-Crouch Manor
"This hovel is the best my sworn can offer me, their Dark Lord?" Voldemort hissed, his homunculus body like that of a prematurely aged child.
Lucius No Name looked disheveled, his carefully coiffure now bedraggled blond locks held back with a twist of leather like some common ruffian, his face unshaved, his clothes, serviceable but no longer elegant. His face was drawn and his eyes shadowed as he carried his Dark Lord with a subservience and fear the child like figure should not merit, until you looked into those burning red eyes.
Barty Crouch Junior's eyes were wild, his grin manic, and a nervous twitch caused him to lick his lips far too frequently, a leftover from his stint in Azkaban before his father switched his dying mother for him, and smuggled him out to hold in the Crouch manor under an Imperius curse.
"My father's house may not be much, but since he is under my Imperius now, it is the most secure in all of England. After all, you now have the Minister of Magic's own protective detail to defend you!"
Barty Crouch's laughter was clearly insane, but his point was valid. When he had attended the Quidditch world cup under an invisibility cloak, he had used the confusion of the event to steal Ludo Bagman's wand. With his father running for Minister of Magic, and with the frustrations of having to broker deals with Dumbledore and Lord Parkinson both, Barty Crouch senior had been driven to drink. With the loss of his willpower and the growing resistance of repeated use of the Imperius, Barty Crouch Junior had finally broken free of his father's curse, and used the stolen wand to place his father under the same curse.
Now Voldemort had smuggled himself back into England, and gone to ground in the Minister of Magic's own manor, with the Minister under his Death Eater son's control, and the Minister's protective detail defending them from any intrusion. The irony made Voldemort join in the laughter.
"The Jorkins woman was milked of all the information we needed for the World Cup security, and the Tri Wizard Tournament. Why am I hearing reports of my followers being slaughtered like sheep by a handful of children? Did I not train you myself? Did I select squibs? Mudbloods? Weaklings? You were to have spread fear and confusion the length of the land, driven the Ministry to spread its Aurors thinly, forced them to reactionary legislation and controls to build resentment and make recruitment of minorities like the werewolves easier. Instead, everyone is talking about Harry Potter and his little friends. Where are my reports? Summon the team leaders, I want to hear what went wrong."
Voldemort hissed and tapped his wand to Lucius Dark Mark.
"
Instantly two figures appeared. Lords Parkinson and Nott.
Voldemort waited for several seconds, then snarled.
"Where is Rosier, Rockwood, McNair, Dulohov? Where are my elites?"
He turned to Parkinson and Nott. "Where, worms, are your leaders, my picked men?"
Lord Parkinson worked his hands like he was washing them, the sweat on his brow betraying his fear. "They are dead milord. They ran into more serious opposition."
Voldemorts child like body could not contain his rage. "Antonin Dulohov was the European dueling champion, he has faced Albus Dumbledore and walked away, battled James Potter and Sirius Black together and still escaped. He killed the Prewit twins and burned their house down over their corpses, how did he die in a simple raid?"
Nott snarled. "Sirius Black killed him. He's different since Harry Potter had him broken out of Azkaban. Stronger, more focused. He had easily twice the power as last time Dulohov fought him. It wasn't even close."
Voldemort shrieked, his voice more like a demon than a man. "What were my Death Eaters doing while Dulohov was fighting alone? I ordered sixty of you to the raid, what were they doing? Buying souvenirs from the stalls? THIS WAS A RAID."
Parkinson whispered harshly. "They were dying, lord. Harry Potter and his brats were ambushing them all through the grounds. They didn't stand and fight, they ambushed our men, cut them down from behind, confused them in the fog and made them shoot each other, and the ones who got lured into the forest got crucified!"
Volemort slumped down, his rage no longer able to push the fragile shell of a body he rode.
"The Jorkins woman was nearly dead before we used her to birth this body. I haven't enough power to lead you in battle like this. We need to complete the ritual to get my body back. Without me, you pathetic fools clearly cannot even discipline school children." Voldemort hissed.
"When I have my body back, I will break my truest disciples from Azkaban. Without Rockwood, I will need Bellatrix, Rabastran and Rudolfus Lestrange. I need my commanders if I am to turn the rabble of this generation into an army to take over Britain."
He watched everyone flinch, and turned his gaze to Lord Parkinson, his red eyes burned into the Death Eater, and his Legimency tore from his follower all the things that they had feared to tell him.
Volemort's voice sounded hollow, and shocked. "Dead? Bellatrix, my right hand, they killed her in Azkaban before I could even come for her. THEY DARED? No. Not they. Not the Ministry, not the gutless Aurors. Potter. Potter dared to free his Sirius Black, and kill all three of my LeStrange. I was always going to kill him, use his blood for my return, but now I must kill him three-fold."
Voldemort sighed heavily. "They found the Cup, and the locket. Regulus Black betrayed me, chose his family over his lord. All my defenses, all my wards, magics no living mage could hope to equal, wards, potions, curses, inferi, potions, and all defeated by one angry little boy, bitter because I poisoned his precious House Elf."
Voldemort turned and his wand flashed, catching Lucius with a blood red beam. "Crucio!"
As Lucius screamed, Voldemort snarled. "If you had not used my diary and bungled it, Narcissa would not have divorced you, denying me control of the wizagamot, denying me the money to bribe the weak and foolish to their own destruction, and my enemies would not have known my Horcrux even exist. They have found and destroyed three. They must know three is a powerful magical number and a greater number of Horcrux than any have ever dared. They cannot suspect that I dared to make seven, or that the Potter boy is the last."
Voldemort sighed. "Still, they know about the Horcrux, and they never should have. That means I cannot wait, cannot rebuild my forces slowly. Ravenclaw's diadem is in Hogwarts, I will need to take that to be sure it is safe. No one can pass the defenses on my ring. No one knows about my snake Nagini. I am going to have to use shock and awe, take the ministry by storm before that old fool Dumbledore trips on his beard and falls on the Diadem, or Harry Potter finds it at the bottom of his cereal bowl like a muggle prize."
Barty Crouch knelt by his Dark Lord and stared into the blood red eyes of his master.
"I can deliver Potter to you my Lord, and the Ministry. My father had already used his access to doctor the Goblet of Fire so Harry Potter gets selected as champion, and he had reset the code from Dumbledore's kinder gentler tournament to the settings that killed the last set of champions! I can manipulate it so Harry Potter's prize at any point can deliver him to you for the ritual. I can take him in the first prize before anyone even knows it is a trap!"
Voldemort sneered. "Before, that would have been wisdom. Before all I needed was Harry Potter's blood to make me whole and strip away that bitch's protection. It isn't enough now. The Death Eaters cannot inspire fear when Harry Potter's little children have slaughtered them at every turn. I need my coming to shake wizarding Britain to its core, they must see my first act and tremble.
It isn't enough for me to kill Harry Potter, I need those pathetic sheep to understand who Harry Potter is, that he is the only thing that has kept me from conquering them for the last decade, that he is their true and only hope. They must know and accept him as their champion, so when I slaughter him before their very eyes, they will see all hope die!"
Turning to Barty he spoke softly. "Harry Potter must be tested, must be pushed to the very limit, he must prove to the world that he is no ordinary wizard, that he is their prophesied saviour, only then when I kill him can I regain the fear your pathetic brethren squandered by dying to kindergarten children playing with crayons."
Voldemort smiled. "We will hit the Ministry next, before they can move to war footing, before those fools even believe I am back."
Barty Crouch Jr knelt and kissed Voldemorts childlike hand. "I have my father under the Imperius, I can order him to drop the wards, and even order his Aurors to surrender when you come. You can take the Ministry with barely a spell fired. When they go to sleep, dreaming of the Boy Who Lived falling to your wand, they will wake up to find you already took the world!"
Voldemort knew it would not be that easy, many would fight. Without leadership, and with their trusted defenses betraying them, they would fight as individuals, never sure who among their own troops were secret traitors. It would not be bloodless, but it would be far closer to a massacre than a battle.
Still, he would not have time to get his Dementor allies from Azkaban, nor free his remaining trapped followers until after the Ministry falls. He had only a handful of Werewolves, not the dozens of packs he was planning on gathering, and he had only begun to gather the vampires.
Harry Potter had cost him time. Voldemort must strike boldly, in the open, not slowly and methodically building strength from the shadows and cutting the Ministry and it's allies in a thousand pinprick raids until they were spread thin and bled almost dry before finally pressing for decisive battle.
Harry Potter had forced Voldemort to strike too soon, to risk it all on one turn of the die. It was a shame he could only kill the boy once. Still, he had friends. He supposed killing them would at least take some of the edge off his frustration.
His remaining Horcrux must be safe! Curse the boy. It wasn't enough he cost Voldemort his body in 1981. Now he forced Voldemort to strike too soon, with too few allies, and too little control of the powerful houses of the wizagamot. Secrecy must be sacrificed, secrecy and security. Once he had his body and magic back, Voldemort would teach this new generation why they dared not even speak his name!
-Dumbledore's Office
Griphook, Sirius Black, Agusta Longbottom, and Narcissa Black sat in seats behind Harry, Neville, Milicent, Hermione, Draco, and Noodle. Severus Snape and Pomona Sprout flanked Dumbledore's desk with Minerva McGonagall and standing behind Albus Dumbledore.
The Headmaster's mask of grandfatherly concern was in danger of slipping as the magic leaking off him caused the wards of the Headmaster's office to spark and flare as his personal wards and the magic of Hogwarts began to clash in unaccustomed opposition.
"Harry, I fear you are needlessly endangering yourself, and your fellow students by acting openly. You have revealed to Voldemort that you know his greatest secret. Now he will be forced to move against you, here at Hogwarts. You have threatened the plans of those far older and wiser, those who have faced Voldemort before and learned his methods."
Dumbledore's voice was low and powerful, the subsonics woven into it would have been imperceptible to anyone who was not currently wearing Noodle draped over Hermione and Harry both. The compulsions were subtle and not overtly demanding; not commanding instant obedience, just that his words be heard, internalized, and deeply considered.
Noodle poked Harry in the side of the head, then hissed at Hermione.
"$ The lying one is doing it again. Since he can't get into your minds, he is weaving his magic into his voice. Center yourself. Find the magic that is not your own and drive it out. $" Noodle hissed before glaring at the Headmaster.
Most of the room was nodding, unconciously giving the Headmasters words the weight he desired them to have. The parselmouths in the room all snarled, and took a moment to center themselves. As their eyes flared open, human and goblin, wizard and witch glared hotly at the Headmaster.
Griphook took it upon himself to speak, sliding his dagger from its sheath and resting it on the Headmaster's desk, point facing Dumbledore.
"You have just used voice magic to influence the mind of everyone in this room. All of you who find yourself suddenly agreeing with the Headmaster should cast whatever detection and protection charms you have to find and isolate his influence, or you wil find yourself freely giving away your will, your choice, and your rights to this, thing." Griphook said, contempt dripping from his voice, and his knife digging deeply into the Headmaster's desk as if daring him to object.
Faux, the phoenix on his perch gave an angry squawk and flew from the room in a flare of fire, expressing his disapproval of Albus actions by leaving his side and the castle during the discussion.
Minerva McGonagall who had been nodding, cast the charms reluctantly, only after noticing Pomona Sprout and Severus Snape both casting theirs and turning, wands in their hands to face the Headmaster. When she cast her own, purely to dismiss the ridiculous notion that Albus Dumbledore would use magic to affect the minds and wills of faculty, students and parents, she was shocked to see her detection spells found a suggestion active and working against her will.
A quick and almost overpowered banishing of compulsions saw more than one effect torn from her, and her thoughts about more than a few conversations in which the Headmaster had talked her around suddenly struck her as deeply suspect.
"Albus Dumbledore how could you!" McGonagall shrieked, shock and horror at her mental violation robbing her of her legendary self control.
"I am going to have to see to the wards of the Board of Governors chambers. How many times have you used this Albus? We knew about your Legilimency, and most of us have Occulemency to protect ourselves, but we never dreamed you would stoop to casting wandless and chantless charms of influence on us. This will have to be addressed." Augusta Longbottom said, the old lady sounding tired and almost defeated as the faith she had so long held in the Champion of Light and the righteousness of his cause died its last and final death.
Dumbledore slammed his hand down on the table. "DO NONE OF YOU UNDERSTAND? YOU HAVE ALL BUT DEMANDED VOLDEMORTS IMEDIATE ATTACK!"
Sirius laughed and gripped Harry's shoulder. Nodding to him. Harry turned to Griphook who bared his teeth in a smile no goblin could mistake. Harry took a deep breath and faced his Headmaster and would be puppet master.
"Of course we did. Every one of his pet Death Eaters has seen their Dark Mark growing, every one of them is beginning to make plans of their own to sabotage whatever resistance the Ministry can give. We stopped one attack at the World Cup because it was dead bloody obvious they would need to hit it, but while we sit here in class writing lines for hurting your feelings the Death Eaters are free to recruit and train entire legions, they are blackmailing and threatening officials to get access to all the information and influence they need, they are getting busy with laying the groundwork for winning the war AGAIN and you are sitting in your office like the worlds skinniest acromantula spinning webs and puppeting school children while Voldemort gets on with winning the war."
Dumbledore rose to peer down at Harry. "The Order of the Phoenix is moving..."
Harry held out his hands. "Yeah yeah, guarding some prophesy you won't tell me about that supposedly explains why Voldemort needs to kill me first, well I already know that bit. You will only lie about the rest, and you know what? I don't care."
You have had since my father died to buy my mother time to make her own death actually matter to act without Voldemorts interference. In that time you have neither found nor destroyed a single Horcrux, which you already knew about.
I am in my fourth year of school, and I have found and destroyed half of them, oh yes, I know he tried to make seven. You have had my entire life to act when Voldemort wasn't even able to lift a wand, and you have done nothing but try to mess with my life. You haven't killed a single Death Eater, you haven't destroyed a single Horcrux, you haven't even raised an army to defend Britain. You have sat in your office and told the world that I am the Boy Who Lived and that you will guide me to some predestined victory where I guess I am supposed to hug the greatest mass murderer since Grindewald and we just explode in a magical backlash of suppressed feelings.
Harry mimed gagging, throwing up, and wiping his face. He then raised his hands.
"Or, just throwing it out there, we could cut off his access to political power, see Lady Selwyn, Lady Longbottom and Lord Black behind me. Cut off his access to the funds needed to bribe his way into influence over officials, see Griphook and Lady Black, also behind me. We could start stacking piles of his Death Eater senior leadership as corpses in public so that his new followers see that the price of marking themselves with the Dark Mark is a sudden and violent death, see the World Cup. We could show that his great terror weapon that no witch or wizard dare to face can not only be beaten, but can be killed, see our last years train ride and the Dragon of Hogwarts raining dead Dementors all over the quidditch pitch in front of most of the students and half the parents of Hogwarts.
We are not waiting for Voldemort to decide he is ready to strike, when he is sure he has subverted, coopted or destroyed every defense we have, and can just stroll in and take power. We are taking the war to him, and forcing him to act before he is ready.
We are winning the war, not waiting for it."
Harry's voice was strong, clear, challenging, but absolutely controlled, rather than emotional. He eyed Dumbledore who opened his mouth to say something else when a hammering was heard on his door.
"Headmaster, Headmaster. I know there is a meeting going on about the unconscionable disruption of the Ministers presentation and as the duly appointed Inquisitor of Hogwarts, I demand to be present."
Griphook laughed, as evilly as only a goblin could laugh.
"Go ahead Headmaster. You have chosen to let the dragon into your castle. Now you have no choice but invite it to sit at every table, lest you offend it." Griphook's laugh was savage as Dumbledore's wand flicked to open the door to a very angry Delores Umbridge whose face was as darkly pink has her dress, and whose rant went on for twenty minutes, alternately insulting, threatening and demanding answers Harry and party smiled sweetly and laughed in her face.
Harry cast his eyes over to Severus Snape whose mask of Slytherin disinterest cracked slightly to reveal disgust at Umbridge and her total lack of control, as much as her seeming inability to see how suicidally stupid forcing denial of reality as public policy would be, as the wizarding world stumbled and staggered unprepared into the second round of Voldemort's aborted Blood War.
Harry saw Snape flinch as his Dark Mark flared, and watched how the Slytherin House Master stroked Slytherin's locket, and drew the strength from it to rise above the pain of his mark, and the ranting of a barely functional witch whose only power was to toady to those with authority.
Harry raised an eyebrow and let a small smirk twist his lips, and saw the dark flash of humour and ghost of a smile play across the Potion's Master lips as well, the ridiculousness of the little pink puffertoad daring to berate a room full of witches and wizards, the least of whom could snuff her like a candle, was too funny to fully pretend to take seriously.
Griphook crossed his legs and laughed openly as Umbridge lost what little self control she had to rage against subhumans being allowed above ground, and to dare to actually speak to a wizard beyond taking orders and begging forgiveness for the crime of being born subhuman.
Hermione turned to Milicent and whispered "If she says that to Professor Flitwick, ten galleons that the blood spatter covers at least five meters of hallway."
Milicent turned to Hermione and shook her hand. "You are on. I think he will use fire and render her down into the kind of grease stain you get when you have a lard fire. No more than half a meter of slippery soot marked floor."
"Fifty points from Hufflepuff and Slytherin for disrespecting the Inquisitor!" Umbridge squeaked, fumbling in her purse for her wand.
Pomona Sprout's wand was already out. "Fifty points to Slytherin for defending another Head of House from defamation. Filius Flitwicks goblin heritage is a point of pride for him, and his inclusion among our heads of House is a point of pride for us."
Severus Snape flicked his wand casually and he drawled, almost lazily. "Fifty points to Hufflepuff. The House of Slytherin does not tolerate racism against our magical brethren. I am pleased to see Hufflepuff maintains similar standards of behaviour."
It was a testament to Slytherin self control that none of the Slytherins in the room reacted to the claim that Slytherin had ever accepted the other magical races of Britain as anything but servants. It was perhaps the greatest show of House Unity ever, that no one in the room laughed as Severus gave the point award while claiming Slytherin's claim to historically rejecting racism.
Delores Umbridge sputtered herself into silence, unable to even decide who to target next in her rant. Dumbledore, recognizing that there was no possible advantage to continuing this confrontation masquerading badly as a conversation, offered quietly.
"I think that covers all we need to discuss at this point, and I am sure that our students, parents, and faculty all have many important start of term things to be about."
Dumbledore waited until he was alone in his office to pull his wand and blow apart several very expensive and irreplaceable magical apparatus, and scream his rage so loudly that his personal wards flared so brightly the whole tower containing his office burned gold in the growing darkness of a Hogwarts dusk.
Somehow, the Headmaster thought, somehow I will get the boy to understand that he needs me. Only I know the truth of the prophesy, and the true path to Voldemort's final end. Harry's as well, but it wouldn't do to burden the boy with that knowledge.
It was enough that Dumbledore knew. In the end, he was the only one who knew what was required, and he would do what it took to see Harry Potter played his part right to the end.
-Classroom outside the Ravenclaw tower.
Luna sat with her teapot two young House Elves too young to serve, and the Ghost of the Silver Lady.
Luna poured a full cup of tea for herself, a half cup of tea for each House Elf, then turned to pour out the rest of the tea on the floor. Taking the now empty teapot, she made a pouring gesture over the remaining tea cup and silver ghostly tea fell from the pot to fill the Silver Lady's cup.
"They have locked you out of the tower again, my Eagles." The Ravenclaw ghost lamented.
Luna cocked her head. "They cast a muffling charm on the riddle speaker, so I cannot hear the riddle. If I was meant to get in, then I would simply guess the answer anyway, but I could not, so that meant I am to spend the night having a tea party."
"They are bullying you." The Silver Lady said quietly.
"Children can be cruel. People can be cruel. Magic can be cruel." Luna shrugged and sipped her tea. "It doesn't pay to dwell on it."
She smiled sadly. "I could get angry, I could tell someone, or I could have tea with my friends."
Luna was instantly pressed between two very tiny House Elf children who were hugging as hard as their tiny arms could hug. She felt warm and happy as the Silver Lady looked sad.
"It's so easy for you. Your friends would never hurt you." The Silver Lady said softly.
Luna smiled sadly. "You are wrong. My friends often hurt me. They hurt me because they can't see what I see. They hurt me because they think I can't tell when they are humoring me, that I can't tell when they ignore me because what I am telling them simply can't be true."
The Silver Lady hissed. "Why do you allow it? They are less than you, they cannot see what you see, they deny what you know, even when you share it with them!"
Luna laughed. "Because I love them, and they love me. They aren't very good at showing it, but I am worse. They want to keep me safe from the things that they see that I have taught myself not to see. I want to keep them safe from the things that I see that they have taught themselves not to see."
The Sliver Lady wept silently. "Friendship isn't real. I had a friend once. I shared with him my greatest shame, and he swore he would help me fix it. He swore he would help me return my mother's diadem that I stole from her because I grew so tired of living in her shadow, and just once, just once wanted her to see me, not the woman she needed me to be that I would never become. Instead, he tricked me, and turned it into something wicked. Now I can't even die to face my mother again."
Luna's met her eyes and let her own tears fall. "My friends are real, and they will make it right. Not yet. There are too many unreal things that have to happen yet."
The Silver Lady looked up, alarmed.
"Unreal things?" She asked, placing her ghostly tea cup down.
Luna shuddered. "That is the problem between untrue things and unreal things. My friends ignore me because I see things that are unreal, but Unreal and untrue are two different things. They have brought something into Hogwarts. Something Unreal, and the Unreal is straining at the seams, stretching reality and looking for the weak points. They are going to awaken it here, inside Hogwarts.
They are going to bring the Unreal into life inside the greatest concentration of magic in all of Wizarding Britain and I don't know if I can keep all my friends safe." Luna said softly, her eyes filled with tears she swore firmly she would not shed.
The Sliver Lady looked at Luna in alarm. "What are you going to do?"
Luna blinked, and refilled the Silver Lady's cup with the ghost of tea, before picking up her own cup of real tea and sipping carefully.
"I am going to have tea parties." Luna stated firmly. Her plan for the Unreal and its uncertainty forming in her mind in the natural way her mind had for accepting the uncanny.
She matched eyes with the two House Elf children who took up their tea cups firmly and with a fierce nod, joined her in taking a sip. Tea parties were serious business.