O.W.L.s
“I can’t believe they’re here already.”
“It felt like we still had a month to go just a day ago!”
“How many hours did you study last night?”
“Too many…”
These were all just snippets of conversation Harry couldn’t escape from in any of his classes leading up to the long anticipated and feared O.W.L. exams. In Herbology he was attacked by Ernie Macmillan spouting proudly the amount of study hours he’d gotten done, in Charms the Ravenclaws from the H.O.O.D. were chattering madly about whether the things Harry taught them would come in handy and maybe get them bonus points. Harry himself had been thinking if producing a Patronus Charm and turning a person into a ferret would get him extra points as well, but he hadn’t brought this up, fearing Hermione would nag him that it wasn’t part of the curriculum and therefore made it unfair.
Most of the H.O.O.D. had disbanded out of fear following Umbridge discovering them, but the Fifth Years found themselves tied together somehow, most likely by their shared greater fear of the approaching exams, which had now led them to studying painstakingly in the library by the fire. Ironic, Harry knew all too well, as where he had first accepted Hermione’s proposition to create a secret army was inside this small lounge. Of course, a certain Slytherin was noticeably missing from it now.
Now Harry instead sat laid flat against a couch with his head resting on Prongs’s belly while he napped soundly to the scratching of people quills and the turning of paper, finding himself rereading paragraphs over and over with the hopes he’d be able to memorize them by heart. He couldn’t tell if he was grateful for Hermione and Ron not being in the library at that moment or not, because while he couldn’t ask questions to his smart friend, he also didn’t have to hear her talking back, and he didn’t find the company of the other Fifth Years all that bad.
He’d even grown to know every Slytherin now, enough to anticipate Vincent asking a question before he opened his mouth by the way his brows creased and Daphne was most certain to be walking towards Pansy about an issue judging by her stance on the floor. Part of knowing the Slytherins meant knowing they’re past drama, and while Pansy had gone all year without a boyfriend or girlfriend, that must have only meant the temptation of her ex-girlfriend Daphne was high.
“You might want to check that Herbology book again, Harry,” Harry stopped in turning the next page in The Standard Book of Spells: Grade 5 to instead look over at the Hufflepuff sitting crisscross at the coffee table below him, pointing a finger at a line far up on Harry’s roll of parchment he had written an hour ago on something to do with Herbology. Cedric then gestured to his Herbology book lying with the other books he’d exhausted the knowledge of the night out of which lay haphazardly on or around his feet. “Or is it not your finest subject?”
“Something like that,” Harry mumbled, thinking he’d add that there were worst subjects but Cedric had already turned back around, fully engrossed in his game of Wizard’s Chess with Neville, who Harry knew no doubt probably would have read through that Herbology book ten times if the Seventh Year hadn’t insisted he looked like he needed a break.
Cedric had come with the claim that he had to study for N.E.W.T.’s but had quickly found the Wizard’s Chess set and claimed he hadn’t played in a very long time, and when Seamus pointed out none of them could play with as they actually intended to study, Cedric had dragged over Neville and not given him much of a choice before setting the pieces. Harry had been watching only with half an eye, as it was hard to miss, being right beside him, and he had to admit the Diggory boy might give Ron a run for his money. Or maybe it was just because Neville kept trying to sneak peaks at his Potions notes.
Regardless, when Neville’s turns took extra long, Cedric would get up and help others out with their studying, and so no one complained that he had come and not actually done his. He seemed to be, as usual, way more willing to help others. It lifted Harry’s spirits a bit, at least, after having to watch him fail at Quidditch all year, acting a little more like himself.
-*-*-*-
“Your OWL examinations,” Professor Snape informed the class of all Slytherins on the Friday before exams. He had just handed out their timetables for their respective exams and everyone was now looking up to him with anxious eyes. All except Draco, who was still staring at the parchment in his hands, turning over in his head if he would have any time to get to the Room of Requirement around these exam times. “Are spread out over the next two weeks.”
And that was when he remembered quite suddenly (as he often had been since his fateful birthday) that the Vanishing Cabinet was already repaired fully, and the only thing keeping him from sneaking up to Dumbledore’s office and killing him now was that he needed to wait for his father’s plan to be set in motion now. When all the dominos would be set in place, and then could cause the fall of Dumbledore himself. Until then, O.W.L.’s.
“The theory portions will be held in the morning and the practice in the afternoons. However, the Astronomy practical must, of course, take place at night.” Snape continued to tell them all of the rules against cheating, of course, and Draco’s eyes drifted down to his timetable, tuning out his Potions Professor’s drawling voice.
Monday the 10th was Charms - he knew he had an easy O in that - Tuesday Transfiguration - he should probably get back to studying for that one - Wednesday Herbology - hopefully his father wouldn’t mind if he grade was less than expected - Thursday Defense Against the Dark Arts - Harry would kill him if he didn’t get an O here - Friday Ancient Runes - time to put study sessions with Granger to good use, and after that, Arithmancy - time to put the coded letters he’d been sending back and forth with his father for months to good use. The following Monday the 17th was Potions, and Draco glanced up at Snape here and briefly caught a word in his lecture that Umbridge was expecting them to get high grades so it would reflect well on her as Headmistress. Of course. The 18th Care with Astronomy at night, and on the final day, the 20th, History.
When Draco packed up his books and left the Potions classroom with the other Slytherins minutes later, he could hear snippets of their worried talk of what their parents would do if they didn’t receive the highest of grades, but he himself could only think of how he’d be getting his inside his locked bedroom, spending a summer very similar to his last at the Manor, or, at the worst, inside a cell in Azkaban. And, most likely, his parents would never even find out about them.
Truly, he didn’t see what the point even was in these exams anymore. Career Advice didn’t matter, and neither did this. All his future held was the Dark Arts and Death Eater masks. There was no need to get ‘Exceeds Expectations’ and ‘Outsanding’s in Charms class.
“Draco, you alright, man?” He turned his head a bit, and saw his friends all gazing up at him, halfway headed down the hall back to through the dungeons to their Common Room. Vincent had been the one who had spoken, looking worried, to say the least. “We’re just gonna go study. Do you wanna come?”
Draco licked his lips, gazing at them longingly. They may not have been the best of friends, but they were all his first, and he could remember meeting each and every one in the heart of his mother’s garden, an eternity ago now, where they would laugh and play, or have tea parties, are pretend they were their parents having ‘big important adult talk.’ Little kid stuff you would never really get to live again. How would they react to all he was going to do soon? They’d no doubt be dragged into this inevitable war soon, too, but would they blame it on him, then, for being the first to be branded with the Mark at fifteen? Would they even be able to go along without him defending them at the front, as he always had, with steel cold eyes and arms firmly crossed.
Those eyes, dulled out with exhaustion and grief, now met Pansy’s for a brief second, and where he had once saw a haughty, pompous brat who thought she was the queen of all Slytherin with ‘shit-don’t-stink’ attitude, he now saw bravery and strength. The sort of fiery courage only Harry Potter could have enforced into her heart through months of training and meetings.
No, they’d be just fine without him, because while he was a Death Eater who had succumbed instantly to Voldemort’s terror - who had been too afraid to resist it - these kids, his longest friends, were members of the Hogwarts Order of Defense, and he knew they wouldn’t go down without a fight.
“No, you go on without me, I’ll be alright.”
But would he?
-*-*-*-
a) Give the incantation and b) describe the wand movement required to make objects fly.
Harry smiled slightly to himself, bent over the paper, and scrawled across the line below the question, Wingardium Leviosa - Swish and Flicking motion. He looked up then and could see Ron bent over his own paper and scribbling vigorously in front of Hermione’s own seat (he got put around girls he hardly knew yet his best friends sat right next to each other. Typical.) and knew he too must have the image of a troll club soaring high in the air and knocking hard into the thick skull of a troll.
Identify which of the following Incantations is used for the fire-making spell;
a) Inferio
b) Incendio
c) Ascendio
d) Glacio
Neville’s quill hovered between ‘a’ and ‘b’ for just a moment before he remembered his grandfather on his mother’s side recounting a tale of having to face forty Inferi at once, and circled ‘b.’
Give the name of the Shield Charm. Which spell can it not deflect and why?
Draco winced at the memory of a lesson with Barty Crouch Jr, where he wrote on the chalkboard all about the Shield Charm he would go on to teach him how to use even nonverbally, but reminded him how it wouldn’t get him out of all situations.
Protego. It can not defend against the Killing Curse (he flinched, and hesitated) Avada Kedavra, as no spell can save you from it and in fact only one person has been known to survive it. He thanked Merlin Harry was seated far behind him in the same row, so there was no way he could ever let his eyes betray him and drift off to the boy.
Hours passed, filled with scratching quills and sweating students before the last student turned in their exam and was permitted leave. All in all, Draco felt rather confident in his work, though he hadn’t expected anything less for Charms.
-*-*-*-
The same could be said for the practical, where the only problem he encountered was when he smashed the glass he was levitating at the arrival of Harry Potter, and the subsequent leaping in his heart, but Professor Marchbanks, who had been testing him, was a friend of his father so he didn’t think too much of it. Following Charms he couldn’t catch a break, however, as he needed to review for Transfiguration as much as he could.
Though, all through the night Draco kept wishing he had Harry to help him out with his studying, and when he went to bed at last, his dreams were filled with different theories and spell models all floating around Harry’s head as he grinned at him in a way that never failed to make his stomach flip. Clearly, this is what happens when he allows himself a break from thinking only about the plot against Dumbledore.
He assumed he could have done a lot worse on Transfiguration - there were certainly some chaotic disasters in multiplying animals during the practical, and at least he wasn’t poor Hannah Abbott, who managed to make them into a flock of flamingos - but Harry, he could see as his eyes drifted over to him across the Great Hall, betraying him just as he had feared, was succeeding with flying colors at vanishing, multiplying, switching… everything. He hadn’t managed to look away before their eyes locked when Professor Tofty had placed the caged ferret on top of his desk, and had unfortunately caught him smiling too, but thankfully he hadn’t been actively casting a spell, then.
Herbology, unfortunately, was a drag, but Draco hadn’t expected he’d manage to get anything higher than ‘Acceptable’ anyway. What was eventful was DADA, which he’d most certainly passed with flying colors, as did the rest of the H.O.O.D., evidenced greatly by the fact that, with a bit of sucking up, Parvati and Lavender had convinced the proctors that every student who knew a Patronus Charm should get to cast one. So that’s how Draco had, bewildered, ended up being surrounded by various spectral animal forms.
The following day was Ancient Runes, where he had nearly been knocked of his feet by Hermione storming past him, and hours later came Arithmancy, where again Hermione hadn’t been in a good mood, but Draco summed it up to her getting a single wrong answer on the exam - or thinking she did.
While his week of exams had ended rather uneventfully, he soon learned for other’s it had been quite the opposite, when he walked into the Great Hall on Saturday morning for breakfast, only to find the whole place in uproar, as people screamed and shouted about what they’d seen at Astronomy tower the night before.
“No fewer than three stunners! I swear, that’s how many, and only then did she go down!” Ernie Macmillan was proclaiming, standing on top of his seat at the Hufflepuff table, Draco being able to watch and listen slyly as he walked along to the bench behind him at the Slytherin table. “And Hagrid took every spell, too!” Ernie pumped a fist in the air and Hannah Abbott grabbed it, giving him a warning look while nodding to Umbridge at the staff table and helping him slowly sit down.
“Must be because he's a Half-Giant, and all, remember?” Susan explained to the younger ones closely listening in, then tugged Ernie’s sleeve. “And don’t tell them any lies,” She turned back and smirked at the kids, “It was four stunners.”
They all gasped with delight and Draco caught a smile on Vincent and Gregory’s, who had been listening in too, faces as well.
What Draco was able to gather after a long (very long, actually, lengthened by the fact that it was mostly spent studying inside the Common Room with gossiping students) day spent with gossip being poured into his ears, was that Hagrid had gotten sacked but had refused to go out silent, instead in a dramatic blaze of glory which made Draco finally realize where Harry got his own flair for recklessness from, being surrounded by adults like this all the time. And yes, he meant adults, plural, as Professor McGonagall herself decided she would like to join in on the fun within minutes, gracing the desperate to focus Hufflepuff and Gryffindor Fifth Years with more entertainment as they tried to take their exams, for she too didn’t go down without a fight, and was now comatose inside the Hospital Wing from the impact of four stunners.
Despite it all, Draco found himself positively thrilled by the night's end, in a nervous, exhilarated kind of way. Hagrid and McGonagall, strong forces and allies to Dumbledore, had been removed from the castle. What sort of resistance would he face now in the plot to come? What would stop Harry from falling for the trap being set and running to the Department of Mysteries? Though in his heart he knew it was sick, and twisted, he couldn’t help but feel joy at this prospect.
Months of planning would not go to waste, and hopefully, in two days time, his family would be safe.
-*-*-*-
With those thoughts in mind, Draco hardly got a wink of sleep that night, and found himself deeply regretting it in the morning, when he had to shovel cereal in his mouth while half-listening to Theodore studying with Gregory, and half-reading the book balanced against his goblet on the Middle Ages.
Two o’clock came and Draco was still blinking sleep from his eyes, but he had various historical facts replaying in his mind. He knew what he was doing. He could do this.
He took his seat behind Ernie Macmillan. They were all arranged alphabetically this time, which meant Weasley was seated far behind him in another row, but Granger was just in front of him in the row to his left, and Harry directly to his right. He didn’t know whether this was a blessing or a curse yet, before Professor Marchbansk announced, “You may begin,” turning over the large hour-glass on the desk on top of the dias where the Professors usually ate, and the test had begun.
Describe, in detail, who Orlagh O’Brudair was, and how she contributed to the Ireland Witch-Hunts of the 1300s.
With a great sigh, Draco began to scribble out an answer, but couldn’t resist thinking that this couldn’t possibly prove to be of any use to him in killing his Headmaster, now could it? (Even that thought caused him a sudden punch to the gut he preferred to ignore as he moved onto the next question). After he finished answering question five with the Vampires involvement in protest a limit to Wizarding celebrations on Hallowe’en night, he glanced over to find Harry bent over his paper, eyelids drooping, and assumed, if he knew him as well as he thought he did, that he too hadn’t gotten as much sleep as he should have.
He flipped his parchment over, beginning question fifteen. Beside him, Harry put his head in his hands for a moment, before jerking his head up and beginning to write fast. It was then Draco heard a hiss and snapped his head up to see Professor Marchbanks eyeing him dangerously, and so he returned to his test.
He managed to reach question twenty, and was circling answer c), for Odin, after crossing out d), for Oggden, when a vicious scream erupted beside him, and he turned sharply in his seat to watch in horror as Harry dropped from his chair, hitting the floor and gripping his head in his hands, rocking back and forth and still howling in pain. Draco could tell, if he squinted at the fast moving form, that his hands were gripping his scar.
A cold, sharp chill raced down his spine as a tiny voice in his mind told him the plan had begun, if it hadn’t already the moment Draco had sent that letter to Harry all the way back in August, when he’d thought it was the right thing to do for the right reasons.
How wrong he had been.
“I - I don’t need - To go - Siriu - I really don’t sir -” Harry was stammering through gritted teeth when Professor Tofty bustled over and helped him to his feet, Marchbanks barking out, “Never you all mind, back to your tests!” to the students who no doubt couldn’t believe how they couldn’t sit through a normal day at Hogwarts even when taking exams, but suddenly Draco didn’t give a damn about Goblin Riots and Giant Wars and Witch Hunts. All his mind was repeating was the truth that in hours he’d have to be facing Death itself, and somehow bend it to his will.
And by the look of anguish and pain on Harry’s face as he was dragged away, still holding his scar, those hours would be short, indeed.
-*-*-*-
Dumbledore was gone, Hagrid was gone, and now McGonagall had left him too. Harry was alone.
Sirius was in danger, and Harry was all alone.
He couldn’t recall feeling this helpless in months. Not since when he was tied to Tom Riddle’s father’s grave at the end of last year (a whole year ago, he couldn’t believe it), thinking that his life had ended, and there would be no stroke of luck to save him this time. But then Draco had arrived, a pale blonde head crawling like a snake in the grass. Back then he always seemed to be there when he thought everyone else had failed him.
So why now, as Harry pushed through the crowd of students flooding out of the Great Hall after the exam, could he see that same pale head dashing up a staircase before disappearing out of sight. Why wasn’t he by his side, like he used to be? Why had so many things changed so quickly?
Blame it on the nerves and worries for Sirius’s life, or maybe blame it on overall fear that he was losing Draco forever, but Harry suddenly forgot for a moment what he had been pushing through the crowd for, his breath heightening in a way he had only seen some of his fellow students get during the revision process for O.W.L.’s. It was painful, and disorienting, and he didn’t really notice he was doing it and it wasn’t someone casting a curse on him until Hermione grabbed him by the shoulders and called through his worried haze of thoughts, “Harry? Are you alright, Harry?”
He blinked, focusing in on her, and shook his head, trying desperately to steady his breathing while thinking of how to phrase what he had seen in the Great Hall.
“What happened? Are you ill? You look -”
“Come with me,” Harry settled for blurting, finding he couldn’t form the right words yet and blurting it all out in the middle of a busy hall also wouldn’t make much sense. “I’ve gotta tell you something.”
And so that’s how the three found themselves sitting on top of desks in an empty classroom. Or at least, Ron and Hermione sat themselves down, while Harry began to pace rather rapidly. He got the sense they were watching him like a bomb ready to blow, not unlike they had back at Grimmauld Place in August, but he was too wrapped up in thoughts to yell at them, though it still served to make him angrier.
“Voldemort’s got Sirius.” He finally turned and told them, settling for blurting it out then and there; no point in building up to it.
“What?”
“How d’you-?”
“I saw it. Just now,” Harry stopped in his pacing to study their reactions beyond initial shock closely, still breathing hard and heavy and speaking in a shaky way that should have embarrassed him in any other scenario. “When I fell asleep in the exam.”
“But - but where? How?” Hermione looked petrified, for Sirius, for Harry’s well being, something else, he didn’t know nor care much at the moment but she seemed to get paler by the second. “I dunno how,” Harry shook his head, saying, “But I know exactly where. There’s a room in the Department of Mysteries full of shelves covered in these little glass balls and they’re at the end of row ninety-seven… he’s trying to use Sirius to get whatever it is he wants from in there… he’s torturing him… says he’ll end by killing him!”
It was only now that Harry noticed the shaking of his whole body, so now he stepped back and collapsed into the seat of the desk behind him, sighing. “How’re we going to get there?” he asked his friends before him, who turned to blink dubiously at each other before staring wide eyed back at him.
“G-get there?” Ron exclaimed, voice shaky as well.
“Get to the Department of Mysteries, so we can rescue Sirius!” Harry said, rather loudly.
“But - Harry…”
“What? What?” Feeling now very much like they had all been thrust back to the beginning, when his friends couldn’t understand his pain, or how he felt, and instead goggled at him like an exhibit, Harry clenched his fists tight in his lap, unable to understand, still, how they could act like this.
“Harry, er… how… how did Voldemort get into the Ministry of Magic without anybody realizing he was there?”
Recovery may be hard, but it has been a year. Harry was way past giving Hermione the benefit of the doubt by now.
“How should I know?” He now shouted, “The question is how we’re going to get in there!”
Hermione hesitated, glancing over at Ron who looked away awkwardly, clearly not wanting to be drawn into this and have to take sides. She didn’t look offended, instead understanding as she shook her head and looked to him solemnly, “But… Harry, think about this,” She slid off her desk and stepped closer to him, slumped over in his own chair, “it’s five o’clock in the afternoon… the Ministry of Magic must be full of workers… how would Voldemort and Sirius have got in without being seen? Harry… they’re probably the two most wanted wizards in the world… you think they could get into a building full of Aurors undetected?”
“I dunno, Voldemort used an Invisibility Cloak or something!” Harry waved a hand around uselessly as he shouted, then finally gripped his chair with it and sprung to his feet, grinding his teeth as he said, “Anyway, the Department of Mysteries has always been completely empty whenever I’ve been -”
Sadly, Hermione shook her head, lowering it to softly say, “You’ve never been there, Harry. You’ve only dreamed of this place, that’s all.”
“They’re not normal dreams!” He was now bellowing straight into her face, all care for her stability thrown out the window. Recovery couldn’t be this hard when he’d given her leverage all year, and she had Ron with her now, didn’t she? What did Harry have? Nothing, nobody, and no one. But Sirius, who was at the Department of Mysteries, getting tortured by Voldemort, maybe even dead already - “How d’you explain Ron’s dad then?” He continued to shout, as if talking over his own thoughts now, “What was all that about? How come I knew what had happened to him?”
Ron picked at a crack in the wood of the desk he was sitting on with his nail. “He’s got a point,” He mumbled quietly, looking at Hermione for the briefest of moments before glancing back down.
“But this is just - just so unlikely.” She continued desperately, shaking her head and rubbing her forehead with her fingers, using the other hand to hug herself around the waist. “Harry, how on earth could Voldemort have got hold of Sirius when he’s been in Grimmauld Place all the time?”
“Sirius might’ve cracked and just wanted some fresh air,” Ron slid off his desk and came to stand beside Hermione, awkwardly brushing his shoulder against hers in a way that made her shiver and snap around to gaze up at him, looking worried. “He’s been desperate to get out of that house for ages -”
“But why… why on earth would Voldemort want to use Sirius to get the weapon, or whatever the thing is?” Harry rolled his eyes and his head too, glancing up at the massive clock ticking away beside the chalkboard at the head of the classroom and getting worried as another second passed by. Another second where Sirius’s chances of living were just going down. “I dunno, there could be loads of reasons! Maybe Sirius is just someone Voldemort doesn’t care about seeing hurt -”
“You know what, I’ve just thought of something,” They both turned to Ron, who was staring into the distance and speaking in a hushed voice of realization. “Sirius’s brother was a Death Eater, wasn’t he? Maybe he told Sirius the secret of how to get the weapon!”
“Yeah,” Harry marched over to the door, cracking it open just enough to see kids passing by without a glance towards this classroom. He wasn’t actually that worried about getting caught, deep down, but sensibly knew he just needed something to further distract himself or he’d punch a wall. Why were his friends taking so long? Couldn’t they just believe him and help, like they were supposed to? Like they had always done? “- and that’s why Dumbledore’s been so keen to keep Sirius locked up all the time!”
“Look, I’m sorry,” He turned around, a glare creeping onto his face at his friend’s sudden exclamation, because whatever it was, they certainly didn’t have time for it. “But neither of you is making sense, and we’ve got no proof of any of this, no proof Voldemort and Sirius are even there -”
“Hermione, Harry’s seen them!”
“OK,” She looked up at Ron, raising her hands in mock surrender, a vain attempt to calm both boys down now, “I’ve just got to say this -” “What?” In hindsight, Harry hadn’t meant to make that such a growl, but how could she expect him to be calm at a time like this?
“You…” She swallowed hard, eyeing him very apprehensively, “this isn’t a criticism, Harry, but you do… sort of… I mean - don’t you think you’ve got a bit of a - a - saving people thing!” In less than a moment, he was glaring harshly at her.
“And what’s that supposed to mean, a ‘saving-people thing?’”
“Well… you…” She had begun to twist her wrist as she talked, looking anywhere but at his eyes. “I mean… last year, for instance… in the lake… during the Tournament… you shouldn't have… I mean, you didn’t need to save that little Delacour girl… you got a bit… carried away…” She saw the red embarrassment on her face, surely, as she quickly added, “I mean, it was really great of you and all, but you didn’t have to, and then, in the graveyard, when you were cornered by Voldemort with Draco and -” She choked, clasping a hand to her mouth and blinking rapidly to force back tears.
Harry couldn’t find it in himself to care anymore.
“When he died, you sent him back… with Draco,” She shook her head, “You didn’t have to do that, but you knew Viktor couldn’t stay in that awful place, and Draco would die too. But you acted very rashly, without thought and -”
“Are you saying,” He took a slow step towards her, speaking with a malice he hadn't known he was capable of as he looked into her tear filled eyes. “That I should just back down and let Sirius get killed, because it would be more safe for me?” She nearly gulped.
“No! Harry I just - Voldemort knows you, Harry! He took Ginny down into the Chamber of Secrets to lure you there, it’s the kind of thing he does, he knows you’re the - the sort of person who’d go to Sirius’s aid! What if he’s trying to get you into the Department of Myst -?”
“Hermione, it doesn’t matter if he’s done it to get me there or not - they’ve taken McGonagall to St. Mungo’s, there isn’t anyone from the Order left at Hogwarts who we can tell, and if we don't go, Sirius is dead!”
“But Harry - what if your dream was - was just that, a dream?”
“WHY CAN’T YOU JUST BELIEVE ME!” His roar was so loud it caused Hermione to step back and Ron to grab her tight by the shoulders as she stepped into him, eyes just as wide as hers as he gawked at his friend. “You don’t get it!” He continued to shout, “I’m not having nightmares, I’m not just dreaming! What d’you think all the Occlumency was for, why d’you think Dumbledore wanted me prevented from seeing these things? Because they’re REAL, Hermione - Sirius is trapped, I’ve seen him. Voldemort’s got him, and no one else knows, and that means we’re the only ones who can save him, and if you don’t want to do it, fine, but I’m going, understand? And if I remember rightly, you didn’t have a problem with my saving-people when it was you I was saving from the Dementors, or -” he rounded on Ron “- when it was your sister I was saving from the Basilisk - or even sending Viktor and Draco back! You never said a thing! Why am I only just hearing -”
“But Harry, you’ve just said it,” Hermione stepped forward now, looking up at him fiercely, despite the tears clinging to her cheeks, “Dumbledore wanted you to learn to shut these things out of your mind, if you’d done Occlumency properly you’d never have seen this -”
“IF YOU THINK I’M JUST GOING TO ACT LIKE I HAVEN’T SEEN -”
“Sirius told you there was nothing more important than you learning to close your mind!”
“WELL, I EXPECT HE’D SAY SOMETHING DIFFERENT IF HE KNEW WHAT I’D JUST SEEN! HERMIONE HE’S DYING! SIRIUS IS DYING AND -”
“Sirius Black?!”
Harry froze, Hermione froze, and even Ron, who had been watching all of this with a sort of dazed horror, looked straight up like a dog at the source of the sudden exclamation which was followed by a distinct gasp; the door behind them. Slowly, Harry turned to it, stepping forward carefully then opening it wide, stepping back with a sort of disappointment on his face when he saw what lay beyond.
Two people were inches from him, hands raised as if they had previously had them pressed up against the door, and he knew them very well to be Pansy Parkinson and Ginny Weasley, and he could see just behind them, Luna Lovegood, peeking between their heads with the bemused expression of one who couldn’t possibly have been listening to the same conversation they had.
“How long have you been standing there?” Harry demanded instantly of his former fellow H.O.O.D. members, who blinked guilty before Luna said smoothly, “Since you opened this door rather suspiciously, Pansy was worried about you and -”
“Now let’s not get confused, I was not worried -” “Your hands were shaking,” Cedric poked his head around the doorframe and into view (Harry suddenly felt very worried for just the sheer amount of people who had heard his yelling), smirking down at Pansy’s black head of hair. “If you weren’t worried you were probably scared of him.”
“Neither!” No one looked very convinced of Pansy’s denying, but Harry didn’t much care at the moment, instead pointing between the four of them and saying, “You all need to leave - no, don’t come in here! Get out! Go… study or something. Forget you ever heard this.” But they didn’t stop walking inside, instead taking places around the room and looking back at the Gryffindor trio defensively.
“We’re staying,” Ginny said, folding her arms, “Because whether Pansy was worried or scared or nothing at all we all came here wondering if we could help.”
“Well, you can't,” said Harry shortly, nodding towards the door, “So go.”
“You’re being rather rude, you know,” said Luna serenely and again Cedric smiled and pointed a finger at her to say, “She’s got a point, you know.” Causing Harry to swear and turn away. He didn’t much enjoy conversations with Luna and Cedric on their own when he was already stressed like this, but together -
“Wait,” Hermione raised her hand, lips turning up in a smile, “Wait… Harry, they can help. Listen,” She stepped forward, shutting the door and turning to face the whole group with the same smile spreading across her face; the sort of smile Hermione Granger only got when she was starting to have a plan form in her brain, and one Harry had seen all too often this year. “Harry, we need to establish whether Sirius really has left Headquarters.”
“I’ve told you, I saw -”
“Harry, I’m begging you, please!” Hermione had never looked more desperate than now. “Please let’s just check that Sirius isn’t at home before we go charging off to London. If we find out he’s not there, then I swear I won’t try to stop you. I’ll come, I’ll d - do whatever it takes to try and save him.”
“Sirius is being tortured NOW!” Harry’s shout made the newcomers, with the exception of Luna, all jump in surprise, while Ron and Hermione only blinked at him sadly, all too used to it by now. “We haven’t got time to waste!”
“But if this is a trick of Voldemort’s, Harry, we’ve got to check, we’ve got to.” Harry rolled his eyes, let himself fall backwards into the seat behind him once more, and shrugged his shoulders, getting a bit too exhausted to shout anymore. “How? How’re we going to check?”
Hermione gulped, then, “We’ll have to use Umbridge’s fire and see if we can contact him,” already, she looked petrified at the very thought, but still nodded to the new comers, who were flicking their eyes back and forth between the whole conversation very confused. “We’ll draw Umbridge away again,” “AGAIN?!” came Pansy’s questioning exclamation, which they ignored, “But we’ll need lookouts, and that’s where we can use Ginny, Luna, Pansy, and Cedric.”
Immediately, Pansy threw up her hands in an exclamation of, “I did not sign up for this -” but was cut off by Ginny shoving her to the side rather roughly and saying, “Yeah, we’ll do it.” Luna blinked at them all, bemused, though, and asked, “When you say ‘Sirius’, are you talking about Stubby Boardman?” although the only reaction she got from that comment was Pansy folding her arms and shooting a glare at her.
“OK,” Harry turned and spoke rather angrily, still, to Hermione, “OK, if you can think of a way of doing this quickly, I’m with you, otherwise I’m going to the Department of Mysteries right now.”
“The Department of Mysteries?” both Luna and Pansy exclaimed, although the former didn’t sound nearly as panicked as the slightly older Slytherin. “But how are you going to get there?” She instead wondered, leading Pansy to, again, glare at Luna and hiss, “That is what you are asking? Seriously?” Again, they were ignored.
“Right… Right… Well, one of us has to go and find Umbridge and - and send her off in the wrong direction, keeper away from her office.” Hermione had begun pacing now, looking more and more terrified of the thought of fooling Umbridge as it grew in her mind. “They could tell her - I don’t know - that Peeves is up to something awful as usual.”
“I’ll do it,” Ron, predictably, recognized Hermione's concern in a second and grabbed her lightly by the arm to stop her pacing, smiling comfortingly down at her. “I’ll handle it, I promise. I’ll tell her Peeves is smashing up the Transfiguration department or something, it's miles away from her office. Come to think of it, I could probably persuade Peeves to do it if I met him on the way.”
“I’ll take Peeves,” Cedric interjected, raising a hand. At their eyes he continued with, “I can be very persuasive.” and winked. Usually such an action would lighten Harry’s spirits, and the others too, as Cedric always seemed to have that sort of effect on people. Not today though, seemingly, as Hermione only started to wring her hands - still permitted by Ron to be able to pace.
“OK,” she said, “Now, we need to keep students right away from her office while we force entry, or some Inquisitorial Squad goon is bound to go and tip her off.” She shot Pansy a guilty look, “No offense.” The bob-cut girl shrugged her shoulders, saying, “None taken. I can do that though. They won’t question a thing if they see pink,” She flapped her pink cape for emphasis.
“Tell them someone’s let off a load of Garrotting Gas.” Hermione looked around at Ginny, surprised so she shrugged as well and said, “Fred and George were planning to do it before they left.”
“Alright, good. Pansy, you might actually want to keep Luna and Ginny with you, too, so if Umbridge does come, you can say they were the culprits,” She then frowned at the Fourth Year pair, “You are alright with taking the blame, aren’t you?”
“Hermione, do you know who you’re talking to?” Ginny asked smartly and the older girl smirked. “Fair point,” he turned to Harry again at last, “Well then, Harry, you and I will be under the Invisibility Cloak and we’ll sneak into the office and you can talk to Sirius -”
“He’s not there, Hermione!”
“I mean, you can - can check whether Sirius is at home or not while I keep watch, I don’t think you should be in there alone, Lee’s already proved the windows a weak spot, sending those Nifflers through it.” Harry’s eyes widened only slightly because, yeah, it was dangerous, but she was going to guard him anyway. Because she was his best girl friend, and she was loyal to a fold when it came to him.
“I… OK thank you,” he muttered, suddenly feeling all too guilty of his actions before.
“Right, well, even if we do all of that, I don’t think we’re going to be able to bank on more than five minutes. Most of the Inquisitorial Squad might be on ours, or at least Pansy’s side, but I doubt Filch will be fooled by the facade for long.”
“Five minutes’ll be enough,” Harry was already turned to the door, ready to open it once more and praying there wouldn’t be more H.O.O.D. members he had to deal with behind it. “C’mon, let’s go -”
“Now?” He turned to see Hermione and grabbed him by the wrist, Ron just behind her, looking ready to grab her by the arm again at any given moment. He rolled his eyes, growling, “Of course now!” angrily at her. “What did you think, we’re going to wait until after dinner or something? Hermione, Sirius is being tortured right now!”
“I - oh, all right,” she said it like she had just remembered he fully believed that statement to be true. “You go and get the Invisibility Cloak and we’ll meet you at the end of Umbridge’s corridor, OK?” Harry didn’t waste any time bursting through the door and bounding down the hall towards the marble staircase, only faintly hearing Pansy’s voice behind him demanding, “Isn’t anyone here going to tell me what in Merlin’s name is going on?!”
In the Gryffindor Common Room people were celebrating the end-of-exams already, but all Harry focused on was grabbing his Invisibility Cloak and Sirius’s knife and stuffing them into his bag before bounding back down the stairs and along the corridors leading up to Umbridge’s, finally reaching Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Luna, Pansy, and Cedric at the end of it a few minutes later.
“Got it,” He pushed through a gang of sixth-years and held up his bag. “Ready to go, then?” Hermone sighed, and stepped in closer to their huddle, the other subconsciously doing the same, “All right; Ron - you go and head Umbridge off… Cedric, find Peeves and get him to wreck McGonagall’s classroom… Pansy, you grab Ginny and Luna and see if you can start moving people out of the corridor - do it quickly please… Harry and I will get the Cloak on and wait until the coast is clear…”
Ron and Cedric both turned and ran down to the edge of the passage before turning opposite corners, out of sight, meanwhile Pansy grabbed the girls by the ears and pushed through the jostling students, instantly exclaiming screeches over the ‘Garrotting Gas’ in a high pitched, panicked voice.
“Get over here,” Hermione tugged at Harry’s wrist and led him behind a statue as he retrieved the Cloak from his bag. “Are - are you sure you’re OK, Harry? You’re still very pale.”
“I’m fine.” He didn’t feel fine, not one bit, and actually felt as if he was going to be sick and puke all over Hermione from either anger or anxiety over Sirius’s condition, and yet he pulled the Cloak over the two of them and hurried off to Umbridge’s office, scar aching so bad it was as if he was actively, at that moment being watched by Voldemort’s red eyes.
They passed Pansy at the head of the crowd, pushing them back while Ginny and Luna stood at her sides in a tight body-bind curse, shouting, “Deepest apologies on behalf of the Inquisitorial Squad. These two brats seemed to think it funny to block off a whole corridor with Garrotting Gas. I can’t imagine where they got such an original idea from.”
“Nice acting,” Hermione whispered to her as she passed, making Pansy smirk with pride, “Don’t forget the signal.” They then continued towards Umbridge’s door. “What’s the signal?” Harry asked and Hermione explained, “A loud chorus of ‘Weasley Is Our King’ if they see Umbridge coming.”
Harry inserted the blade of Sirius’s knife and slid it down the crack between door and wall, right where the lock would be. He listened as it clicked open and slowly, he pushed the door inwards and they stepped inside, Harry handing the Cloak off to Hermione as he instantly ran to the fireplace, past the garish kittens in their plates. Hermione sighed in relief at its emptiness.
“I thought she might have added extra security after the second Niffler.”
Harry fell to his knees before the fireplace, grabbed the Floo powder and threw a handful into the grate, causing emerald flame to burst into life there. And then, seeing nothing for it in waiting a second longer, thrust his head into the fire and cried, “Number twelve, Grimmauld Place!”
After a moment of vertigo and swirling ash, he opened his eyes to the cold kitchen of Grimmauld Place, not unlike he had weeks prior when asking about Snape’s memory, only this time, not even Lupin was sitting waiting. There wasn’t a soul in sight, and while he had fully expected this happening - it didn’t stop the wave of panic that Sirius was most certainly in the Department of Mysteries, alone and suffering at Voldemort’s hand at that very moment, from overtaking him.
“Sirius? Sirius, are you there?” Nothing. Nothing but an echo. But then, a small sound, just to the right…
“Who’s there?” He called, hoping beyond hope his suspicions of it being a mouse weren’t true, and they certainly weren’t, as he was met with the hideous face of Krecher, peering into the edge of his view. He looked delighted about something, and Harry could think of only horrible things as to what.
“It’s the Potter boy’s head in the fire. What has he come for, Kreacher wonders?” What was it with Elves and referring to themselves in the third-person?
“Where's Sirius, Kreacher?” Harry demanded, only to be met with malicious, wheezy chuckling. “Master had gone out, Harry Potter.”
“Where’s he gone? Where’s he gone, Kreacher?” Kreacher merely turned up his hands in a shrug, and continued to cackle, menacingly soft. So that while Harry’s shouts continued to echo, his voice did not.
“I’m warning you!” said Harry, although he wasn’t yet sure what he would be able to do to the Elf in this strange position. “What about Lupin? Mad-Eye? Percy and Tess, where have they gone? Are any of them there?” But surely Lupin and Mad-Eye had to be busy with the Order’s work now, and Percy and Tess had been moved to the Burrow weeks ago after the latter’s labor.
“Nobody here but Krecher! Kreacher thinks he will have a little chat with his mistress now, yes, he hasn’t had a chance in a long time, Kreacher’s master had been keeping him away from her -”
“Where has Sirius gone?” Harry continued to yell even as the Elf turned and began to walk away, “Kreacher, has he gone to the Department of Mysteries?!”
Abruptly, Kreacher stopped. “Master does not tell poor Kreacher where he is going,” said the Elf quietly, but Harry could still hear the maliciousness in his voice clear as day. “But you know! Don’t you? You know where he is!”
Silence, and then… cackles, loud and finally bouncing off the walls all around him, high pitched and evil.
“Master will not come back from the Department of Mysteries! Kreacher and his mistress are alone again!” And then he scurried out of sight, leaving Harry to scrunch up his face, ready to release a string of curses before -
Something grabbed him by the head, causing him great pain and as he gasped from it, he inhaled far too much ash, and, choking roughly, found himself being forcibly pulled from the depth of the flames even as he uselessly clawed at them to return, thinking of only the things he wished to do with the evil Kreacher until he opened his eyes and saw, to his horror, a face he could imagine doing far worse too, and that same would she do to him.
“You think,” Umbridge whispered, bending Harry’s neck, which she was forcing back by pulling on his dark hair, as far back as hit would go and causing him to gaze up at her pink ceiling, “that after two Nifflers I was going to let one more foul, scavenging little creature enter my office without my knowledge? I had Stealth Sensoring Spells placed all around my doorway after the last one got in, you foolish boy. Take his wand,” Someone he couldn’t see poked the inside pocket of his robes before removing his wand. “Hers, too.” He had a feeling that the girl’s voice he heard growl a curse was definitely Hermione getting her wand wrested from her.
“I want to know why you are in my office,” said Umbridge, shaking the fist holding onto his head in a way which made him stagger and scramble to remain on his feet. “I was planting a Niffler!” He croaked.
“Liar.” Again, she shook his head. “You had your head in my fire. With whom have you been communicating?”
“No one -” He attempted to pull away from her, but he hadn’t expected her grip on him to be this strong.
“Liar!” shouted Umbridge, and she threw him backwards where he slammed, stomach first into her desk. Here he could look up and see Millicent Bulstrode pinning a horrified looking Hermione to a wall, Adrian Pucey leaning against it beside her, twirling she and Harry’s wands in his hands. He heard the door open, and craned his neck, not willing to move any more and provoke Umbridge, and watched as Warrington, Zacharias Smith, Crabbe, and Goyle walked in, gripping Ron, Cedric, Luna, and Pansy respectively. All four were gagged.
“Got ‘em all,” said Warrington, pinning Ron to the wall beside Hermione, who mouthed ‘are you alright’ to him in fright and he nodded slowly. A second later the door banged open once more and Miles Bletchley shoved Ginny and, to Harry’s great surprise, Neville, through the door, both gagged as well. “That one,” Warrington pointed over at the newly arrived Neville, whom Bletchley had just grabbed in a chokehold. “Tried to stop me taking her,” he now pointed at Ginny, who a Sixth Year girl Harry didn’t recognize outside of her Inquisitorial uniform had just grabbed. He looked on proudly as Ginny attempted, to the best of her ability, to kick the much larger girl in the shins. “So I brought him along too.”
“Good, good,” said Umbridge, who was also watching Ginny with delight. “Well, it looks as though Hogwarts will shortly be a Weasley-free zone, doesn’t it?” Warrington and Bletchley grinned, but they were the only ones. Bulstrode and the sixth-year were too focused on the girls they were holding trying to fight out of their grip and Crabbe and Goyle just looked incredibly guilty. Zacharias of course had been scared to say or do anything against the H.O.O.D. since he’d gotten the SNEAK scar, which was now being covered with a scarf. Harry suspected Umbridge didn’t have as much control over her Inquisitorial Squad as she thought.
Umbridge came around her desk and sat herself down in it like a throne, gazing at them all with her toad-like smile ever present. “So, Potter,” she said. “You stationed lookouts around my office and you sent this buffoon,” she nodded to Ron, “to tell me the poltergeist was wreaking havoc in the Transfiguration department and turned the Head Boy against me to convince him to do it,” she nodded to Cedric. Both boys were glaring at her darkly, Harry’s best friend trying his best to kick Bulstrode while Cedric’s eyes flicked around the room, as if searching for ways out of this mess.
“Clearly, it was very important for you to talk to somebody. Was it Albus Dumbledore? Or the half-breed, Hagrid? I doubt it was Minerva McGonagall. I hear she is still too ill to talk to anyone.” Bletchely, Bulstrode, and Pucey began to laugh at that, Zacharias, Crabbe, and Goyle following suit clearly only out of fear. Harry felt himself flooded with rage at the woman before him both for her interruption of his mission, and manipulation to get these people he had trained and befriended within the H.O.O.D. to act like this.
“It’s none of your business who I talk to,” he settled on growling at her, lips pulling back in a vile sneer.
“Very well,” Umbridge said after a sickeningly long moment, her voice the most dangerous and falsely sweet yet. “Very well, Mr. Potter… I offered you the chance to tell me freely. You refused. I have no alternative but to force you. Adrian - fetch Professor Snape.” Pucey seemed upset to be missing out on the party, but left obediently, taking the wands with him.
Harry didn’t care as much as he thought he should, for he had just remembered something so obvious he felt stupid to have forgotten it; Snape was a member of the Order, and if there was still a member of the Order of the Phoenix left at Hogwarts, there was still a chance for a much stronger adult to help him save Sirius. And he was walking through the door right now.
“You wanted to see me, Headmistress?” Snape asked, looking at the struggling students and appearing all too calm for a teacher. Harry knew, had it been McGonagall, she’d have started a riot and had Umbridge flung from her own pink curtained windows. However, this was the notorious student bullying Snape, so such a miracle was just that; a miracle.
“Ah, Professor Snape,” Umbridge stood once more and circled around the desk and out of Harry’s vision, leaving him to sneer at Pucey as he came back around and glared right back at him. Surely, when all this was over, and hopefully Draco wasn’t still a closed off arse, he’d have a talk with him about this kid, because Harry decided right then he hated him. “Yes, I would like another bottle of Veritaserum, as quick as you can, please.”
Harry had to count his blessings; she was still relying on poison, and hadn’t resorted to an unforgivable instead. She certainly seemed the toadlike type to him.
“You took my last bottle to interrogate Potter. Surely you did not use it all? I told you that three drops would be sufficient.” Harry allowed himself to turn around in his seat just so he could see Umbridge’s red-faced reaction to that. “You can make some more, can’t you?” A clear giveaway she was only becoming more angry, her voice got even more high pitched.
“Certainly. It takes a full moon-cycle to mature, so I should have it ready for you in around a month.”
“A month? A month? But I need it this evening, Snape! I have just found Potter using my fire to communicate with a person or persons unknown!”
“Really?” Snape turned to look down at Harry who opened his mind wide open, as much as he could, in the loose hope that he would look into it and see that Sirius was in danger. See the truth. “Well, it doesn’t surprise me. Potter has never shown much inclination to follow school rules.”
“I wish to interrogate him!” Umbridge spat in Snape’s face so that the Professor turned away from him and Harry was left sighing hopelessly. “I wish you to provide me with a potion that will force him to tell me the truth!”
“And I am telling you that I have no further stocks of Veritaserum. Unless you wish to poison Potter - and I assure you I would have the greatest sympathy with you if you did - I cannot help you. The only trouble is that most venoms act too fast to give the victim much time for truth-telling.” As if to mock him with those final words about ‘truth-telling’, Snape looked back at Harry, who again tried his very best to explain with his eyes the danger Sirius was in.
Voldemort’s got Sirius in the Department of Mysteries. Voldemort’s got Sirius!
“You are on probation!” The shrill shriek shocked Snape enough to swivel his head back around to her, “You are being deliberately unhelpful! I expected better, Lucius Malfoy, always speaks most highly of you! Now get out of my office!”
This was his last chance. Throwing his head back in exasperation at Snape’s difficultness, Harry rose from the chair to look him straight in the eye and shout, “He’s got Padfoot!” Mercifully, the Potions master stopped at the door. “He’s got Padfoot at the place where it’s hidden!”
“Padfoot?” Now it was Umbridge’s turn to have her head on a swivel as she grinned between student and teacher. “What is Padfoot? Where is what hidden? What does he mean, Snape?”
A long pause, much too long for Harry’s liking, as he grew to worry that Dumbledore had been wrong, and he wasn’t on the Order side at all, or maybe had simply not understood him. He wasn’t going to say it any clearer - he couldn’t - and yet this was his last chance. Snape had to help him, he just had to-
“I have no idea,” and with four words, Harry’s heart sank to his stomach, and he swallowed back the swears he wished to throw at the man before him. “Potter, when I want nonsense shouted at me I shall give you a Babbling Beverage. And Warrington, loosen your hold a little. If Longbottom suffocates it will mean a lot of tedious paperwork and I am afraid I shall have to mention it in your reference if ever you apply for a job.”
As always, he left with his cape billowing behind him like a bat's wings, the door shutting behind him sharply. Harry’s only relief to the utter despair he now felt at being alone once more was that he realized he wasn’t truly alone, and Umbridge had just lost her last hope too. He had a feeling that wasn’t going to be a good thing for much longer, however, as she walked towards him, a sick grin still playing on her lips.
“I’ll give you one last chance, Potter,” She paused before him, glaring up from her short stature but still managing, with all her anger, to pull herself up to her full height. “Who were you speaking with?”
She could have offered him all the galleons in Gringotts, and he still would have said, “No.” Alternatively, nothing was going to stop her from responding to that ‘no’ with a hard, and very sudden, slap across his face that sent him stumbling backwards into her desk, which she pinned him to by the shoulder. Once again, he had to marvel at just how strong she could be.
“Very well,” Harry couldn’t help the way his eyes widened involuntarily when they followed her hand, which was slipping into her pocket and retrieving her short little wand. “Very well… I am left with no alternative… This is more than a matter of school discipline… This is an issue of Ministry security… yes… yes…” If Harry didn’t know any better, it almost sounded as if she was trying to psych herself up to do something that could get her in a lot of trouble, and he found himself wondering if it was too late to ‘knock on wood’ she wanted to use Veritaserum and not the Unforgivables. But the way she was staring at him, with the nervous air of a person who knew they’d get caught for their crime -
His hopes weren’t high.
“You are forcing me, Potter… I do not want to, but sometimes circumstances justify the use… I am sure the Minister will understand that I had no choice.” Even though Harry knew with absolute certainty that Fudge would never let her get away with this and had been planning to fire her for months now, he also knew there was little chance he'd get to see that outcome. Especially as her wand, which she had been smacking against her palm, slowed to a light tapping when she quietly spoke the words, “The Cruciatus Curse ought to loosen your tongue.”
Immediately, Harry heard muffled yells from his friends, gagged friends and groans from the Squad as they no doubt fought harder to get out of their hold, while he clearly heard Hermione shrieking, “No!” desperately. “Professor Umbridge - it’s illegal.” And almost like a beg.
But of course, Umbridge didn’t pay attention to her, as she never had all year, instead got a strange sort of eagerness to spread across her face as the evil side no doubt won over the lawful one, and she raised her wand up high. Harry couldn’t stop himself from gaping at her in horror, for he’d known from day one she was an awful sort of evil, but never did he expect her to be like this.
This, this was criminal.
“The Minister wouldn’t want you to break the law, Professor Umbridge!” Hermione continued to cry, and there was some truth to that, really. There would be no way Fudge would spare her after this, and they knew that all too well.
“What Cornelius doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” but Umbridge was too far into the joyful (for her) prospect of torturing Harry Potter to back down now. “Why, how’s he to have known I was planning on ordering Dementors to go after Potter last summer, before he foolishly had them removed from Azkaban on Dumbledore’s orders.”
“Dementors?” Harry gasped, horror overtaking every part of his body as he felt his hands begin to shake when they looked into her maliciously gleeful eyes. “You were going to send Dementors after me?”
“Somebody had to act,” Umbrdige, who had been struggling to decide where to place the curse that would cause the most pain, smirked twistedly, and pointed her wand directly at Harry’s forehead, where he knew his scar would be. “My co-workers at the Ministry were all bleating about silencing you somehow - discrediting you - and I was going to do something about it, maybe get a promotion… but Fudge has grown all too weak to Dumbledore’s whim, and got dragged into your nasty lies too. Well, if he has a problem with this… I don’t really care…” She sucked in a deep breath, Harry held his, and clenched his fists, praying for a miracle, or a savior out of nowhere to come and scoop him up and take him straight to Sirius-
“Cruc -”
“NO!” Hermione’s shout was earsplitting. “No - Harry - we’ll have to tell her!”
He’d rather die. “No way!” He yelled back, pulling his head back as far as it would go to try and get a glimpse of her, still pinned to the wall beside Ron, who had begun to tear up by how hard he was howling against the gag in his mouth.
“We’ll have to, Harry, she’ll force it out of you anyway, what’s… what’s the point?” And, abruptly, Hermione began to cry into Bulstrode’s robes, who let her go immediately out of disgust and let her fall to her knees, holding her face.
“Well, well, well!” Umbridge backed up from Harry and he let out a breath he really only just noticed he was ever holding, “Little Miss Question-all is going to give us some answers! Come on then, girl, come on!”
“Er - my - nee - no!” Harry could only barely understand the words Ron was shouting from his gag, but he could clearly see the anguish on his face now as he gazed at her, looking betrayed. Neville, too, looked betrayed and Ginny seemed to think of her as a stranger. But Harry could tell, though Hermione howled into her hands, there wasn’t a trace of a tear.
Not as good of an actress as Pansy, maybe.
“I’m - I’m sorry everyone,” she said, “But - I can't stand it -” She yelled as Umbridge grabbed her roughly by the shoulders and dragged her into the abandoned chair before her desk, leaning over her as she had to Harry, who now allowed himself to sit up from the desk, feeling a lot safer.
“That's right, that's right, girl!” said Umbridge, “Now then… with whom was Potter communicating just now?”
“Well,” Hermione didn't raise her face from her hands still as she spoke, “well, he was trying to speak to Professor Dumbledore.”
Just like that, all his viciously fighting friends froze. Ron stared at her wide eyed, Ginny turned from looking betrayed to mildly curious, Cedric adopting much the same look with a raised eyebrow. Even Luna looked surprised, though Pansy was left yelling something incoherently into her gag, which Harry assumed to be confusion as to Hermione actions, which she was warranted to. She hadn’t a clue what was going on yet she had helped anyway. Harry’s initial anger had faded a bit by now into cold fear, and with that came the sense to acknowledge Pansy’s bravery.
“Dumbledore? You know where Dumbeldore is, then?” Meanwhile, Umbridge couldn’t look any more pleased.
“Well… no!” sobbed Hermione, still without tears. “We've tried the Leaky Cauldron in Diagon Alley and the Three Broomsticks and even the Hog's Head -”
“Idiot girl - Dumbledore won't be sitting in a pub when the whole Ministry's looking lor him!” shouted Umbridge, and, with the attention of the Inquisitorial Squad mostly on Hermione now, Harry allowed himself a quick glance and a smirk over at Ron. Only they knew full well that the Ministry couldn’t be any less on the lookout for Dumbledore, and that people do tend to hide in plain sight and pubs, with only transfigured beards and smoke-pipes to hide their identity.
Hermione's award winning performance wasn’t finished. “But - but we needed to tell him something important!” she continued, wailing harder and now clutching her face hard; Harry could just see her fingers inches beneath her bangs and clawing at her skin, most likely to make the tears she was missing from this little show appear.
“Yes?” After the disappointment that they did not, in fact, know where DUmbledore was, Umbridge’s excitement had returned. “What was it you wanted to tell him?”
“We… we wanted to tell him it's r - ready!”
“What's ready?” Umbridge leaned across the chair to grab Hermione by the shoulders, and now if her hands fell away one would see her eyes had become red from the clawing. “What’s ready, girl?”
“The… the weapon,”
“Weapon? Weapon? You have been developing some method of resistance? A weapon you could use against the Ministry? On Professor Dumbledore’s orders, of course?” Umbridge looked to be on the brink of laughter, while Hermione gulped and now looked to be on the brink of real tears in having to face the fact that hse was willingly making her this happy. “Y - y - yes,” She choked, “but he had to leave before it was finished and n - n - now we’re finished it for him, and we c - c - can’t find him t - t - to tell him!”
“What kind of weapon is it?”
“We don’t r - r - really understand it. We j - j - just did what P - P - Professor Dumbledore told us t - t - to do.” When Hermione sniffed Harry found it a bit excessive and, catching Pansy’s eye to see her roll them to the sky, he knew he wasn’t the only one. Still, Umbridge let her go at last and stepped back away, arms straightening at her sides, but hand still tight in a fist around her wand.
“Lead me to the weapon,” She proclaimed and, to Harry’s stunment, Hermione didn’t resist for a second to the idea of leading her to a weapon he knew full well did not exist.
“I’m not showing… them,” she instead said, nodding to the Inquisitorial Squad who, having been mesmerized by the surprising show of little resistance to Umbridge from Hermione, now snapped to attention again, clutching Harry’s friends a bit tighter. Umbridge glanced at them approvingly before glaring down at Hermione once more, “It is not for you to set conditions,” she said and, most likely seeing she was revealing too much of her tearless face, Hermione let out a hollow sob and clutched her cheeks once more.
“Fine! Fine… let them see it, I hope they use it on you! In fact, I wish you’d invite loads and loads of people to come and see! Th - that would serve you right - oh, I’d love it if the wh - whole school knew where it was, and how to u - use it, and then if you annoy any of them they'll be able to s - sort you out!” And, far too easily, Umbridge saw right through the Squad’s facades when she glanced at them again. Right through their disguises and into eyes guilty for their actions, hating her, or otherwise far too eager to usurp and gain all the power. Most of them were Slytherins after all, and as a fellow Slytherin she should know their ways. Harry certainly had to learn it the hard way.
“All right, dear,” When Umbridge’s eyes rested once more on Hermione, her voice spoke with the honeyed tones of what she must have thought to be a motherly voice, and Harry was suddenly struck remembering Fudge’s ‘fatherly’ voice. Apparently this was a politician thing, and right then he decided he really did not like it at all. “Let’s make it just you and me… and we’ll take Potter, too, shall we? Get up, now.”
She grabbed Hermione by the shoulder and hoisted her up out of the chair, pointing her wand at Harry and flicking it up as a way of ordering him to move away from the desk and towards the door as well.
“That’s it now, here we go… I trust you all will be more than capable of handling these troublemakers?” She gestured to Harry’s friends, who were now all too eagerly glancing at each other, probably already forming plans of escape, and once again had to bear witness to her Squad masking their guilt with resolution.
“Of course, Professor.” Adrain Pucey proclaimed and, with a slight curl to her wide lips, Umbrdige stepped out of her office and closed the door, turning to face the confused Harry and still acting Hermione, though she had at last let her hands drop back to her sides.
“You two can go ahead of me and show me the way,” once more, she flicked her wand at them and then onward, down the hallway, still freshly cleared by Pansy. “Lead on.”