her ears desiring more and more of him, however, certain individuals within her own government hadn't share the optimism as Harry being the new prime minister, the few plotted to remove him from office.