Based on the Harry Potter Series By J. K. Rowling
Chapter 31 “ Absolute Power, Almost
Please Read & Review, it makes for better stories!
It took Ginny a second to realize where the words had come from and her reaction was predictable; she fainted. Harry, who had started to walk over to Percy’s bed, and was completely unaware of what Ginny had heard, was just able to prevent her head from slamming on the hard Floor. After carrying Ginny over to the sofa, Harry went to Percy to see what had caused Ginny to faint and was greeted by Percy making incoherent sounds. With his lips barely open, it sounded to Harry like he was saying “severe” or ”sever,” he could not tell which. What made the strongest impression on Harry was seeing Percy’s eyes open; they were blurry with partially coagulated tears, and his pupils appeared dilated. But his eyes moved around like he was looking for something or someone. Hearing another noise, Harry looked behind him and saw Peter was doing the same thing.
Whatever this was, Harry knew he had to get a Healer in here quickly and notify the Weasley’s. Looking over to the sofa, he saw Ginny was starting to come around, but Harry ran out of the room and to the nurse’s station looking for help. Seeing Percy’s regular Healer at the end of the hallway chatting with a nurse, Harry whistled loudly, which earned him an admonishment from the Floor nurse, but he had gotten the Healers attention. Motioning with his arm to “hurry up,” Harry ran back to the room where Ginny was stirring and trying to sit up.
“Stay down, Ginny, I have the Healer on his way.” Just then the door opened and the Healer, followed by the Floor nurse, entered the room, demanding to know why Harry was creating havoc in the hallway. Harry just pointed to Percy’s bed; at the same time, Percy let out another moan and then, quite distinctly, said, ‘Severus?’”
The nurse froze for a moment, and then listened to the Healer telling her to “see if the Director was in.”
“She’s in” Harry told her, “We just left her office a couple minutes ago.” The nurse nodded and left at a brisk pace.
Ginny was now sitting up on the couch, but with her head between her legs to fight the dizziness. Harry had poured a glass of cold water for her but she just pushed it away and got to her feat, walking shakily over to her brother’s bed. “Percy, it’s Ginny, can you hear me? Percy?” She wanted to do more but neither she nor the Healer had any idea what could be done. This situation had never occurred in wizarding medicine.
“Gin, you stay here with Percy, I’ll go get your family.” Ginny barely acknowledged Harry as he left for the Burrow.
Harry first Apparated to the Burrow and told Molly and Arthur to go immediately to St. Mungo’s. As he was about to Apparate to Diagon Alley to find Fred and George, Harry remembered to mention that “nothing was wrong” so they would not think Percy had died. The next moment he was in Fred and George’s flat above their shop. Calling out and receiving no answer, Harry peeked into Fred’s room and saw him entwined with a blonde, both were asleep.
Backing out, Harry tried George’s room but found a similar scene. Trying not to embarrass the brothers, Harry started calling out to the twins from their parlor. Finally Fred stumbled into the room and seeing Harry mumbled something about promising a nasty new hex he had learned. Harry just looked at him soberly and said, “Get George up and both of you go to Percy’s room at the hospital. Something’s happened.” Then Harry Apparated to Hogsmeade before Fred woke up enough to carry out his threat.
Harry knocked on the front door and called out, “Hey, Hermione, you awake yet?” Being that it was almost eleven now, Harry thought she might have gone over to Hogwarts. As he was about to leave he noticed a figure approach through the door’s mottled window glass.
“Harry! What are you doing up so early?” Ron had answered the door wearing nothing but boxers. He had obviously just woken up.
“RON! Great, this is even better. Come over to the hospital right away, Percy woke up.”
“WHAT? When did that happen?”
“Ron, who’s at the door?” Hermione had stumbled down the front hallway, half asleep she ran into Ron and almost knocked him out the door. “Harry? Did they find you?”
“What? What are you talking about? I’m here about Percy. Who’s looking for me?”
Ron looked at Hermione then looked back at Harry, his face was etched with worry and concern. “Harry, three Aurors were up here a while ago looking for you. Where have you been?”
“Three Aurors? Why? I’ve been with Ginny over at St. Mungo’s. Why does anyone want me?” In the background Harry heard Hermione gasp, “Ron, he hasn’t heard.”
“Haven’t heard what? Come on, you two, what’s going on?”
Ron grabbed Harry’s arm and pulled him into the house, closing the door behind him. Hermione had retreated to the bedroom to find a robe. “Harry, these Aurors came over to the house looking for you. They, uh found Fudge’s body this morning.”
Ron stopped volunteering information. “WELL? Why do they want me?”
Hermione finished the story. “Harry, that boy, Rudy, found Fudge’s body in your office this morning.”
Molly Weasley was sitting next to Percy as the rest of the family stood around the bed. Over the past hour Percy continued to show signs of consciousness, but could not carry on a conversation or even demonstrate that he could see or hear those around him. The Healers had performed a number of basic stimuli-response tests and it was clear that Percy still had a long way to go in his recovery. But what concerned the Healers the most, including Olga Windshine, was Percy’s inability to focus on people and his continual utterances about “Severus.”
Ron ran into Percy’s room, out of breath, and looking terribly vexed. “Sorry it took me so long to get here, I had to Apparate three times and still ended up at the Ministry.” His father filled him in on Percy’s change and then Ron, in turn, told everyone about Harry and Fudge. Mrs. Weasley, whose nerves were already stretched thin, let out a small cry and collapsed in the chair, crying hysterically.
Olga suggested that the family go home, the improvement Percy had exhibited was all that could be expected now, she said. Arthur agreed and encouraged his children to head home. Ginny and Ron told their parents they were headed to Hogwarts to find out what was going on there. Hermione had followed after Harry to see if he needed anything and they all had planned to meet in Harry’s office.
Fred and George said their good byes first and appeared to be attempting to Apparate but nothing happened. After three obvious attempts, the last of which left the twins with looks on their faces like they were constipated, badly, Ron tried, then Arthur. Percy’s Healer made an observation. “If your inability to Apparate is at all connected to the events following September 19, all apparating spells may not work.”
Olga added, “I suggest you head to the closest fireplace on the Floo network before they become jammed. If that’s the only way to get around now we’re going to have some major jams and no one here has the authority to create a Portkey. I’ll keep you posted by owl if anything else happens.”
Thanking the staff for their help, everyone left the room, including Molly and Arthur, and headed downstairs to the hospital’s only fireplace. There were no lines when they first got to the fireplace, but Arthur, the last to leave, had a number of people behind him, and it took him two attempts to return to the Burrow.
Ron and Ginny Floo’d directly to Harry’s room at Hogwarts and found the room had two Aurors in it looking around. A third was in the hallway speaking with Harry. Leaving the room they also saw Rudy Keane and a man they assumed to be his father. Rudy looked like he was upset but gave Ginny a little wave. Rudy’s twin friends, Lisa and Carol, were down the hallway a bit speaking with another man. Judging by his looks and red hair, they assumed he was also related to Rudy. Moody was just now hobbling into view at the other end of the hallway with the Minister of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour; neither looked happy. Hermione was nowhere to be seen.
The head Auror performing the interview finished interviewing Harry and walked down the hallway to speak with Moody and Scrimgeour. Harry walked over to Rudy and Liam Keane, when he got there he put an arm around Rudy’s shoulder, a move that brought obvious relief to both father and son. Ginny and Ron joined them and the questions started.
“Harry! Are you alright? Ron told us Rudy found Fudge dead in your office.” In spite of her apprehension, Ginny looked down and smiled at Rudy.
“Yeah, it’s ok now. Those guys were a bit rough on Rudy and me at first, but we both had airtight alibis and based on the, er, condition of the body he had been dead for almost a week. I think they’re just as confused as the rest of us.”
“Harry, do you know where Hermione is?” Ron asked, still not seeing her.
“She’s in the library, Ron. She looked pretty stressed so I told her to take off; Remus walked her up there. How’s Percy?”
“About the same, but something else has happened. It looks like no one can Apparate anymore. We tried at the hospital but none of us could go anywhere, we all had to Floo out.”
Harry just shook his head, this was all a bit too much, but it was about to get a lot worse.
“Potter!” Moody, called out from down the hallway. Harry excused himself and joined Moody, Scrimgeour, and the lead Auror.
“Potter.” Scrimgeour acknowledged, nodding at Harry. Then turning to Moody. “Alastor, I want this to take effect immediately. Between Fudge and now this damn apparation problem I’m thinking about a complete shutdown of the network until we find out what’s going on and set up some Portkeys. Brooms are out, too. We’re fortunate we didn’t have any serious injuries there. Salem wasn’t as lucky. Get the kids home and the staff together and try to find some answers. Owl me if you need anything.”
With that the Minister and Auror headed back to Harry’s room, presumably to Floo back to the Ministry. Based on the amount of cursing that was coming from the room a short time later, the network was already badly backed up.
“He’s closing the school?” Harry heard the words coming out of his mouth but could not believe it.
“Yeah, he is. I’m calling an assembly in the Dining Hall in thirty minutes. Be there.” Moody patted Harry’s arm then took off toward his office.
Harry walked slowly back toward the various groups in the hallway and called them all together. Lupin had turned up, as well as Gerrianne, to hear what Harry had to tell them.
The student gathered in the Great Hall a short time later. The roar of the hundreds of voices, all shouting questions at the prefects and head boy and girl made any conversation impossible. When Moody walked down the center aisle the room quickly began to quiet down; by the time Mad-Eye had reached the head table the Hall was so quiet Harry could hear Moody’s magical eye rotating back and forth.
“Students, I regret that I have to tell you this, but until further notice, this school is closed.” The talking started up again but Moody bellowed out, “Quiet, NOW! Ok, I won’t go into details but as you all probably know something started happening last September. Today there have been some other events that made it necessary to temporarily close us down, for you safety.” Moans and groans from the students started up again, but Moody raised his hand to quiet them for the third time.
“I want every student to pack all their belongings and be at the train station in Hogsmeade by two this afternoon. I’ll have a buffet lunch set up in here and you can grab a bite to eat when you have the time. The Hogwarts express will leave at two-thirty, sharp. Be there!” With no other explanations or answers, Moody left the Hall to the stunned students.
As Moody was finishing, Hermione came up behind Harry and Ron and pulled them away. “Ron, Harry, come quickly, Hagrid wants to see you.” Leaving the school, the three walked quickly down towards Hagrid’s hut, but Hermione led them behind it where they found Hagrid tending to Bane, one of the centaurs from the Forbidden Forest.
“Thanks ‘ermione, ‘ello ‘arry, Ron. You remember Bane, don’t yer?” Hagrid looked like he was still losing weight, but it was the expression on his face that concerned Harry. Hagrid looked like he was scared. Then turning to Bane, Harry greeted him cooly. Bane had been part of the herd of centaurs that had thrown Firenze out of the forest for helping the humans three years earlier. Even when Firenze had died early in Harry’s seventh year, none of the centaurs appeared for his memorial service.
“Harry Potter, again we meet.” Bane’s voice was weak and he seemed to be struggling to breathe. “This is the time, the time.”
“Yeah, ‘e’s been sayin’ that all day, ‘arry. Can’t make no sense of it.” Hagrid shook his head in frustration.”
“Did you ask any of the other centaurs, Hagrid?” Hermione asked.
“Well, of course I tried that, ‘ermione, but I canno’ find any others.”
Bane spoke again, sounding even more distressed. “I’m the last, Hagrid. You would not be able to find any others.” After a short pause the centaur spoke again, but he was obviously near death himself, “Wizards take care, Mars and Venus are now aligned, Mars and Venus are now aligned.” Finishing his cryptic message, Bane laid hid head on Hagrid’s lap and died.
That evening, with all the students gone, Harry, Ginny, Ron, and Hermione sat around a table in the Great Hall snacking on some of Dobby’s famous chocolate-marshmallow cookies and drinking butter beer. Harry had thought of asking this earlier, but with everything happening it had slipped his mind.
“Ron, why are you home? Didn’t you have another week of camp?”
“Well, we took one of those Muggle airplanes to Los Angeles, that’s in California, and stopped for a while. The team manager went to check the brooms and other equipment and found that none of the brooms worked.”
Hermione cut in, “I’d like to know how he discovered that while they were packed away.”
“He said it had to do with a spell he placed on the bags holding the brooms. Without working brooms it was useless to continue on, so the coach cancelled the camp and sent us home. I got in late last night.”
As Harry thanked Ron an owl flew by and dropped a not for Ginny. Picking it up she read,
Ginny,
Hermione offered to let you use her old room at Hogsmeade if you want to stay a bit longer. Please let me know either way.
Love,
Mother
Ginny scratched out a brief reply that she was remaining behind and sent it back with the owl. After Ron finished the last of the cookies, the two couples got up, Ron and Hermione said they were going home. Ginny told them her plans.
“You two go ahead, I’ll stay here tonight.” Ron looked at Ginny, but did not say anything. Ginny had guessed (correctly) that her brother and Hermione wanted the house to themselves tonight. As for where she would sleep...
“Harry, any ideas where I could spend the night?”
“Sure, we’ll find you something. We have plenty of room, don’t we?” Harry didn’t see the other three roll their eyes.
Reaching Harry’s room, Ron and Hermione said goodnight and walked off with their arms around each other.
“Harry, did you know Ron and Hermione are trying to get pregnant?”
“Wow! No I didn’t. I can’t believe Ron or Hermione didn’t tell me. That’s great!” Opening his room door, Harry remembered something. “Oh, we have to find you a place to sleep, don’t we?” Harry was standing in the doorway, blocking Ginny from entering. Placing her hands on Harry’s chest, Ginny pushed him in the room, then closed and locked the door.
“Ginny, what are you doing?”
“Harry! I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that question.” Laughing, she pulled Harry back toward her, and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Do you really want me to go, Harry?”
“Er, no, not really. What’s your plan? Um, never mind.” Harry was blushing and flustered. Ginny found it amusing but she had not been thinking along those lines.
“Well, not much, actually; this isn’t a good time for me. Can I just stay here tonight?” I wonder where Hermione’s book is.
“Ok, er, do you want to use the sofa?”
Ginny gave Harry a disgruntled look. “No, I don’t think so, Harry.”
“Oh...OH! I see. Ok, well, um, I’ll just grab a quick shower. Make yourself comfortable.”
After his shower, Harry and Ginny were laying next to each other in Harry’s bed, (yes, wearing their pajamas,) and reading Hermione’s book. Ginny giggled, pointing to a paragraph. “See, love, that’s all you need to do!” Looking over to Harry, she saw that his face was turning red and his eyes were opened wide.
Ginny was amused at both Harry’s innocence and her own boldness, but she wasn’t going to push him any further. Leaning closer, Ginny kissed him on the lips. “Good night, Harry. I love you.” Harry tossed the book on the Floor and returned the kiss. “I love you, too. And, thanks for being here tonight, I’m glad you stayed.”
Harry and Ginny wrapped their arms around each other and slept peacefully through the night.
Monday morning dawned bright and frosty in Hogsmeade. It was a typical start to the work week for those employed in town, but those who were use to apparating to work, like Hermione Weasley, it was far from typical. By eight-thirty Hermione had been trying to Floo to her Dover office for an hour. Their supply of Floo powder was running low and neither she nor Ron wanted to think what this would do to its price.
Ron had nothing to do all week so he told Hermione he would spend the day with Harry. Hermione gently reminded him about the list of chores needing attention. Grunting an acknowledgement, Ron turned around and looked at the list.
Hermione was about to give up when the Floo network pulled her through their fireplace and deposited her in the employee break room near her office in Dover. Recovering from the sudden transport, Hermione took off for her desk, where she found Patty Lee sitting, writing a note.
“Hi Patty, what’s going on?” Hermione said, a little too loudly.
“Hermione, you SCARED me! I was just leaving you a note saying I would be in the clean room with the next parchments.” Patty crumbled up the now unnecessary note and tossed it into the waste basket. “Can you believe this mess? I heard about the apparation problems. I’m glad I moved to Dover and can walk here. Almost no one is here today.”
“Yes, and it will only get worse.” Then changing the subject, “Did you hear about Ron’s brother?” Patty had not, so Hermione told her what had taken place over the weekend while she put her things away and prepared to go with Patty to the clean room.
“Wow, that’s great, isn’t it?”
“It’s certainly moving in the right direction. Ron’s mother was almost hysterical, Ron said, but I can understand that. These past nine months have been terrible for her. Anyway, let’s go see the new parchments.”
Walking down two levels to the document clean rooms, Patty showed Hermione the two newest parchment she had had brought in on Saturday. Unlike so many of the other fragments they had worked with, these showed no traces of fire damage and were almost intact. To view them in their entirety would boggle the brightest minds; the runes were small, almost to the point of needing a magnifier to see them distinctly, and they showed none of the proper spacing needed for translation. For all practical purposes, they appeared to be just a sequence of vertical and horizontal lines with some dots and dashes here and there.
“MY GOD!” Hermione exclaimed in astonishment. “How are we ever going to figure these out? You can’t even tell where one letter stops and another starts.” Flopping down on a chair, Hermione covered her face, silently wishing she had not accepted Snape’s challenge to work with these.
“Yep, daunting, isn’t it? It would take a genius to figure this out, wouldn’t it?” Patty added, looking at Hermione, and waiting for Hermione to look back. When she did, Hermione saw a big smile on Patty’s face.
“YOU DIDN’T? Did you?” Hermione knew that smile on Patty’s face; she also knew that if Patty had not all ready found the key, she had come very close. “How? You just got it the other day?”
“Well, Hermione, I’d prefer the ‘genius’ title but I have to settle for a couple awards of ‘dumb luck.’ Take a look at this.” Hermione got up and followed Patty to a large table. There were exact photocopies of each document next to each other, but one was copied to a clear plastic backing so a person could see through it.
“When these two sheets first arrived on Saturday morning I thought they were a single page. I guess that through the years they were just mashed together, and you can see the wear on the sides that show they were bound at some point. ‘Dumb luck’ number one was this.” Patty pointed to the upper right corner of the ‘top’ parchment. “It looked like three or four centimeters of the top document had been torn off. The bottom parchment was of a darker hue than the top. I just happened to notice this contrast and asked the handlers to see if they could detect a second parchment and they did.”
“Fortunately for us the two parchments separated very easily and here we have them. As for ‘dumb luck’ number two, look in the lower left corner of both parchments.”
Hermione took a magnifying glass and looked in each corner. On both sheets she saw a group of runes, unlike the main text above, these were properly written and spaced. Setting the glass down, she took a notepad and started copying the runes.
“Hang on, Hermione! I already have the translation.” Patty laughed, handing Hermione a sheet of paper. On the left was the runes and on the right the phonetic equivalent “septemdecim” and “duodeviginti.” Hermione looked at it for a moment.
“The first appears to be a month, like September and December? I have no idea about the second. What are they?”
“Page numbers, Hermione.” Patty plopped down into another chair and explained. “It relates to the old Roman calendar that had ten months, the last four were September, October, November, and December, literally seven, eight, nine, and ten. ‘Septemdecim’ is Latin for the cardinal number seventeen, seven plus ten; ‘duodevigenti’ is the cardinal number eighteen, or as the Romans would say, ‘duo-de-vigenti,’ literally two from twenty. See, a Muggle education has its advantages.” Patty smiled and Hermione was impressed.
“Outstanding, Patty. But how does knowing the page sequence help with the translation?”
“Aw, come on, Hermione, give me some credit. That’s where this transparency comes in. I had a hunch that the author did not change ciphers from page to page.” Patty saw the smile on Hermione’s face. “Have you figured it out?”
“No, no, go on, I see what you’re getting at, though.”
“Ok, when I held the clear copy over the other I saw distinct patterns of these runic symbols, but they have no meaning, they simply represent spaces; the spaces you need to translate a rune character correctly.”
Now Hermione got it. “And I’d wager that the runes between these spaces actually have a meaning. Is that it?” But seeing Patty’s face fall squashed Hermione’s optimism.
“Well, yes and no. It’ll be clear to you, when you see the letters, that there’s at least another layer of code. I spent the rest of Saturday and a good part of Sunday morning trying to see if the second layer would follow a pattern similar to the first. It was a very long day.”
Laughing, Hermione advised Patty, “You need to get a social life.”
“Oh, give it a rest, Hermione...have anyone in mind?” Patty was only half joking.
“No, sorry, unless you want to waste your life with Fred or George Weasley.”
“No, thank you. I’ll stay single.”
Turning back to work, Hermione asked, “Did you owl Keric to see if he had any ideas?”
“No, not yet. I wanted us to give it a go first.”
For the rest of the morning both Hermione and Patty looked at every runic code they had encountered, but none fit the document. They talked about it over lunch then back in the ‘dungeon,’ as they called it, for the rest of the afternoon. By the end of the day all the excitement of Patty’s discover had worn off and both were ready to call it a day.
“Think we should talk to Keric tomorrow?” Patty made the suggestion, which almost made Hermione give in.
“Well, let’s try one more day. I’ll check the library at Hogwarts again tonight to see if I missed something.” Hermione’s voice told Patty that she wouldn’t find anything.
“Very well, for the time being I will accept your word that you are Merlin. Peter seems to think so, too.” Snape found it increasingly difficult to master the finer movements of the body he was occupying. It was not his own and certainly not completely Percy’s. There was a strange sensation of detachment, also; almost a feeling of constant lightheadedness.
“Mr. Snape, please don’t have him repeat everything,” Peter pointed an accusing finger toward Merlin, “and start from the beginning. It took us five months to get this far.”
“What do you mean by five months?” Snape had asked Peter the question, but was eying Merlin for the answer.
“I explained to Peter that this world does not track time as does yours.” Merlin seemed satisfied with his own answer, Snape was not.
“I see. Peter, if you had to guess, how long would you say you’ve been here?”
“What do I look like, a bloody wrist watch? How should I know? Sorry, Mr. Snape, I guess a few hours; maybe for or five.”
“Excellent.” Turning to Merlin, Snape asked his next question. “I would think I’ve been here an hour or so. Does that mean it’s now mid-February in our world?” Snape’s sarcasm seemed to fit well with the last two words of the question. But Merlin shook his head.
“There is not a one-to-one ratio. In the hour you’ve been here only an hour of your world’s time has passed. We should continue with the story. It will explain much.” Merlin rose and walked to Snape. Removing a beautifully carved piece of light colored wood from his garment, he performed what Snape recognized as a memory transfer. Instantly, everything Merlin had told Peter, Snape now knew. “Yes, I see that you understand now. Good.”
Snape and Peter looked at each other. Merlin had been pushing the story on Peter for a long time, but Snape had only heard him mention it once before.
“Don’t try to fight it, Mr. Snape. He’ll make you listen to it no matter what you say. Besides, the story’s more interesting now.”
Sitting on the bench Merlin had conjured earlier, Snape nodded at Merlin. “Very well, if you insist.” Again, a beautiful smile came across Merlin’s face.
“Excellent, both of you, excellent.”
“I was now aging, it was a peculiar sensation to watch my body change after all this time. Adolescence was a difficult time and I had difficulty controlling my emotions. Sometimes things would happen that I couldn’t control and it made me angry with myself.”
At this admission, Merlin’s face registered, what Snape believed was, genuine shame.
“I had seen this in normal humans, and hoped that my abilities would prevent me from experiencing it, but I found my self control...lacking at times. For seven years I fought against myself and the normal people around me. Three times I had to move because of the suspicion I had drawn upon myself. By the time I was in my eighteenth year I thought I had calmed enough to again attempt converting the pagans to Christianity.”
“My reception, now that I was closer to the form of an adult, was more readily accepted. From speaking with the ever present traveling clerics I came to learn the ceremonies and devotions of the faith. I still scoffed at some of the stories that these clerics told me, they were simply not in the mold of the Joshua I had met.”
Snape asked Peter, “Who is this Joshua?”
“He’s Jesus, who else?”
Shape bolted upright, stunned. In all the stories of Merlin he had grown up with, none mentioned that Merlin had actually met the Christian Messiah. Snape sat again and was determined to listen to the story, especially after this revelation. “My apologies, Merlin, please continue.”
“For the next few weeks I busied myself, wandering and preaching. I also did something that I knew was a trademark of Joshua. I healed people. I used this power sparingly because I knew there were many ailments I could not fix. I also didn’t want to be trapped into having to fail at a healing; the results of such a failure could undo all my efforts.”
“By my late teens, and after only a few months of evangelizing, I had established a strong following; most of the area around London was firmly faithful to Joshua. It was also during this time that I made one of those great mistakes I spoke about. I decided to take a few years off from my work to again explore my powers. The few followers of mine who knew of my power tried to convince me that I should be happy with what I had. Yes, they had learned one of Joshua’s messages, I ignored it.”
“About the year 419, in your calendar, I left my followers and again traveled to an area just east of a place you know as Carlisle. Into the mountains I journeyed looking for solitude, and again found it in a cave. This one was enormous and had fresh water running through it. I cast numerous curses to light and warm the place; more to clean it and provide me with comfort. And it is here that I lived for the next six months and discovered that the powers I possessed were far, far greater than anything I had ever guessed.”
“I first realized that my powers were truly great when I traveled into the ancient village of Carlisle to trade for more paper or parchments. I found nothing available and was terribly angry. My plans were spinning in my head and I had no way to record them. Arriving back at the cave I found stacks of paper and parchment, as much as I would ever need. I was puzzled at first, not making any connection between my wish and the appearance of the objects of my wish. One day I was being lazy and found myself desiring a meal; it was instantly before me. Making a connection between my conscious and formed desire, I tried something else. I wished for a bird to keep me company. One appeared, caged, next to me.”
“Why I had never experienced this before was a puzzle to me. Certainly, over the course of four thousand years, I had wished for other things; why did they come to me now? I searched for the answer until headaches drove me mad. The only thing I could remotely come up with was my physical change from childhood to adolescence to adulthood. Had my powers matured with my body? Within that period I did nothing extraordinary except promote Christianity and Joshua. For weeks I wondered if that was the reason. Was Joshua now happy with me and did he grant me the powers he had? Then I thought of a way to test this theory.”
“I traveled to the outskirts of a nearby village, to their cemetery. There I sat and waited for the dead to arrive; in those times I did not have to wait long. One morning a man brought the body of a boy to bury. While the grave digger was away for a short period, I stole the body and carried it back to my cave. The boy could not have been dead more than a few hours; in those days it was common to bury someone almost immediately after death. I set him in a chair and commanded life into his body. Nothing happened. Remembering what I had learned with Osiris, I placed my hands on the body of the dead boy and again commanded life into him. This time something did happen.”
“I found myself on the cave Floor with a headache that blinded me and made me so sick I vomited for almost an hour. Not only was I sick, I was drained. The process of giving life had extracted something from me and, I assumed, given something to the boy. As I attempted to control my discomfort, I realized that the boy was no longer in the chair. Fighting the blindness of my headache I looked around the cave, finally finding him crawling on the ground. I knew I had to take my powers back and return him to his grave.”
“Taking life turned out to be simple, I reversed my incantation and was immediately rewarded by seeing the boy fall over, dead again. I felt rejuvenated, but deeply ashamed for having violated the boy. It was not until later that I understood the concept of ‘brain death.’ I could have transferred everything I had into him and he would still be crawling around in the cave. So I was back to where I had begun: power without explanation. My anger rose and I looked for a place to assign it.”
“Peter, Severus, this is where I made the most terrible mistake of my life, the one that brought me here today. I believed, at that point in my life, I was nearly equal in power to Joshua, and I convinced myself that the only thing that made me different was that Joshua would suffer no peer. This idea came to me slowly, over a few weeks or months. I know it was not instant because after the experience with the dead boy, I gave up my pursuit of understanding myself and returned to London, now the city of London, with the intention of making Joshua’s power felt. I was going to force the people to believe in Him, and through Him, me. My selfishness and arrogance doomed me before I started. I forgot that basic lesson Joshua had told me about converting people. I had forgotten that conversion had to be sought after, not forced; and here I was ready to use force.”
Merlin looked up at Snape and Peter, there was great sadness in his face, perhaps the sadness of knowing and understanding his failure. Both of his guests were silent, in thought, trying to digest a key point in the history of the world that had never before been revealed.
“Merlin” Snape spoke first, choosing his words with great care. “Why has this version of history never been known? Surely an evangelist such as you would have inspired some sort of record. A writing, a tale, a legend of some sort?”
“Severus, the answer to your question is in two parts. First, there are fragments of my story in existence, but judging by the almost complete lack of public information about them, no one has realized their significance. My original manuscripts, the ones I tried to burn, were mostly destroyed. A few fragments have survived through history, but only to distort your understanding of me. My second manuscript, the one I worked on with Osiris, has disappeared and I cannot speak to its whereabouts. However, it seems logical that because your civilization’s understanding of me is so inadequate, this second manuscript is also hidden or lost. Which leaves only this.” Merlin indicated the book he carried. “This is everything about me, even my failures.”
“Now I have one last story to tell you. Be patient. It is long, and important to both of you, but to you, Severus, more than Peter.”
Waking Monday morning was far more pleasant to Harry than he could ever remember. The beautiful red-head in his arms probably had a lot to do with it. Unfortunately, the knocking on his suite door was quickly ruining everything. Harry tried to get out of the narrow twin bed without waking Ginny, but it was hopeless. His right arm being asleep didn’t help his efforts, either. The only consolation was that the person knocking on the door had identified himself. Lupin!. Not bothering with a robe, Harry stumbled to the door and opened it so quickly that Remus’s hand was in mid-knock.
“Morning, Harry. Moody wants us right away. You sleep ok, you look tired.”
“Oh, yeah, sorry, I was up reading last night. Um, I’ll be up in a minute.”
“Ok, well, I’ll just wait here for you.” Remus started walking into the den but Harry stopped him.
“Remus, why don’t you go on up without me, I’ll be along.”
“Oh, ok, Harry. See you soon.” Remus turned around and left with a curious look on his face.
Returning to the bedroom, Harry found that Ginny was already up and in the loo. “Did you hear that, Gin? I have to go right up to see Moody.”
“Yeah, Harry. I’m going to go to St. Mungo’s later, I’ll be back for dinner.” Ginny walked out of the loo as she finished talking, and climbed back in bed. “Go ahead and use the loo first. You know women, we take forever. Can’t have you late for work, can we?”
“Right then.” Harry gave Ginny a kiss and then, grabbing a change of clothes, went to get ready for the day.
“Miss, you have to stop right there, please.”
From across the street the man looked like any other well dressed businessman, except for the hat with a badge in front. His close cut black hair was barely visible, but his ears, reddened by the cold damp wind off the Thames, stood out against his pale skin. In only a second he’d moved from behind the striped barrier to stand in front of Ginny. His left arm was placed outward, parallel to the street, in a way that prevented her from proceeding without running the officer over; his right arm was inside his coat.
Stopping immediately, Ginny asked, “Is Kingsley Shacklebolt on duty today?” Ginny looked around the officer, trying to see if Shacklebolt was at a post on Downing Street, but he was nowhere in sight.
“I’m sorry, miss, you cannot stand here, please keep moving.” Except for his mouth and eyes, the officer had not moved and inch.
“Please, can I leave a message for him? It’s quite urgent.”
“No, ma’am, I’ll only ask one more time. Please move along, immediately.” Two other officers were walking from the front of 10 Downing Street toward Ginny, both had their right hand inside their coat. Realizing that this was going nowhere, Ginny turned and started to walk back across Smart Street. Before she had proceeded two steps, a strong grip on her coat shoulder yanked her backwards where she stumbled over the curb.
“You might want to be careful there, miss.” The officer said; his last word almost drowned out by the sound of a passing van. Ginny had not been paying attention and was almost run over.
“Thank you. I’m sorry, I guess I wasn’t paying attention.”
“No, I can see that.” Ginny tried to continue but the officer’s hand was still holding her. The other two officers had arrived now and asked the one holding Ginny if there was a problem. In the few seconds that all this had occurred, a small group of tourists and locals had gathered across the street watching the incident.
“Here you go, miss, please come with me.” One of the other officers had taken Ginny’s arm and escorted her to a door off of Smart Street, just a few meters from the corner of Downing. Walking into the building, Ginny recognized it as some type of police facility. She was escorted down a short hallway and into a holding room. “Please ‘ave a seat, love, someone ‘ill be ‘ere shortly.” Then releasing her, the officer left the room. Ginny heard a deadbolt lock seal her in the room.
After no more than a minute, the door unlocked and two men entered, one in uniform and the other in a regular Muggle suit. Ginny stood up.
“Hello, my name is Frank Church, this is Inspector Layman. Please sit down.”
“Am I in trouble? I didn’t think I did something wrong.” Ginny was intensely curious. Until Church and Taylor came in the room she was certain that Shacklebolt had been summoned.
“No, miss. We’re just a bit curious why you’re interested in one of our agents.” The civilian who had identified himself as Church seemed affable, and his tone was conversational.
“I’ve known Kingsley for a few years and I wanted to say hello.” It was a lie, but not a big one. Ginny hoped this would satisfy the two men.
“What’s your name, miss?” Officer Taylor asked.
“Ginny Weasley. Can I go now?” The officer just watched her, he had not written her name down, Ginny noticed.
“Virginia Weasley?”
“No, Ginevra. It’s a family name.”
“Where are you from, Miss Weasley?” Again the civilian.
“Ottery St. Catchpole, that’s in Devon.”
“You’re a right good distance from home, aren’t you, Miss Weasley?”
“Yes, well, I go to school up north and we have the day off, so I thought I’d stop by and see Kingsley. Is something wrong with this?” Ginny was getting irritated by the meaningless questions.
“No, not at all. What school are you in? You look a bit young for the University.” Now the civilian was writing down notes in a pad.
“I’m seventeen and I attend a private school near Carlisle, I’m quite certain you have not heard of it.”
“Try me.” The civilian’s comment wasn’t quite as friendly now.
“I want to leave. Are you charging me with a crime?”
“No, not yet, but I don’t think you’ve answered our questions. I’d like to know what a young lady, from a nameless school, far from home, and too distracted to notice she was about to be run over is doing outside the Prime Minister’s residence. Perhaps you understand my concern now? Miss Weasley?”
Ginny was beginning to feel a little sick. Her contact with the Muggle world had been very limited her whole life. In fact, the trip to London with Harry the previous Saturday was the longest time she had spent away from the wizarding world. But there was another thing she could try to help her get out of this room.
“Yes, I do understand. Please, I had tea with the Prime Minister Saturday. Kingsley helped set it up and I wanted to thank him. That’s all.” This declaration did get the attention of the two men.
“You had tea with the PM?” The officer asked, giving Ginny a skeptical look.
“YES! I was in town with my fiancé last Saturday, we walked by Downing Street and Kingsley saw us. While we were talking the Prime Minister returned from his morning walk and invited us to tea. We chatted and I met his daughter, then we left. I can’t tell you anything else.” Ginny had kept her voice even through the explanation. She really did not want to use magic to get out of this situation, especially after giving them her name.
“Just a moment, Ms. Weasley.” The two men left the room. Ginny could hear them speaking to each other, but their voices were too soft for her to understand what they were saying. After a couple minutes the officer poked his head in the door.
“You’ll have to wait here a few more minutes, miss. We’re checking your story with Officer Shacklebolt.” He then left and bolted the door shut.
A half hour later, as Ginny’s patience was wearing thin, the door opened and Kingsley Shacklebolt entered the room in Muggle clothes, along with the other two men. Ginny jumped up with a relieved look on her face. “Kingsley! Thanks for coming to my rescue.”
At second glance, Shacklebolt did not look happy. “Miss Weasley, you should know better than to come to Downing Street if you wanted to speak with me.”
“Oh, sorry Kingsley, I was in town and just wanted to...yeah, it was not very smart.” Ginny knew she was about to get off, but not by much. The civilian nodded to Ginny and left the room.
The uniformed officer told Ginny she was free to go, then turned to Shacklebolt. “Your shift starts at 1800, please be at my office at 1700.” His tone was unfriendly and Ginny realized she had put Kingsley in a bad position. When the officer left the room, she apologized again to Kingsley.
“Ginny, what the blazes are you doing here? Never mind, come on.” The Auror took Ginny’s elbow and walked her out of the building, AWAY from Downing Street, before speaking again. “Do you realize I may lose my job over this, Ginny?”
This thought had NOT occurred to Ginny and she immediately felt ashamed and selfish. “No! I’m so sorry Kinglsey, it was stupid of me.”
“Why did you want to thank me? I got the impression when you left that you were glad to be out of there.”
“Um, actually, Kingsley, I didn’t come to thank you...I...uh, was hoping you would give the Prime Minister a note for me.” Ginny pulled an envelope from her coat pocket and handed it to Shacklebolt.
“YOU WHAT!? Ginny, I’m not a postal carrier and I don’t presume to deliver unsolicited letters to the PM.” Shacklebolt was obviously quite mad, but he didn’t return the letter, either. “What’s in this letter?”
“I was asking if the Prime Minister’s offer to work with Rebecca was still a possibility.”
Shacklebolt’s angry face softened. “Ginny Weasley, you’re too naive for the Muggle world. You’re very lucky we both didn’t land in jail.” Thinking for a moment, “What about school? I’m sure Hogwarts won’t stay closed forever.”
“I know, but I don’t think I’m going back even if it does reopen.” Ginny delivered this news in a way that almost made Shacklebolt believe her.
“Are you sure, Ginny? Don’t you want to talk with your parents, or at least Harry?”
“No, I need to do this.”
The answer was not quite what Shacklebolt expected, but he accepted it. “Ok, Ginny. IF I’m not sacked tonight I’ll see what I can do, but there are no promises. After today I may be working the streets and have my access to the PM revoked. I’ll owl you. Not get out of here and do not do this again.”
Shacklebolt had spoken the last line with an impressively deep voice, and his tone conveyed his serious annoyance at her; but Ginny was so happy she hugged him impulsively and kissed his cheek before heading back to the Ministry of Magic.
Shacklebolt headed back to his apartment to get more rest before his night shift started. His relationship with Thompson had cooled noticeably after Saturday’s confession and he was not sure he could ever deliver the letter personally.
“All right, Harry, let’s take a look at that memory. Got it with you?” While Ginny was causing troubles for Kingsley in London, Harry was meeting with Moody, Lupin, Slughorn, and Gerrianne in the Headmaster’s office. Over the past half hour Moody had filled in the others about Fudge and his conversation with Harry.
“Yes, I have it. Who gets to see it?” Harry really had no desire to see the memories of a dead man.
“I’ll do it,” Gerrianne replied, “I have a good memory and don’t seem to have much else to do, now.” Harry handed the small, marble-sized memory to Gerrianne. Placing it on the table, Gerrianne took her wand and tapped the marble and a pale silver thread emerged and connected to the end of her wand. Moving the wand to her head, Gerrianne closed her eyes as the memory entered her mind and after five or six seconds she placed the wand down.
“Well, the memory had started to degrade, but I believe I have everything from the conference.” Taking a pad of paper, Gerrianne first listed the name of everyone at the meeting. Passing this to Moody, she began to tell the small group what Fudge had learned in the meeting. When she was through everyone had a look of “So what?” on their face, including Gerrianne.
“Why would Fudge have risked his life for that?” Harry asked. “None of these...wait!” Harry’s mind was processing the story and its significance, but what stopped him was Fudge himself. Turning to Moody, Harry asked, “Do you think this is what the note was talking about?” Moody nodded.
“Hold on,” Lupin shouted, “What note?”
“Sorry, Remus. I didn’t want it to become public knowledge. When the Aurors found Fudge’s body it had a note nailed to his head. All it said was, ‘Forget the Parchment’.”
“Forget what parchment?” Slughorn asked.
“I have no idea.” Looking at Moody drop his head, Harry had an idea that he might know. “Mad-Eye, do you have something to tell us?”
“Harry, you do know what this refers to. Don’t you remember last November when Snape had us look into some of the effects of the 9/19 events?”
“So?”
“Harry, who did he send off to read some old Rune documents?”
“Oh, yeah, Hermione. But she hasn’t found anything. She told me the other day that it was looking like a waste of time.”
“Hmm, ok, I hadn’t heard that. Next time you see her tell her to be careful. If whoever killed Fudge thinks Hermione’s involved, she may be in some danger, too.”
“Ok, Moody. I’ll tell Ron, he’s off this week and maybe he can watch over her, more than he already does, I mean.”
“Ok, good idea. Let’s get back together tomorrow at this time and see if Potter can pry any secrets out of Mrs. Weasley.” Moody had a wicked grin on his face, like he knew something Harry didn’t.
“I think Ron would have more leverage than me.” Harry muttered.
“Spending the night, again?”
“Yes!, but let’s fix the bed, this is pretty uncomfortable.” Ginny waved her wand and the bed changed size.
“Too big.” Another wave.
“just right! You want the inside or outside?” Harry asked.
“Inside, I suppose. I’m sure you’ll be up before me. So, you want to walk over and see Hagrid?”
“Great idea.”
“I understand, sir. I was expecting this. I’ll collect my gear from the house.” By “the house,” Shacklebolt meant the Prime Minister’s house, 10 Downing Street.
Kingsley was escorted to the house and went to his usual post just off the foyer. Collecting two small pictures and a folder, which he showed to his escort, he walked down the front hallway for the last time. Stopping to look in the parlor, Kingsley’s escort stopped also, allowing him a moment of reflection about his former job. Kingsley took two steps into the parlor, just enough to prevent the escort from seeing his right hand reach into his coat. As the escort went to follow Shacklebolt, his own had reaching for something different, his charge spun quickly and pointed a stick? at him.
With the guard momentarily stunned, Shacklebolt walked to the Prime Minister’s personal desk and left an envelope in the center of his desk blotter, its bright red ink clearly stating the addressee. Returning to the stunned guard, Kingsley removed the stun and pretended like nothing had happened. A moment later the two left 10 Downing Street.