Harry Potter, The Jedi That Would Not Die
Chapter 34 – White Knight, Grey Queen
"Right, where were we?" asked Padma.
"We were talking about Neville, Ginny and...Luna was it?" asked Harry.
"Yes."
"Being on this horcrux hunt and the former getting very frustrated about his single status."
"Single?" asked Cho, "Who said anything about Neville being single?"
"Well you said-"
"I said he was getting frustrated with having two horny lesbians sleeping a few feet from him,"
"Or not sleeping as the case may be," added Parvati with a grin.
"Yes, thank you Parvati," Cho added with a groan, before continuing where she had been interrupted. "Far from it in fact, he's engaged too, he's just annoyed that his other half is needed elsewhere."
"Really?" asked Hermione shocked.
"Well good for him," smiled Harry. "Go on, who is he engaged to?"
"No no don't tell us, let me guess," interrupted Hermione in a rare moment of girlish excitement. "Errrmmm. I'm guessing either Hannah Abbott or Susan Bones?"
"Wrong and wrong, though he and Susan were together briefly in fifth year, she also unfortunately did not survive the second battle."
"Well, whose he with then?"
"Daphne."
"Daphne?" asked Harry confused. "Wait, not Daphne Greengrass?"
"The same," returned Parvati.
"The Slytherin Ice Queen?" asked Hermione.
"Yep."
"Parkinson's right hand girl."
"Yep."
"Miss Slytherin Centrefold 1995?"
"Why Potter," came a voice from behind them making the padawans jump, "I never knew you saw me that way, if only I'd known. And by the way it was Miss Slytherin Centrefold 1995 to 1998, though considering my only competition for most of that time was Pansy and Millicent that's not saying a lot."
"Merlin Greengrass don't do that," Hermione gasped as she recovered from the shock.
"She never would have been able to if the two of you had been paying attention to your senses," remarked Aayla, to which Coleman made a sound of agreement.
"Sorry Master," they both replied before turning back to Greengrass who had come around the table and had sat in the vacant seat next to Cho, placing her feet up on the table.
Unlike the other three who were wearing sensible jeans and shirts Daphne was wearing her Hogwarts skirt, but judging from its length it wasn't her most recent one, her Hogwarts shirt but knotted over her stomach and partially undone at the top so that her midriff and a good portion of her cleavage was exposed, her black bra was also clearly visible through it, making for one very provocative image.
"Can someone please explain this as I'm struggling with it?" asked Harry with a screwed up brow, ignoring the overly revealing school girl costume and its contents in front of him. The sight of scantily clad women did not shock him anywhere near as much as it used to do, after being in enough gambling dens with bikini clad dancers and ladies of various other professions and in various other forms of undress he soon got used to such things, having a former slave who loved to wear that sort of outfit as his personnel ranger and a Master who didn't dress that conservatively either also helped contribute to him being quickly cured of the shock that such lack of clothing used to give him.
"It's quite simple," replied Daphne, "The year after you left Draco was informed by his father that he would have to be ready to marry as soon as he left Hogwarts, and being a Pureblood Elitist he did not have an awful lot of options to choose from. In fact there were only about half a dozen girls in the right age bracket with the appropriate blood lines, backgrounds and wealth that fitted the mould. Of course everyone was expecting him to choose Pansy, especially Pansy; her family are almost as powerful and rich as his, she is the girl he talked to the most and she has pretty much the exact same political views. What no one expected to happen was for Draco to actually use his head and think that while she was all the above she had the face of a pig and there might be other more attractive options."
"And he chose you?"
"Unfortunately yes, I mean I expected to have a slightly limited set of options for who I could marry; I knew I could never marry a Weasley or any brothers that Granger had because that would instantly push us out of the Pureblood safety block and make us blood traitors, no offense meant."
"None taken," Hermione replied, seeing that the statement was not intended as insulting, "And for the record unless my parents had hidden any older brothers from me or have had another child in my absence which I highly doubt then I don't have any siblings."
"Noted," nodded Greengrass a bit dismissively, probably as the point was rather irrelevant to her rather than as a snub of having to talk to Hermione. "But getting back to my point I knew I would not be as restricted as Draco and his lot because I would not be forced to marry into the Pureblood Elites."
"Wasn't there always a chance Malfoy might have chosen you?" asked Alema.
"Not really, it never even occurred to my family and me."
"Why is there so much of a rush for wizards and witches to get married so young?" asked Coleman.
"There are several reasons," Greengrass replied, "Firstly there is that fact that there are not a lot of us, even less in the 'acceptable' breeding stock category for Pureblood families and if you don't get in quick all the good options will be gone, and I don't think I am being too immodest to say that I am physically definitely one of the better options. There is also the fact that all the family elders want to guarantee the security of their blood lines and fortunes for another generation, and lastly for young witches specifically there is urgency of being shall I say ...'deflowered'... as soon as is acceptably possible as there are a lot dark rituals that involve spilled virgins blood, which is why most young witches do not wait until marriage to get around that problem, though most of their families prefer to think that their daughters and future daughters-in-laws are 'pure' until their wedding nights. I know I wasn't taking that risk."
"Despite the fact I agree with you Daph," commented Parvati. "That was a little too much info there."
"Soz," she shrugged in apology before turning back to her audience. "Now where was I...Oh yes, Draco took a fancy to me which either meant he was going to try and marry me, I might not be the best political option but I was still completely socially acceptable, or worse he was going to try to get me as his mistress which is something I do not want to even think about."
"Who would," agreed Hermione as she and the other young witches shuddered.
"Precisely, so he went to Uncle Lucius and told him that he wanted me as either. Uncle Lucius accepting his choice slightly disappointed that he had not picked Pansy from a political point of view but not overly so, we think he accepted so easily as it showed that Draco was at last thinking for himself rather than just badly echoing his father's opinions. So Uncle Lucius then went to my dad to make the proposal privately to sound him out and to negotiate the terms before Draco's public proposal to me. As you know the Malfoy's are the de facto head of the Pureblood Elite and you do not say 'no' to them when they are proposing an alliance with your family."
"What happened?" asked Hermione.
"Well my dad flatly refused the idea of me being Draco's mistress thank Merlin, saying that he refused for his family to be considered as un-worthy for marriage."
"It's generally considered that becoming a mistress means you are either buying protection from the wizard's family or are unworthy to marry someone of the wizard's status," interjected Cho.
"Thankfully Uncle Lucius accepted that and after some bargaining it was agreed that I would become Draco's wife."
"How could your parents say yes to that if they don't believe in Pureblood superiority?" asked Hermione.
"I never said they didn't, they generally do believe but accept that some Muggleborns and Half-bloods like you two are as capable as most of us are. I just said they are not as supremacist or as aggressive about it. Anyway it was the best my father could do in the situation; my dad and I both refused to see me as a high class whore for that little ferret and saying no would have been most likely fatal socially, politically and physically. Marriage was the best option my father could negotiate for and was also a very shrewd move on his part."
"How so?"
"Well what you probably don't know is that most Pureblood families have arranged marriages set up for their children not long after they are born and this included the Malfoy and Parkinson families for Draco and Pansy, in most cases it's a safety measure to ensure that someone will be available to marry their child and so continue the line in the event that they cannot find someone better. In the case of Malfoy and Parkinson it was something they all through would happen anyway. Agreeing my hand to Draco meant that the Malfoys would spend months in talks with the Parkinson family in order to negotiate a settlement through their lawyers for the cancelling of the contract which is not something the Parkinsons expected and as such they would fight tooth and claw to keep it in place. One of the convenient laws of that sort of marriage is that there cannot be any other legal claimants to either party at the time of the wedding, so while the Parkinsons still clung to the old contract we could not get married. As soon as the engagement was announced my family got a leg up in terms of power and prestige and best of all it provided me and my family with protection from Pansy and her family, who we were understandably not very popular with just in case they tried any underhand tactics to get the contract put back in place by killing me or any other form of retaliation. It also gave my dad almost a year to think of a way out of it and as Minister Bones was already planning her sweeping changes to the law it was hoped that by the time the wedding was scheduled either the Malfoy's would have been stripped of lots of their power or that we would be able to find a legal way out of it."
"What did happen?"
"Well my father made sure to include a disloyalty and chastity clause in the contract, meaning that in the year or more between the announcement of the engagement until the contract with the Parkinsons was settled and until the required engagement period concluded prior to the wedding neither of us could be with anyone else or each other intimately or even attempt to be so, as such I was protected from Draco's wandering hands to an extent and if that clause was broken by Draco we could have legally and properly cancelled the contract and collected a large compensation fee without any risk of retaliation. My father and I never spoke about it when he showed me a copy of the contract, that way we were legally innocent of any form of plotting to break it but we both knew that that was the key to getting out of the contract; by making Draco attempt to force himself upon me or be with someone else voluntarily without being coerced."
"So all the way through sixth year she dressed more like she is now," explained Padma. "Not this extreme of course during school hours or outside of the Slytherin Common Room but sexually enough to make Draco rather frustrated which was very evident to everyone in the entire school, though most of us did not know why at the time as it hadn't been officially announced yet and subsequently the details of the contract where kept secret."
"It took until Christmas of sixth year for him to finally try something, he somehow came up with the bright idea that if I did not know we had been intimate then the contract would not be broken, whether that was because he didn't know it was magically binding or because of stupidity we will likely never know. Either way, just before we broke up for Christmas while everyone else was busy packing their stuff to take home he asked me up to the Owlery and brought a bottle of wine with him to allow us to say goodbye privately. When he opened the wine I detected the slightest whiff of potions ingredients; it was a lust potion. He was obviously trying to make me get tipsy and intoxicated on the potion so that I would be with him then try and wipe my memory of it afterwards while I was suffering the after effects of the alcohol, that way even if the memory charm didn't work and I remembered I would be the one who initiated it and in his mind I would not dare risking jeopardising of the most important day of my life by mentioning it to anyone."
"I trust it didn't work?" asked Windu.
"No, I had made sure to have some simple neutralising potions in me all year, expecting him to try something. Unfortunately I did not expecting Draco to go for anything more than the most basic potion and again unfortunately I was wrong and he managed to find one that the antidotes I had in me did not work on, unfortunately I did not discover this until I had already drunk some."
"Hang on;" Harry interrupted. "I thought you said it didn't work?"
"Oh, the potion worked but his plan didn't, as soon as I felt myself not considering him as the slimy self-centred prat I knew he was I knew I was in trouble, as such I did the only thing I could think off and drunk as much of the wine as I could."
"What!" Hermione exclaimed, "Why?"
"Firstly to make sure that there was a bigger chance that the potion would still be in my blood stream the next morning so that I could prove he had done something, I had owled my father earlier in the day saying Draco had asked for us to meet, which was not something he did very often so I was instantly suspicious, so my dad had planned to get me completely medically checked when I got home to check nothing had gone on that had been covered up. And secondly was because I knew I could not fight the potion and I was hoping that if the alcohol was not enough to make me pass out I might at least be able to make sure that I could not remember what happened."
"That's a horrifying thought," remarked Cho, "Being unconscious dressed like that with only Draco Malfoy near you."
All the girls shuddered in agreement.
"It wasn't my best plan I admit but I was drugged and slightly intoxicated so my brain was not at one hundred percent at the time, I did not have a lot of options."
"So what did happen?" asked Harry.
"As far as I was concerned a miracle," she replied. "I had got to the point where I was very drunk and half way between being completely floppy and being just malleable to do things with."
"Can you please stop making us think about that please," begged Hermione, screwing up her eyes in an attempt to remove the disturbing mental image. "I don't like thinking about Draco's wandering hands as it is and you talking about him doing it to someone while they were helpless is going to be haunting me forever now."
"Soz Granger, anyway just as...Soz again, you are going to be made to think of it at least once more I'm afraid. Just as Draco's was starting to undress me, he never got to my underwear thankfully, Neville came up to the tower, he was sending his owl home a day ahead of him or something and came across Draco doing what he was doing to a barely conscious me. Now I don't know about the rest of the school but I never really paid a lot of attention to Neville before that as he was generally considered a bit of a weak Pureblood but apparently he can get VERY defensive of women when he needs to be and took instant offense to what was going on."
"What did he do?" asked Harry shocked.
"Well, let's just say he might not have been as skilled at knowing as many spells as Draco is but he is capable of putting a lot more power behind them when he wants to. When Draco was sent to the hospital wing the disarmer he had cast against him was powerful enough to cause him to crack his skull as he impacted the wall."
"Way to go Nev," laughed Harry.
"Of course within six hours both our fathers and Neville's grandmother were present at Hogwarts and Lucius was of course trying to claim that first it was Neville who got me intoxicated somehow and that Draco merely interrupted him having his wicked way and that he somehow managed to disarm him, then that I was a whore who would sleep with anyone, then a drunk who his son was going to be gracious enough to put straight, basically every ploy he could think of to put the blame on anyone but Draco and it worked right up until the point that Madam Pomfrey determined what it was I had been given, it was determined who had brought the drugged bottle of wine, which two of us had it in our systems and after the only one of the three of us to refuse to take a truth potion was Draco, at which point the Headmaster kindly let us use his pensive and with some instruction on how to use it all of us watched both mine and Neville's version of events."
"Draco was expelled on the spot," continued Cho, "As well as being given five years in Azkaban for attempted rape and breach of contract, we don't know how much Lucius had to bribe anyone to get that reduced."
"In addition as he had broken the contract by trying to force me into intercourse forty percent of the Malfoy fortune became mine and my families overnight."
"Hang on, let me get this straight," concluded Harry. "You got Malfoy expelled and imprisoned, deposed Pansy as the head of the Slytherin girls by being paired with Draco, got forty percent of the Malfoy fortune and all it cost you was a bit of exposed skin at the last moment and presumably a bad hang over."
"And several months of having to put up with Draco's slobbering kisses, unwanted touches and having to see him a hell of a lot more than I would have liked to," she emphasised. "But it gets better; as Draco was publicly declared an attempted rapist of a respectable Pureblood family heiress. Don't give me that look Potter, just accept that certain portions of the wizarding community will take that more seriously considering my blood status. His families control on power was rocked to the core; there was a brief mad power struggle to pick up the pieces that had fallen off the pile of Malfoy dominance, they managed to hold onto a lot of their power but their name is now shunned by many and the Parkinsons in particular took advantage of the situation and managed to replace them as de facto heads of the Pureblood Elites. My family also did very well out of it too, as well as increasing our wealth by several hundred percent we also created a reputation for ourselves that we would not let other people cross us."
"So how did you and Neville actually get together?"
"Well, after the incident was over he was treated like a hero by most of the school as well as the Daily Prophet, those that hated Malfoy loved him for helping to catch him literally with his trousers down, those that hated the idea of rape rallied behind him and of course all the girls started looking on him as their white knight. It was like having you back here Potter; he was the nation's new hero."
"How did he cope with it?" asked Harry.
"He was incredibly overwhelmed. I should not laugh but it was so funny watching him try to cope with his new found status as school celebrity and heartthrob."
"I know how that feels," mumbled Harry, to which he quickly elaborated at the looks he got from the other former students. "The first bit, not the heartthrob bit."
"Anyway, I hadn't had the chance to thank him after what had happened and although it didn't go to my plan it ended up a lot better all things considered so I planned to find him and do so, this was once school resumed so everyone had had time to hear the news. I came out into the courtyard to see a throng of girls surrounding him all arguing and trying to ask him out, I gathered later it had started with Brown and Parv here trying to ask at exactly the same time."
"Don't look at me like that Herm," accused Parvati, "I remember what you were like with Lockhart, you were just as bad as I was. Besides we were all a little in awe of Neville then and there was a mad rush as we all wanted to nab him first."
"Anyway," continued Daphne. "I came upon this sight and saw poor Neville standing in the midst of this looking half terrified that he was at the centre of it. So I decided to bluff everyone."
"What did you do?"
"I walked straight up to the throng and used some subtle magic to nudge the people off balance that were in my way so I could squeeze through the created gap. I then said something like 'Nev darling, I missed you so much over the holidays', followed immediately by planting a scorching kiss on his lips that was enough to curl anyone's toes, before taking his arm and leading him back through the gap I created saying something like 'Come on dear, it's a little busy out here, let's go somewhere we can be alone so I can show you how much I missed you'."
"I imagine that stunned Neville a bit?"
"Just a bit yes, he barely reacted at all for at least thirty seconds after the kiss which was enough time for me to guide him into an unused classroom before he regained his senses, but Nev being Nev he was so flummoxed and shocked by the whole thing he was barely able to say words let alone string a sentence together. It was so sweet that I decided to take pity on him. I basically told him there were four choices when we left that room; First we could pretend it was just a ploy to get him out of the crowd and we could then go back to probably never speaking a few words to each other for the rest of our time here. Two, the first bit still applied but we try to be friends instead of enemies by default of political views. Three, we could pretend we were a couple just to keep the crowds off of him until things died down again then revert to being friends, I thought that was the least I could do for him considering and then fourthly and lastly I said that we could leave this room as a serious couple with the promise of lots more equally good kisses plus more still to come with an attempt at a full relationship."
"Had you planned to ask that?" asked Hermione.
"No, it shocked me when I thought of it part way through his attempts to speak before I gave him the options, I don't know if it was just that he was not Draco, because I wanted to say thank you to him, that it was the first kiss I had had in five months that I actually wanted and enjoyed or whether it was because he had defended the honour of someone who as far as school rivalries go was an enemy henchwoman, but I asked and after several long minutes thinking, I insisted he not rush his answer, after a good ten minutes in which every possible emotion crossed his face he decided to try for option four. A few months later I contacted my father and asked if he would object if I were to consider being with Neville permanently and after he had met him and spoken to him a couple of times he said he had no objections either as a father or politically as Nev was from an old Pureblood family who he had proved to be magically powerful, noble and honourable, not to mention willing to stand up to the at that time the most powerful Pureblood family. So my father spoke to Nev's Gran and she also agreed with the match and after she tactfully brought up the subject with him he brought it up with my father and he proposed with my mother's engagement ring. When he went off on the horcrux hunt he begged me not to try to follow him as he needed to know I was safe so I volunteered to stay here and use my family's contacts to gather intel for the side. As such we are forced to remain separate until the hunt his over and he returns triumphant to take my hand."
The four younger women in the room sighed at the romantic story, prompting Harry and the other jedi to roll their eyes and have various reactions to the girl's swooning.
"I think we have gone about a mile off track this time," interrupted Harry. "We were speaking about the other horcruxes."
"Yes, do we know if they found any more?" asked Alema.
"We haven't seen them for a while; the last time they came back this way was when they came by for some basilisk fangs to destroy the locket that Mr and Mrs Lupin recovered."
"Well now we know what happened to them," concluded Windu. "What happened to the rest of the school after and during the first battle?"
"Well when the aurors attacked the school the entire senior student population minus a few purebloods turned out to defend it as well as all the teachers and a lot of others who had been called in by McGonagall to help. The aurors were not ready for the numbers they had against them and despite the student not being trained for that sort of fighting we won the fight decisively though there were still heavy casualties on both sides. A few hours into the battle Umbitch turned up and demanded our surrender, not quite realising how badly outnumbered the aurors were. Flitwick as the new Acting Headmaster told her very firmly that they would not but that they needed to talk as there was no reason for them to fight as her information was incorrect. She thought, or at least she said she thought that Dumbledore led the attack on the Ministry, it was only once we produced Dumbledore's and then McGonagall's bodies to prove they had been dead long before the attack that she grudgingly admitted that her information was wrong and that she would keep a very close eye on Hogwarts. We think she probably would not have called off the attack but the aurors could see that they had attacked on bad information and as many had students at Hogwarts they were only too happy to call off the attack and she could not do it without their support."
"The castle was badly damaged," resumed Cho. "But still mostly intact, but it did not stay that way for long. An election was scheduled for a few weeks later, Umbitch was sure she would get re-elected but she got outvoted."
"Who by?"
"Lucius Malfoy."
"Oh Merlin, are you telling me Lucius Malfoy is the Minister of Magic?"
"Yes, he unfortunately still had enough political power to achieve that and he of course he then started undoing all the laws that Madam Bones had brought in to prevent corruption, Pureblood supremacy and to balance the rights of all magical creatures."
"This by the way was after my engagement was broken off with Draco," added Daphne. "I have no doubt that if Uncle Lucius had been the Minster at the time I would not have got out of it at all."
"Anyway, it only took him a few months but he started slowly trying to enforce controls over Hogwarts, assigning new teachers to teach new subjects, changing the curriculum, enforcing curfews and education decrees all without the permission of the Headmaster Flitwick. The Headmaster of course had to accept them as the Board of Governors was also controlled by Malfoy, but it got to the point where he and Deputy Headmaster Snape-"
"Snape!" both the padawans exclaimed.
"He was the next most senior teacher. They both agreed that enough was enough when he tried to have some of the Muggleborn teachers expelled from the castle as unfit to teach on grounds of ancestry."
"That's ridiculous," accused Aayla.
"We know but it was all a part of these new Pureblood biased laws, the same time he brought that decree into place he also announced a law that stated that only Pure and Half-bloods could possibly have magic naturally and any supposed Muggleborns must really be Muggles who have used dark potions to steal magic from true wizards and witches."
"Hang on," interrupted Harry, "Why would Snape oppose that directive?"
"We found out that he's a half blood himself, it was only his Pureblood parent and his friendship with Malfoy Senior that would have allowed him to keep his position and that was far too fragile of a position for him to accept."
"Are you saying Malfoy made it illegal to have the wrong parents?" asked Aayla, not even believing what they were being told.
"Exactly, it led to mass panic as Muggleborns were rounded up by the Inquisitors."
"Who are the Inquisitors?" asked Harry.
"That's the legalised name for Death Eaters who were all pardoned for any past crimes as they were working in the 'best interest' of the Wizarding World. The effort was led and overseen by the new Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot Lord Vol- Vol-...damn it. Lord You-Know-Who and the new head of the Auror Corp and the person responsible for bringing the so called 'Blood-Thieves' to trial; Inquisitor General Delores Umbridge."
"Oh no."
"Oh yes, there was a mass exodus as Muggleborns went into hiding or fled the country, only those that agreed to turn in other Muggleborns or those that agreed to serve as reserve aurors were spared from Azkaban."
"That's despicable," commented Windu, his usual blank Council Member mask being replaced by one of focused concentration and suppressed anger.
"When Flitwick and Snape stood up to the decision, the Inquisitors led the Aurors and the now vastly swelled numbers of the Reserve Auror Corp against Hogwarts. This battle was nowhere near as in our favour of the last one. You-Know-Who himself directed the attack along with Inquisitor General Umbitch. Thankfully seeing that this battle was imminent the Professors had all the younger students evacuated and any older students that wanted to leave could go with them. The battle was fierce and we were of course driven back quickly as their numbers overcame us, that was when Fred and Katie... The teachers stayed behind with them and a few others to cover the retreat but where eventually forced back, many were arrested including Flitwick. Snape died at the hands of Bellatrix Lestrange protection a few younger students who never heard the call to leave."
"Snape dying a hero...That's not something I ever imagined."
"Say what you like about him Potter, and we all did in our time," commented Daphne. "He may have been a terrible teacher but he was an excellent duellist and was willing to die to protect his students."
"Many of the teachers and older students were captured," continued Cho, "A few of us who had taken it upon ourselves to form our own self-taught Defence Group when Snape took over the DADA position..."
"Which he was just as bad at teaching as Potions," interjected Padma.
"Yes, managed to stay together. It was during that fight that an inquisitor sent a cloud of tiny metal filings at me; I managed to slow them down so that they did not go straight through me, but they still penetrated most of my exposed skin at least a centimetre deep, which unfortunately included my eyes. Some of the filings got into my eye sockets and although Padma was able to use some spells to turn them into water so that they ran out of my eyes the damage had already been done."
"Cho was of course unable to fight and was almost unconscious from the involuntary acupuncture so we tried to find cover and ended up in the girls bathroom above us. Some of the inquisitors tried to come in a few minutes later to see if we had gone that way but they ran into Moaning Myrtle who was not overly happy at her home being attacked and started violently flooding the bathroom and had recruited Peeves into helping to repel them."
"Peeves being helpful," replied Hermione, not believing what she was being told. "Now I have heard everything."
"He might be a joker but he like the ghosts and the portraits had no desire to see their castle invaded and did all they could to help the defenders. When the inquisitors had been driven out of the bathroom and we emerged from the stalls we had been hiding in we rapidly started trying to come up with ideas what to do next and surprisingly it was Myrtle who came up with the answer. She floated over to the sinks and hissed something that made them move exposing the tunnel we came down earlier."
"I didn't know she was a parselmouth?" exclaimed Harry.
"She's not, but she heard another student enter and leave the Chamber both before and after she died and then you showed her where the entrance actually was, she had plenty of time to learn how to mimic the sound once she knew what it did. She instructed us to hide down here; she then sealed the tunnel and came back to get us when it was safe to emerge. We had to stay down here for over a week which was not overly pleasant as you can imagine but she got the House Elves who escaped the battle to start bringing us food and supplies and helped us make is at least hygienic enough to start treating our wounds."
"What happened then?"
"Well, when we emerged the castle was as you see it now, the Inquisitors had ransacked the place and destroyed much more than was necessary. We were told by the ghost and the portraits, most of who had thankfully survived that they had tried to conduct repairs on the castle so that You-Know-Who and the Inquisitors could use it as their base but the castle refused to be repaired."
"How can the castle refuse to be repaired?" asked Coleman.
"Hogwarts isn't just any old building Master," explained Hermione. "It's alive, parts of it move, it's full of magic and its connected to it."
"We later found out from the portraits, many of which had been saved by the house elves, that Hogwarts did not recognise them as its proper residence and as such refused to cooperate with them," continued Daphne, "Doors slammed in front of them, rubble shifted when they walked over it, stones fell when they passed underneath etc. It took them a week and a lot of anger from both Umbitch and Y.K.W of which some of the inquisitors bore the brunt before they decided to give up and leave. When they cleared out we were signalled to emerge and after a period of shock and adjustment some of us decided to try to contact our families and friends. Some of us left to go to them but some of us who either could not get to our parents or did not have them to go back to decided to stay at Hogwarts and to set up a sanctuary here to protect those that could not go home or that were actively being sought by the enemy. We consulted with the Headmasters Portraits as they were the only authority of any kind in the school and they agreed that it was a good idea and it was mutually agreed that the Chamber as one of the most secret places in the castle was the best place for it. They also explained to us how to hide the Sanctuary so that only those that knew that it was there would be able to see it."
"They also explained how to get around one great weakness in the fidelius charm in that if the secret keeper dies usually all the people that know of the secret become the new secret keepers, but by having two or more original secret keepers and as long as one remained permanently in the Sanctuary where it was safe, even if the other was killed the secret would still be safe."
"What about...'persuasion'?" asked Alema tactfully.
"You can never be forced to reveal a fidelius charm secret using truth potions or the imperious curse, but to cover all options just in case the four who know this secret, that's the four of us by the way, was coerced we took a rather controversial decision."
"What?..." asked Harry slowly, none of the jedi liking the tone that the last sentence had been delivered in.
"We always knew it was a possibility that for example Padma and I could be captured," explained Parvati, "And the obvious thing to do there is threaten to hurt her to get me to reveal the secret or vice versa, so we all took wizarding oaths that for the duration of this war until You-Know-Who, Umbitch, Malfoy and the Inquisitors are defeated that if any of us were in anyway coerced or forced into revealing the secret as soon as we start to speak our magic will build up and cause us to explode."
"What!" shouted all the jedi at once.
"Whose bright idea was that?" demanded Harry.
"Mine actually," replied Daphne.
"Are you insane?"
"No Granger I'm not, but it was the most logical thing to do."
"How in Merlin's name do you work that out?"
"Well if we are captured its highly likely that we will be tortured and it's likely the torture will be so bad that we will want to die, as such it provides us with an instant way out if it gets to be too much and it will hopefully mean we take a few inquisitors with us."
"We didn't take this decision lightly Herm," assured Parvati. "But if you had the choice between months of torture and worse, possibly longer followed by a slow death wouldn't you take an instant way out that would likely take some of the bastards who were going to do that to you with you, what would your choice be?"
"I...," she attempted, but words completely failed her.
"Precisely, it's a no win situation, besides we are not forced into taking the decision it just gives us a way out if we need it."
"Anyway," continued Padma, "As we were the four most senior people left at Hogwarts the portraits agreed that we should be the keepers and that they would help us in any way they could. We started with the house elves help of course by draining the water from this room and creating us places to eat, sleep, places for stores, and considering the great loss of life a mortuary was necessary as well. That took us a week or so, we also asked the portraits and the ghosts to set a guard around the school which was just as well as it seems the Inquisitors have been ordered to check over Hogwarts every few days, which is why we ambushed you, we thought you were them deciding to do a really detailed inspection for once instead of a quick once over. Any way, we then sent the house elves and the portraits out to look for anyone who was in danger or that was trying to hide etcetera and then direct them to come to a place where we could meet and after subjecting them to truth potions, getting them to swear wizards oaths regarding which side they were on and verifying they were telling the truth we brought them back here for safety, we now have about one hundred and fifty people down here, plus a few dozen more at a couple of other hidden locations inside the castle for the wounded and the ones we still aren't that sure about."
"I'm surprised some of the adults haven't tried to take charge from the four of you?" asked Hermione. "No offense but considering you are only just alumni I would have thought that some of the older adults would not have taken to kindly to that.
"A few did," answered Daphne. "Ironically they were some of my less 'accepted' Pureblood cousins, very traditional to the point where they believed that women are second class citizens and so backward that they believe revolutions were too revolutionary to be a part of. Anyway, the ghosts and the portraits didn't take kindly to it when they stated that they were taking over as we were not suitable to lead. After a good ten minutes of arguing, that is they argued with the ghosts and portraits not us, we were beneath arguing with, the Bloody Baron decided he had had enough of their attitude and got Peeves to throw water balloons at them until they decided to behave like adults, it was the most fun I'd had in months."
"Besides spending time in broom closets with Neville," added Pad with a wink to the blushes of some of the others.
"Well obviously. Anyway, the Headmasters Portraits then told them very firmly that in the absence of a proper command structure of teachers that control of the castle was at the discretion of the magical items and beings in it, of which the Headmasters Portraits have the casting vote on all issues."
"My cousins then tried stating that in the absence of any full adults they were the de facto leaders of any group at Hogwarts and that objects could have no say in the matter," continued Padma.
"So the portraits explained that it was written in the Hogwarts charter as set down by the Founders that the Headmasters Portraits had such power and that they were welcome to try and get the castle to cooperate with their new theory as to who was in charge but just to remember what happened when the Inquisitors tried to do things to Hogwarts that it did not want to do. Plus, if they wanted to talk like that then the Headmasters Portraits were the de jure owners of Hogwarts in the absence of appointed teachers which therefore meant that they could appoint its new de jure staff which they then did," smiled Cho. "They decided that I was to be Headmistress, Parvati the Head of Gryffindor House and Deputy Headmistress, Padma Head of Ravenclaw House and Daphne Head of Slytherin House."
"I suppose congratulations are in order then," replied Windu.
"Thank you Master Windu, but until we have a few more people with teaching experience so we can resume some limited classes with the few children and students of the old Hogwarts the entire school leadership issue is rather academic really, if you'll excuse the turn of phrase."
"You intend to start teaching then?" asked Coleman.
"We feel we should," replied Padma. "Even if the teachers and students are all dead, captured, turned or fled we feel that we should resume teaching as soon as possible, even if it is just simple classes like charms, transfiguration and duelling. There are several adults here who have expressed an interest in teaching, not including ourselves so we think it's viable."
"Well, now we know what's going on here," concluded Harry. "So just so summarise, Voldemort, Malfoy and this Umbridge woman control Wizarding Britain, the most powerful force for good is dead, all the teachers are either dead or captured, all our friends are either dead, captured or in hiding and the future of the Wizarding Britain rests on the shoulders of an orphaned boy and two of his friends."
"Sounds familiar," remarked Hermione.
"So..." asked Greengrass. "What's the plan?"
"Plan...What plan?" asked Alema.
"Well are you seriously going to just come here, hear our story then fly away again?"
"Well..."
"Of course not," interrupted Hermione. "We must help."
"Padawan," warned Coleman, sending a small gesture towards Master Windu who was watching her with a raised eyebrow.
"Oh, sorry Master, but we're not are we? We can't just leave things as they are...Can we?"
Windu said nothing for a moment before turning to Cho and the others.
"As you are not members of the Republic and as this is technically an internal matter we should not interfere...but as it's possible that our previous presence here and its after effects may have contributed in some way to this situation and as it's in the defence of innocents from discrimination...We will help you."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry for the delay, it's been a busy month, I haven't been writing a lot of late, but finally got around to getting this one ready to post.
Some of you might recognise the name of this chapter as being the title of a Harry/Pansy story by Jeconais, one of my all-time favourite fanfiction authors and stories. The title of this is just a little tip of the hat to his mastery of writing; also it seemed oddly appropriate when thinking about Neville and Daphne.
As for Ginny & Luna and Neville & Daphne, I just wanted to throw something more light hearted into this chapter given how serious and sad the rest of this sequence were. As well as explaining what's been happening to Malfoy junior during the intervening time. Enjoy.