"Bestest Baby" Shouted Fred across the Great Hall
"Brother Draco!" Cheered George as they descended upon Draco Malfoy with arms spread and clear intent to hug.
Draco looked petrified on the Slytherin table. Years of training as the pureblood Heir of Malfoy had prepared him for slander, poison, curse, dagger, sword, bullet, bludger, lethifolds in the closet and vampires in dark corridors. Group hugs in public had shockingly not been part of his training. He was horrified as his new occulemense ability to create a second thought stream decided to express itself with drafting a letter of admonishment to Mother for the laspe, rather than coming up with an adequate defense for public hugging.
The crack of a whip sounded like thunder, and Draco felt his hair shift in the breeze and his cheek flutter with the single cut strand of it as the whip passed within molecules of his skin to lash about one charging Weasley's ankles, one hard yank landing said twin on his arse while detaching the whip.
Milicent Bulstrode stood on the Slytherin dining table, a black serpentine whip extending magically from her wand.
"Bad Weasley's. Sit. Stay!" Milicent shouted imperiously, her whip cracking out again, this time catching the second Weasley not across the ankles, but across the bum as he spun and stuck it in the path of the whip with the same reflexes a rational being would have used to dodge it.
The shock of impact drove him face down on the floor next to his twin, a grin on his face.
"You have," Accused Fred
"A fetish!" Agreed George
"Jealous?" Inquired George
"Totally!" Agreed Fred.
Fred admired the bloody gash in George's pants, and Milicent very pointedly ignored pleading looks to give him a matching one. Ravenclaw table did their best to ignore it, Hufflepuff had given up eating, speaking and breathing to better catch all of the memory for future gossip.
Milicent sighed, and accepted Draco's proffered hand to step back down onto the bench to resume breakfast. The looks the two of them were receiving from Slytherin were at least as horrified as the looks the twins were receiving from Gryffindor. Ron was as red as his hair and shouting at his brothers, while Percy was looking like he would be several minutes and a calming draft from being able to speak. Ginny Weasley on the other hand was laughing so hard her bench mates arms were the only reason she hadn't fallen off the bench.
Draco fumed for a minute or two, looking for the old Malfoy public pride, but finding it shattered into bits and pieces from Tom Riddle's breaking of him, and not really worth rebuilding in the new and somewhat unexplored new Draco Malfoy he was learning to be.
"What am I going to do about those idiots. They know the whole thing isn't true. Mother used the veritus serum and I did the blood inheritance ritual, so even Father had to admit it was a lie. Still, the fact he was willing to believe it already had Mother half way around the bend before he tried to feed me to his Dark Lord as a snack."
Milicent shrugged so slightly only another Slytherin could notice and spoke softly, because rather than whisperes that carried forever, soft speech died within a few feet in the echoing Great Hall.
"If you were Weasley, you could just hug it out. The hug out everything. You could be Malfoy and immediately do something public rash and stupid. Or you could be Black and smile softly as if mildly amused, then when Io, Callisto and Ganymede next cast the Black shadow upon Jupiter flip a coin to see if you will enact a vengeance that fills the streets with blood and darkens the skies with crows, or have an extra slice of pie for desert." Milicent suggested.
Draco let a laugh slip out. That was Father, and Mother in a nutshell. Merlin but he came with baggage. He wasn't going to hug it out, and public overreaction had really not served him well so far. It must be wonderful to come from family traditions that were all not deeply disturbing and counterproductive. Maybe not huggy traditions, but something between genocide and group singing must be possible.
Remus Lupin saw Severus Snape fighting the urge to go for his own wand, and the hard lines on the other Professor's face and realized Remus was not the only one who felt Harry's friends reminded them of the Marauders back in their heyday.
Considering how much of their heyday had been spent waging a take no prisoners prank war in a deliberate attempt to publicly humiliate anyone who espoused public support for Voldemort and the Knights of Walpurgis (Death Eater being a name they didn't yet admit in public), it was understandable that Severus held a grudge. As an adult it was possible to admit his best friends were bullies, and excused their general excesses by the fact that some of their targets were legitimately evil. Many of the rest were just calling the Marauders on their bullshit, which Remus felt less than proud of all these years later.
Neville and Hermione were looking on in shock and horror as Harry explained in detail what whips and chains had to do with fetishes. Goblin sex education was far broader and a lot more deeply disturbing than anything Hogwarts health classes with Poppy Pomfrey would cover. Several of the other Hufflepuff's looked alarmed they had not thought to bring quill and parchment to take notes.
Remus sighed. How had Harry ended up almost more Sirius than James, given no exposure at all? He flinched, remembering how Sirius had betrayed James and Lilly in the end. Frowning. Or had he. Peter's murder was the proof, and Sirius presumed confession at his trial. Except Peter somehow died at Hogwarts last term, and Sirius may not ever have received a trial.
"James, Lilly, I know I was never there for Harry when he needed me, but with you lost, and without Dumbledore's protection, I couldn't even support myself as a werewolf in London, let alone take on a child. Now I have Dumbledore's protection, and I want to help make Harry safe, and maybe teach him like you would have, but I don't even know him!" Remus swore, thinking of his coming Dark Arts class.
Well, there was one thing he remembered from taking DADA as a Marauder. Finding out what each of them feared had bonded the four like nothing else. Sirius collapsing in front of a charging and hateful Walburga Black stuck in his head. The face you show the world is a mask, as a werewolf he knew this more than most. It was your fears that spoke to your core, and how you faced them spoke to the lessons you took away from those formative trauma.
It had taken Remus about two hours work to redo the wards in the DADA classroom to let the boggart out of its cabinet. Whatever the song had done to the wards of Hogwarts, it had activated parts of the wards that had never been awake when Remus was a student. Parts that both could identify dark creatures and could target them.
The DADA classrooms, as dedicated spaces to work on defending against dark arts and creatures had potential overrides built in. No one had needed them in generations, and given no DADA professor had lasted more than a year since Tom Riddle was denied the post in 1945, it wasn't like the information got passed down. Remus wrote them down. At least whoever followed wouldn't have to beg Mrs Pinns in the library for access to the old instruction manuals.
The boggart was now free to use its power to its fullest extent without fear of Hogwarts wards pinning it in a cage of fire and dropping several tons of ceiling on it. Remus sat waiting for his students in the DADA classroom. He expected Harry and his friends to stake out the back of the class like the Maruaders did. That was fine. Remus had spent his school days using that dodge, and he remembered how professors like Flitwick and McGonagall had countered it. Now, Merlin help him, he was the teacher.
His first class was Gryffindor and Hufflepuff. Harry and two of his friends were Hufflepuff, and in this class. You could learn a lot about someone by who they chose to associate with. James had adopted the Black outcast Sirius, the bookish werewolf Lupin, and the picked-on mama's boy Pettigrew. James collected broken people and dragged them alone on adventures until whatever trouble they were in now made their past problems irrelevant and trivial. It was a very Gryffindor therapy. Harry was a Hufflepuff, who and what had he gathered.
Harry, Hermione and Neville took their places up front, which was the least Marauder like behaviour Remus could imagine, but he supposed that was the Hufflepuff influence. Hermione already had her book out to the reference page he had written on the board and was already instructing Harry and Neville about what that implied they were studying.
The snake that Harry had worn coming into the classroom had slithered off to the cabinet where it was swaying back and forth in a threat display that Remus thought was interesting. It was just a snake, it couldn't possibly know there was a boggart in there.
Remus grinned. Hermione was their him. The scholar among the jocks. He remembered Neville and Harry were both Hufflepuff beaters. Sirius had been a beater, and James a seeker. James was the glory hound, and Sirius just liked the violence. Yes, Harry definitely had more Sirius in him. This would be messy. Sirius fears were not the sort of thing that were pretty to watch.
Remus spoke softly, forcing the class to pay attention to his words.
"What we are going to study today is called esoteric magic, can anyone tell me what that is?"
Unsurprisingly, Hermione's hand shot up first, but a Ravenclaw named Padma Patil was a close second.
"Miss Patil." Remus said, pointing to the young Ravenclaw.
"Esoteric magic is the school of magic that is not described in arithmancy. It's effects are not adequately or completely described in the linear equations based on spell formula, power input, will and intent alone." Padma Patil said firmly.
Remus nodded. "Well done Miss Patil, from an Arithmancy point of view that is a full and compete answer, but here in DADA it is not, so only three of the five points. Miss Granger, if you would like to clean up, what did she miss?" Remus continued, pointing at Hermione.
"Emotion sir. Esoteric magic is the only school of magic in which the emotional state of the caster directly effects the success and potency of the spell." Hermione said.
Remus nodded emphatically. "Yes, Yes. Well done Miss Granger, well done. Two points Hufflepuff. Esoteric magic is based on emotion so the arithmetic descriptors of arithmancy fail to adequately predict or contain the requirements and effects of the spell. It's reliance on emotion puts in on the border between the real and the unreal, the physical and the immaterial. Why is that important to DADA, anyone?" Remus said turning his eyes to the class.
He found Harry staring right back at him, meeting his gaze with neither arrogance nor fear. He met his gaze as if across a dueling field, no malice, but no mercy either.
"Because not everything we need to fight is real." Harry said.
Terry Boot laughed. "Come on Potter, even you can face something that isn't real. I mean, it isn't like anyone with half a brain thinks those stories about you facing all those creatures and You Know Who could be real."
Remus smiled. "Ah Mr Boot, well done Ravenclaw, I do love a volunteer. Very well, you will be the first one to show how little there is to fear from the unreal. What I have in this cabinet is not real. It is a boggart. A boggart is a being of the Unreal. Muggles confuse the Unreal with things that don't exist.
Witches and Wizards of course are smarter than that and are aware the Unreal is all that might be, that could have been, and in the boggart's case, we fear might be. A boggart's weapon is fear, as is its food. It is Unreal, and has only the power you give it. Fear is the power you give it, so laughter is what takes that power away.
The boggart has no form of its own, so when I open the cabinet door, it will look into the soul and mind of the person facing it and adopt the form of its fear. You will then cast the spell Ridiculous! Using the wand movement I show here, simply carve a question mark in the air, and thrust forward as the point at the bottom, thinking firmly of the most ridiculous thing you could turn that fear into.
This is important. You will be afraid. In that moment of fear, you must master yourself. Master yourself to master your magic. If you allow the boggart to master your fear, it will begin to feed upon your magic. Your will in this case must not simply overcome the boggarts control of your magic, but of your mood. You must feel the urge to laugh at your fear in order to defeat it."
Terry had remembered staying safe in his car on the Hogwarts express while the windows iced over and the girl who looked outside collapsed on the floor. Clearly she had been weak. Terry had studied occulemency, and clearly he had command of his own mind! Wand in hand he strode before the cabinet and made a gesture for Professor Lupin to open it. The snake looked at student, then teacher, then over to Harry who hissed something at him causing the snake to sulkily crawl out of the way.
Remus opened the cabinet and Terry began the wand movement, exaggerating it like Lockheart at his finest, shouting his "Ridiculous!" even as he got his first look at what boiled out of the cabinet.
A wash of cold filled the room, and Terry felt like every good feeling in his life had been a lie. He was not strong, he was not smart. His mother was brilliant, his mother had got all O's on her OWLS and NEWTS, why was he struggling to get E's on his tests? The Dementor leaned down to him, the hood flaring to allow the face to loom over him. Terry felt his wand fall from his fingers as the Dementor leaned in for a kiss. Oh Merlin. His first real test and the truth came out. He was a coward. A weakling. A failure. Better off dead.
Terry Boot accepted his death and the Dementor leaned in. Just then Remus Lupin stepped between them, and the boggart was suddenly a shining full moon before Lupin made the question mark wand motion, and poked the moon firmly with his wand shouting "Ridiculous!"
The moon popped like a balloon, and shot once in a circle around the room before slamming back into the cabinet and slamming the doors behind it.
Remus Lupin smiled at his students, now firmly having gotten their attention.
"Esoteric magic is not something memorizing and control of your thoughts will be enough to skate through. Occulemency to shut off negative emotions will not help you. You need to actually master and muster your positive emotions to make it work.
The spell Ridiculous is effective against boggarts, as it takes the power of the Unreal and turns it back upon itself. Fear or laughter, each are forms of chaos and madness that rule the Unreal. The boggart cannot defend itself against the very thing it feeds upon.
Later this year, we will learn the Patronus charm, a higher form of esoteric magic that takes a positive or happy memory and weaponizes that power as a defense against those creatures of the dark whose darkness and hatred extend beyond the boundaries of reality and into the unreal. This is the only weapon against Lethifolds and Dementors, but it is also effective against Werewolves, Wendigo, Inferi, and vampires. If its hatred extends beyond reality, the unreal may be used against it.
Esoteric magic extends beyond reality. Emotion rules the Unreal, to master emotion is to master unreality. Your journey to master this magic, is to master yourself. Ridiculous is the first step. Form a line, everyone gets a turn."
Remus smiled at his class, they were no longer smiling back. He could smell the fear on many of them. Good. Too many felt the controlled conditions they learned their spells in class under were a measure of how they could use the spell in combat. He had been taught in a classroom. It had faield him the first time he needed it. Only the hatred of the Wolf inside him had spared his life, but not his date that night. She had been broken by the Dementor because in the face of its soul destroying despair, neither one of them could form the happy memory to wield their Patronus. He would teach them against boggarts, but if they could master their emotions against the lesser psychic predator, they would be prepared to face the greater.
The snake was hissing loudly, and he looked back to see Neville Longbottom and the snake Noodle leaning over Terry Boot hissing at each other and staring into his eyes. Casting some quick detection spells, he noticed what he should have seen earlier. The boy was in shock.
Oddly, magic was flowing from the snake and Neville to the boy, as if they were joined together. Soon the snake began to sway and then the boy with it. After a while, the boy's eyes grew wide and began to tear. Neville then gripped the boy's shoulders and whispered something to him. The wildness went out of the boy's eyes and soon he was breathing normally and nodding.
Remus, nonplussed, simply asked. "Who would like to go next?"
Neville snarled as he stood. "I will."
Remus notes on Longbottom had been "Possible squib, shy, nervous." Of course those had been from Quirrell in First Year. Lockhearts notes had been mostly about female students and their degree of attractiveness and suggestibility. Those he had burned. Something was clearly different about this third year Longbottom.
Remus opened the cabinet and a wizard in the Unspeakables Grey Robes with the face blurring magics activated stormed out. "You are a squib, a coward and a shame to the House of Longbottom. I am doing the House a favour removing you."
Remus looked at the boy, expecting to see an emotional wreck, but instead the Longbottom boy simply and somewhat sadly stated. "Hello Uncle Algie. Ridiculous!"
Vines shot out of the cabinet, grabbing the Unspeakable around both wrists and ankles, around his neck, before another tendil undid his belt and began yarding down the Unspeakables pants. As the boggart was dragged intot he cabinet, the shrieking of the Unspeakable could be heard "Not there, NO, that is not an in door!"
While the class broke out into laughter, the boy Neville suddenly looked horrified, then turned to whisper to Harry and Hermione. "Did I ever tell the House Elves to let Uncle Algie out of Greenhouse 3?"
Harry snickered, and Hermione answered casually "I'm sure it was taken care of." In tones that made it clear she would be happier if Uncle Algie the eternal attempted murderer never made it out of Greenhouse 3, and had zero intention of inquiring."
Remus blinked. He had remembered Hufflepuff's being fluffier. Not so hard core. Then again Mad Eye Moody was a Hufflepuff, and that boy was somewhat scarier than a Dementor on dragon back. He guessed teachers learn too.
The next student was Terry Boot again, this time with Nigel standing right behind him.
The Dementor charged out of the cabinet, and Terry roared out "Ridiculous!"
The Dementor tripped on his robe and fell face first on the ground, rolling around in obvious pain, having broken both wrist on the stone trying to catch itself. This time the whole class laughed.
Remus worked through more of the students with ease, having one bad moment when Padma Patil saw her own mother burst forth screaming about having a marriage contract with caretaker Filch.
He was expecting some sort of feminine breakdown, but Padma's cold "Ridiculous!" summoned a very jealous Mrs Norris, Filch's cat, who chased Padma's mother around the room before she bolted back into the cabinet and locked it behind her.
Hermione's was unexpected. Auror Dawlish came storming out. He didn't have a wand in his hand, he had a paintbrush.
"I must paint you again, you are my muse, my inspiration, my goddess!" Auror Dawlish, now with only one arm and obsessed with painting the muggle born witch who had saved his life charged her with paint brush in hand, and canvass hanging behind him.
Hermione shouted "Ridiculous!" From her wand came a parchment which unrolled and began to burn its letters into the air.
"What is this?" The Auror Dawlish said in horror.
"This is a cease and desist order, a copyright challenge, a notice of violation of the Official Secrets Act as what happened in the Chamber of Secrets was classified cut your throat before reading and oblivate the corpse, not paint it in oil and hang it in the Ministry atrium you total pure blood biggoted piece of corrupt crap!" Hermione roared.
The Auror had the legal parchment wrap him up, still burning and pack him into the cabinet. Hermione threw her arms back and shouted.
"Morganna's magical muffin, that was fabulous!" Hermione shouted, doing a legitimate happy dance.
Whirling to Professor Lupin she grinned. "This is better than therapy. I love it. Can we go again!"
Remus decided right then and there, Hufflepuffs were deeply wrong on levels no Gryffindor could fully comprehend. He made a shoeing gesture to send her back to her seat.
Harry's turn was something Remus was ready for. When the boy came face to face with Voldemort, Remus would be ready to step in. Harry needed to know he was not alone. Harry needed to turn to Remus to guide and mentor him, or when he faced the real Voldemort he would not be ready. James was not here, Sirius was not here. It fell to Remus to fix things, the way Remus had always fixed things when the famous Marauder plans went pear shaped.
Harry stood before the cabinet. Remus opened it.
Voldemort crawled out. Remus blinked. Voldemort bled from a hundred wounds, and a basilisk had him by the ankles, already beginning to swallow him.
Remus went to step forward, but froze from what stepped into existence over a screaming Voldemort.
Lilly Potter.
Remus froze.
"Stay out of this Remus. I don't have the time here to explain." Lilly said, frowning at Professor Lupin before looking at Harry softly.
"Harry, you know this had to be. You have to be ready to let me go." Lilly said softly.
Harry stood, tears streaming down his face. "What if I am not ready?" He said, his voice somewhere between a rasp and a scream.
Lilly walked towards him slowly. "Then he will kill everyone you love, everyone who depends on you. He will kill everyone who gives your life meaning, because that is all he is capable of. He isn't even human anymore, he has so little soul left all he is is rage and hatred. Until you put him in the grave, he will keep punishing the world because he can't love it."
Harry screamed "THEN YOU WILL DIE!"
Lilly screamed back. "AND YOU WILL LIVE!"
Harry's face went cold. He pointed his wand at Voldemort who screamed and writhed on the ground, and whispered. "Ridiculous."
The basilisk swelled in size and gulped Voldemort down in several bites, each time it took another bite, as the fangs sank into Voldemort, bite marks would appear in Lilly and as Voldemort died, she screamed and faded into nothing.
Turning to stalk from the room, Harry Potter pointed to the door and screamed "REDUCTO!" and the door blew itself into pieces, its wards and oak failing against the bottomless well of rage and terrifying well of power inside Harry Potter.
As Remus froze, Luna Lovegood stepped past him to the boggart.
The room suddenly filled with a kaleidoscope of colour and strange discordant music. Every straight line began to bend and the space between objects both shrank and stretched as if the fabric of reality wavered.
Luna stood before the boggart who seemed to be woven of unformed madness, as it held up a crown and placed it upon her head. Luna simply stretched out her hand and touched the boggart.
"Rest now." She said softly. "Perthro." She spoke the rune of chaos, and bound once again cause to effect and bound the unreal within time and space, as much as would ever fit there. The cabinet stayed firmly shut when Lupin tested it.
Patting Professor Remus Lupin on the shoulder, she stopped and gave him a hug.
"It was a very good first class Professor." She said, then trotted after her friends making sure Harry didn't destroy any load bearing portions of the castle as he stormed back to the Hufflepuff dormitory.
Looking at the stunned students, Remus gave up and shrugged. "Class dismissed. Go to lunch."
Remus looked upon the disaster of his plans and assured himself that at least the Gryffindor Slytherin class would go smoother.
Hours later, he would have evidence that proved Slytherin and Gryffindor could indeed be at least as disturbing as Hufflfepuff and Ravenclaw.
He suppose it should be blamed on Miss Bulstrode. All had been within normal parameters until her turn.
Standing in front of the cabinet, looking elaborately bored, Milicent Bulstrode made the hand rolling gesture to Professor Lupin, encouraging her to get on with it. He had seen the icy resolve of Slytherins and the stoic courage of Gryffindors both break in the face of their secret fears. This child thought her mask was truth, and that was not enough to face a boggart. You had to know yourself.
He opened the door and Lord Selwyn stepped out, in full Death Eater regalia, with his mask slid back to reveal his face.
"Half blood scum, filthy mud blood bitch daring to pollute the sacred House Selwyn!" He raged, wand coming up. Even Remus was shaken by the hatred and power coming off the figure.
Miss Bulstrode simply snorted. "Ridiculous." She said flatly, making the wand motion, which resulted in Lord Selwyn glancing at his left forearm, as his sleeve appeared to attempt to wriggle.
Milicent Bulstrode raised her left hand and turned it, showing the Lord's Ring of House Selwyn and tapping it with her wand. "You have one chance to kneel and beg, then things get ugly. Now, skill testing question; whose ring?"
The boggart swelled to at least nine feet in height, shadows growing around it like a cloak, magic swirling around it like a growing storm. "You dare to face the rightful Lord Selwyn?"
Milicent Bulstrode turned to the class, shocking Professor Lupin.
"Those of you looking to pursue Muggle Studies beyond the OWL level, will note what you are about to see is called Hentai. Those of you who find you are interested in this, should see Cassius Warrington, Slytherin Prefect and all around degenerate who has an extensive collection filling entirely a space expanding trunk. Those of you requiring therapy afterwards should book time with Noodle, he will be available to sequester images of tentacles going places tentacles ought not to go, as the late Lord Selwyn is about to experience."
Milicent concluded, rather like a muggle stewardess giving the seat belt and life preserver lesson on those airplane rides Remus had been forced to use to get around Werewolf travel restrictions. With shock Remus turned to see the Dark Mark under the boggart Lord Selwyn's sleeve sprouted a mass of tentacles that went on to do various deeply disturbing things until Milicent was done enjoying the suffering of her first real enemy, the man who had forced a child to kill for the first time.
With a sigh, she flicked her wrist and banished it back into the cabinet, then shook her finger at the class. "Remember witches and gentlewizards, the Dark Mark does not come with a warning label, warranty, or any form of return for customers experiencing buyer's remorse. Use at your own risk, and be damned in so doing." The last phrase no longer delivered as a joke, but a cold threat.
Milicent Bulstrode, Lady Selwyn by right of conquest, was done with Death Eaters. She was not Dumbledore. She did not buy, sell, or trade second chances.
It was safe to say all the Gryffindor's were in need of chocolate, therapy, and brain bleach at this point and the Slytherins who were at least masking their own distress were sneering at their weakness. This proved a strategic error when Draco Malfoy stood before the boggart cabinet. He was working himself up to face Tom Riddle who had almost eaten his soul, or his Father, Lucius Malfoy who had sent the diary to Hogwarts, willing to risk his only son as long as Voldemort's needs were met.
So of course he got Arthur Weasley. He loomed like some rumpled version of a Dark Lord, maybe a dork lord? His hand extended in entreaty or perhaps temptation.
"Search your feelings, you know it to be true. I am your father!"
Draco felt the need to scream defiance at the universe for mocking him so, but then he saw Luna's face in his mind and he smiled.
"Ridiculous." Draco sneered. It was a very good sneer. He had missed it.
"Minister Fudge has forseen this, but together we can overcome him. We can rule the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts division as father and son!"
Draco remembered Milicents words of lunch time. Weasley's hug it out. So mote it be!
"If you only knew the power of a Weasley hug. Face me father. Hug it out like a true dork lord!" Draco shouted, advancing on the boggart with arms wide and smile bordering madness.
"Wait, NO, back off. What are you doing." The boggart said retreating around Remus, but Draco manovered to keep facing the boggart, denying it the chance to hide in some less wierd fears.
"Hug me daddy! Tell me about plugs and ekletrickity." Draco said as he stalked the terrified boggart until it bolted for the cabinet and slammed it shut behind him. A second later, a reptilian hand came out and hung a sign "Keep out" on the handles.
Draco was laughing softly, as the whole of House Slytherin (save Milicent) looked on him in horror as if he ate a live baby by hand while wearing a Chuddly cannon bib and without using the proper knife and fork at all.
Ron Weasly looked on in absolute frozen terror, unnoticed by Draco Malfoy as he drank in the shock of his own house with a smile of smug satisfaction that was as much a missed companion as his earlier sneer. Getting in touch with your feelings was easier to weaponize than he thought. Hufflepuffs should come with warning labels. They are more dangerous than he was told.
Ron Weasley faced the door, prepared for anything, he thought. Gryffindor courage, he was a Weasley after all. They were poor but honest. Not the sharpest tools in the shed sure, but not a coward among them.
Molly Weasley stepped out of the door, patting a surprised Remus Lupin on the shoulder.
"Thank you Remus dear." The boggart/Molly said.
Ronald, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, but you were adopted. We found you among the cabbages being raised by garden gnomes. Well Fred and George used you to test potions on and when you turned pure ginger we took it as fate and adopted you. We are sure you are no more than half garden gnome, and love you just as much as a real boy. Not as much as Bill, he was Head Boy, or Percy, he was also Head Boy, or even as much as Charlie as he was Quidditch captain. Not as much as the twins obviously, as there are two of them, and both adorable. Not as much as Ginny, she is the only girl, and both quite a bit cuter and brighter than you, but certainly we love you a lot. I mean, with whatever is left."
Molly smiled and Ron Weasley collapsed. He muttered "Ridiculous, Ridiculous, Ridiculous." Tears streaming out his shut eyes as Remus stepped forward to block Molly from reaching the broken and traumatized Ron.
The boggart took the familiar form of the moon and Remus banished it back into the cabinet. Draco looked upon Ron Weasley, the blood traitor, the muggle loving ignorance embracing idiot example of everything he despised about Gryffindors and swore softly to himself. Or at himself.
"Idiot, idiot, idiot. I am an idiot. Morgana save me, Mother will cut off my bits and wear them as earrings if she ever finds out about this." As Draco Malfoy, the boy slowly coming back together after Tom Riddle ate his soul and a ginger mudblood ghost chose to save his pure blood idiot self decided to pay if forward.
He knelt down and gripped Ron's shoulder. "Buck up Weasley. Boggarts are lies. They don't dig up secrets, they dig up fears. You are as much an ignorant ginger prat as the rest of your brothers. You are Weasley born and bred, now man up and think. I mean, garden gnomes are like a foot tall. How would that even work? I swear upon my name, you are a Weasley."
Ron looked up at Draco, and Draco's cold gaze pierced the fog in Ron's own eyes, and Ron grasped onto Draco's words as if they were a lifeline. With a sob, he grabbed Draco in a crushing hug and sobbed brokenly.
Draco glared at Milicent Bulstrode as he found himself patting the Gryffindor Weasley uncomfortably on the back, wishing now he would have memorized how Longbottom and Potter made it look somehow natural, so he could at least fake it.
Milicent shrugged and muttered. "I warned you that you would end up hugging it out."
Draco glared at her before muttering. "Do not laugh at me."
Milicent shook her head. "No. Not for this." They shared the look of children who had already lived through trauma that no child should have to experience often enough to become connoisseurs of pain. Let fools who had never suffered laugh. They understood better.
Remus Lupin looked upon his students and frowned. Either things had changed a great deal since he had been a student here, or he had as many prejudices to shed as Sirius and Severus did. Wasn't that a disturbing thought. For a first day in DADA, it was enough to drive a werewolf to drink. Luckily, in third year, he learned who had the good booze in Hogwarts.
Sitting in McGonagall's office that evening, Remus outlined his day to an amused looking McGonagall.
"Remus, now that we are fellow profesors, I am supposed to rise above my feelings about your student days, but since you are drinking my scotch in my office, I am going to indulge myself."
She smiled.
"Do you remember all those days when you, James, Sirius and Peter would alternate between pleading ignorance and innocence (the first one I will grant you) and snickering at the fact that you were indeed guilty and quite pleased with yourself?"
Remus winced. "Now Minnie, that was a long time ago, and we were innocent children!"
McGonagall raised her hand. "I asked if you remember Remus, not if you regret it."
Remus sighed. "Yes I remember."
Minerva McGonagall raised her scotch, sipped it, let it roll around in her mouth as she let the flavour explode on her pallet as she rolled a memory across her mind to do the same.
"Do you remember," the old witch began "how I hoped one day you would be in my position, and get a taste of how it feels?"
Remus gave his former Head of House a hurt look. "Now Minnie, that is a little petty, isn't it?"
McGonagall tried to hold it in, but the laughter made her snort and then cackle like a mad witch, eventually pounding on the table with a small delicate fist, tears streaming down her face, and a look of transcendent joy upon her face.
Grinning, she refilled both their glasses.
"Oh sweet Merlin, it was even more GLORIOUS than I dreamed!" McGonagall cackled madly as she clinked glasses with the depressed werewolf then drank her scotch with the sort of uncomplicated joy those who knew her back in her student days would have remembered fondly.
Remus tried to wallow in self pity, but it was good scotch, and you didn't survive as a Marauder without a well developed sense of humour. Remus began laughing too. It was time to throw his preconceptions of Harry Potter and his friends aside. Dumbledore had sold him a fairy tale, and Remus had believed it, but the kids don't fit the story Dumbledore was selling. Remus would judge for himself. Of all the Marauders, he was the scholar. Well, time to study Harry Potter, and the new version of the Marauders.
In the shadows of a very expensive club in Diagon Alley, Lucius Malfoy sipped a drink. If you don't know its name, you were not put down on its membership list when you were born. You couldn't buy your way in, couldn't force your way in. This was a club that existed only for gentlemen of exceptional breeding, of unmatched purity. A club to indulge those tastes that lesser beings, which described virtually everyone and most especially everyone in government, frequently frowned upon.
"I say Walden," Said Lucius to Walden McNair, one of the Death Eaters acquitted by Sirius Blacks so called confession, the transcript of the trial that never happened. "Do you have the sample of Black's hair from his trial."
McNair snorted into his drink. "Of course not. Didn't get a trial did he."
Lucius smiled. "How about his Auror sample. All Aurors have to give one, don't they?"
McNair snarled. "Can't get to those. Active or retired Aurors samples are held tight behind wards. I would need an order from the Wizagamot countersigned by the head of the DMLE to get at those."
Lucius smirked. "Yes, but when he got sent to Azkaban, tried or not, his sample was removed from the secure Auror files and put into the simple evidence files. Since it has been this long, its probably in the cold case files now. They have less security than my father's erotic art collection."
McNair looked up. "Yeah. That I can get to. Why do you want to? I mean, if they could have tracked him down with that, they would have already."
Lucius smile broadened and showed teeth. "Why the problem we have with Sirius is that there is no evidence to convict him, which makes the evidence to exonerate us somewhat problematic. If there were new evidence to convict him of new crimes, then he can go back to Azkaban, suffer a tragic accident, and all of his assets can again slip into my dear Draco's inheritance.
Given Draco's eternal lack of spine, I can have him restored into a useable heir inside of six weeks without Lord Black and the damned Black family primacy in my marriage contract tying my hands with my own bloody son!"
McNair snorted. "Won't help. Gringotts told the Wizagamot that Sirius made that Potter brat his heir already. You won't inherit anything, and Draco will get maybe a sip from the golden cup, not the bloody fountain."
Lucius examined his nails carefully. "My dear Walden, what crime to you think our Sirius is going to be convicted of? The shocking murder of Harry Potter. Black family madness, all that time in Azkaban, honestly Cornelius Fudge is so scared the truth will bring his government down he would believe anything that kept Black from taking his seat in the wizagamot and daring to testify about what was done to him."
McNair began to laugh. His job as the executioner for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical creatures made him technically an enforcement officer of the wizagamot, if not the DMLE. He could get into the cold case files for the sample of Sirius Black's hair that was pulled from his Auror files to compare to the non existent bit taken at his arrest. Lucius was a rather good potioner. Polyjuice had been a common Death Eater tool in the past. The old ways were always best.
Looks like another tragic year at Hogwarts was due.