Chapter 14: Denouement
A few moments of shocked silence marked Sirius's wincing announcement.
Graham took an inadvertent sip of his Pimms, then lowered his glass in embarrassed realisation. He was faintly aware that he was in a sudden high-stakes situation - and entirely unable to find words to address it.
Luckily, Remus had less of an issue collecting his thoughts.
"Sirius, and... Amelia, I see. Why don't we try and deescalate things a little? As you can see, we're armed with drinks, not wands-"
"And you'll stay that way." Amelia snapped. "I have Sirius' wand - and I want each of yours, right now. Put them on the floor, and don't be stupid about it; I haven't slept in seventeen hours and I don't want to do something... rash."
Drinks and wands were deposited in short order, and the latter summoned to Amelia with a twitch of her wand. A muttered "Accio wands." satisfied her that nobody was packing a duplicate, and Amelia let out a quiet breath of relief.
"Alright, Black," she said, "over there with the others, if you please."
Sirius, mirroring her relief (with the added element of no longer having a deadly weapon pressed to his neck) trotted across to the group. Graham did his best with eyebrows and an incredulous stare to try and ask what had happened, but Sirius returned the gesture, just as nonplussed. It didn't seem as if Amelia had been particularly forthcoming in interrogating him.
Amelia took another couple of deep breaths to calm herself. Graham noted her exhaustion - her eyes were almost wreathed in sleep-deprived shadow.
"Amelia - maybe we should all sit down to talk about... whatever it is you want to talk about." Delia ventured, voice quavering a little.
"Right - yes. Sit, please." Amelia said, curtly; with a swish of her wand, she conjured a set of folding chairs. Graham took a seat with the others, wincing as he sat; it was impressively uncomfortable.
"Yeah - painful chairs to help with interrogations." Sirius muttered. "Classic tactic."
Amelia took a conjured seat of her own - a few inches higher and quite a lot softer than theirs, Graham noticed - and mastered herself.
"Alright," she began. "Please understand that I am currently doing you all an enormous favour. I'm going to tell you some of the things I've learned; you're going to listen very carefully. And once I'm done, you're going to explain why I shouldn't arrest you all for trampling on the statute of secrecy."
Sirius didn't really believe in miraculous acts of providence - a side effect of being a wizard. Still, as Amelia set out her findings, he found himself hoping for an unseasonable lightning bolt to put him out of his misery. He'd admitted, under threat of veritaserum, his theft of the magic-born registry. What he hadn't reckoned on was how much of the rest of the puzzle Amelia had pieced together from a few paltry clues.
"There are quite a few gaps you'll be explaining." Amelia concluded. "And those explanations will need to be particularly compelling. The way I see it, you're all complicit in the theft of a Class A arcane object. You appear to be using that object to plan some kind of magical school for muggleborns - something which could easily break half a dozen laws just off the top of my head. And I don't even want to venture a guess at all the statute violations you've committed on top of that."
The wish for unexpected immolation hadn't fully left Sirius, but Amelia's conclusion sparked a distant memory.
"Uh - Graham can explain the schooling side of things, I'm sure." Sirius said, falteringly, wincing at Graham's incredulous stare. "But - I'm pretty sure that taking the book wasn't a crime, Amelia. And we have kept it safe, of course."
"I'm your boss, I'm a qualified prosecutor, and I've had a very long day." Amelia shot back. "Do you want to start somewhere less idiotic than that?"
Sirius was already so far out on a limb he could almost hear it creaking.
"No, no! I'm pretty sure - it was something Lily said at the time. Some exception, I think? I'm not-"
"The vigilante carve-out!" Delia broke in, before blushing at her outburst. "Um - I wanted to be a lawyer, before I learnt about the blood requirements, so I keep abreast of this stuff…"
"That's it!" Sirius agreed. "Uh - that said, maybe you could explain it for the others?" And me, he thought.
"That's a terrible excuse, Sirius." Amelia interrupted. "And I can fill in the gaps myself. The vigilante exception was emergency legislation offering an amnesty for crimes committed against death eaters. It's how the order got away with half the stuff it did in the war, in fact. But it doesn't cover random theft, it doesn't cover breaking and entry, and it definitely doesn't cover crimes against the ministry!"
"Well, yes." Delia said, carefully. "But the situation changes when you consider how devastating the book would have been in You-Know-Who's hands. And it was taken by someone who wanted to ensure that he didn't get hold of it. On the basis that the ministry's defences were insufficient, of course."
"Apparently, he was furious that someone on his side didn't have the initiative to take it." Remus offered. "Of course that was our most important motive for, uh, extracting it from its insufficient protections."
"Of course it's a tenuous argument." Delia concluded. "But on the other hand, Sirius has already suffered a grave miscarriage of justice at the ministry's hands. Moreover, he's a depressingly wealthy pureblood. How do you think that case would pan out?"
"Look - I understand how bad this looks, Amelia." His friends had given Graham enough time to plan his response. "But I don't think we've broken any laws, and this is all for a reason. You see..."
The easy part of the explanation passed without issue. There hadn't been a violation of the statute of secrecy, Graham noted. They rarely dealt with muggles, and acted according to ministerial guidelines when they did. This was even true, if only by technicality. His and Lily's actions in the fertility clinic would technically have been deemed muggle-baiting - but they hadn't been accused of that and he had no intention of bringing the clinic up of his own volition.
More problematic was the point about how legal the scheme itself was. Technically, there was nothing stopping them from telling muggleborns about the magical world. Technically, there was nothing banning a kindly wizard from teaching a young muggleborn. And extremely technically, there was nothing stopping a very kindly wizard from teaching all the young muggleborns.
Amelia was silent for a long minute after Graham's explanation.
"Alright, so let's say I buy this tenuous legality argument of yours for a moment. Actually, scratch that - I definitely don't. It's just as thin as Sirius' case, with none of his financial or ancestral advantages and a troublesome hint of muggleborn sedition. If I wanted to, I'd be perfectly justified arresting you all right now - but I'm willing to humour you for the moment. Why the hell is this… ridiculous, over-contrived mess even necessary?"
This, at least, was a question Graham was ready for.
"Well, at first this sprung from desperation on my part. Amelia - more than half of the muggleborns I knew were dead by the end of the war. I was so intent on finding a way to protect the next generation that a school almost seemed a sensible solution."
Then came the lie he'd been trying to improvise since he'd started talking.
"The thing is, Amelia - we noticed something remarkable after the war - world-changing, even. At a guess, how many muggleborns would you say are born in a calendar year?"
It wasn't a line of questioning which Amelia had expected.
"Less than fifteen, I assume. Not that I'd know, given that I haven't stolen the book people use to find that out."
Graham blushed, despite himself.
"Well - um, yes. That's what I thought, as well. Only, for reasons I just don't understand, that changed after You-Know-Who was defeated. And when I say changed - Amelia, in the last three months, over a hundred and fifty children manifested magic for the first time."
There was a moment of suspended shock. Graham was grateful that his companions seemed to be hiding their confusion. In fact, he thought, Sirius and Remus looked the tiniest bit impressed at his lie.
Amelia's reaction was a credit to her composure. She pinched the bridge of her nose, took a deep breath, and said, very carefully:
"Well, then. I think it's about time you show me the birth registry - don't you?"
It was only after she'd satisfied herself as to the number of new magicians that Amelia relented and returned the wands she'd confiscated.
"I want to be clear." She said. "I'd absolutely be in my rights to detain the lot of you, even on uncertain legal territory. You all know that the ministry isn't kind to muggleborns. And it certainly won't be kind to people endangering the statute by telling them about magic."
"We understand, Amelia." Remus said. "Thank you for listening, and for your understanding-"
"I don't think you quite understand, Remus - I'm not endorsing this insanity." Amelia interrupted, sharply. "You'll need my express approval for whatever happens here from now on. The ministry might not be supervising this, but I damn well will be - someone needs to. God, I need a drink."
"Well, I'll make you one." Delia offered, smiling cautiously. "Graham does have a surprisingly extensive drinks cabinet, after all."
Amelia shook her head. "Thank you - but no. God, it must almost be ten, and I need to get back to Susan - Polly must be losing her mind with worry."
She gathered herself up, and cast an impassive stare over the group.
"Once I've had some time to think this over, you'll hear from me through Sirius. But I want to be very clear - this is not a back-and-forth arrangement. If I have requirements, you will follow them; if I tell you not to do something, you will stop immediately. Am I understood?"
The ragged chorus of agreement was enough for Amelia, and - steeling herself - she disapparated, leaving a scene of instant chaos in her wake.
It was far too dark to discuss what had happened outside, so the group retired to Graham's kitchen table and let a carelessly ensorcelled kettle prepare some tea.
Remus did take some relish in mocking Sirius's ego for wanting to call the school the "Black Foundation for Magical Improvement". Otherwise, though, Sirius felt that he escaped relatively lightly. This was helped, of course, by the fact that he beat a hasty retreat soon after to "make sure that Harry's alright."
Delia departed soon after that on the basis that her flatmate would start to worry if she didn't come home - another wartime scar, Graham thought - leaving Lockwood's two permanent inhabitants nursing their drinks and wondering how to proceed.
"Do you think she's going to buy the mystery baby-boom?" Remus asked, staring pensively into his mug. "I agree that you were right to lie, for what it's worth - but Amelia isn't stupid, and this isn't a stone she'll leave unturned."
"I'm hoping that she won't - at least for a while." Graham said. "If she knew about the muggle science underlying our plan, it wouldn't be hard for her to find out. But she doesn't - and she's worried enough that she left the registry in our possession, which I suspect bodes well for us."
"I suppose that we're going to have to see what her demands are." Remus said. "What we do next is rather in her gift, now - I just hope she's willing to see our side of things as something other than a threat."
By the time she'd come home, apologised to Polly for her delay, woken Susan by mistake, put Susan back to bed, and had a paltry meal of leftovers, Amelia had been awake for almost a full day, and felt moments away from falling prey to exhausted sleep. From a seat by her hearth, she stared at the fire's dying embers, trying to piece together her chaotic day.
The one piece of unequivocal good news, she reflected, was that she could probably get away with not arresting Sirius, or his friends. She'd had no idea what could have underlied Sirius's theft. On reflection, she was ashamed to admit that she'd assumed something rather darker than what she'd discovered. Intellectually, Amelia knew that he'd worked against Voldemort. Yet a small part of her still saw him as a Black, with all the implications of that dark name.
It helped that the remit of magical criminal law was very poorly equipped to deal with the madcap ideas of Longshaw and his friends. Amelia had, during her training, memorised scads of law designed to protect purebloods against bloodline theft, inheritance scams, and more - but nothing to deal with something which, by every indication, presented a far more serious threat to wizarding society.
Which left, of course, the question of what she should do with the information she'd gained. The population boom was the most concerning aspect, whatever its source. Amelia could only imagine the impact it'd have on the wizarding world, let alone the reactionary response which so many magicians would have to an explosion of muggleborns. She'd caught herself reacting with horror, and she counted herself at the very least neutral, if not liberal, on the issue of muggleborn rights. In that sense, Lockwood wasn't a terrible idea - the children it aimed to educate needed all the help they could get.
Which left the question of what Amelia wanted them to do next. She didn't have the energy, let alone the time, to supervise a school. And she had no idea how the hell a proper school was meant to be run in any case.
The last remaining hints of flame died out, leaving Amelia in the dark in every sense. The important thing, she supposed, was to make sure that children were kept safe and that the statute of secrecy was preserved. The mystery of how many there were was a question for another time.
But for now, Amelia decided, the best move she could make was to try and get some sleep - a conundrum she suspected she'd have far less of a problem solving.
It took three spectacularly tense days for Amelia's first demands to filter through - during which the witch, though she'd deny it to her grave, took relish in making Sirius sweat with little more than a disapproving glare (Amelia wasn't a great proponent of blackmail, but she had to admit that it was doing wonders for the younger man's efficiency).
What she had finally settled on was - in a sense - reasonable. The entire scheme still made her uncomfortable, so she decided that what she really wanted was reassurance, in as many aspects as she'd been able to think up.
Sirius understood - had expected, even - the most important demand passed to him: Amelia was to be kept fully apprised of any procedure, process, or progress involved with the running of Lockwood - with the power to veto any aspect with which she found issue.
Over several tense evenings of discussion, he and the others had agreed that it was the least they could expect. Delia had posited that it might even help them to avoid future issues with the law - something which Sirius felt was just a little naive. He certainly understood her rationale, but Amelia had been absolutely correct in saying that she'd have had no issue in arresting them if she'd so chosen. The horror of educating, let alone creating, muggleborns would be matched up with an offence of some kind in a wizarding court, no matter how spuriously. While the magical world delighted in the legal technicalities of ownership and property, the court would become a much blunter implement in the hands of nervous purebloods looking to eradicate a serious threat.
It was only after he took them to Graham that Sirius really understood the purpose of the other demands.
"I'm impressed." Graham said, despite himself. "Amelia's clearly put some proper work in."
The witch had specified a list of certifications which she expected evidence of before any students were admitted to Lockwood - not least of which was for any teachers to have degrees from an accredited institution qualifying them to teach young children.
"It's not just that, either." Graham continued, tapping the paper which Sirius had brought him in thought. "She must have copied this list from a muggle source. Listen to this: 'building to be kept to appropriate health and safety standards subject to unscheduled investigations - that'd be her, I suppose - and maintain appropriate medical staff, including a school nurse."
"Well, you can do that, I assume - it's not anything like as significant as the stuff you did in the war." Sirius suggested.
"I would, if I was actually able to qualify as a healer here." Graham shot back. "Bagnold already tried to repeal Minchum's muggleborn ban a few weeks after she said she wouldn't stand for re-election, and the wizengamot laughed her out of the chamber. But we can work out that chestnut later."
Sirius, feeling a little chastised, worked through the rest of the list with Graham, for his own understanding as much as anything else. He wasn't yet sure of what he wanted to do with the rest of his life - he was certainly wealthy enough to retire whenever he chose, if the desire took him - but he knew that he wanted to make up for his earlier indiscretions by paying better attention now.
Despite some irritation over the prospect of additional hurdles, neither Remus nor Delia felt terribly aggrieved by the demands which Amelia raised. Admittedly, the relief was largely due to the fact that Amelia issuing any demands at all (let alone letting them keep hold of the registry) meant that she wasn't going to turn them in.
"The teaching degree isn't even a terrible idea." Delia said, over the communal dinner of boeuf en daube she'd prepared with a little nonchalant wandwork. "The last time I was really around five-year olds was when I was five myself - and the fact that the magical world has no teaching standards doesn't mean we shouldn't."
Graham smiled in remembrance. "Standards might have got us some better Defence teachers, anyway. Remember Madam Feast in fourth year?"
"Hey - Feastie was a great teacher! She taught us more about animist magic than the entire Hogwarts library could!" Sirius retorted, around a mouthful of food.
"Very true, Sirius - and I'll always treasure everything I learned about voodoo from her." Remus agreed. "On the other hand, she was discovered eating Percy Forecombe's severed leg after he vanished over easter weekend - he had to wait weeks for it to be reattached properly once he was rescued, and he still had a limp afterwards."
Delia snorted at the memory. "Well, Forecombe was a prick, so it pretty well served him right. But anyway - standards. Not a bad thing, and it'll probably help us to work out proper pacing for a curriculum, as well."
Remus nodded his agreement. "We have time, as well - we won't be seeing students for another three years at a minimum, will we?" In fact, he had already decided that he needed to better understand the muggle world, and higher education wasn't the worst way of doing that.
"We'll also have money to spare." Graham added. "Lockwood's well on the way to being done, or at least done enough - and our business is pretty well a license to print money on its own merits. All we'll need then is a healer."
"Mate, that should be you. The qualification thing is ridiculous - you're already as good as any healer." Sirius scoffed. "I'm sure there are some technical bits of advanced healing which you don't know, but it's really just going to be scraped knees and accidental magic accidents - you're not going to have to cure the plague or anything."
"I get how ridiculous the worry is - but I've no plans to second-guess the person with a very frightening metaphorical dog on a leash." Graham said. "I'm not going to be a healer here, and I made my peace with that a long time ago."
A sudden thought halted Remus's fork an inch from his mouth, and he lowered it slowly.
"You're right, Graham." He said, slowly. "You can't become a full-blown healer here. But - what about qualifying somewhere else?"
"I wish." Graham sighed. "But the UK ministry doesn't accept the validity of foreign healers. It's supposedly because we have different technical requirements, but the only other equivalent awarding body is MACUSA, and they've closed their borders to us, so that's a non-starter-"
"Not any more, it isn't." Remus grinned, seeing Graham's understanding grow. "You were still in New Zealand when it happened, but MACUSA's finally opened up to us again - that impossible barrier isn't all that impossible, any more."
"Holy hell - you're absolutely right." Graham muttered, a little dazed. "But I can't. It's not right for me to be away for so long, not when this is so important-"
"Like hell." Sirius said, grinning - Graham's stupefaction had clearly tickled him. "You'll be a floo call away if you're needed, you have the time you'll need, and you'll have the money soon enough as well, by the sound of things. Who could have guessed that my slip-up would bring so much joy?"
This was definitely a step too far, and the conversation dissolved into joking recriminations - but Graham still allowed himself a moment, that night, to consider just how far he'd come from the disillusioned student of just a couple of years ago. He was still worried by Amelia's discovery - yet, for the first time in months, he felt he understood what he'd be doing next, and the thought sped him into a night of peaceful, dreamless sleep.
AN: It only took the best part of two years and a pandemic, but I'm back!