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The many Deaths of Harry Potter by ShayneT
 Books » Harry Potter Rated: T, English, Harry P., Hermione G., Words: 242k+, Favs: 6k+, Follows: 4k+, Published: Mar 2, 2017 Updated: Jun 15, 2017 3,851Chapter 35: Disaster
Harry had hoped to use the Marauder's map to find Black still lurking in the castle that night. He'd then slip out under his invisibility cloak and ambush him. Once Black was in custody, the dementors would be withdrawn and Harry would possibly have years to learn the patronus.
Unfortunately, even looking at the map under the covers of the sleeping bag after lights out, he couldn't see any sign of Black.
It was frustrating.
Knowing when Black was going to attack would have made it so much easier. Now he'd have to keep checking the map in classes and out. Undoubtedly Black had assumed he was in Gryffindor, since Harry doubted that subscriptions to the Daily Prophet were allowed in Azkaban.
He couldn't depend on that continuing to be the case. The thought of waking up with Black standing over his bed was fairly chilling.
Harry decided that he'd do everything he could to find Black as soon as possible. The fact that Black had betrayed his parents was disturbing, but in Harry's mind that just put him in with the faceless ranks of Death Eaters who were out to kill him.
It was the Dementors who were Harry's current obsession, the true threat.
Harry fell into a restless sleep on the hard floor of the Great Hall.
Over the next few days the school talked about nothing but Black. Harry caught people glancing at him out of the side of their eyes and people who had formerly been friendly to him withdrew somewhat. Harry suspected this wasn't because they resented him, but because they didn't want to be around him when Black finally came to stab him to death.
More disturbingly, the various teachers began to find excuses to walk with him. They weren't very clever in disguising what they were doing. When it wasn't teachers, Harry found himself being followed by Slytherin prefects.
Considering that he'd beaten some of the fifth year prefects in dueling club, Harry didn't feel particularly safer. It was a little insulting that they thought he needed that kind of protection. After all, Black, for all his insanity wasn't a Death Eater who was fresh and sharp with his wand. He was a broken down wreck of a man who had been drained to the last dregs by the dementors in Hogwarts.
Harry couldn't imagine what twelve years being drained by a dementor would do to a man. Just a few moments had been enough to almost destroy him.
Disturbingly as well, Lupin was absent from Defense class, and Snape substituted in. It was clear that Snape didn't care for Lupin, and he immediately substituted werewolves for the creature they'd actually been assigned.
Fortunately, there were werewolves in the Forbidden forest, and so that was one of the creatures Harry had actually bothered to study. Harry imagined that if he was going to have to repeat the semester he'd start studying the wizard killing creatures that didn't live near Hogwarts.
He'd start studying from the most dangerous and work his way down. He'd save flobberworm level creatures for seventh year, assuming they weren't covered already.
Harry carefully checked his Map as often as he dared, even during class if he thought he wouldn't get caught. He didn't bother in Snape's class, of course. Snape would confiscate the Map the moment he saw it, and Harry's chance of ending the dementor threat would be gone.
He never saw Black, however, no matter how much he searched.
One of the features of the map that Harry discovered as he repeatedly stared at it was that it revealed the passwords to various secret passages, including the one at the base of the Whomping Willow.
It was reassuring to know that he'd be able to slip out to Hogsmeade whenever he wanted, even though he doubted the teachers would officially let him go, permission slip or no permission slip.
He wouldn't have gone in public anyway. He'd have to wait until the other students were allowed to go to Hogsmeade before he went because someone his age would stick out like a sore thumb. He'd grown some, and at thirteen he was no longer able to pass for ten.
Storekeepers would note if a Hogwarts age child was in Hogsmeade during the school year alone. From what Harry had heard, Hogsmeade was a ghost town as far as children went in between visits.
Still, he needed supplies, and he fully intended to take advantage of the next Hogsmeade weekend to get more money from the Gringott's subsidiary there and to buy things from the joke shop that could be turned into weapons.
The Weasleys were being entirely unreasonable about their sister; no matter how much Harry claimed that he had no interest in her they were acting overly protective.
Harry almost suspected that it was some kind of long con, the kind of prank they'd pull on him for the entire term just to see his face at the end of the term. Unfortunately he couldn't be sure.
The one thing he was certain of was that having the dementors close by was going to be a recipe for disaster. From what he'd read they hungered for human emotion and they became less and less rational the less they fed. In that way they were a little like vampires, except that they ate souls instead of blood.
Nothing Harry had heard suggested that the dementors were being fed. Considering that children felt emotions more intensely than adults, or at least weren't as good at hiding them, and there were hundreds of children not far from the dementors...Harry felt that the Ministry hadn't really thought their plan through.
When it all happened, Harry had no intention of being one of those who had their souls devoured. Unfortunately, he doubted that going to his professors would do much good. He was widely considered to be a little mental, what with his conspiracy theories and paranoia.
He'd been a little too open about his opinions in the past. If he had a chance to do it over he'd have pretended to be as clueless as a Gryffindor. Unfortunately, most of his mistakes had been made in his first year, and that ship had already sailed.
"Professor Snape?" Harry asked cautiously as he peered into the doorway of the potion master's office.
He hadn't had many opportunities to enter Snape's office; the man seemed to do the best he could to avoid Harry, although that had changed a little since their business deal with the Basilisk.
Despite the slight softening in his attitude toward Harry, Harry knew better than to try to take advantage of it in class or in public. Snape was a former Death Eater, a fact that was confirmed by some of Harry's Slytherin contacts.
Undoubtedly, even if he'd largely renounced his ties to Voldemort's organization, he still had to deal with his former contacts. If he really was a spy for Dumbledore, as the court records indicated, he might still be spying for Dumbledore in which case he would have to be even more careful about who he angered.
Despite his past, Harry had gradually started to trust Snape a little more. The man had come to rescue him after the basilisk incident after all. If he'd really wanted Harry dead, he could have simply waited to tell Dumbledore and not come until after Harry was dead and eaten.
Snape's office was just as Harry remembered it. It was gloomy and dimly lit, with shadowy walls lined with shelves of large glass jars filled with ingredients. Many of the ingredients were slimy and revolting, pieces of animals and plants floating in potions of various colors.
If it had been Harry, he'd have lit the ingredients from behind. That would have made them even more horrifying, and would have increased the intimidation value of entering his office.
As it was, Harry couldn't understand why Snape kept things so dim. He wasn't actually a vampire, although Neville seemed to think so, especially now that Snape was angry about whatever Neville had done to repel his boggart. He'd been doubling down on his abuse of Neville, which had increased the number of incidents in potions class because of Neville's anxiety.
Harry had taken to sitting farther away from Neville, because sometimes Neville's mistakes affected everyone in an area. He noticed that the other Slytherins had taken to doing the same. Although he could tell that this bothered Neville, the last thing Harry needed was a face full of boils to go along with his other issues.
Some of Neville's mistakes had put some of the Gryffindors in the hospital for as long as two days.
"Come to beg for your Gryffindor friend, Potter?" Snape said, entering from another room.
Harry shook his head. "If you enjoy seeing Gryffindors covered in blisters, it's not my place to complain. He'd probably be a little safer if you let up on him though."
"Then why did you come here?" Snape asked, scowling. He glanced at the door, as though to see whether anyone else was listening.
"Because I've got a problem and you're my Head of House."
From what Harry had heard, Snape was much more responsive to the problems of other members of his house than he was to Harry.
"And what sort of problem might that be?" Snape asked. He returned to sanding behind his table, which was scattered with essays, presumably that he was due to grade.
"I've been trying to learn the patronus spell from Professor Lupin," Harry said.
At the mention of the other professor's name, Snape stiffened. "I'm sure he would be...proficient in teaching that."
Harry nodded. "I don't have any problem with his teaching. The problem is with me. He says I cast the spell perfectly, but I can't generate more than the slightest glimmer of a patronus."
"It is a highly advanced spell," Snape said. "And despite your...determination, it may simply be beyond you. Some adults are simply incapable of learning it."
"The problem is coming up with the memories I'm suppose to use. I just don't have any memories happy enough to power the spell."
Snape stared at him, his face expressionless. Unspoken between the two of them was the knowledge that many dark wizards couldn't cast the spell, no matter how talented they were for the very reason that Harry couldn't cast it.
Finally he said, "And just what is it that you think I can do about that?"
"I'm not sure I'll ever be able to cast it," Harry admitted. "And if I can't then I'm in trouble."
"Expecting to go to Azkaban, are you?" Snape asked. He smirked.
"There are dementors right outside the door," Harry said. "And they haven't been fed. How long do you think it will be before they decide to come on in and have themselves a little feast?"
Snape stared at him for a moment. "And you aren't concerned about anyone else in this proposed disaster?"
"You've seen my luck," Harry said. "I'm no Gryffindor. I try to stay back, away from danger, and yet every time I'm the one staring down a basilisk or a troll or a crazed professor. There's a good chance that if the dementors come, I'll be in the front of the line."
"So you think I'm the one to teach you how to have happy memories?" Snape asked.
Harry smirked. "Considering that you have to deal with Neville in potions class, I'd say no."
Although Neville was his friend, he definitely had his flaws. He had anxiety problems and some memory issues. Those didn't outweigh his loyalty or his sense of humor, of course, but they had to be addressed.
Harry doubted that he himself was that good of a friend.
Snape smirked back, then asked,"What then?"
"Teach me occlumency," Harry said. "Dementors detect people by sight and by their emotions. I have ways of hiding from sight, but emotions I can't control."
Snape froze. "And who told you I even have that skill?"
"It stands to reason," Harry said. "Records say you were Dumbledore's spy during the war. Either you were able to conceal your thoughts from Voldemort, or you were actually working for Voldemort and concealed your thoughts from Dumbledore."
"Don't say his name," Snape hissed. He leaned forward. "Do you know why people fear saying his name?"
Harry shook his head. He'd assumed that it was because they feared retaliation from him or his followers. The fact that they were afraid to even say it in private was less understandable.
"There is a powerful spell, a taboo which reveals the speaker's location every time the Dark Lord's name is spoken aloud. Those who spoke it, whether in public or in private often were visited shortly afterward by the Dark Lord's followers."
Harry frowned, trying to think back to whether he'd ever spoken Voldemort's name in a place that wasn't warded or where Voldemort didn't already know he was, like Hogwarts.
"The Headmaster says it all the time," Harry said, finally.
"The Headmaster is able to defend himself if anyone appears to have an issue with his saying it," Snape said shortly.
"Someone should have told me," Harry said. He scowled. "Something like that would seem vitally important for me to know."
"The taboo was broken when Voldemort vanished," Snape admitted. "The Headmaster undoubtedly hopes to make it useless by having too many people saying the name for it should it be established again."
Too much noise for it to be useful...a strategy Harry hadn't considered yet.
"I suppose it would be a good way to set up an ambush," Harry said. He suddenly shifted topics.
"What about the Occlumency?"
Snape was silent for a moment, staring at him. "Do you know what that kind of training entails? You practice trying to shield your mind from being entered by the legillimens. At least at first you risk having every secret in your mind laid bare to your teacher."
Snape hesitated. "You don't strike me as the type to trust anyone with your secrets."
Was Harry ready to share the secret of his resets with Snape? Although he trusted him more than he had in the past, he wasn't sure. If Snape really was a triple agent and working with Voldemort, then Voldemort's learning about his ability was a sure recipe for disaster.
"I didn't think so," Snape said, staring at Harry's face.
Harry hesitated. "What about Legillimency?"
"You think I'd trust you to reach into the minds of others?" Snape asked. He shook his head. "It's a power that is very easy to abuse."
Harry said, "It'd make it easier to find out who's trying to kill me."
Snape stared at him skeptically, and no matter how hard Harry tried, he couldn't convince him to teach him.
Nothing Harry tried in the next few weeks convinced him at all.
Rain sluiced down everywhere and the wind blew so hard that Harry could barely see ten feet in front of him. He couldn't understand why anyone would be out in this, but Quidditch was so popular that everyone in the school had come out.
Harry had tried to beg off; while he enjoyed the occasional Quidditch match as much as anyone, being outside in this sort of weather seemed like a stupid thing to do. Even when the prefects had insisted he'd refused.
It wasn't until Professor Snape had insisted that he go that he realized that he was going to be forced to go because the school staff feared leaving him alone in the castle while Black was after him.
Dumbledore and several of the professors were waiting inside for Black on the theory that he may have heard about Harry's love of staying inside during games.
Worse, instead of getting his usual spot near the aisles, the prefects had insisted that he sit in the middle of the row. Presumably this was to keep Black from easily getting to him, although Harry suspected it was just as much to keep him from slipping away while no one was looking.
As it was, he was miserable in the middle of a crowd that was huddled together to keep warm. Despite this he was soaked to the skin and frozen, and it had to be worse for the players, who were moving through the air.
There was a water repelling charm, but Harry hadn't learned it yet as it didn't seem necessary for survival. He could see however that Hermione had learned it, from the smug look on her face and the fact that she was dry instead of looking like a drowned rat like everyone else. She must have also cast it on Neville.
For once Harry was rooting for both teams' seekers. The game ended when either seeker found the snitch, and the sooner the game was over the sooner he could be inside with a mug of hot cocoa.
Harry had given up on paying attention to the game; he couldn't see with all the rain on his glasses anyway. Instead he simply closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of the crowd; the cheering, the oohs and the aahs as the players made daring plays.
As everything fell silent, Harry opened his eyes. He wondered if something had happened; perhaps someone had been hurt.
Instead he realized that even the wind had gone silent, even though he could still feel it pounding against his skin.
A familiar feeling of cold washed over him and Harry felt a sudden sense of horror as he realized what it was. As lightning flashed he saw a hundred dementors on the pitch, and before he could do anything they were spreading out everywhere.
Dementors began floating up the stairs, scattered among all four houses. People began to scream and panic, and Harry saw several students being pushed and shoved and falling over the side to land unmoving on the pitch twenty feet below.
It took him a moment to react as the people around him screamed and began to panic. The dementors had all the escape routes blocked and there wasn't any way to get away. Some students began to jump, but the dementors left on the field simply swooped over to them.
Harry could see at least a dozen dementors bent over bodies in the field, presumably relieving them of their souls.
He would have done something, anything to help but he already felt the memories overwhelming him. He fell backward, and he could feel someone stepping on his hand as they ran backward, hoping to find a way off the back of the bleachers even though they were even higher off the ground than the first.
A pair of seventh years, one a prefect grabbed Harry and started dragging him to the top.
Harry was only semi conscious, but he wondered at the sudden heroism of the seventh years. Everyone else seemed to only be out for themselves.
He couldn't move and what he saw was in flashes; dementors were in the stands now, grabbing students and pulling them in for the last encounter they'd ever have in this world or the next.
People were pushing and shoving each other, gathered at the top of the stands in a tight crowd.
He heard a sharp crack as one of the older sections of stands collapsed. The sounds of people screaming were interspersed with the bodies of those the dementors had already finished with, lying desolate in the lower section of stands.
Harry saw first years lying dead or worse; Pansy Parkinson was among the dead, as were Goyle. Crabbe was still fighting for survival, although he was being approached by three dementors who looked ready to fight over his body.
Harry was being dragged to the top of the stand. The crowd was getting tighter around them, a crush as people tried to get away from the dementors. With the collapse of one section of the stands more people were coming in this direction in an effort to escape the dementors.
This was it; Harry was going to die with the feeling of a knife in his stomach, with the glare of the basilisk, with the feeling of being crushed under train wheels.
He hoped that Hermione and Neville had gotten away, but he wasn't sure how.
Harry was pulled away from the two seventh years holding him by the press of the crowd. Dementors were surrounding them and people were crushing in on all sides. Harry slipped down and felt people begin to step on him.
He couldn't breathe; he could feel a rib break as people stepped on him and he could feel something stab into his chest. He suspected it was his own rib.
He felt fluid filling his throat but he couldn't breath anyway as the pressure of people piling on people above him grew.
The last thing he saw as he died was a bright, blinding flash of light, and he thought he heard Dumbledore's voice.
It didn't matter; it was too late.
Harry died choking on his own blood.
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The many Deaths of Harry Potter by ShayneT
 Books » Harry Potter Rated: T, English, Harry P., Hermione G., Words: 242k+, Favs: 6k+, Follows: 4k+, Published: Mar 2, 2017 Updated: Jun 15, 2017 3,851Chapter 36: Pray
Gasping for breath, Harry suddenly realized that he was leaning against a wall of feathers. He looked up to see an eye the size of his fist staring down at him, and a beak that looked like it could snap his head off.
He carefully stepped back. Hippogriffs were dangerous at the best of times, and now wasn't the time to reset his life only seconds after he'd just revived.
Everyone else was busy with their own hippogriffs; no one was foolish enough to fool around, except for Draco, who looked like he was about to be an idiot again.
Harry pulled out his wand and a moment later Draco went flying.
Still unable to breathe, Harry gestured for Hagrid. His heart was racing and his hands were shaking. It felt as though his heart was going to come out of his chest.
"Harry?"
"I'm not feeling well," Harry said. "I might need to go to see Madam Pomprey."
He had to get away from everyone, to calm down and think. He was still panicking after what had happened.
Harry had been so smug and self assured, assuming that he'd always be the target of everything. It hadn't occurred to him that he'd just be a helpless bystander, trapped in the middle of the crowd.
This had to be stopped, or it would happen again. He hadn't seen what had happened to Hermione or Neville. He hoped they survived.
"Malfoy can take yeh," Hagrid said. He gave Malfoy a stern look. "Don't think I didn't see what ye were doin with Buckbeak."
As they staggered off, Malfoy looked at Harry. "Th...thanks Potter."
The first time Harry had come up with some sort of line, but now he didn't have the energy. It was all he could do to keep focused on the slope back up to the school.
Harry shook his head. "I can make it on my own. You don't have to go."
The last think he needed was a Malfoy seeing him in his moment of weakness. If Malfoy communicated this to his father, they'd find a way to use it against him.
"What's wrong with you, Potter?" Malfoy demanded. "You look white as a ghost."
Glancing back at the group inside the corral, Harry realized that in two months time many of them would be dead if he didn't do something. People he thought of as friends, acquaintances...even enemies. Even the people he wanted dead he didn't want to have their souls destroyed.
Maybe Voldemort, but that was just because otherwise he suspected he'd even find a way to come back from the grave just to make Harry's life more difficult.
Harry's heart was slowing down and his breathing was getting easier. Apparently not focusing on the images of the entire student body of Hogwarts being attacked was the right thing to do.
"I'm feeling better," Harry said. "I'll be all right."
They were moving out of sight of the class; the castle looming up ahead. Harry's head still pounded and he could feel a phantom pain in his chest, but he knew it would pass if he just gave it time.
"But what was it?" Malfoy asked.
Harry shook his head. "It doesn't matter now. I'm going to make sure it doesn't matter."
No one else was going to die on his watch.
The first step was finding out who exactly was responsible for placing the dementors in the first place. Harry began making inquiries with the Slytherins who were secretly seeking his favor, and they sent notes back to their families.
The results which came back were clear. Releasing a hundred dementors could have only been authorized by the Minister for Magic himself Cornelius Fudge. No one else had enough political power to even attempt to do that.
The second step was to attempt to contact the man.
Harry sent several owls over the next two weeks, but they always were returned unopened. They smelled of a nauseating perfume, which Harry interpreted as meaning that his letters were being intercepted by a female flunky somewhere.
In the long term, if he found Black on Halloween night it would all go away on its own. However, Harry wasn't willing to bank the lives and souls of all his friends and classmates on the chance that he could somehow subdue a full grown wizard.
He had to be like Voldemort or Dumbledore and have plans within plans. If he didn't everyone would die.
Going to Lupin was his next step.
"It won't involve much more effort than trying to teach me," Harry said. "And it just might save their lives and their souls."
"Most of them probably won't be able to do it," Lupin said.
"But the ones who can will be able to protect their classmates," Harry said. "I'm not sure I'll ever be able to cast a patronus, but if my friends can, I'll at least have a chance."
If half the class had been able to cast patronuses, then the disaster wouldn't have happened.
"This situation with the dementors is a disaster waiting to happen. They aren't feeding them and its only a matter of time before a Hogsmeade weekend turns into a feeding frenzy."
Lupin looked troubled. "There might be something to what you say."
"Give people the option and I'll bet that a lot of them will take you up on it, even if it's not mandatory," Harry said. "You don't even have to meet any more often than you are meeting with me."
"I doubt that anyone your age can learn it," Lupin said. "I only tried with you because of your reputation."
"Let them try," Harry said. "If they can't learn it they aren't any worse off, but if they can...it'll make all the difference in the world."
Lupin reluctantly agreed.
Lupin stared out at the sea of faces in front of him. "I didn't think there would be this many."
Harry had gotten Hermione and Neville to talk to the Gryffindors and he'd talked to the Slytherins. He'd reminded them about how they'd had one of their own snatched away from their doorstep the year before, less than fifty feet from them and how they'd been helpless.
The Hufflepuffs had been easy to convince; they were generally afraid of things anyway and the Ravenclaws were interested in an academic sense. He'd made it a challenge, and the Ravenclaws loved intellectual challenges.
Almost two hundred people were waiting for them.
"We're going to have a bigger venue," Lupin muttered. He began casting an expansion charm to expand the classroom he'd planned to use.
He'd seemingly only expected twenty or thirty students to come, but he'd underestimated the uneasiness the entire class had toward the dementors.
Harry didn't participate. Instead he stood near the boggart, helping to hold it in its dementor shape. Apparently Lupin had a spell that kept the boggart focused on one person instead of multiple people.
Lupin claimed that Harry had already mastered the spell, and Harry did help the other students with their wandwork and pronunciation.
Harry practiced focusing on all his anger and rage, his obsession with survival while standing near the dementor-boggart. While the boggart wasn't able to produce as powerful an effect as a real dementor, he still felt drained and exhausted by the end.
It wasn't until the third class that the first patronus was created, unsurprisingly by Hermione. Hers was an otter.
Surprisingly, the second to master the spell was Malfoy. His patronus was a ferret.
The other students began to succeed one after the other once they saw that it could be done, and eventually three quarters of the class had managed to produce patronuses, although few of them could produce full, corporeal patronuses.
Those, mostly were the students in the upper years, fifth year and above.
It was a sign of Lupin's skill as a teacher, and the urgency that Harry put into the entire proceedings that the students did as well as they did.
Harry could only hope that it would be enough.
"I'd like to see the Minister please," Harry said.
He had purchased a nice set of robes and had used the Weasleys' magical comb just so he looked presentable.
"Do you have an appointment?"
Harry shook his head. "I'm Harry Potter; he'll want to see me."
He'd tried to get an appointment through every means he knew how, but his letter had always been returned with the same sickening sweet perfume on them.
Escaping Hogwarts hadn't been difficult; he'd slipped through one of the secret passages on the map to Hogsmeade, then entered the floo network from Zonkos while under his invisibility cloak.
He'd taken the floo network directly to the Ministry.
"There's a killer after you," the representative frowned. "Where is your escort?"
Harry shrugged. "They're around here somewhere. I need to see the Minister."
He'd never been to the Ministry before and it was much more crowded than he thought it would be. He hadn't realized that there were this many people working in government.
"He's in a conference. I can let you see his second in command, though."
Harry nodded shortly. If that was the best he could do, it would have to do.
He was escorted through a series of halls to a door. According to the plaque on the outside of the door he was about to speak to the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister for Magic.
As the door opened, his eyes were overwhelmed by pinkness. The walls were of pinkish grey porcelain tiles. Pink lace drapes and doilies covered every available surface that wasn't covered in dried flowers. The walls were covered in plates that had paintings of cats on them; cats of every conceivable type.
In the center of the room, behind a highly polished desk sat the closest approximation to a human toad Harry had ever seen.
The woman was wearing a pink tweed outfit that wasn't flattering at all.
Harry stepped into the room uneasily. This wasn't what he had expected from a ministry official, not at all.
"Mr. Potter," the woman began. Her voice was simpering and high pitched. "What could have possibly brought you here during a school day?"
"I'm here to talk about the dementors," Harry began. "They aren't being fed and it's only a matter of time before they are a danger to the students."
"The Ministry has full control of the dementors," the woman said. "A child like you shouldn't be meddling in things he knows nothing about."
Harry stepped closer and he suddenly smelled her perfume. It was cloying and it was the same as had been on his returned letters.
"I know that the Ministry is putting the lives and souls of the children at Hogwarts at risk," Harry said. "All because one murder is targeting one person."
"Ah, but you aren't just any person, are you," the woman said, leaning forward. "You are the hope of the Wizarding world."
Harry scowled. "I'm not that important."
"The Ministry doesn't have the resources to protect you through conventional means, so they have to resort to unconventional means."
Harry took that to mean that dementors didn't ask to be paid.
"Then can you arrange for the dementors to get fed? It's a disaster waiting to happen leaving unfed dementors around children."
Although the woman smiled, it didn't reach her eyes.
Although Harry attempted every argument he could think of over the next half hour, he couldn't get the woman to agree to even one of his demands.
She had him escorted back to school, and he received several detentions from Snape, who didn't look as though he particularly disagreed with what Harry had tried to do. It felt as though the detentions were just a way to placate the Ministry.
Harry decided that enough was enough. He had one more option.
"I can't believe you did this," Hermione was saying. "Aren't you afraid of making an enemy of the Ministry?"
Harry shook his head. "It's too important to worry about that."
Hermione was staring down at the Daily Prophet.
Harry had slipped out again and found his way to the newspaper. He'd met another unpleasant woman, Ms. Skeeter, who'd seemed very interested in what he'd had to say.
He'd given an interview, although he'd refused to allow a picture. She'd been disappointed by that and had tried to get one anyway. He'd almost broken her camera.
"If the Ministry believes in the prophecy, then I am in no danger from Black at all. I am destined to face Voldemort and no one else is going to kill me before then. If the prophecy is not correct, then I am not that important. Why then is the Ministry endangering every child at Hogwarts, body and soul for one child?" Hermione read out loud.
She turned to him and said, "You don't really think you are immortal until you face You-Know-Who, do you?"
Harry shrugged. "It was just an argument to convince the public."
If she only knew, he thought.
"The muggles have a saying, 'Letting the fox guard the hen house,' which is exactly what is happening here. The dementors are not being fed and inside the school is the largest concentration of food that they could ever wish for. It's not a matter of if a disaster will happen, but when." Hermione read out loud.
Harry nodded.
Hermione continued. "You know who has attacked the school several times; by doing this the Ministry is doing the work of the Death Eaters for them."
Perhaps the language had been a little harsh, but Harry had been adamant. This was too important and if he had to shock people into doing the right thing, so be it.
"This is going to cause problems, Harry," Hermione said. "Confronting the Ministry like this. Governments don't like to be threatened."
"What else could I do?" Harry asked. "Nobody was listening."
His hope was that if enough parents were outraged that the government might be pressured into withdrawing the dementors.
He'd made the point in the article that assigning a couple of aurors to watch him full time would be much safer for the public than removing a hundred dementors from Azkaban, making it more likely that even more prisoners would escape.
Pointing out Senior Undersecretary Umbridge had possibly been a mistake, but Harry had resented her and her obstructionism that he hadn't been able to help himself.
"Potter."
Harry looked up from where he was sitting in the library. Snape was standing over him.
"More detentions?"
Snape nodded, although for once there was a slight glimmer of humor in his eyes. Apparently Snape had no more love for the Ministry than Harry did.
The rain and wind were just as bad as Harry had remembered, although by now he'd made sure to learn the charm that kept the rain off his face and clothes. It didn't help the chill wind that kept blowing through.
Harry had learned the warming charm as well, and periodically he would cast it inside his robes, causing a gust of warm air that would inevitably be blown away by the next strong wind that would blow right through his robes.
Despite everything he'd tried, the Minstry hadn't done anything. They'd reassured the public that the children were safer with the dementors than without and they'd painted Harry as being paranoid.
Worse, Harry had spent Halloween eve huddled under his invisibility cloak outside the Gryffindor common room waiting for Sirius Black to show. He never did. Something Harry had done had changed things.
Although Harry had done everything he could to avoid coming today, none of the teachers had been willing to allow him to stay in the castle. He hadn't even managed to get an aisle seat. His protestations that Dumbledore should stay at the Quidditch game in case of an attack were ignored.
After all, if Snape and McGonegall and Lupin weren't enough to deal with Black, they were all in trouble.
Harry had tried to make the best of it. He had managed to get a seat on the top row.
His only hope was that his constant exposure to the boggart dementor left him able to act when the real dementors came. Unknown to the prefects who had escorted him here forcibly, underneath his robes he was wearing the Weasleys' suction cup shoes.
Their products had gotten a lot more reliable over the past two years. If the worst came to worst he planned to go over the back and run down the wall so he could escape. If the shoes failed and he fell, well maybe he'd get another chance to do it over again.
Still, the misery of waiting was worse this time, even if he was physically a little more comfortable. He'd warned Hermione and Neville that he was afraid something might happen. Although they were clearly humoring him, they had stayed near the aisles and close to the top in a part that was less crowded.
Harry had cast strengthening charms on the stands when he had realized that he was going to be forced to come. He didn't know whether they would help much; the spells hadn't been meant to withstand tens of thousands of pounds of panicked children but at least he felt he had done what he can.
As the silence began, Harry closed his eyes.
He'd never prayed before, but all he could do now was pray that things wouldn't turn out the way they had the last time.
People began screaming as the dementors approached.
Harry stood and put his wand to his throat.
"EXPECTO PATRONUM, EXPECTO PATRONUM. STAND AND FIGHT! FIGHT FOR YOUR SOULS AND THOSE OF YOUR FRIENDS! EXPECTO PATRONUM, EXPECTO PATRONUM."
Those closest to the bottom were panicking still, but Harry saw a bright light as a silvery otter burst forth from the stands across the way.
Bless you, Hermione, Harry thought.
"THIS IS WHAT YOU'VE PRACTICED FOR. PROTECT YOUR FRIENDS, PROTECT YOURSELVES! EXPECTO PATRONUM, EXPECTO PATRONUM!"
Silvery light began to emerge from wand after wand. Many of the children, even those who'd managed a solid patronus in the class weren't able to create more than a mist under the influence of the dementors collected aura.
However, as more and more of the mist coalesced, the dementors slowed and stopped.
Seeing this, some of the students who had begun to flee to the to the stands stopped and pulled out their wands.
Harry saw a swan made of silvery light emerge, followed by a shimmering fox. A hare, a doe, and a glittering lynx.
Inspired by the success of their fellows, more and more of the students were turning and trying the spell which would save their lives.
Even the Slytherins, initially more fearful were following suit. Harry saw shimmering snakes flying through the air, interposing themselves between the students and the children.
He saw badgers and dogs and even an aardvark emerge through the wall of shimmering mist generated by those who couldn't manage the full spell.
The dementors began to draw back, a rattling sound in their collected throats.
"THIS IS HOGWARTS AND THIS IS OUR HOME. YOU WILL NOT HAVE US!" Harry shouted, his voice amplified by the spell.
The dementors wailed a frustrated wail and began to fall back, away from the pitch altogether.
Harry felt an unfamiliar feeling busting inside his chest. He'd done it. He'd managed to save everyone and no one had died.
He'd saved them. He'd saved them all.
It was unlike anything he'd ever experienced, and it took him a moment to realize what it was. In his entire life he hadn't ever experienced a single moment like this. This wasn't just happiness, it was joy.
Unbelieving, he pointed his wand and shouted, "EXPECTO PATRONUM."
A silvery, shimmering mongoose emerged from his wand.
It was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
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