Witch Weekly
“Alright, Harry,” Mrs. Parkinson slid a tin of biscuits in Harry’s direction. “I want you to be as comfortable as possible for this interview.” He nodded his thanks as she continued to try and comfort him. “Just pretend like there’s no photographer, and no one is taking notes. This is just a one on one conversation between you and me.”
As if on cue, said photographer snapped a picture, casting a brief flash of bright white light across the Malfoy’s parlor.
Harry took a swig of tea, attempting to force down the bubble of nerves in his throat, before glancing self consciously at Pansy and Draco in the corner. Mrs. Parkinson followed the movement and jerked her head at the door, indicating that the two should leave. They both crossed their arms obstinately, and Pansy pouted in reply, but another dark look and they obediently left.
"Alright," Mrs. Parkinson continued, "Now, can you tell me—in excruciating detail—why you've decided to press charges against Albus Dumbledore?"
As ready as he would ever be, Harry took a deep breath and began his story. He didn’t want to leave anyone with a shadow of a doubt that this was the right decision. So he started at the very beginning, and he said everything. Everything he knew Dumbledore did. All the bad choices. Everything he experienced with the Dursleys. The threats to send him back. Everything.
In the end, he wound up going over every detail twice, and he had to force himself to stop fidgeting seventeen times. Even still, he managed to completely crumble three biscuits in his lap, and peel off most of his fingernails.
It was difficult laying out his entire history for the world to see. And they would see it.
Despite being considered an entertainment magazine, Witch Weekly was considered one of the most popular news outlets in the British wizarding world. It often beat out the Daily Prophet in weekly sales. With his name and face on the cover, Mrs. Parkinson had promised sales in record numbers. There had even been talks of translating the article to be published in their foreign editions as well.
Baring his heart and soul to his friends and the Black-Malfoy brood was one thing. But doing it in the most public forum possible was a completely different story.
But, all in the name of the downfall of Dumbledore, right?
Save the obvious, almost everything that had gone wrong in Harry’s life up to that point was inadvertently Dumbledore’s fault. No one would be able to argue the man’s incompetence and problematic nature with it all laid out before them.
When the article finally went to print, Harry didn’t want to read a word of it. He wanted to act like it was an ordinary day. Fortunately, Mrs. Parkinson was kind enough to receive any letter responses at her office, so Harry didn’t even have to deal with that.
Aside from Aunt Wally’s occasional gloating at the success of his plan (no amount of reasoning could get her to do anything other than exactly what she wanted)--and a single instance of Lucius and Mr. Nordstrom laughing during a fire call--that actually wound up being the last he heard of it.
Harry was able to immediately refocus on more positive matters. Such as getting to know Sirius better and spending time with his best friends. He was able to spend plenty of time with Draco, what with the two small families really just being one—still small, but slightly larger—family. They didn’t get to have their third musketeer around very often, though.
Hermione was only able to visit Malfoy Manor or Grimmauld Place a few times over the summer. Her parents wanted to spend as much time with her as possible before she had to return to Hogwarts.
Harry understood, of course, but he and Draco were definitely feeling her loss. Without meaning to, she had become the sort of de facto leader of their group. The boys weren’t exactly lost without her. It was more like being directionless.
The first time she came to visit was a week after the article went to print. She knew Harry had gotten enough attention about Dumbledore for the summer, so all she could talk about in her letters were her excitement to finally meet Sirius, and her plans to implement change at Hogwarts.
“It’s not that I don’t find Professor McGonagall to be a capable woman. She most certainly is,” she had explained that first night at Grimmauld Place. “It’s just that she was also very loyal to Dumbledore. He was her mentor after all. She’s likely to keep up with some of his practices out of a sense of loyalty. I just want to help make sure that she doesn’t. If nothing else, just to convince her to use her own judgment for matters instead of relying on his silly old rules.”
“What kind of changes do you want to see?” Draco asked.
“Well, I want all muggleborn students to be automatically enrolled in a Wizard Culture class!” Hermione’s voice had risen sharply and Harry could tell that she’d gotten started. “There should be some Ministry program to introduce them to the magical world before they turn eleven, but that’s a project for another time. Focusing on a Hogwarts class is the most feasible for now.
“Also, doesn’t it bother you that all the other houses hate Slytherin so much? I mean, sure, most of the Death Eaters were from Slytherin, but not all of them. Besides, it’s a totally new generation. Slytherins shouldn’t be punished for the decisions their parents made. It’s not fair that when we win a quidditch match, three-quarters of the school is booing us. More than that, even. Ours is the smallest house because people are literally afraid of being sorted Slytherin.
“What we need is something to create house unity. Teambuilding exercises of some kind. We can at least start off with an inter-house lounge. That’s easy to put together. In fact, I’ll create one myself if need be! McGonagall be damned!”
Hermione was swearing. That meant she was getting really worked up. It was time to intervene before she barreled her way into plans for world domination again.
“I think Hogwarts should have its own newspaper,” Harry interjected. “One about school matters and written by the students.”
“I think that would be perfect!” Draco jumped in. “Pansy would go absolutely mad over it as well. She’s such a gossip, she’s bound to know everything that goes on. We could invite people from all the houses. Then, there goes that house unity you wanted.”
“That’s actually brilliant!” Hermione agreed, thoroughly derailed. “With us in charge, we’d be able to control the narrative. We could decide what’s important, and what isn’t. Hm.” Hermione put a finger on her chin as she began contemplating the usefulness of having the only inner school news source.
The trio had spent hours after that discussing who they wanted to involve and who they didn’t. Deciding how to get the paper started and brainstorming names.
They’d gotten so caught up in planning their newspaper that it wasn’t until the next day that Hermione had met Sirius at all. Although, he may have just been hiding from her anyways. Harry could never be sure. When she did finally meet him, it was more of an accident than intentional.
She’d gotten up early in the morning, and the boys were still asleep. So, she decided to explore the mildly creepy townhouse while it was empty.
She’d been contemplating a door in the hallway that merely opened up to another door with the handle on the opposite side. The second door was locked, but there was a dim light coming through the cracks around it. As far as Hermione could tell, there was nothing on the other side of that wall, so she was rather stumped.
She decided to just give up and ask Aunt Wally about it later, so she turned around to head down the stairs. At the same time, Sirius had just rounded the corner to come up the stairs and they bumped into each other.
“Excuse me!” she gasped. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you there.”
“That’s alright,” Sirius explained. “I’m afraid I hadn’t seen you either.”
Hermione was still blocking the way, but she barely realized as she stared openmouthed at the handsome man before her.
“You’re Sirius Black!” she blurted.
She recognized him from his Azkaban file, though he hardly looked like the same person. The man in that file looked either deranged or completely catatonic, depending on the date. He was filthy as they come and more than half-starved. The man in front of her was healthy and clean-cut, with bright—though expressionless—silver eyes, and full of life. She wouldn’t go so far as to call it vitality, but there was color in his face where before was only pallor.
He was absolutely gorgeous.
“I am,” Sirius agreed quietly. “And you must be Hermione Granger. I’ve heard very much about you.”
“Oh, have you?” Hermione blushed.
“Indeed.” Sirius nodded with a barely-there smile. “According to those boys, you’re an absolute genius.”
“Oh,” she dismissed with a wave of her hand. “They say so, but they’re both brilliant as well. I think I just see things a little differently than they do, and they find it shocking from time to time.”
“Well, whatever it is, they certainly admire you.” Sirius glanced up the stairs behind her and she realized she was still standing in his path.
“Oh!” she jumped to step out of the way. “Um, you have a good morning.”
Sirius gave her a polite smile, that was more like the twitching of either side of his mouth. “You too,” he called as he breezed past her, then continued up the stairs.
Later that morning, Hermione burst into Draco’s room while he was chatting with a sleep rumpled Harry, then proceeded to beat the blonde boy with a pillow, shouting, “You did not tell me that Sirius Black was fit!”
“I didn’t think you would care!” Draco laughed back, blocking her swings with another pillow.
“I don’t!” she huffed. “But at least if I’d known, I wouldn’t have stood there in the hall gaping at him in disbelief like an utter loon!”
Harry cackled at her but soon regretted it as she turned her wrath on him. In moments, they devolved into a massive pillow fight. As expected, Hermione completely demolished both of them. She had them help pick feathers out of her hair as punishment.
The next time Hermione had visited was well into July, and she came to stay at the Manor. She and Harry slept in the same rooms as last summer, and they spent the entire morning taking turns with the Nimbus’ and flying over the grounds.
By lunchtime, the trio had put the brooms away and were sitting around one of the tables near the field that served as the quidditch pitch, discussing the events at the end of the school year.
“I just hate that out of all the spells we sent his way, not a single one of them hit Fred,” Draco grumbled. “What were we doing wrong?”
“Nothing, probably.”
Draco screeched at the sudden voice and nearly toppled out of his chair.
“Where did you come from?” Harry asked Sirius, trying not to laugh at Draco’s dramatics. He helped pull him back upright, and brushed invisible dust from his robes.
“I got bored at Grimmauld Place. I kind of hate it there,” Sirius admitted. “I figured, if nothing else, the open air of the grounds would be a nice change.” He gestured to the sky and the lack of walls around him.
“What do you mean we probably did nothing wrong?” Hermione asked. “If that was the case, why is it that we missed every shot?”
“You’re first years,” Sirius scoffed. “You can’t expect to be master spellcasters already. You’re just beginning to learn magic. I’m sure all you need is practice.”
“But we do practice!” Draco argued. “We practice all the time, and most of the spells we used that day were ones we’d done flawlessly in the past.”
“Then, it’s probably just your aim.” Sirius shrugged. “Being able to see and envision your target is usually enough to get the job done in a classroom setting, but when things are moving quickly and your mind isn’t calm enough for absolute focus, aiming your wand perfectly can be a huge advantage. It’s something you pick up over time. As I said, you just need practice.”
Harry got an idea. “Can you teach us?” he asked.
“You want me to help you with target practice?” Sirius quirked an eyebrow in disbelief.
“Yes!” Harry nodded vigorously.
“That’s actually a great idea!” Hermione agreed.
“Honestly,” Draco added, “anything helps. We were darn near embarrassing that day.”
Sirius squinted his eyes pensively for a moment, then shrugged again. “I suppose.” He gave a half-smirk as he thought of something funny, then turned back the way he came. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
The trio watched him walk away curiously. When he returned a little bit later, he was carrying a heavy box. Silently, he waved an intricate pattern in the air with his wand, flicking it ten times at the end to conjure ten different columns of varying height, each about a foot apart. He then reached into the box and one by one added a vase to each of the pedestals. He tapped each one on the side, making a glossy black bullseye appear.
Something about the vases looked familiar. Harry wasn’t exactly sure why until Draco spoke up, though.
“Are those-” the blonde started, seeming unsure himself.
“Yup,” Sirius replied bluntly. One side of his mouth quirked up in a definitely evil smirk as he said it.
“No!” Draco argued, indignant. “Those are priceless Malfoy heirlooms!”
“Why yes, I know.” The mischievous glint in Sirius’ eyes was unmistakable.
That was where Harry had recognized them. He’d seen them in his periphery countless times while walking the halls of Malfoy manor. He thought one of them might have had a bouquet of peacock skulls inside it at one point.
“We are not destroying those!” Draco stomped his foot dramatically, putting his hands on his hips.
“That’s fine,” Sirius sighed, bored. “We don’t have to do target practice.” He turned back around to begin putting the vases back in the box, but Hermione stopped him.
“Wait! We’ll do it, just fine!” She pleaded. He raised an eyebrow at her, and she gestured eagerly for him to put the vase in his hand back on the pedestal.
Draco gasped in disbelief.
“It’s not like we can’t just fix them,” Harry tried to reason. “A simple reparo should do the trick.” Draco huffed in frustration but gave up.
“Fine,” he agreed begrudgingly. “But my father’s going to be hearing about this.”
“I’m sure he’ll find out on his own,” Sirius assured him, tiny malicious smile on his face. “Alright,” he began. “Each of these vases is charmed so that they will only react if hit directly on the center of the bullseye.” He pointed at the nearest one with the tip of his wand for emphasis. “Hit it here, and it will burst into pieces. Hit it anywhere else, and you’ll get nothing. Use the incantation: ‘Conlidam.’ Repeat it to me.”
“Conleedam,” the trio chanted in unison.
“Very close. Try it with a short ‘I’ sound. Con-lih-dam,” he sounded it out.
“Conlidam!” they tried it again.
“Perfect. Now, stand about there.” Sirius pointed with his wand, directing them to a position directly in the middle of the line of vases, and about 5 meters back. “Alright Harry, you first. Wand up.”
Harry did as he was told raising his wand in the air.
“Start from the left and work your way across, hitting each one once. If you miss, just keep going. A flick is all you need. Go ahead.”
Harry nodded, determined to do well at this. He brought all of his focus onto the first vase, directing his magic toward it. “Conlidam!”
He definitely hit the vase, but he missed the bullseye, causing it to only rock back and forth for a second.
“Very good,” Sirius praised, smiling at him proudly.
“But I missed,” Harry complained.
“Not really,” Sirius disagreed. “You definitely hit it. Just not the bullseye. Go on, try the next one.”
Harry took a deep breath, then tried again, focusing on the next one. “Conlidam!”
After three rounds of attempting to shatter the vases, neither Draco nor Harry had managed to get a single one. It was quite disheartening. Hermione, however, had managed to break a total of 5 out of all three rounds. Harry could tell that she was caught between wanting to gloat at her success and being disappointed that five out of thirty was still an abysmal score.
She was instantly distracted from the thought when Lucius literally climbed through a window, shouting at Sirius. It was a ceiling to floor window with only about a half a meter or so between the windowsill and the plush carpeting beneath. So, it was more of a step than a climb, but Harry honestly didn’t even know that the windows in that hall opened.
“What do you think you are doing!?” Lucius was absolutely furious. He stomped over to Sirius with his hand gripped tightly around the middle of his cane, leaving the snake-headed handle open.
Harry could feel a chill go down his spine at the man’s rage. Even Draco had gone stock still in apprehension. Sirius, on the other hand, burst into laughter.
He threw his head back, barking at the sky. It was the biggest Harry had seen him smile in days, possibly weeks, and almost certainly the most mirth Harry had ever seen coming from the man. The tension melted from his frame and he couldn’t help a bemused grin himself.
“Just a bit of target practice,” Sirius managed to squeeze out between chortles, voice higher than normal from the strain of holding his laughter in.
“With my priceless family heirlooms?” Lucius screeched, fair skin flushed with anger. He didn’t even wait for an answer before swinging his cane at Sirius’ head. The Gryffindor dodged it easily, raising his hands up in placation, but still sniggering.
“’Priceless family heirlooms,’” he mused in a teasing voice, “’worthless ugly vases.’ To-may-to. To-mah-to.”
Beside Harry, Hermione slapped a hand over her mouth to hold in her own chuckles while Lucius swung his cane again.
“Alright, alright!” Sirius tried to soothe him but was still smiling. The cane had come much closer to actually getting him this time. “Calm down, Lucy! Your bloody vases will be fine.”
Lucius stepped very close to Sirius, getting right into his face. “I ought to curse you where you stand,” he threatened through grit teeth.
Sirius was still smiling. “Oh, but my mother would be so upset with you. You’d hate to disappoint dear Aunt Wally, wouldn’t you?”
Lucius just glared at him for a second longer before shouting, “Go inside!” He turned to face the children. “The rest of you too!” He pointed toward the house and the trio immediately started moving.
“Should we go through the window as well?” Sirius asked, voice wobbling and slightly too high as he fought to keep from starting up again.
“Use the door!” Lucius hissed back at him.
Sirius took a deep breath and let out a sigh as he turned away. “Oh, Lucy.” He was still grinning. “You never fail to entertain me.”
As all five of them headed inside, they somehow found themselves on the top floor in the library. The children spread about, finding books to occupy them, while the two adults went off in the other direction.
Draco immediately found himself a potions book to settle down with. Harry got his hands on a spellcrafting book, and Hermione pulled a huge book on Pureblood etiquette down from one of the top shelves. They settled around a group of chairs with a low table between them near the middle of the room and were quickly engrossed in what was becoming one of each of their favorite subjects. Well, pureblood etiquette wasn’t necessarily a favorite subject of Hermione’s, it just happened to be an interest of hers that she wouldn’t get the chance to study anywhere else.
Occasionally, one of them would point out an interesting fact they’d come across and the three of them would take a moment to discuss it. Otherwise, they were perfectly content to read in silence. That was something Harry enjoyed about his tiny group of friends.
He didn’t do well in primary school because due to the Dursleys interference, most of his teachers had wound up disliking him before they’d even met him, treating him like a problem case despite the fact that he loved to learn. He also had no friends, and no one at home to encourage him. When left to his own devices, it was hard to find the motivation to actually enjoy his education. Having the Dursleys actively sabotaging him made it even worse.
Now, having friends around him that also loved to learn, cultivated an environment that drove him to always do his best in classes and to seek out more knowledge with a voracious curiosity. If his friends hadn’t been such avid learners, and eager students, he didn’t think he would have ever been either.
Instead, he would have found schoolwork tedious and done everything he could to avoid it, as many students often do. Harry couldn’t imagine all of the things he would have missed out on discovering had he fallen into that trap.
That was why he loved his friends so much. They pushed him into being his best. They fostered growth within each other and they all genuinely enjoyed it. Even when that meant just spending hours together, reading and studying silently.
Today, that silence only lasted until they heard the two older men bickering again, though much more calmly this time.
“I’ve never seen anyone talk to my father the way Sirius does,” Draco mused aloud.
Across the library, they were arguing in hushed tones about something to do with a party Sirius didn’t want to go to. If he peeked through the shelves at just the right angle, Harry could see them both.
Earlier antics aside, the only time Sirius ever seemed to show any real emotion was when he was reminiscing about the past, or if he was furious about something. Currently, he was more mildly annoyed than furious, so—though his tone was petulant—his face expressed nothing more than the typical boredom.
Lucius, however, was very clearly angry. He also wasn’t the type to express much emotion either, maintaining the aloof condescension of most upper-class individuals. Draco was the same when he was in public. It was a part of their upbringing to remain so reserved and closed off around people outside their inner circle.
So, Lucius being visibly angry at all was a testament to exactly how good Sirius was at getting on his nerves. That had been a common theme all summer long. Lucius flipped his hair over his shoulder impatiently, then crossed his arms while tapping a toe against the ground in agitation.
“It’s probably because he’s a Black,” Hermione reasoned without looking up from the giant tome balanced on her lap. “Historically, The Blacks have always been considered superior to the other magical families. Even the more well-respected ones, like The Malfoys. So, Sirius was likely never made to show any deference to him growing up like most of the other old purebloods. In fact, it’s almost certain that it had gone the other way. Without the natural inclination to be respectful, Sirius just treats him like he would anybody else.”
“It’s a bit unnerving to see,” Draco admitted. Most people showed the utmost respect for the Malfoys, bowing their heads and quibbling with appeasements. It was completely unthinkable to him to see someone treating his father like an equal, or worse, like a lesser.
“I don’t think it’s that complicated,” Harry added, smiling as he watched Lucius roll his eyes in a very uncouth manner then scoff as he dropped his hands to his hips. “I mean, I’m sure that factors into it somewhere but… I think Sirius just doesn’t like him.”
“Why not?” Draco whipped his head around to glare at Harry, indignant at the thought of his father as unlikeable.
“I don’t know,” Harry admitted, raising his arms in surrender. “I do know there’s a lot of history there. It could be anything.”
“Hmmm,” Hermione pondered before chiming in again. “It probably has to do with the War, then.” She finally looked up from her book. “They were on opposite sides, weren’t they?”
“But that’s not my father’s fault! He was imperiused! Before that, he remained neutral because he wanted to stay in favor of the Blacks, so he could marry my mother. The Blacks always remained neutral. With only a few notable exceptions.”
“Perhaps, he was neutral,” Hermione replied, “but you have to admit his line of thinking was certainly the same as V-Voldemort’s.” Hermione was still trying to get used to saying the name. “Sirius was on the side fighting against that. It still makes perfect sense that he would just plain not like your father.”
Draco couldn’t argue with that, but that didn’t mean he would admit it. Instead, he just crossed his arms and pouted in defeat.
Draco didn’t like to think of his father as being less than perfect. His father was his idol. The person he always aspired to be. It was hard to swallow the idea that he’d been wrong in the beliefs he raised Draco to follow.
Even though the proof of it was sitting on Draco’s wrist as a constant reminder.
“Oh, just do as you will, Black!” Lucius shouted, throwing his arms over his head in defeat before spinning on his heel. He stormed through the shelves of books and out of the library, shouting, “You always do anyways!” as he went. He exited the room with a dramatic flourish of his cloak. One he must have picked up from a certain grumpy potions master.
Or perhaps it was the other way around.
The more time Harry spent around the elder Malfoy, the less and less intimidated he was becoming by him. Having Sirius nearby and not being intimidated at all, certainly helped. As he got to know Lucius more and became familiar with his behaviors when his guard was down, and the subtle nuances that made up his real personality as opposed to his public persona, Harry was beginning to realize that Lucius Malfoy was a bit of a drama queen.