After

This time Minerva did not stop on the step outside the door, she did not pause for a moment but pushed the door open and crossed the threshold into the room. It was in a state of disarray, papers and forms tossed about or blown by the wind that chilled the room from the open window at one side of the room. The portraits were either empty frames or had feigned sleep just as soon as she entered the room, that was fine with Minerva, she didn’t want to talk, she was already running out of courage. 

She closed the window against the light rain that was falling now, and turned to the desk, ignoring the feeling that she was in grave danger. She vanished a table full of vials and bottles, knowing not what they were, but knowing that they weren’t likely to be remedies. The cabinet that held Albus’s pensieve was open, and there was a vial lying beside it, empty, she vanished that too, and put the pensieve away. There was an insignia of Slytherin house over the empty fireplace, rather than the whole school’s coat of arms, Minerva saw to that in short order as well. Even these small jobs were taxing, simply because of where they took place. Thankfully Severus wasn’t much of an interior decorator, so there wasn’t so much to clear away. She went on doing the smaller tasks, ignoring the main problem for a few moments more. 

There was a plain chair behind the dark Black walnut-wood desk that was strewn with the detritus that came with running the school. She couldn’t bring herself to sit there, not where he had been, but eventually she began rifling through the papers atop the desk. 

She found several letters that were addressed to her, and supposed that they had been delivered there by people who hadn’t known how else to reach her. The first she took from the bottom of the pile and opened was a note from Kingsley, just trying to locate her. Another was from Molly Weasley, one from Septimia, and another from Hagrid. She felt guilty for not having seen them to respond though she had no doubt that they had all been informed of her whereabouts during her stint in the hospital. There was nothing that the Order could keep secret from each other. 

She took the last on the pile and opened an official ministry seal, “Oh dear, what fresh hell is this?” She muttered as she noted that it had been sent earlier that afternoon. She breathed deeply and hoped it wasn’t what she thought it was. It was exactly that. An inquiry had been started into the goings on of May the second and she was being summoned as a material witness. “Oh fuck.” 

This could not be good. She apparated away directly, knowing that if she’d gotten one others certainly had as well. She went first to her summer house to check that Pomona and Filius had not reappeared, and when she did not find them apparated to St. Mungos, where Poppy was back to work in the disaster ward. 

She passed through the sterile-looking white doors and found almost everyone she was wanting to speak to already gathered there. Half of the Order was there already. So many of them had still been in the hospital or hadn’t known where else to find the others. They all looked up at Minerva, who realised that she must look a mess, but frankly did not care. 

Aberforth Dumbledore remarked sarcastically to the rest of the group when she entered the ward, “Oh good, here comes the boss.” He only received a few cold glances in reply 

“Thank Merlin, you’re here,” Pomona said grouchily, holding a very similar-looking letter in one hand. 

Filius agreed, his copy folded up in one fist, “I was about to go and fetch you.”

“I expect you’ve seen this?” Poppy asked, holding up her own copy of the summons. 

“Of course,” Minerva answered, showing off her copy. “I want to see each copy, please,” She held out a hand for them, and was immediately given ten. She readjusted her spectacles and ran through each letter quickly as the others complained or looked at her curiously. She checked the dates of each summons against the others, the nearest date, hers, was a few weeks out yet. She sighed a slightly relieved sigh. “Fine, well, we’ll come up with a plan.” 

Molly caught her attention and held out several others, “I confiscated them from the kids. I won’t have them called up like criminals.” 

“Quite right,” Minerva sighed, taking the new stack of letters from her, leaving the others floating in the air to be collected by their right owners. Neville, Ginny, Harry, Hermione, Ron, George, Luna, Bill, Charlie, and Percy, were all called up for hearings in two weeks' time.

“I tried to tell the committee to stop and think about what they were doing before they did it, but as you all know that is not how the government operates,” Kingsley grumbled, his low voice rumbling like disagreeable thunder.

Hestia Jones turned to Kingsley with a disgruntled expression and an over-taxed sigh, “What is all of this about then?” She asked, “I mean reading through the lines, what do they want?” 

Septimia answered in the form of a question, “They’re trying to assign blame for deaths and such, I suppose?” 

“Yes, I’m afraid that is what they are after,” Kingsley said mournfully. “I practically begged them to hold off, but they would not listen.” 

“Of course not,” Arthur agreed, muttering discontentedly and showing much more negative feeling than he ever did usually. 

Minerva took charge of the situation with the very tone of her voice, “I don’t want any of you to worry about this now, we have a few weeks before the dates begin. I will be speaking to several members of our elected authorities about this and see what can be done. We may have to do some, shall I call it, creative truth-telling, to keep some of you and as many of the children as possible, off of the witness stand.” 

“Well, I can take mine,” Filius offered gallantly, then leaned in slightly and said, “I’ll take some extra blame too.”

“I’ll take the heat off of some of the kids, for sure,” Pomona agreed, nodding affirmatively. 

“I knew I could count on the two of you,” Minerva said with a small smile, adding in a  lower tone, “And as far as anyone is concerned in the wizengamot I killed Bellatrix Lestrange,” She turned to Molly and said, “That’s you off the hook, Molly.” 

“Oh, I can’t let you do that for…” Molly began, but she was silenced when Minerva held up a hand to stop her protestations.

“I won’t hear of it,” Minerva said firmly. “I will also take any confirmed deaths from you, Poppy dear, we can’t have them taking away your medical license for breaching your oath.” 

Poppy didn’t argue, just said, “Thank you.” 

“Of course,” Minerva answered as if hers were the only obvious way of dealing with the situation before them. She turned back to Molly and Arthur and said, “I’m afraid there really will be no way that we can spare Harry, Hermione, or Ronald. They have been situated quite in the middle of this thing, by no fault of their own, but that leaves them invaluable witnesses. I will attempt to keep the rest of them from this public spectacle, and it will be best if the only one of them who is confirmed to have killed someone is Harry. We will have to discuss this with them later.” She wanted them to prepare all those kids under their care for the discussions that she would have to have with them. 

“Okay, we’ll talk to them,” Arthur said, understanding the task she was laying out before them.

“Good,” Minerva answered, turning now to Kingsley, “You and I will both attempt to use any influence or connections or favours or goodwill that we have with anyone inside of the ministry to attempt to postpone this unpleasant eventuality, I suppose I am understood.” 

“Of course,” Kingsley said with a deep nod. 

“Good,” She answered crisply, turning to the other professors in the group, “Septimia, Pomona, Filius, the four of us are going to have to take a lot of blame that we don’t bear. I would expect censure from the board for all of us, but they will not have the power or option, or audacity to remove any one of us. And this is vastly preferable to allowing the students to take any blame.” 

“Agreed,” Septimia nodded staunchly.

Pomona added her agreement, saying quietly, “Here here.” 

“I’m in,” Filius said assuredly. 

“Good. I do believe that is all that we can do at this moment, however, we should plan to call a meeting in a much less…” Minerva glanced around the ward, to ensure that they weren’t drawing any undo attention, “public place. We may have won the war but I don’t trust the world at large with the Order’s plans, especially in this matter.”

“The Order is disbanded, is it not?” Aberforth asked, with just the slightest sound of amusement in his voice. “You won the war after all.”

“Actually, Aberforth, the Order has not been disbanded until I say it is,” Minerva answered, her tone made it clear that she was claiming, rightfully, her position as the head of the Order of the Pheonix. “And while there persists a danger to its members and all those who were involved in this god-forsaken conflict, the Order of the Pheonix has not yet reached a burning day.” 

Minerva McGonagall, wearing flat shoes as she was at the moment, is significantly shorter than half of the people before her, but at that moment she was more imposing and impressive than even Kingsley could have hoped to be. There was no contesting what she said now.