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Warning: There is brief mention of off-camera sexual assault in this chapter.

Chapter 39: The Home Guard, Holland, and Hogsmeade

Wednesday, July 11, 3:00pm
Palace at Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, Scotland

That Rongo the Maori Sorcerer wasn't much of a talker didn't mean that Harry Potter suffered for lack of conversation as the two monitored the aftermath of the Garden Party assault from the Palace rooftop. 

Hermione had returned to London to brief the Prime Minister, and was using her Art Club badge to ask for updates as she presented a hastily assembled brief.  Wally used Harry’s MI-5 ¾ issued earpiece to ask for advice as he led the Muggle incident commanders who were minding the Ministry Obliviators and sanitizing the field of battle. Chatter over the handset of an EMP-hardened walkie-talkie that hung around Harry’s neck tracked the Army’s evacuation of the Queen to Balmoral Castle via helicopter gunship. And the mobile phone with “push-to-talk” capabilities that was clipped to Harry’s sporran was constantly going off, as the TPOMS squadron and those who were repairing the Parliament building phoned in. 

Rongo found the cross talk across different platforms amusing, and took pity on the Queen’s Wizard by pointing towards whichever device was screaming for Harry’s attention at any point in time.

Chirp-chirp

“Harry?”

The distracted wizard followed Rongo’s finger pointing, and pulled his mobile from his belt.

“Potter here...go ahead Fred.”

“We think that we're done repairing the party-mint building, but...can you get the fog lifted so that you can check our work?”

Harry turned towards Rongo, and got a head nod confirmation that he had heard the request.

“Copy that…should have what you need in a few seconds.”

As Rongo communed with the clouds and arranged for the fog to lift, Harry looked across the street to where Rookwood’s Reductos had done damage. The revealed structure appeared to be whole, but did not look quite right. All of the odd angles and “organic” asymmetrical elements of the complex that had been compared to “a scattered heap of leaves and twigs” were gone, and replaced by rectilinear lines and boxy shapes.

Harry swore under his breath.  Or at least he thought it was under his breath, until Hermione frantically asked over the the open line on his Art Club badge, "What's wrong, Harry?"

"They've fixed the Parliament building a little too well, I'm afraid."

"What do you mean?"

"Hold on, Hermione...Fred?"

"Yeah, Lord G?"

"What in Merlin's name are you doing over there...it doesn't at all look like it's supposed to."

"It isn't?"

"No, it isn't...weren't you using Reparos?"

"Erm...yeah, we were, but we thought they weren't working right, because there were all of these curves, and odd angles and loose ends."

"Fred?"

"Yes, Harry?"

"There were supposed to be curves, odd-looking angles and pieces hanging out in strange places."

"Really?"

Harry sighed, and called Wally with a request to have somebody who knew how the Parliament building was supposed to look like sent across the street. He then turned towards Rongo, only to find that he was already bringing the clouds back down.

“Thanks,” said Harry. At the sight of the Maori’s head shaking, he added, “Yeah, I thought it looked better after Fred’s improvements as well.”

“Lord G?”

“Go ahead, Wally.”

“The Japanese Wizard that’s been fixing up the trees has something he wants you to look at.”

“Roger that, Wally,” he replied, as he reached for his rucksack. “Alert air control that I’m going to fly down.”

“Going to ride side-saddle on your broom?”

Harry snorted as he looked down at his bright red kilt. There was ample opportunity to tease Wally, but it wasn’t the right place or time.

“Just do it, Wally.”

The Queen’s Wizard ignored the witty retort as he pulled a full-sized broomstick from his never-full rucksack, shouldered the pack, and swung a leg over the broom handle.

It was a more of a controlled fall than flight as Harry swooped down to the Emperor’s Wizard’s position in front of the man-eating tree. As he jumped to the ground, he asked, “What’s up, Sensei?”

Matsuhisa chuckled at the younger wizard’s salutation and pointed towards a wand that lay at the base of the tree.

“I was repairing the arrow damage when I spotted that.”

Harry nodded.

“Wonder if it was dropped by our tree climber?”

“Would you like to find out?”

“Erm, sure…do you have a way to determine spell usage from a wand?”

“No,” the Shinto priest replied, “But I can ask the tree to spit out its food.”

Harry looking up at the tree’s limbs and decided, “Let’s make sure that the ground is cleared of evidence first.”

A sweep of the area revealed nothing of interest, other then a Muggle candy bar wrapper that, according to Matsuhisa, displayed a weak magical aura. Thinking that rather odd, Harry badge-called Tonks, who had been sorting through the personal effects of the dead and captured Death Eaters at Edinburgh Castle. She jumped to Harry’s location and confirmed that the attackers also had charmed candy wrappers in the pockets of their robes. Afraid that it might be a touch-activated portkey to the bottom of the sea, Tonks levitated the wrapper into an Auror-issue evidence bag.

“Are you ready for the…how do you say that which a cow chews on?” asked the Japanese wizard.

Harry snorted as he and Tonks took more than a few steps away from the tree trunk.

“Cud,” he then replied.

Not wishing to be in the splatter range himself, the Emperor’s Wizard moved to the back side of the tree to avoid the mass of pulpy flesh and shattered bone that fell to the ground.

“Thanks,” said Harry, as he tried not to flinch at the smell. He picked up a stick and started to poke at the body, before realizing where that stick likely came from. Harry paused, and nodding up towards the tree asked, “Would it be upset that I’m using this branch?”

The Japanese wizard smiled thinly and shook his head. “It is polite of you to ask, but the spirit within the tree has no sense of ownership or connection to its severed parts.”

“Good,” replied Harry, as he poked into the collapsed chest and fished out a pair of omnioculars.

“Looks like the protective charms on the object worked a little too well for this bloke,” Tonks noted. She then used Scourgify on the omnioculars before lifting them up to her eyes.

“Are they still operable?”

“I think so,” Tonks replied, after twisting the various knobs and levers. She then added, “It would have been nice if they’d been….yes!”

Tonks passed the viewing device over to Harry and said, “There’s recorded playback…shows what the DEs were looking at before they attacked.”

The Queen’s Wizard immediately put the viewing device from his eyes.

“Palace in the background…Parade Grounds in between….”

Harry lowered the omnioculars and looked to the East.

“From one of those houses beyond the grounds, I’d wager,” he announced. The charmed field glasses were then raised once more, and Harry fiddled with the adjustments until the omnioculars offered a magnified field of view.

“Damn,” he muttered. “Some of those houses have swing sets in their rear gardens.”

The Queen’s Wizard threw the omniocular’s carrying strap over his head and yelled “Up!” at his broomstick. One leg was over the handle before Tonks had the chance to grab his arm.

“Where do you think you’re going, Harry?”

“Need to find out which house, Tonks…Death Eaters and children’s toys aren’t a good combination.”

“But it could be a trap!”

“You think that they’d use a nearby location for a safe house to escape to?”

“Erm….”

“That’s what I thought.”

“But…it could be a booby-trap. Don’t go half-cocked on your own…you’ve got people.”

“And they’re all busy…well, most of them are.”

Tonks rolled her eyes and hiked her Potter plaid skirt up to her thighs.

“Scoot up, then, and at least pull-up short so that I can check for trip-wire wards,” she demanded, as she jumped onto the broom behind Harry.

Expecting the need to also placate the Emperor’s Wizard, Harry turned…and spied a snow monkey standing where Matsuhisa had been.

Too anxious not to take the transformation and the monkey’s jump onto his shoulder in stride, Harry shook his head and warned Wally that he was making another flight. He then told both Tonks and the monkey to hold on tight as he sped across the Parade Grounds.

With the wind rushing past his ears, the Queen’s Wizard didn’t hear Wally’s frantic calls out to the Muggle defensive units not to fire as he buzzed by their heads.

oo00OO00oo

3:30pm, Amsterdam Central Station, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Percy Weasley’s treatment in the hands of Dutch immigration officials had less to do with where he was from than how he arrived…wearing only Y-fronts.

More than a few foreign wizards had heard wild stories about beautiful Dutch Muggle women with loose morals, and traveled to the Netherlands in search of a good time. Having arrived at the portkey terminal dressed only in his shorts, Percy just seemed more eager than most.

The Dutch magical community didn’t care for the stereotypical stories…it led to Dutch witches being harassed almost as much as their Muggle counterparts, and created all sorts of breach of secrecy issues within Amsterdam’s Red Light District. But there were many within the country who profited from this type of “vacation travel,” so the Dutch Ministry of Magic had long ago come upon a practical compromise. Sex-starved foreign wizards were allowed into the country, but only if they paid a dear price.

There were port arrival tariffs, visa processing fees, costly medical examinations, mandatory tuition payments for a “Muggle sex world orientation” class, required currency exchanges as horrific exchange rates…the list went on and on. Sex-junket wizards had to wear a magical tracking bracelet, so that they would be linked to any attempts to magically coerce Muggle women, or to memory charm prostitutes into thinking that they’d already been paid. And most dear, from a financial standpoint, was a 5,000 galleon “departure deposit,” refunded only if a wizard left the country within the visa-permitted time window and through a sanctioned immigration station.

The Special Assistant to the Minister’s Diplomatic Passport only helped so far…he would have been able to avoid almost all of this hassle, but only if he had voluntarily answered questions about his reasons for travel whilst under Veritaserum. That wasn’t an option for him, so three hours and several thousands of galleons later, Percy was escorted out into the Muggle part of Amsterdam’s Central Station, dressed in an ill-fitting (and terribly overpriced) tracksuit and trainers.

Percy headed straight towards the head of a rank of cars for hire, handed a written street address to the driver, and climbed into the rear bench. The focus he gave towards the Muggle buskers and bicyclists that he spied out the side window was lost when the red-haired wizard realized that the car was heading towards the Red Light District, despite his written requests. He complained loudly, only to be told that the street address that he’d given was in the very heart of the Gedoogzone. That shut Percy up, enough that he didn’t bother to argue when the driver demanded twice what was recorded on the fare box.

The small row house looked like most of the others on that street…except, of course, for those buildings that had large street-level windows framed with red neon, and scantily-dressed women trying to entice customers from the other side. A man on a mission, the Special Assistant to the Minister resolutely ignored the ample display of Muggle flesh and focused instead on the small sign that was placed in the house’s window:

Vanderwood and Son, Charms Masters
Fine Hiders of Infidelity Since 1325

Wondering what exactly the sign meant, but taking note of the name and words “Charms Masters,” Percy knocked on the door, and was quickly shown into the study of the a white-bearded wizard who looked almost as old as Dumbledore.

The Dutchman quickly sized up Percy and asked, “Muggle vows or magical?”

“What?”

“Was your marriage ceremony Muggle or magical, son?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Percy huffed. “I am not married.”

“Then why in Merlin’s name are you trying to keep your whoring secret?”

“Who said that I…there must be some misunderstanding, Sir, I am Percy Weasley, Senior Assistant to the British Minister of Magic. I am here on official business…and certainly not here to do any sort of whoring.”

“What business is that, then?”

“The Ministry has need of someone who can cast the Fidelius Charm.”

“So it’s the Minister of Magic who has been cheating on his wife, then?”

“No, no, no…the Ministry has need, not the Minister.”

“Well, why didn’t you say that, then?”

“I thought that I just did.”

The old wizard rolled his eyes.

“Not that it matters,” said Percy, “but why did you begin this conversation by asking how I might have been married?”

“Because there’s a price difference, my boy.”

“How is that?”

The wizard snorted. “Do you know anything about how the Fidelius Charm works?”

“Of course I do,” Percy snapped back. “It keeps something secret within the body of a Secret Keeper.”

“So you can cast it, then?”

“If I could, then I wouldn’t have needed to travel this far, would I have?”

“So why can’t you, boy?”

“Because….well, it doesn’t matter, really.”

“Don’t they have Charms Masters in Britain? Flitwick is still alive and kicking, isn’t he?”

“Erm, yes…the Ministry needs to keep its need to protect a secret…well, secret.”

“Right, well…let me give you a free tutorial, then,” huffed the wizard. “The main reason why any old ‘Joe the Wizard’ can’t cast the Fidelius is that it requires a tremendous amount of effort and intent to pulled the secret away from the rest of the world, and to bury it within a single person. The more people that know what’s to be kept secret, and the more magic there is that would resist it, the harder it gets.”

“So…if I wanted to keep secret the fact that I’ve cheated on my wife, it’d be more difficult to do so if there were magical marriage vows getting in the way? Or cost more if I told my friends first?”

The wizard let out a deep sigh. “Finally, I thought I’d have to write off all of Britain as hopeless idiots.”

“Here, now,” huffed Percy. “There are many, many brilliant people working at the British Ministry of Magic.”

“I see, so you’re not representative, then?”

“Erm, right.”

“Thought not,” the wizard said with a smile. He took a moment to write something down on a slip of paper and handed it to Percy.

“I’m too old and set in my ways to travel with you for this job. Go to this address and ask for Peter, my son”

“Your son?” Percy asked dubiously. “Your son can help us with a complex Fidelius?”

“Ask for a demonstration, if you don’t believe me,” snapped the old man. “Have him protect the secret that you’re in control of your own bowel movements, and see what happens.”

“Erm…right…your word is good enough for me.”

“Good day then, Sir.”

The old charms master shook his head in disgust as the British wizard left the room, and pulled out his mobile phone to inform his son that he was expecting a 30% referral fee for the easy mark that he’d sent the boy’s way.

oo00OO00oo

4:00pm, Scottish Parliament Grounds, Edinburgh, Scotland

As the Headmistress of Hogwarts didn’t have an Art Club badge, or MI-5 ¾ -issued comm. gear, or a mobile phone, it took a few minutes for the Queen’s Wizard to find her within the cloud-encased Parliament grounds.

It was the distinct sound of her voice dressing down a former student that guided Harry to her position.

“I will not have my reasons for being here questioned, Mr. Conners.”

“But Ma’am, it does seem strange for you to have been invited to a Muggle party…”

“No stranger than me finding you in a broom closet with Dicky Knowles in your Seventh Year,” countered Minerva. “But maybe my comparison is off…perhaps we should ask a few of your colleagues for their opinions…or perhaps your wife?”

“Now that’s just uncalled for…”

“Then let’s ask Mr. Potter,” Minerva said with a smile, as the Queen’s Wizard appeared from the mist.

“Ask me what, Headmistress?”

The Ministry official who had been standing almost toe-to-toe with McGonagall turned away, and shook his head.

“Nothing that matters,” he muttered. “Professor McGonagall and I were…”

“You mean Headmistress McGonagall?” asked Harry sharply.

“Erm, yes…Headmistress and I were just discussing the deployment of my witches and wizards,” the man quickly replied. He then added, “So you’re the Queen’s Wizard, and in charge of this mess?”

“That’s right,” Harry replied. “And speaking of mess, I’ve got something for you.”

“You telling us what to do? Oh, that’s rich…”

“Maybe he should ask Dickie, then?” McGonagall said sweetly.

A pained look came over the Obliviator’s face. He sighed, and then asked, “What is it, boy?”

“The correct address is Sir,” Minerva stated. “Unless Mr. Potter would prefer the use of one of his other titles?”

Harry snorted, but didn’t take the bait.

“Here’s the situation,” he stated. “We found the Muggle house that the Death Eaters used as a staging area for this attack.”

The Ministry official’s eyes lit up. “Right, tell us where and we’ll be off.”

“Hold on,” Harry replied. “They didn’t use any spells that we can tell, and the Muggles were kept in the basement nearly the whole time.”

“They’re still alive?” asked Minerva.

Harry nodded his head slowly, with a hard steely gaze that left no doubt about his anger. “They left the family in real rough shape, but yeah…they’re all alive. Three toddlers and a mum and dad.”

“We’ll still need to interview them,” the Obliviator stated.

Harry nodded. “Just as a heads up, the husband and wife thought that it was the terrorists that did the Ten O’clock Attacks that were holding them hostage.”

“Well it was, wasn’t it?”

“No, I mean yes…well…they believe that it was the pretend Muggle terrorists that were used as a cover story,” Harry replied.

“And they didn’t see any magic being done by the alleged Death Eaters?”

Harry shook his head. “Not that they recognized as such.”

The Obliviator sighed. “So why are you gracing us with this information?”

“Because they were able to give good physical descriptions of the Death Eaters that were holding them,” Harry replied. “Unless you wanted to return to the Ministry without anything to say about who was involved and how many?”

After chewing on his lip for a few moments, the Ministry official looked in the rough direction of the fog-hidden Palace.

“And you’re certain that there’s nothing for us to do across the street?”

Harry nodded. “Just some broken dishware and tattered tents left over from when the guests all ran away.”

“And none of these alleged Death Eaters that tried to crash this party were killed or captured?”

With a shrug of his shoulders, Harry asked, “Were you working the other night after the Ten O’clock Attacks?”

“Of course I was, didn’t sleep for two days.”

“And did the Muggles kill or capture any of those attackers?”

“Not that we could determine.”

“And do you really think it’s possible for Muggles to fight against wizards?” Harry asked sharply. “I mean, c’mon…I’m only a Hogwarts student who got lucky because our wards held.”

“And what about those wards?” the official asked.

“Ask Percy Weasley,” Harry shot back. “He experienced them first-hand down in London.”

The Obliviator crew chief arched an eyebrow. He didn’t care much for working under Dolores Umbridge, but Percy Weasley would have been even worse. Nodding to himself, he asked, “But what about these repairs?”

“I think they’ve got them done right this time,” Harry replied. “Tell you what…I’ll have someone bring you and your crew around to the Muggle house, and you can check on things here when you get back.”

Deciding that it might just be the best way out of a bad situation, the crew chief accepted Harry’s offer, and was led away to gather his witches and wizards for the short trip down Royal Park Terrace.

“So, Harry…you actually trust them alone with that Muggle family?” asked McGonagall.

The Queen’s Wizard held up his hand, and waited until the Ministry official was out of earshot before responding.

“Of course not…Sensei and Tonks are there to make sure the Ministry folks don’t overdo it.”

“And why aren’t you still there?”

“Because if I stayed there any longer I’d have lost my control and gone medieval on our prisoner’s arses,” Harry said softly.

“That bad, then?”

Harry nodded. “The bastards made the little kids watch.”

“Oh, I see…perhaps, you’ll tell me where the prisoners are so that I can express my displeasure in medieval ways?”

Harry shook his head in disgust. “We need to keep the moral high ground, as much as I’d like to retaliate…and I need to ask you to take a walk with me.”

“Why is that?”

“I’ve got to brief the Scottish First Minister,” replied Harry, “and since the two of you got along so famously the other night…”

Minerva snorted, “You’ll need to provide a little more incentive than that…perhaps if I get the real story along the way?”

That snark managed to brighten Harry’s foul mood a bit, and he held his arm out for the Headmistress.

“But everything that I said was true,” he hissed in mock protest.

“But that doesn’t mean that you said everything, does it?”

“And what makes you think that I was less than forthcoming?” Harry asked with a slight grin.

“Years of experience?”

“Yes, well…you do have me there.”

oo00OO00oo

4:30pm, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Percy Weasley’s new destination was one of the many “Coffee Shops” in Amsterdam that were known far more for their hash-laced brownies than hot drinks. Not knowing this fact, it took almost no time at all for the red-haired wizard's fears and concerns to fade into a cloudy haze, once the younger Vanderwood insisted on sharing a few “snacks” while they discussed the Ministry’s needs. It only took slightly more time for Percy to be enticed up the stairs to a private room by the dread locked young Charms Master and his blond girlfriend. The British wizard was deftly stripped down naked, relieved of his money belt, and subjected to a rather thorough Legilimens scan that sliced through impaired mental defenses like a knife through butter.

Armed with the knowledge of exactly what Percy wanted, and how much he’d be able to pay for it, the young Charms Master and his girl did a cost-benefit analysis. They decided that a quick trip to Britain with Percy would be worth far more than what he had on his person, so they planted a fake memory of a very good time into Percy’s brain, returned his belt and clothing, got him to sign a lopsided magically-binding contract, and dragged him down the stairs.

Within minutes, Percy and his new best friend Peter were in a taxi heading towards a ferry terminal on the Dutch coastline.

oo00OO00oo

Palace at Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh, Scotland

Harry filled in the missing details about the Muggle family that lived on Royal Park Terrace as he led the Headmistress across the street and back onto the Garden Party grounds.

The involuntary hosts for Rodolphus Lestrange’s crew had been traumatized and abused over nearly thirty hours of captivity. The victims really had initially thought that they had been held hostage by Muggle terrorists…until Harry flew to their rescue upon a broomstick. Having the Emperor’s Wizard reveal his animagus form by morphing back into his human form had also been a shock for the Muggles. But these magical revelations had worked to their advantage, as they supported Tonks’ reliability when she asked the mother and father whether they wanted to have their family Obliviated. The parents had declined, asking only that their children be made to forget the entire experience.

Harry then went on to say that the husband and wife were able to identify some of their assailants from pictures of the dead or captured Death Eaters, and that they picked out Rodolphus Lestrange and Augustus Rookwood from a book of Death Eater photographs.

As the Queen’s Wizard told this story, a series of motor coaches drove up and parked along the south edge of the Palace grounds.

“What are they here for?” asked the Headmistress.

“To carry our guests away while the Ministry folks are down the street,” Harry replied. Leading the Headmistress into the Queen’s Tent, he then grabbed a rug and dropped it down onto the lip of the goblin-excavated tunnel.

“And what is that?” Minerva asked.

“The fastest way down to the First Minister,” Harry replied. “Ladies first?”

McGonagall snorted, but had come to trust Harry enough to sit down onto the rug. Harry, in turn, didn’t trust McGonagall to sneak an up-kilt peek, so he made sure to mind the hem as he squatted down and sent her down into the bomb shelter.

There was a buzz in the basement as Harry rode down the tube using his own carpet. The Garden Party guests who had spent more than ninety minutes below ground were queuing up to climb a stairwell that led up to the main level of the Palace.

“How long will it take to get them all to the coaches?” Harry asked the MI-5 ¾ agent who had been guarding the base of the slide.

“If they stay cool about it, no more than ten minutes,” replied the secret agent.

“And have they been cool about being down here?”

“Cool as cucumbers,” the man said with a smile. “The First Minister was surprisingly brilliant…helped organize everyone into small groups, and then enlisted the pop stars and gentry from the Queen’s Tent to help hand out bottled water and biscuits.”

“Did he really?” asked Harry. Looking around the magically-expanded area, he asked, “So where is he now?”

“Other room,” the guard replied, pointing towards a guarded doorway on an adjacent wall. “Your clan folk had been in there with the Royal Family, and he wanted to have a word with them.”

“Thanks,” replied Harry. He then led McGonagall over to the secured area, and walked inside after flashing his MI 5 ¾ identification. Fifteen witches and wizards dressed in Potter plaid were there, mixed in with a dozen c-mugs and MI-5 ¾ agents. The witches and wizards looked almost as pleased to see the Headmistress as the First Minister was to see Harry.

“Well hello, there, Major Potter,” the First Minister said brightly. “We’ve some food left over, if you like?”

Harry shook his head. “Wish that there were time…you requested a briefing, sir?”

The First Minister nodded, and gestured towards one corner of the room.

“So things are safe enough topside to evacuate, Major?” he asked, once they were apart from the others.

Harry nodded. “The Parliament building has been repaired, and the obliviators have been taken down the street and out of range of view,” he said softly.

“Obliviators?”

“The witches and wizards whose job it is to erase the memories of any Muggles that saw magic being used. We needed to keep you all down here until they were out of the way.”

The Scot snorted. “So they’re gone for good?”

“Wish so, but probably not,” Harry replied. “Once the evac is finished we’ll bring them back for a sanitized look-see.”

“What of the Queen?”

Harry looked at his watch and replied, “Should be landing at Balmoral in a few minutes.”

“And the latest casualty count?”

The Queen’s Wizard frowned a bit as he drew a piece of paper from a coat pocket.

“Five civilians dead, twenty-seven injured. Amongst the security forces…the Yard have three dead, including a K-9 unit, and four injured. The three BA troopers stationed across from the front gate are missing and presumed dead…the Army also lost a two-man sniper team when a portion of the Parliament Building’s rooftop collapsed underneath their feet.”

“What about the Royal Archers?”

Harry looked up from his notes and nodded slightly. “Good news on that front, at least. Turns out that our magical burn salve works on Muggles…one of the medics told me that four of the injured wouldn’t have survived without it. So they all came through, with only eight still injured enough after the salve to send to hospital.”

The Muggle nodded gravely. “That is good news…so what of the terrorists?”

Harry frowned. “Ten dead, three captured. At least three more got away.”

“And have the prisoners been interrogated?”

Harry shook his head. “We’ve kept them stunned and unconscious up at Edinburgh Castle. Once we rid ourselves of the Ministry of Magic we’ll bring them back down here for questioning.”

“Why here?”

“Because the Queen won't be returning anytime soon, and we’ve got wards in place that will keep the prisoners from magically escaping.”

“And have you identified their dead?”

Harry nodded. “All were marked Death Eaters…from first looks all low-level troops. One of the attack leaders was in the first wave, but managed to pop away before he splashed into the pond. Don’t know about the other”

“So their leaders were the first to retreat?” asked the Scottish leader. “Rather cowardly.”

With a shrug of his shoulders, Harry replied. “Might have only postponed the inevitable… Voldemort will probably decide that this was a failed attack.”

“Why wouldn’t he? Surely you wouldn’t consider this attack to have been successful?”

Harry stared at the Muggle, trying hard not to wear his incredulity on his sleeve. “I failed to protect the Queen’s guests, despite our plans and preparations.”

The First Minister scowled. “Well, don’t let the Queen hear you say that…we both thought just the opposite. You were put in an impossible situation. Eight thousand people cramped together in a public setting, for a well-publicized event? We should have known better…and how many more would have died had your plans not been in place? Had there not been those slides, or your wards, or your people?” He pointed towards the door and added, “Those people out there…the people in here, for that matter…we all owe our lives to you and your people.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“So what’s Whitehall’s response to all this?”

“A work in progress, Sir,” Harry replied. “Hermione’s having a devil of a time keeping COBRA from passing out pitch forks and going on witch hunts.”

“Taking an offensive approach is wrong?” the First Minister asked.

“Not so long as we’re certain of our targets,” Harry replied, with a glance across the room. “There are thousands of witches and wizards in Britain that have nothing to do with these attacks, or with the stupid policies of the Ministry.” He then gestured towards the others in the room wearing Potter plaid and added, “This lot is a prime example. Without their help during the evacuation, things would have been far rougher.”

The Scottish leader snorted. “I’ll give you that,” he replied. “They were helpful down here as well, and Her Royal Majesty was quick to make me aware of these same points before she left.”

“Good,” replied Harry.

“So what is the appropriate response to all this, then?”

“We’ve established a…well, call it either a full blockade, or a quarantine. All transfer points between the Muggle and magical worlds are locked down. No witches or wizards in or out.”

“Based on what I’ve learned the past few days, that won’t keep their movements in check, though.”

“That’s right, but it’s better than nothing,” Harry admitted.

“So why did you bring your Headmistress along?” asked the First Minister.

“To brief the Magicals the same that I’ve been briefing you,” Harry replied. “And with Gilmerton Close shut down, she’s their ticket back into the wizarding world.”

“And we’ll let them go because we trust them?”

“Of course we trust them,” Harry replied sharply. “Well, at least I do, and they are wearing my tartan, right?”

The First Minister snorted. “Pity that we’re letting them go, then. They could be a big help to our side of this mess.”

Harry bit his lower lip, emulating Hermione’s favorite way to think.

“Couldn’t force them to help,” he finally said. “But that doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t volunteer.”

Raising an eyebrow, the First Minister asked, “How so?”

“Well,” replied Harry, “we’ve already got sympathizers working on our side. There’s people inside the Ministry keeping us in the know…and then there’s the volunteers that are still up on the coastline doing Dementor patrols.”

“Not to mention your TPOMS squadron,” the First Minister added. “So…fancy mustering this lot into the Paras?”

Harry turned back towards the small crowd of witches and wizards that were presently huddled around the Headmistress. Half of them were parents of his classmates, like the Abbotts and Patils. None of them looked like Paratroop material.

As a new box took shape on Harry’s mental org chart, he shook his head and said, “Don’t think that active military would be best, but…perhaps some sort of volunteer reserve that could be called on to help as needed?”

The First Minister’s eyes lit up. “Like the Home Guard?”

“The Home Who?”

“The Home Guard, during the Second World War,” the First Minister explained. “A kind of civilian defense corps.”

“That might work,” agreed Harry. “They’d need a leader, though…I’ve got enough on my plate already.”

“Looks like they’ve already got one,” commented the Scottish politician, as he nodded towards the Headmistress. “Of course, she’d need to coordinate with someone high on our side of the fence.”

Harry smiled, “Volunteering for the job, Sir?”

The Muggle politician snorted, then looked back towards McGonagall.

“Well it’s not like London has asked for my help otherwise, is it?” he asked. “Co-leaders of the ‘Scottish Home Guard’…nice ring to it, don’t you think? Now, how we would get hold of Minerva or my troops if they disappear into your world, that’s a question…they know how to work mobiles?”

Harry snorted, and wondered whether the First Minister’s possessive pronouns and the use of the Headmistress’s first name were good or bad things.

“Some of them likely do,” he replied. “Whether they’d work in high-magic areas is the question…not too many cell towers around Hogwarts.”

“Maybe your Headmistress would have an idea, then?”

Harry smiled. “Might want to get her on-board with the idea of co-leadership first, Sir.”

“Well, then, time to make my recruiting pitch, then, isn’t it?” the First Minister replied. “Can you stay long enough to help me with questions?”

Harry nodded, and decided that he might have to radically revise his opinion on the First Minister…and maybe even his general opinion on politicians.

oo00OO00oo

5:30pm, En Route to Balmoral Castle, Scotland

The voice of the latest (and least wanted) member of Harry Potter’s entourage broke a few brief seconds of radio silence.

“Major Potter, Sir?”

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

“We’re five minutes from landing…if you care to look out the cabin window, I can start identifying units for you.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” Harry replied with a sigh.

They’d been in the air for a little over thirty minutes. The Ministry of Magic’s Obliviators had finally left Holyrood Park, the Garden Party guests had been evacuated, the ICW delegation flown back to London, and the Parliament building restored to its former “glory.” Harry had orders to join the Queen at Balmoral Castle (not that he wouldn’t have followed her without the orders), and had planned on simply badge-jumping using Steve as an anchor. But as TPOMS was also deploying there, it was suggested that he ride with his squadron, so that he might get an aerial view of the Estate and its defenses.

Unfortunately, from Harry’s perspective, a tour guide came along for the ride. The pimply-faced junior officer from the Royal Scottish Regimental HQ had been “loaned” to TPOMS, as a liaison between Harry’s group and the regular Muggle army. This eager beaver had been briefed in on the contingency planning for a possible Royal evacuation, and was determined to show the extent of that knowledge from takeoff to final approach.

The similarity between this Muggle soldier and the older brother of two in his squadron wasn’t lost upon Harry. Nor to Fred, who had coughed out the name “Percy” into their shared comm. system more than once.

“The bulk of the Army’s deployment involves the 51st Highland Brigade, with elements of the Black Watch thrown into the mix,” the aide stated as they began their descent.

“Black Watch?”

“The Royal Highland Regiment,” chimed in New Six, from across the cabin. “Top shelf active regiment, with troops drawn mostly from Scotland. They’ve been in Iraq for a few years now, but they rotate units in and out to keep them fresh…must have pulled the poor bastards who were home on hols.”

Harry nodded. “So this Highland Brigade?”

“Territorial Army,” said Stout, joining the conversation. “They’re reserves and part-timers for the most part. Not nearly as well-armed or well-trained.”

“Sir, the 51st does have civil defense within its ORBAT, and has trained for just this sort of thing,” the junior officer stated.

“What’s an ORBAT?”

“Erm, Order of Battle, Sir?”

“The ORBAT identifies the brigade’s standing missions,” added New Six.

“Oh, thanks,” Harry replied. He then looked down as they passed over some of the higher peaks of the southern Cairngorms. “So what are those domes and dishes down on those hilltops?”

“That’s 2nd Signal Brigade, Sir,” replied the aide. “They’re tasked with providing emergency and disaster recovery communications across the country.”

“Also looks like they’re sharing space with field radar units,” added Stout.

“So we’ll have to ask for permission to fly up here as well?” asked Harry.

“Yes, Sir,” the aide replied, as he looked curiously around the cabin. He’d never seen such a strange squadron…half-officers, half-enlisted, half young, half older, more than a few women. And they were led by a boy younger than he was…a boy with the rank of Major that was asking the most basic of questions about the armed forces. Had it not been for the pips on Harry’s uniform and the respect shown by the older enlisted men under his command, the junior officer would have pegged Harry to be more likely a Firstie at Sandhurst.

“Sir?”

“Yes, Lieutenant?”

“If I might ask, exactly what kind of airborne unit is this?”

Harry turned away from the cabin window and shared a smile with his squadron. He then gave the junior officer a stern-looking gaze and asked,

“Lieutenant, do these maroon berets, or the patches on our sleeves mean anything to you?”

“Yes, Sir,” the Muggle soldier replied. “You’re with the First Paras, Sir.”

“That’s right, Lieutenant…the Parachute Regiment. So how do you think we go airborne…flying on broomsticks?”

“Erm, no Sir…sorry Sir.”

“Any other questions, then?”

“Erm, no Sir,” the young Muggle replied sullenly. But then he quickly regained his composure, and picked up his running commentary on the Castle’s perimeter defenses.

oo00OO00oo

A badge-call from Steve once they had landed at Balmoral informed Harry that he was to attend to the Queen. He would have badge-jumped, were it not for the fact that Lieutenant Longbottom’s presence was also required. So he decided instead to get some use out of the Percy-wannabe and ordered the aide to help the rest of his squadron find a mess tent. The junior officer resisted Harry’s dismissal until New Six and Stout stepped up and stared down the lieutenant with suggestions that the boy follow their commanding officer’s orders.

A Household Staff member that Harry knew from Buckingham Palace was waiting at the Castle’s front steps. The elderly groomsman raised half an eyebrow at the slightly disheveled mishmash of tartan and combat fatigues worn by the two young men, but held his tongue…he knew what had happened in Edinburgh, and had become accustomed to the terribly informal relationship between the Queen and her Wizard.

The Castle’s rooms and hallways were bustling with a thick mixture of military and civilians that the three needed to make their way through en route to what the groomsman called “The Bunker.”

When asked about their destination, the servant explained that Balmoral had been earmarked in the 1960s as a royal refuge in the event of a nuclear war. A Cold War-era evacuation plan had been dusted off and enacted that brought most of the Queen’s extended family to the Estate. He noted further that there was a select group of Muggle Civil Servants and Members of Parliament who had been flown up from London, and that the Household staff were having fits trying to find suitable accommodations for them all…despite the fact that there were sixty-seven rooms in the Castle and more than 100 outbuildings on the Estate.

Harry’s thoughts about why Civil Servants and MPs had been brought to Balmoral were put on temporary hold when the elevator that took them several levels below ground opened its doors, and a blur of tartan shot through to envelop him in a bone-crushing hug.

“Harry!” Hermione exclaimed as she buried her face into the nook of his shoulder.

“Erm…hey, Hermione, hey Susan,” Harry replied with surprise, noting out of the corner of his eye that Neville had been similarly attacked by Potter-Plaid and pigtails.

“What are you doing up here?” Harry asked, once he lifted Hermione off the ground and carried her out of the elevator cab.

“Do I need a reason to be by your side, Major Potter?”

“Of course not…it’s just…you and the P.M….”

“Plans were enacted that sent some of the other COBRA members off to secured remote locations,” Hermione replied, squeezing his arm. “The Foreign Minister is traveling up as part of that plan, and we’ll teleconference after dinner.”

“So you’ve been posted to Balmoral instead of Number10?”

“No, I’ll just have a longer commute,” she said with a smile. “Do you mind?”

“What? I’d be daft if I did,” Harry said with a firm squeeze around Hermione’s waist.

The sound of Harry’s Muggle escort clearing his throat brought his mind back to business.

“Lord Gryffindor, if you would be so kind, then?” the groomsman asked, gesturing down the hallway with his arm.

“Erm, right…thought we’d been through this…I’m Harry, right?”

Hermione smiled and pinched her boyfriend’s arm.

“Given the occasion, Milord, the title fits.”

“What occasion is that, then?”

A sparkle came to Hermione’s eye as she recalled how Harry had teased her during their first Royal audience. She gave him a sly smile and said, “You’ll see.”

oo00OO00oo

Thirty minutes later Harry Potter left his audience with the Queen with a set of keys in his sporran and a shocked expression on his face.

“I can’t believe she just did that,” he muttered, as he rode the elevator back to ground level with Hermione and Neville.

His consort snorted. “Well, you have to admit…it does solve the TPOMS lodging situation rather nicely.”

“So she could have just offered to let us sleep there for the night,” Harry countered. “Didn’t have to give me the bloody building…or the 10,000 acres of land that goes with it!”

“Thought that this was just an exchange for the Gryffindor lands that were turned into Windsor Park and Castle?” asked Neville.

“But I didn’t ask for it…didn’t need it…”

“But that didn’t keep you from telling the Queen ‘Yes, Ma’am, thank you, Ma’am’, right?” asked Neville.

“Yeah, but…10,000 acres? I don’t even know how big that is!”

“About fifteen square miles,” Hermione replied, quickly doing the math.

“It’s big, but not obscenely big,” Neville offered. “Our family lands cover 6,400 acres, for comparison.”

“And Longbottom Manor is huge!” Harry explained. “And why did she decide to give this to me now?”

“Have you already forgotten how the Queen answered that question, Harry?” Hermione asked with a smile.

Harry shook his head as the elevator doors opened to the Castle’s main floor.

“Yeah, yeah…’You’ll see,’ she said…made me think that she was channeling you, Hermione.” Harry muttered. “So how long before I see, then?”

Hermione smiled as she took hold of Harry’s hand, led him outside, and pointed to two waiting Land Rover Rapid Deployment Vehicles.

“You’ll see just as soon as you gather your squadron, Major Potter.”

“Right, then,” Harry said firmly. “You’re in on this surprise as well?”

“You’ll see.”

The TPOMS commander sighed, allowing Hermione to have her bit of fun. Neville was dispatched to go find the others while Sir Harry and Dame Hermione walked hand-in-hand towards the Landys.

“So who else is along for the ride?” Harry asked.

The answer came when Hermione led Harry around the back of one of the Land Rovers and gestured towards a pair of Potter-Plaid wearing snoggers who were doing a bit of opportunistic groping.

“Oh, hi there, Harry,” called out Luna, as she nonchalantly pulled her hand out from underneath Ron’s kilt. “Thanks for the ‘his and her’ skirts!”

“Erm…sure,” Harry stammered. “Checking for ants in Ron’s pants?”

As the youngest male Weasley blushed from embarrassment, Luna shook her head and shrugged.

“Oh, Ronnie isn’t wearing any pants right now, but you can’t be too sure, can you?”

“Erm, hello, there Harry,” Ron said, pulling his own hands free for a slipshod salute.

Harry snorted. “I’d say ‘at ease’ but that would be rather redundant, wouldn’t it?”

Ron replied with an even deeper blush, allowing Harry to add, “So when did you two arrive?”

“When Hermione did,” stated Luna. “Five o’clock is quitting time in the mail room, and she gave me the nicest hug when we side-along apparated.”

“Did she, now?” Harry asked with a smile and a glance towards his girlfriend.

“Just close enough to get our…cough…fellow MI-5 agent…cough…here,” Hermione muttered. “Of course, if her boyfriend knew how to apparate, he could’ve done it himself.”

“Oh, that wouldn’t have been any fun…Ronnie and I have plenty of other chances to hug,” Luna said brightly. “You, and I on the other hand….”

“Yes, well we’re all square now, aren’t we?” Hermione said quickly. “And you might want to get some last hugs in now, because boys and girls will have separate dorms tonight.”

“Oh, poo!”

“Oh, poo is right,” added Harry.

Hermione gave Harry a sidelong glance, smiled, and whistled a bit of “Love Shack.” It was horribly off-tune, but he still got the idea.

“So Luna, are you going to be staying with us, then?” he asked.

Luna nodded and shrugged her shoulders. “Somebody needs to ride on Ronnie’s broomstick, right?”

“Better her than me,” Hermione muttered under her breath.

Ron tried to change the subject, asking, “So where is this forward position that we’ve been assigned to?”

“Ask her,” Harry replied, with a nod towards Hermione.

She gave the two-word response of the day.

“You’ll see.”

The arrival of TPOMS squadron and the pesky Muggle junior officer kept Ron from pressing the issue.

“Which Landy will you be using, Major Potter?” asked the attaché.

“Hadn’t decided…why?”

“Because I’ll need to ride by your side, of course,” the Muggle said matter-of-factly.

“Oh, that won’t be necessary…Lieutenant,” chimed in Hermione. “I’ll be by the Major’s side.”

The junior officer gave Hermione’s civilian dress a once-over. The woven pattern of the long skirt she was wearing matched that of the non-military issue kilt that Harry still wore, but there were no other signs of rank.

“I am Lieutenant Bravard, Ma’am, the Major’s new attaché. You are….”

“Somebody with a security clearance much higher than yours, Lieutenant,” Hermione said with an arched eyebrow and a flash of her laminated MI-5 credentials. “And somebody who is traveling with Major Potter and his troops to an area that you most certainly haven’t been cleared to visit.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, Lieutenant, I’m afraid that it is,” said Harry with a smile. “Now why don’t you run along and make yourself useful someplace else? I’ll come looking for you if I need your assistance.”

“But, Sir?”

“Dismissed, Lieutenant!”

“Yes, Sir,” the young man said with no small amount of dejection.

Once the Muggle soldier was out of earshot, Harry said, “Thanks for the excuse, Hermione…that boy was starting to get on my nerves.”

“Boy, Harry?” Hermione quipped. “He’s at least a few years older than we are.”

“Doesn’t feel like it right now,” Harry said with a sigh.

“Sounds like the ants are getting to Harry, Hermione,” opined Luna. “Do you want to check, or should I?”

Hermione smiled. “Oh, I’ll take care of that later, thanks.”

“Promise?” asked Harry with a smirk.

Hermione waggled her eyebrows, and took a step closer to Harry so that she could grab hold of the pleated front of his kilt.

“Unless you’d rather have that inspection now?”

Wolf-whistles and catcalls from the members of TPOMS squadron kept Harry from fully considering his options, so he gently pushed Hermione’s hand away from his kilt hem and gruffly ordered his troops into the back of the vehicles.

It wasn’t until Hermione and he climbed into the front cab of the lead Landy that he whispered an answer into her ear.

“Later would be brilliant, thanks.”

oo00OO00oo

There were a number of checkpoints between the Castle grounds and the highway that connected Balmoral with Aberdeen.  Once they turned onto the two-lane road Harry noticed only military traffic.

“Blocked off civilian access, then?” he asked.

Their driver nodded. “Probably only for a few more hours, Major…until all of the troops are where they should be.”

“And where is it that we should be, Hermione?” Harry asked.

“You’ll see,” she replied with a grin.

A mile away from the Castle’s main entrance road, the Land Rovers turned north along a secondary unpaved path that climbed up out of the wooded valley of the River Dee and into heath-covered moorlands. They crossed armed checkpoints at the start of this rough road, and came upon another checkpoint at a crosspath four miles farther along.

That this latest roadblock was in a barren area of moorlands caught Harry’s eye, but not as much as what was guarding it…two dozen members of the Black Watch, dressed in desert-pattern camouflage and armed to the teeth with automatic weapons, two machine gun emplacements, armored vehicles, and a tank.

“Good afternoon, Major,” said the soldier that popped his head into the Land Rover’s cab.

Harry was in too pissy a mood not to respond to the sarcasm in the man’s voice, so he took note of the man’s rank and said, “It is a good afternoon, isn’t it, Sergeant?”

The soldier snorted, which made Hermione turn a little cross. After demonstrating her reason for being with a flash of her MI-5 badge, she asked, “Do you have a problem, soldier?”

“No, Ma’am,” he replied. “It’s a lovely day to be sitting here out in the open, waiting to be attacked by witches on broomsticks. Makes perfect sense that I’m here, instead of home with my girl after eight months in Basra.”

Harry shook his head. “You’ve been told, then?”

“Yes, Major. We’re to defend the Queen against you lot.”

“You lot?”

“Well, sir, not you personally…you’re supposed to be one of the good wizards, right?”

“That’s right, Sergeant,” Harry snapped. “I’m the Queen’s Wizard, Major Harry Potter…do you have a problem with that?”

“Erm, no Sir…sorry Sir,” the soldier said with his eyes cast down. “Just seems rather ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous, you say?” roared a voice from behind the Landy.

Harry popped his head out of the opened window and spotted New Six and the other “real army” members of his squadron bearing down.

“You miserable piece of excrement,” shouted New Six. “Did you even ask the Major for permission to speak freely?”

The sergeant and the other members Black Watch squadron took note of the demeanor of the men from Sport and Social, and made to back up their man. Deciding it was time to live up to his command rank, Harry stepped out of the Landy and ordered New Six and the others to stand down.

“I think that the Sergeant and his men need a little bit of reassurance that there’s a real reason why they are here to guard against witches and wizards,” he announced.

“Good idea, Major,” New Six said with an evil grin. “Turn him into a newt…that’ll get his attention.”

The soldiers on both sides of this mini-confrontation laughed, with only the TPOMS members knowing that Harry could actually fulfill that request.

“Hermione…don’t suppose we have wards established here?”

“No…can only put the ward line so far out.”

Harry nodded. “Too bad, that makes it out of bounds for me to turn the Sergeant here into a flobberworm. So how far to my new Lodge?”

Closing one eye in a squint to aid her estimate, Hermione replied, “About four miles to the west.”

“And does the view change between here and there?”

“Not really, why?”

“Because brooms won’t trip the Ministry’s sensors, and these men need to get an idea of what they might be up against.”

“Oh, Harry, you aren’t thinking….”

“So what else is new?” he replied with a grin. “Captain Weasley?”

“Yes, Sir!” Ron shouted.

“Break out the brooms.”

“Yes, Sir!”

The members of the Black Watch Squadron who had been ordered to defend the crossroad filled the valley with laughter at Harry’s orders.

Three minutes later, some of these same men were filling their pants as a full squadron of airborne assault broomsticks buzzed two feet over their heads at one-hundred and ten miles per hour.

“Ahh…that felt good!” announced “Seeker” as they left the checkpoint behind and headed up the valley in a stacked V-formation.

“Harry…slow down! And the secrecy statutes…” whined Hermione.

“Won’t mean a thing if a group of Death Eaters pops in front of those boys, will it?” Harry retorted.

“Seeker?” asked a voice coming through their charmed headgear.

“Go ahead, Lee…erm, I mean ‘Rasta’.”

“So we’re heading to a position that is forward of those blokes?”

“Looks like it, Rasta.”

“In the direction towards where that tank’s gun was pointed?” added Stout.

“Got a problem with that?” asked Harry.

“No Sir, just wondering.”

“No worries, Sergeant Stout,” chimed in Hermione. “We’ll be free to use our wands up there for defense.”

“And where exactly is there, Chequers?” asked Harry.

The question had been posed enough times in front of the troops for them to all respond in unison on Hermione’s behalf.

“You’ll see!”

oo00OO00oo

The Queen’s Wizard didn’t think there was much at all to see as they followed a one-lane cart path up the valley. Nothing rose above the level of the heath, other than the stone walls of two abandoned buildings passed along the way. Harry was beginning to question the Queen’s generosity, but kept those thoughts to himself so long as he had a live mike within his flight helmet.

They followed the valley until it came to a point and started back down on the far side of a large hill to their left. Hermione pointed towards a small monument of rocks and told him to land, explaining that the squadron needed to be keyed into the wards that began at that point.

“What wards are you talking about, Hermione?” Harry asked, as he followed her instructions.

“Those that protect Glengairn Lodge, Harry.”

“And where is that, then?”

Hermione pointed up to the top of hill on the north slope of the valley, where a lonely looking stone building stood sentinel.

“That’s Glengairn Lodge?” he asked.

Hermione nodded just before she hopped off the broom and removed her helmet.

Harry took a good, full-circle glance at their bleak-looking location. There was a fine view of Ben Avon and its sister peaks to the west, but not much else. He removed his helmet, so that he could ask in confidence, “That’s it, then?”

His girlfriend chuckled. “Oh ye of little faith…don’t you know by now that looks can be deceiving? Come here, you.”

The Queen’s Wizards followed orders, and allowed Hermione to wave her wand over his head a few times.

“Take a few steps up the hill, and see if your opinion still holds.”

Harry did so, and witnessed a dramatic change in landscape as he passed through the slight shimmer of a ward line. Halfway up the hill, the heath gave way to lush green lawn, and a manicured landscape of flowering bushes and shrubs. The forlorn-looking stone structure had morphed into an impressive ivy-walled estate house.

“Whoa…what’s that?”

“Well it could be home, if you want,” Hermione replied brightly. “But for now, we can just call it Glengairn.”

Harry thought that “Glengairn” had a nice ring to it, but that “home” sounded even better, especially when Hermione said it. He began to stride up the hill, only to have her stop him.

“Hold on, Harry…let me get the others through,” she asked. “I want to see the look on your face when we get up there.”

“Why?” he asked. “Can’t imagine that the view could be any better than this one.”

“You’ll see,” Hermione said with a wink.

Harry anxiously waited for Hermione to complete her spell work.

“So you built this illusion into the wards?” he asked.

“No, that’s beyond me, I’m afraid,” Hermione admitted. “It’s a hyped-up notice-me-not charm built into a perimeter ward. The goblins think it’s been here for hundreds of years…all I can do is control who is affected by it.”

“How did you manage that?”

“With the land-owner’s permission,” she replied.

“But I thought that I own all this, now?”

“Not until the papers that you signed are filed,” Hermione noted. “And you certainly didn’t own these lands two weeks ago.”

“So you had the Queen’s help?”

“Well, she was the land owner.”

“And you kept this a secret from me?”

Hermione chuckled, and nodded. “It was supposed to be a birthday present, but given present circumstances it couldn’t wait.”

“Wow,” said Harry, amazed at what his Queen and Consort had accomplished.

“Save the wows until we get to the top,” Hermione instructed.

“Yes, Dear,” he replied with a grin.

Once everyone was inside the ward line Hermione grabbed Harry’s hand and took the lead up the hill. They stopped twice along the way, just so that Harry could smell the flowering bushes and touch the green grass to reassure himself that it was all real.

“So where is the front door?” he asked, taking a new look at the building.

“Around the other side,” Hermione replied. “View is better facing north.”

“How could it be any better?” Harry asked.

Hermione decided not to give her stock reply, as they had reached the building and were following a flag stone path around to the other side. Instead, she waited until she could sweep her arms out towards the valley below and simply say, “That’s how.”

“Holy shi…”

“Language, Harry!”

“And you didn’t swear the first time you were here?”

“Not as far as you know.”

“Sweet Merlin on a Manticore!” shouted Ron, who had been close behind Harry and Hermione.

“There, see Harry? And it was Ron, too…if he didn’t see the need to curse then surely you shouldn’t.”

Ron was too shocked to notice the insult. Neither were the other magical members of the squadron once they shared the vantage point.

Luna didn’t seem too concerned, though. Neither did the Muggles.

“So this is our forward position?” asked New Six.

“Yes.”

“And there’s something down there we’d need to defend against?”

Harry snorted.

“Pull your wizard glasses out and take another look.”

All of the Muggle squadron members took the hint and put digital binoculars up to their eyes.

“Whoa…what the hell is that swimming in that lake?” asked Coley.

“Why that’s Lenny, of course,” said Luna.

“That thing has a name?”

“Doesn’t every Giant Squid?”

“So let me guess,” said New Six. “You all recognize that hamlet below us?”

“Yes,” Harry replied with a wavering voice. “It’s called Hogsmeade.”

 

10:00pm, Harwich Port, Essex

Peter Vanderwood paid no mind to Percy’s dry heaves over the port rail of the Hook to Harwich ferry…his focus was already divided between the approaching coastline and the bottom of his beer bottle.

“Damn,” he scowled, “I wonder if there’s still time for a final round.”

“Aren’t we there, yet?” Percy asked weakly.

“Your country, mate…you tell me,” the Dutch wizard muttered. “Stay here,” he ordered, as he headed back below decks.

“Not going anywhere,” Percy replied, as he hung for dear life to the railing.

The North Sea hadn’t been all that rough during the six hour transit, but the Minister of Knowns had gotten the munchies and stuffed himself full of Muggle fast food right before they had boarded the ship. The greasy cheeseburgers and chips didn’t last long in his stomach once the anchor was raised and the first pint of duty-free beer went down. He’d been puking at regular intervals ever since.

There was a dark green bottle in each of the Dutch wizard’s hands when he returned a few minutes later.

“Hey, I thought to get you a beer before I closed out your tab,” Peter announced.

“No thanks,” Percy whispered.

“Right then…I’ll have to drink twice as fast.”

“When are we getting off this cursed Muggle ship?” whined Percy.

“Once we pass inside the frontier wards, or I finish my drinks…whichever comes last.”

“But the wards…I’m a high-ranking Ministry official.. Won’t be a problem if you’re with me.”

The Dutch wizard looked at the green-gilled English wizard and laughed.

“So you say…forgive me if I don’t think you look much like a high-ranking Ministry official right now.”

“But I am!”

“So go then…I’m not keeping you.”

“Have to take you along.”

“No way in hell that I’m letting you side-along apparate me onto shore,” the young wizard scoffed. “Although once we’re there…don’t suppose you know of any floo connections in Harwich?”

Percy frowned. “Don’t know anything about Harwich…we floo to specific places, not Muggle cities.”

“How stupid is that?” asked Peter. “Never mind, I already know the answer.” He thought for a moment, then said, “Taxi into London shouldn’t cost more than a couple hundred quid…I’ve got enough, and you probably have just enough galleons to pay me back.”

“Taxi?” asked Percy.

“A Muggle car for hire, you idiot,” the Dutchman replied.

“I know what a taxi is,” Percy complained. “Just want this trip to be over.”

Peter Vanderwood ignored Percy’s whining as he took a long final draw from the second beer bottle He then carelessly tossed the empty bottle overboard and wiped his mouth on his jacket sleeve. Looking out towards the fast approaching shoreline, he said, “Have to be within three miles now, let’s see…we’ll apparate inside that Muggle fort on that point of land, okay?”

Percy groaned.

“What a helpless bugger,” Peter muttered. Grabbing hold of his two bags stuffed with duty-free whisky, he asked, “Think you can manage to switch your grip from that handrail to my waist?”

Percy nodded and lurched towards the Dutchman’s side.

“Oi, keep your face pointing away from me,” Peter yelled. “Don’t want you spilling your guts on the single malt.”

When Percy complied with this request, the Dutch wizard rechecked that they wouldn’t be spotted by the other passengers, then apparated out into the night.

 

10:30pm, Balmoral Castle,. Scotland

The Queen’s Wizard had returned to Balmoral Castle, and was in SO14’s control room with Steve when his Art Club badge began to vibrate. Not wishing to disturb those monitoring the different video displays (or to openly advertise the capabilities of his Order’s emblem), Harry stepped into an adjacent loo.

“Go ahead, Hermione,” he said, once he activated his badge.

“Are you ready for bed yet?”

Harry looked at his watch.

“Yeah, I guess so…not that much going on right now.”

“Good,” Hermione replied. “Are you someplace…private right now?”

“Yeah, actually, I am…why?”

“Because I’m already under the covers, I don’t fancy you using me as an anchor point with your boots still on, and I want to see you dressed in my housewarming present.”

“Oh,” Harry replied, with some confusion. “So you’re at Glengairn?”

“That’d be a bit crowded, with your squadron quartered there, wouldn’t it?”

“The Love Shack, then?”

“Harry…I’m under the covers.”

“Yeah, but where…Balmoral? London? Windsor?”

“Does it really matter more than the fact that there’s barely anything between me and those covers right now?”

Harry snorted. “Well, when you put it that way…”

“That’s right, so pull out that present and get cracking.”

“Right…hold on.”

Pulling his ever-present rucksack off of his shoulder, Harry opened the flap and pulled out a small package that Hermione had given him as a “housewarming present” that afternoon. It had been something that she hadn’t wanted him to open in front of the squadron.

When he unwrapped the small box he saw why.

“So what do you think, Harry?”

Harry frowned as he pushed past folded tissue paper and pulled out a small triangle of tartan fabric fixed with a few pieces of string.

“Hold on, I’ll tell you once I’ve canceled the shrinking charm.”

Hermione giggled over the Art Club badge.

“Harry, they haven’t been shrunk.”

“Really? Erm, what are they then?”

“Harry, you can’t tell me that you haven’t seen a thong before.”

“A thong? For me?”

“Why not?” Hermione asked. “You seem to like them well enough when I’m wearing them.”

“Yes, but…”

“Are you telling me that you aren’t going to make me happy and wear my gift?”

“Erm, no…of course not…wouldn’t you rather me arrive under the covers starkers, though?”

“And what if there’s an emergency and we have to badge-jump to the Queen’s defense?” Hermione asked. “You wouldn’t want to duel naked, would you?”

“Erm maybe…but not in front of the Queen, and only if you were my naked opponent and we were shooting chocolate sauce at each other.”

“Hmmm….hold that thought for another night, mister, and get dressed.”

Harry shook his head in disbelief, and then cast a worried glance at the door that led back into the control room.

“Are you doing this just to get my mind off things?”

“No, I’m doing it to get your mind onto me.”

“And the pillow talk is part of the deal?”

“Is that a complaint? Because if it is, I hear that some of the other agents are sleeping out in Balmoral’s mews tonight.”

“Erm, yes Dear…I mean, no Dear…I mean….hold-on,” Harry said with no small amount of exasperation.

The Queen’s Wizard quickly stripped down. Or at least tried to…he was still getting used to fastening and unfastening his kilt pins and straps.

Once he was down to only his dragonhide wrist holster and wand, he grabbed hold of the skimpy shorts and managed to slip them on after a few tries getting his legs into the correct gaps.

“Hermione, this looks silly,” Harry whined, checking out his look in the mirror.

“Guess they look too silly for me to wear, then?”

“Of course not…you’ve got a cute bum.”

“And you don’t?”

“Hermione….”

“Hey, are you a Gryffindor, or not?”

Harry snorted, grabbed his rucksack in his other hand, and jumped…into something that looked quite like a Gryffindor dormitory. Only it wasn’t.

“Harry?”

The Queen’s Wizard flinched at the sound of a feminine voice that wasn’t Hermione’s.

“Parvati?” he asked, as he quickly covered his barely-covered bits with his rucksack and spun around.

He had it half right…both Parvati and her twin sister were sitting on a four-poster bed with drawn curtains, wearing skimpy little night gowns with a tartan pattern that matched his thong.

“Harry, what are you doing here?” Padma exclaimed. “What are you doing here dressed like that?”

“Not that we mind, mind you,” Parvati said with a grin. “Hermione never told us how cute your bum was.”

Motion in the corner of Harry’s eye caught his attention before he could explain. Susan Bones’s head poked out from the curtains of a different bed and she sleepily asked, “What’s going…Harry?”

“Hold on a second,” Harry asked, as he nudged Hermione’s “ray” on his Art Club badge.

“Harry?” came a voice over the badge. “Where are you?”

“That’s what I’d like to know,” he replied. “And while you’re telling me where I am, maybe you can talk loud enough to explain to Susan, Parvati and Padma why I am here?”

“Susan…Parvati?….oh, bugger!”

A moment later, Harry heard the silence-charmed curtains pull back from the bed behind him.

Two moments later, he found himself being dragged arse over teakettle backwards.

“Hermione?” Harry asked, as his limbs got tangled up with his girlfriend’s.

“Hang on,” his new bedmate asked. She then leaned over Harry’s body, giving him a close-up view of the matching thong that she was wearing, and poked her own head out of the curtains.

“Sorry, girls, he was supposed to pop up under the covers, not outside of the curtains.”

“Oh we don’t mind too much, do we girls?” Parvati asked brightly. “You can make it up to us by telling us all of the juicy details in the morning.”

“Okay…no,” Hermione replied.

“So is he spending the night, then?” Padma asked with a sly smile.

“Would you mind if he did?”

“I wouldn’t, but Hannah might be surprised when she goes off-duty in the morning.”

“Unless she is supposed to be part of the juicy details?”

“Of course she isn’t,” Hermione huffed. “Good night, ladies.”

“Good night, Harry!” Parvati shouted across the room, earning her a chorus of giggles.

Hermione swore under her breath, and pulled her head back inside the curtains. Her boyfriend was sitting on top of the covers with a bemused expression on his face.

“Oh, Merlin, Harry, I’m so sorry…this was supposed to be a way to get your mind off things and I’ve…”

“Succeeded beyond your wildest dreams?”

Hermione let out a deep breath. “I’m never going to hear the end of this one, am I?”

“Probably not,” Harry replied with a smile, as he unfolded his legs and stretched out on the bed. Shifting uncomfortably, he then reached back and adjusted the string that made up the back of his shorts. He patted the pillow next to him and asked, “So where did you bring me, anyway?”

“Still in Balmoral,” Hermione said softly, as she took the hint and stretched out next to Harry. “In the tower…they converted the top part into a room for the witches-in-waiting to use.”

“Thought that it looked familiar…this is where I first met the Prince. Weren't we were going to use the Love Shack that we set up outside of Glengairn, though?”

“Yes, well…I decided to let Ron and Luna use it for the night.”

“Ron and Luna?” asked Harry. “What in Merlin’s name for?”

“So that Ron can do something other than get jealous of you and so that Luna can do Ron.”

“Oh,” Harry replied. “That actually makes sense, I guess…so why here, then?”

“Well, Hannah has the night shift by the Queen’s chambers, so she offered me the use of her bed, and I thought since you’ve never been able to see the witch’s dormitory at Hogwarts, that…”

“You thought that you’d sneak your boyfriend into your pretend dorm room for a romp?” Harry asked with a grin.

“Well, maybe not a romp so much as…a cuddle?”

Harry nodded.

“Scoot up then, and let’s get under the covers.”

Hermione smiled, and quickly complied, turning away from Harry so that she could fall back into a tight spoon. Once she reached for Harry’s hand and pulled it down to cover her midriff, they lay quiet for a few moments.

“Hermione?”

“Yes, Harry?”

“Hannah does know not to pile into bed in the morning, right?”

“Hmmm….would you be upset if I asked her to join us?”

“Is this some sort of boyfriend test, Hermione?”

“Maybe,” she said with a smiling tone of voice.

There was a second lull in the conversation.

“Harry?”

Her boyfriend’s response came in the form of deep, regular breathing.

Hermione sighed, and wiggled even closer to Harry.

“If only it had been a fiancé test,” she whispered. “You would have passed; you know…not that I could ever say that out loud, for fear of being hypocritical about not jumping off of deep ends.”

Hermione never saw the smile that formed on Harry’s lips in response.

 

 

Chapter 40: A Busy Morning

Thursday, July 12, 5:00am, Haven’s Head, Milford Haven, Wales

The Dark Lord went against his better judgment and crawled out of his hidey-hole in the early-morning pre-dawn in search of some good news. He could have gone straight to the hippogriff’s mouth and portkeyed to Rookwood’s or Rodolphus Lestrange’s separate hiding places, but with the way things had been going...well, there was a reason why he hadn’t given Rookwood a portkey that transported him to Milford Haven. And so he chose a different path (both figuratively and literally).

Voldemort took care not to do magic or otherwise draw notice towards him during the fifteen-minute walk from the bluff down into the nearest Muggle neighborhood. That the gaunt nose-less reconstructed wizard went unnoticed had more to do with the lack of people out at that early hour than any non-magical stealth skills he possessed. A modest bungalow with a small pile of folded newspapers on its front steps provided exactly what he was looking for…a relatively risk-free source of news. He cautiously approached the house and scooped up the papers under an arm. The loud bark of a neighbor’s dog kept him from overstaying his visit. He walked briskly back to the curb with wand and hand, then down the street and back up to the bluff, where the magic carpet waited to ferry him back up the pipe chase and into his isolated lair.

The week’s worth of Western Mail that had accumulated while the Muggle homeowner was on holiday didn’t need to be sorted out by date…the one whose headlines screamed “TERRORISTS CRASH QUEEN’S GARDEN PARTY!” was clearly the most recent. Voldemort snatched the paper up and did a rush read of what was (for him at least) very bad news.

A second, more careful reading allowed the wizard to read between the lines.

The Muggle Queen and Harry Potter lived, which meant that Lestrange had somehow failed.

The Muggles believed that the attack was performed by Muggle terrorists. This suggested that the Ministry had been able to clean up or cover up after the attack. But then Voldemort remembered the Muggle bullet hole in Alecto Carrow’s head, and wondered whether it might have been Potter and the Muggles who were doing the covering up. And if it had been the Muggles who had successfully repelled the attack, and actually killed six of his men (as the paper had claimed), then it was Potter who might have the escape portkeys that they had all carried.

And if Rookwood had been one of the wizards who had been killed or captured?

Voldemort cycled through Occlumency exercises that kept his temper (and more importantly, his magic) under control. This gave him the time and temperament required to review the limited options before him. Harry Potter was just brave enough and stupid enough to activate a blind portkey to see where it led. Which meant that there had been purpose behind the paranoia that had led him to steal newspapers from Muggle stoops…the cave in Cornwall that had been Rookwood’s portkey destination really could not be considered secure.

He had to assume the worst, and plan from there. Writing off Lestrange and his men meant that the cursed and wounded wizards under Snape’s medicinal care now comprised the bulk of his fighting force. The potions that were needed to bring them back to health would take at least one more week to concoct and administer, under optimal circumstances. And if the Muggles were to overreact to the attack and lash out against the wizarding world, their targets would be those that were the most visible…not those who had gone to ground.

There was more than enough food in the magical pantry to last the week, but Voldemort took no chances, and prepared a meager ration of egg and bacon for breakfast.

 

5:45am, Balmoral Castle. Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Harry woke to the sensation of a hand rubbing small circles on his back.

“Hmmm…feels good.”

“Ssshh...go back to sleep, Harry…we’ve still got forty-five minutes before Hannah will want her bed back.”

This response led the Queen’s Wizard to recall where he was and how he got there. With eyes now opened and a mind now cleared, he flipped over to face his girlfriend and immediately began to chuckle.

“What’s so funny?” Hermione asked.

Harry paused, so that he could permanently archive the memory…his bare-chested girlfriend, sitting cross-legged in bed, dressed only in a Potter Plaid thong. The hand that hadn’t been rubbing his back had been used to sort e-mail on a BlackBerry that sat high on her upper thigh.

Pulling her other hand to his lips, he gave it a tender kiss and asked, “Do you know just how sexy you are when you multi-task?”

“Hush,” Hermione chided, pulling her hand back. “You weren’t sleeping very well, so I thought that….”

“Yeah, thanks.”

“So go back to sleep, already.”

Harry shook his head as he reached for his wand.

“No, I can’t imagine that my mailbox is any less full than my bladder.” He then transfigured his own tartan thong into less-revealing boxers and asked, “Think my transfiguration will last long enough for me to make it to the loo?”

“I don’t think that any of the witches-in-waiting would mind if it didn’t.”

“Right, so it’s the jacket too…it’s almost long enough to cover,” Harry replied, as he pulled his TPOMS field jacket out of his sack and slipped his arms into the sleeves.

“It’s the door behind Padma’s bed, next to the hearth,” Hermione said with a smile. “Don’t get lost along the way.”

“Maybe I should have you lead me there and back?”

“Tempting…but that’s exactly the sort of thing that Parvati would expect of us.”

“So why disappoint her?”

“Go!” ordered Hermione.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Harry said with a cheeky salute, as he grabbed his bag and slipped out through the curtains. Treading lightly across the room so as not to wake the others, he made it to the loo without incident.

oo00OO00oo

The stream of hot water that beat down on the Queen’s Wizard’s shoulders was far less effective than Hermione’s comforting hand when it came to keeping his spirits up. His nightmares had melded the good and bad of the previous day…both the Garden Party attack, and Hermione’s unguarded thoughts about their relationship. What came out was a replay that focused on the Muggle family that had been abused and held hostage in Edinburgh. Or to be more precise, on their situation…in Harry’s dreams, it had been Hermione and he who had been held hostage, Hermione who had been used and abused by the Death Eaters, and their children that had been forced to watch helpless as their mum was violated. The despair and helplessness that he felt during these dreams began to creep back into Harry’s thoughts, and kept him from even noticing the fact that in those dreams he was not only married to Hermione, but the father of her children.

Any ideas he had brought into the bath about returning to Hannah’s borrowed bed and ravishing his girlfriend flowed down the shower drain along with the gray water. Righteous anger rode in on the back of an adrenaline rush, as he roughly toweled off and stepped into his kilt. By the time he’d fastened his belt and slipped into his dragonskin boots, Harry had decided that some combination of physical activity and physical violence would be needed before he either went off on the captured Death Eaters, or activated one of the their confiscated portkeys with both wand and gun blazing.

The solution came when Harry pulled the magical scabbard that held a third weapon from his rucksack. With a determined grin he slipped the leather harness over his shoulders, pulled the Sword of Gryffindor cleanly from its scabbard, grabbed his wand, and strode bare-chested back into the witches-in-waiting’s bedchambers.

Hannah’s bed had gotten crowded in his absence, and his drawn sword and bared chest drew a chorus of non-verbal utterances that were tinged with surprise, shock, and no small amount of lust.

“Erm…Good Morning?” he stammered.

“Good Morning, Harry,” four witches cooed in unison.

Harry tried to focus on Hermione face. It helped that she had thrown a white t-shirt on over her thong. It didn’t help that Padma, Parvati and Susan were wearing no more than they had the night previous.

“Erm…sorry,” he said softy. “Didn’t mean to scare you…or to wake you up.”

“No worries, Harry…it was entirely intentional,” Parvati quipped.

“How….”

“I cast a detection charm on your bed curtains last night,” explained Padma. “It set off an alarm when you got out of bed.”

“But I didn’t hear any alarm?”

“It was a silent type,” Padma stated.

“Yeah, it was set to vibrate,” added Parvati cheekily. “Three guesses where it was set to go off.”

“Hush,” Padma admonished.

“So why….”

“We wanted the chance to do some girl talk with Hermione,” offered Parvati.

“And the chance to see my boyfriend less than fully dressed was just incidental, right girls?” asked Hermione.

“Well that part worked,” said Susan, as she gazed appreciatively at the defined muscles on Harry’s bared chest.

“In a rush to get somewhere, Harry?” Hermione asked.

“Erm, no…I mean yes,” he replied. “Wanted to get in a quick workout with my sword.”

Hermione cocked her head to one angle in thought.

“Bit too early to wake Sir Evan and badge-jump to Windsor, or to find a sparring partner, don’t you think?”

“Yeah…I was just going to find a tree to hack at around here,” Harry replied.

“What…and show the world your secret weapon?” Hermione asked.

“That I’ve got a sword isn’t that secret, is it?”

“No, but which sword you’ve got and the way you’ve begun to wield it is, though.”

“Do you have a better idea in mind, then?”

“Yes, actually,” Hermione replied with a smile. She then drew her wand and transfigured a desk chair into a two-foot diameter wooden post that stretched from floor to ceiling.

Harry arched an eyebrow.

“Okay, so it’s out of view, but there’s not a lot of room to move around, is there?”

Hermione rolled her eyes, and cast spells that shrank down every piece of furniture in the room down to miniature size, save for the bed that she and the other three witches were sitting on.

“Any other excuses, then?”

Harry snorted as some of the steam that was fueling his energy and emotions bled off. Two or three other possible counter-arguments came to mind, but the “Hermione voice” inside of his head parried them before the real Hermione got the chance. So he slid his rucksack to the side, and cast a spell towards the four witches.

“A shield, to keep errant splinters from attacking you,” he explained with a smile.

“Better make it two-way, so that we don’t attack him,” Parvati muttered.

“Remember the rules, ladies,” Hermione said. “Look, but don’t touch.”

“Aww….are you sure we can’t form a harem?” Parvati teased.

“Do you want to watch or not?” Hermione asked pointedly.

“Alright, alright…just teasing you,” Parvati replied. “Not that you have anything to worry about.”

“How’s that?”

Padma shook her head in disbelief as Harry began to break into a sweat as he hacked away at the post. She ran hand down the front of her thin tartan-patterned camisole and said, “Oh, please…despite how little we have on, the only Potter Plaid that his eyes were glued to was the bit that’s between your legs.”

Hermione sighed, masking the glee that this assessment had produced with a neutral nod towards Parvati.

“And the only Potter Plaid that your sister’s eyes are glued to is covering my boyfriend’s bum.”

“It's doing too good of a job,” Parvati quipped. “Don’t you think he’d be more comfortable if that kilt’s hem were a little higher?”

“No…it’s no longer than what the Highland warriors wore back in the day,” Hermione replied.

“Just a few inches, Hermione?”

“How many is ‘a few?”

“Fourteen or fifteen?”

Hermione rolled her eyes.

“In your dreams, Parvati.”

“Well that’s going to be true enough,” the light brown-skinned witch admitted with a sigh. “Can you blame me for asking, though?”

Hermione shifted her attention from her dorm mate back out into the room, where Harry had begun to incorporate twirls and thrusts into his routine that revealed firm thighs and teased with the possibility of seeing more.

“No,” she replied brightly. “I guess I can’t.”

There was a brief lull in the conversation that Susan used to check the time.

“Oh darn, I need to get ready for my shift…Hannah’s getting off soon.”

Parvati laughed. “Well, she’s not the only one.”

“Parvati?” Hermione cautioned.

“Yes, Lady Gryffindor, I’ll be good, Lady Gryffindor,” her dorm mate replied in a sing-song voice.

“Hey…I don’t have that title yet,” Hermione protested.

“Not yet?” Padma asked with an arched eyebrow. She reached out for the Gryffindor’s hand and inspected the ring finger. “So exactly when will it become applicable?”

“Come on,” Hermione protested. “We’ve only been together for a few weeks!”

“Oh please,” snarked Parvati. “You two have only been sleeping together for a few weeks, but you’ve been together for six years…just didn’t want to admit it.”

“But…we're not sleeping together...we're just sharing a bed.”

“A difference only in degree, and only if that’s true,” Padma stated. “And you did say ‘not yet,’ so don’t tell me you aren’t thinking about it.”

Hermione smiled slyly. “Ok,” she replied. “I won’t tell you.”

“Really? So start talking!”

“Sorry, but I’ve really got to get going,” Hermione replied. Waving out towards her boyfriend, she added, “Besides, I have more important things to worry about than the color of my bridesmaid’s gowns…like what else I can do to help Harry work out this excess energy.”

The other three witches snorted.

“Do you really need suggestions?” Padma asked.

“Or do you just need some help draining Harry of his ‘energy’?” added Parvati.

“Thank you for the kind offer, ladies,” Hermione replied. “But I don’t think I’ll need any helping hands.”

“How about a helping mouth, then?”

“Parvati!”

“Yes, Lady Gryffindor. Sorry, Lady Gryffindor. I’ll be good, Lady Gryffindor.”

oo00OO00oo

6:45am, Mayfair Hotel, London

Special Assistant to the Minister Percy Weasley woke up far too late, and in far too comfortable a bed for his own good. Reaching for the wand that sat on the ornate side table, he pulled himself up and padded off to the loo in search of a headache potion.

Not that he was able to find one in the most expensive suite of one of the most expensive Muggle hotels in London.

Percy groaned as the events of the previous twenty-four hours filtered back into his memory. He feared the worst as he threw his robes over his head and ran out into the sitting room of the suite...and almost found it.

The worst thing would have been a missing Dutch Charms Master.

The next worst thing was a Dutch Charms Master watching pay-per-view Muggle porn as he washed down a room service breakfast with £300 per bottle champagne.

“Hey Percy, buddy…you’re alive,” the Dutch wizard said with a smile. “Good thing, that…wouldn’t fancy me being the one to pay for all this.”

“What in Merlin’s name do you think you’re doing?”

“Waiting on you to take me to your leader, of course,” Peter replied brightly. “But so long as you’re here…pour yourself a flute and pull up a chair.”

“No, I don’t think…”

“What, don’t fancy that sort of thing?” Peter asked, as he waved towards the telly. “No matter…think I saw a gay porno offered in the listings…I can set you up in the other room.”

“No it’s not that…I’m not that way….it’s just….what I meant was…what…..”

The young Dutchman grinned as Percy was taken in by the scene playing on the television.

“Yeah, it is amazing what some Muggles can do…you’d think that there’d have to be an Engorgio involved somehow...or maybe a magical throat expansion.”

Percy responded with a weak nod.

“So what time are we meeting your boss, Percy?”

“No…scheduled time…” the red-headed wizard replied, as he sat down next to the Dutchman.

“Excellent…there’s more movies once this is done.”

The Special Assistant to the Minister snorted, but didn’t refuse the glass of champagne that was thrust into his hand as he stared at the screen.

If this was the sort of thing was going to cause him to lose his job, then at least he was going to enjoy it.

 

oo00OO00oo

7:15am, Balmoral Castle

Susan Bones’s need to get ready for her day shift, the return of Hannah from her night shift, and the influx of calls and reports at the start of another busy day all conspired to keep Hermione’s hands from getting too naughty once Harry completed his hacking. The two settled for a sweaty hug before he headed off for a second shower, and she decided to rearrange her early morning schedule.

Thinking that Harry found almost as much solace in the air than in her arms, Hermione figured out how to rationalize an early morning flight. By the time that Harry had washed up and dressed (this time more fully), Hermione was kitted out in her combat blacks, and in the company of her parents, who were dressed in full combat gear.

“Attention!” barked Roger, as his wife and he clicked their heels together and snapped off a crisp salute.

Harry rolled his eyes. “At ease, Mr. and Mrs. Granger…what’s wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong, Harry,” Hermione quickly replied. “I thought you might want to do some flying this morning.”

“And we’re the excuse,” Emily said warmly, as she stepped forward and pulled the teen-ager into her arms.

“How are you doing, Sir?” she asked.

“Mrs. Granger, please….”

“Yeah, Mum, aren't there rules about hugging a senior officer?”

“Well if there are, and if your boyfriend can’t call me Emily, then I might rather resign my commission!”

“No worries, Mrs. Grang…erm, Emily,” Harry replied. “Especially when it’s just us.” He then rapped his knuckles against Emily’s body armor and added, “Although it’s hard not to think of that when this stuff gets in the way of your hugs.”

Emily laughed. “Yes, well we’re still trying to get used to it as well.”

“As are her students at the Summer Institute,” Roger said with a smile. “Amazing how well the kids behave when their Headmistress patrols the halls carrying an Uzi.”

“Roger!”

“What…you don’t?”

“No, I do, but it’s to protect the children, not to threaten them.”

“And do they know that, Dear?”

“Well….”

Harry laughed at the banter, and then asked, “Have you a way back, though?”

Roger nodded. “Sir Evan can anchor us to The Round Tower, and Cumberland Lodge is just down the road from there.”

Harry then turned to Hermione. “Not that I don’t enjoy the visit, but can you rationalize it given all four of our schedules?”

“Absolutely,” she replied. “I needed to get Mum and Dad keyed into Glengairn’s wards, and as long as they’re right there…well, you ought to check on your squadron deployment, Daddy ought to take a look at your new real estate holdings, and so long as they’ve come kitted with their wizardvision goggles maybe we could give them a fly-by around Hogwarts?

Harry arched an eyebrow. “We’ve really got time for a fly-by, Hermione?”

“Are you telling me that you’re going to turn down a chance to fly?”

“Of course not,” Harry replied. “So you’re going to fly too?”

“Of course not,” Hermione replied with a grin, as she nodded towards a long-handled broomstick that was propped up against the wall. “I had Fred hop back to the shop for one of the unmodified Bluebottles.”

Harry gave the slow moving “minivan” of broomsticks a frown.

“Well, I guess it’d still be considered flying...”

Hermione rolled her eyes. “Would you rather spend the next couple of hours filling out after-action reports?”

“No, no…this is obviously a much more important mission,” Harry said quickly, as he took hold of the broom. “Shall we open a window and head off?”

“Not just yet, Seeker,” Hermione advised, as she opened the flap on his rucksack and stuffed in the broomstick. “You’ve got a bit of fence-mending to do with the Black Watch.”

oo00OO00oo

Hermione’s idea of “fence-mending” involved transporting chafing dishes and coolers from the castle’s kitchens into the back of a five-passenger Landy. The Muggle driver assigned to provide transport for the Queen’s Wizard arched an eyebrow when Harry and the three Grangers emerged from the castle…not so much for what the four were loading than how they were dressed.

Roger and Emily Granger sported four-color camouflage patterned jackets and trousers, matching body armor (chest plate and leg guards), sand-colored boots and gloves. Each had automatic rifles hanging from shoulder straps, and semi-automatic pistols holstered on their belts.  It appeared to be standard military issue, but was anything but…the boots and gloves were dragonhide, the body armor magically thinned and reinforced with lightened sheets of Kevlar and steel plating, and the uniform charmed to maintain a comfortable temperature.

Harry was dressed similarly, save for the bright red “Potter Plaid” kilt and sporran that substituted for trousers and thigh packs, and the rucksack on his back. Hermione, whose battlefield “cred” came from her MI-5 commission, sported full-black commando gear and matching black body armor underneath a tight-fitting Potter Plaid shawl. In consideration of their eventual destination, her hand gun was hidden in one of her thigh packs and her wand was strapped onto a black arm holster.

“Good morning, Private,” Harry said cheerfully as he climbed into the front passenger seat.

“Morning, Major,” he replied, as Hermione and her parents piled into the rear bench.

“Know where you’re going then?” Harry asked.

“Erm, yes Sir,” the driver said cautiously, eyeing the tartan pattern woven into the Queen’s Wizard’s kilt. He had heard stories in the motor pool about the people who wore that weave, but didn’t dare ask about it…especially once Hermione answered a satellite phone call from Number 10 and began to discuss with “Tony” the need to brief in the Opposition Leader and his shadow cabinet.

The call from the Prime Minister’s office kept other conversations from starting up as the Landy made its way up towards the moorland valley guarded by the broom-buzzed Black Watch. As they approached the checkpoint, Hermione finished the call, and Harry rolled down his window to address the soldier who had waved them to a stop.

“Good Morning, Sergeant.”

“Morning, Sir,” the infantryman said warily, as he looked inside the vehicle. “No broomsticks today, Sir?”

Harry’s eyes darted over towards the driver, then narrowed as they came back upon the Black Watch sentinel.

“What are you on about, Sergeant?” he demanded. “We’ve brought breakfast, not broomsticks.”

“Erm, Yes, Sir…sorry, Sir, don’t know what I was saying.”

“Obviously,” said Harry, as he rolled his eyes and pulled on the flap of his maroon beret. “So go on, then…get your men queued up behind us and we’ll set up a buffet line.”

“All the men, Sir?”

“Yes, Sergeant, all of them,” Harry replied, as he got out of the vehicle. “The four of us can cover your watch for a few minutes.”

“Thank you, Sir…much appreciated.”

Harry nodded as he stretched his legs and stepped away from the Landy. He chuckled as he noted the defensive upgrades…the soldiers were climbing out of foxholes, their tank was hidden behind a wall of sandbags and earthwork, and the machine gun batteries had been augmented by an array of surface-to-air missiles.

“Looks like we made a favorable impression yesterday,” he said, as Hermione and her parents joined him.

“If you mean that you scared the dickens out of them, then yes you did,” Hermione gently chided.

“It was worth it if it makes them take their mission a little more seriously.”

“So what is their mission, then?” asked Roger. “To keep wizards from getting out of the glen, or prevent Muggles from going into it?”

“Both,” Harry replied. “Although they’d be hard-pressed to stop any wizarding force that was strong enough to get past our forward position at Glengairn.”

“So is this part of your new lands, Milord?” Emily asked with some cheek.

“Hey now,” complained Harry. “Hermione is the only one who gets to address me as her lord.”

“Oh, really? And when does that happen, Dear?” Emily asked her daughter.

“Whenever Harry is dreaming,” Hermione replied. She punctuated her response by punching her boyfriend in the shoulder.

“Hey!” he whined. “No beating up a superior officer!”

“Doesn’t apply,” Roger pointed out with a smile. “She’s not in the Squadron, and you share the same rank in MI-5 ¾.”

“Well….no cuffing the Clan Chief, then!”

“Are you saying that the Clan Chief outranks his Consort, dear?” Hermione asked sweetly.

“Oh, I’d think for a moment before I answer that one, son,” Roger advised.

“Fair enough,” Harry said with a snort. “To answer your question, Emily, my new lands start about three miles west of here…the Queen said that they could have been extended out this far, but she advised that I’d be hard pressed to generate income sufficient to cover the tax burden for these moorlands.”

“But if you wanted a buffer zone, this would be hard to beat, wouldn’t it?”

Harry shrugged his shoulders. “I guess, but at the time I didn’t know that there’d be anything on the lands that required a buffer.”

“There’d be even more of an uproar about the transfer out of the Crown Estate if the parcel were any larger than it already is,” offered Roger.

“Oh, that’s not going to be an issue,” said Hermione. “Balmoral has never been part of the Crown Estate.”

“Really?”

Hermione shook her head. “Price Albert bought it for Queen Victoria with his own money…it’s been passed on as private property through different inheritances ever since.”

“It’s still going to be front page news, though,” said her mum.

“We should be so lucky, given the attacks,” said Harry. “That a simple real estate transaction would be the most newsworthy item of the day.”

“Nothing is simple when it comes to you or the Queen, son,” Roger said as he placed his arm around Harry’s shoulders.

“Well I can’t argue with that, can I?” the Queen’s Wizard replied ruefully.

The Muggle Sergeant who had first chatted with them approached, and reported that everyone has passed through the line.

“Right, then, you can send the driver back with the dirty dishes,” Harry advised.

“Yes, Sir,” the soldier replied. “And sorry about the broomstick reference, Sir…I didn’t mean to be telling your secrets.”

Harry nodded. “They’re not just my secrets to keep, Sergeant….they’re yours now, too.”

“Yes, Sir…I won’t forget. Just never thought that I’d have to sign on to the Official Secrets Act.”

“Neither did I, Sergeant…neither did I,” Harry replied, as he casually reached into his eighteen-inch long satchel and pulled out a seven-and-a-half foot long broomstick.

The Muggle soldier gave the broomstick a close look as Harry placed it the ground.

“No forward guns on that one, Sir?” he asked.

Harry smiled. “Good spot, Sergeant…it’s a stock model that’s more minivan than military.”

“If you say so, Sir.”

Harry waited until the Land Rover had pulled around a bend and out of sight before yelling “Up!”. The broom lifted up off the ground as the two rear “bench seats” shimmered with yellow-tinted magical energy.

“Hop on,” said Harry, as he passed out flight helmets pulled from his bag, and climbed into the pilot’s seat.

“We’ll cover the rear,” Roger announced, as he swapped out his beret for his helmet and swung his machine gun around to a ready position against his chest. Hermione’s mum mirrored his actions as they climbed up onto either side of the rear bench. Facing away from each other, they hung their feet over the edges of the bench and fingered their triggers.

“Buckle us up, sweetheart?” Emily asked.

Hermione shook her head, still trying to wrap her mind around the idea of having parents who were armed with more than dental drills. She touched her wand tip to “seat belts” that wrapped around the waists of her two parents, before doing the same for herself in the middle bench. Seeing three “thumbs-up,” Harry turned forward and called into the radio channel used by air traffic control.

“Phoenix Lead requesting permission to take-off from Black Watch Station.”

“Phoenix Lead you are cleared for flight,” replied a voice through the radio. “Good Luck, Major.”

Harry turned to offer the soldier a departing salute, only to take note of the soldier’s intense interest. He looked at his watch and asked, “Think we have time to give the sergeant here a ride up the valley and back?”

Hermione snorted, then shook her head. “Mission first, Harry…pony rides later.”

“Ma’am, Yes Ma’am!” Harry said crisply.

He was started by the slap against the back of his helmet.

“You are a git sometimes, Harry,” Hermione decided.

“Ah…but a lovable git, right?”

“I suppose.”

The Muggle solider had to settle for salutes and a handshake from Hermione before Harry sent the broom up the valley at a steep angle of ascent.

oo00OO00oo

The distance between the Black Watch’s position and Glengairn’s ward line was covered in very short order. A call out over the radio kept fingers off of triggers and hands from drawn wands once they came in sight of the ivy-covered manor house and the sentinels that were now posted on its rooftop. While Hermione keyed her parents into the wards, Harry pulled hooded robes and tartan lap blankets from his bag. The robes hid their Muggle military apparel, while the small blankets hid Roger and Emily’s automatic weapons…this type of concealment would be necessary just as soon as they plunged into the valley on the other side.

Roger and Emily’s reactions to Glengairn once they passed through the wards were no less dramatic than Harry’s the day previous.

“It’s beautiful,” Emily gushed, as Harry ferried them to the top of the hill. “So lush…and green…and it’s yours?”

The Queen’s Wizard shrugged his shoulders. “That’s what they tell me.”

“But the flowers…and the shrubs…how can they thrive at this latitude…much less altitude?”

“Magic,” Harry replied glibly. “Neville reckons that the same weather moderation charms that temper the winters and keeps Black Lake from freezing over work up here as well.”

Roger and Emily got their first glimpse of Black Lake when Harry flew the Bluebottle up to the roof of Glengairn Lodge, where Katie Bell and New Six were standing watch. While Hermione played tour guide and began pointing out places that her parents had only known previously through her letters, Harry chatted with his troops

“How are things looking?”

“A quiet night, Major,” New Six replied.

“But only because there were silencing charms on the Love Shack you loaned out to Ron and Luna,” Katie snarked.

Harry snorted and looked down at the formal garden, where the Love Shack had been pitched. The tent flaps were still drawn shut.

Looking down at his watch, he asked, “No sign of those two this morning, then?”

“No, Sir.”

Harry sighed, and tried to call Ron using his Art Club badge. It took almost a minute’s time before he got a response.

“Oh, poo!”

“Luna?”

“Sorry, Harry.”

“Is something wrong?”

“Yes, Ronnie’s badge just stopped vibrating. I must have nudged it the wrong way…would you hang up and call again?”

“Erm…Luna, why are you wearing Ron’s badge?”

“Oh, I’m not wearing it…Ronnie and I aren’t wearing anything at the moment.”

“But how did you know that it was vibrating….wait, wait, don’t tell me….is Ron there?”

“Yes.”

“Can I talk with him please?”

“Erm, sorry, but Ronnie is busy checking me for overnight messages.”

“Checking you for overnight…how is he doing…wait, wait, don’t tell me.”

“Okay, Harry.”

“Will you have him call me when he’s done…checking?”

“Sure Harry…it won’t be much longer…even quicker if you called back.”

“Erm…right. Thanks, Luna.” Harry said hastily.

Katie Bell gave Harry a devilish look as he touched “off” his badge.

“You know, Harry…George knows a charm that turns his voice into a dead-on imitation of his Mum's.”

The Queen’s Wizard paused for a moment to consider this statement, then matched Katie’s grin. He called Ron’s brother, then listened in on a “three-way” call that was made to the Love Shack.

It took almost as much time as the previous call for Luna to accidentally “lift” the vibrating receiver with an errant touch.

“Oh, poo…it stopped again.”

“RONALD BILIUS WEASLEY!” George shouted using a a dead-on impersonation of his mum. “GET OFF OF YOUR GIRLFRIEND, AND GET YOURSELF OUT OF THAT DEN OF FORNICATION THIS MOMENT! NO SON OF MINE IS GOING TO…..”

The volume of this faux tirade was sufficient to catch Hermione’s notice.

“Harry…what is that?”

“Ron’s alarm clock,” he replied with a grin, as the Love Shack’s tent flaps were thrown open and the Clan Champion exited whist trying to run and put on his boots at the same time.

The laughter that rang down from the Lodge’s rooftop had to bounce around in Ron’s head for a few moments before he realized that he’d been pranked.

“That was mean, Harry,” Hermione said with a shake of her head.

“It was Katie’s idea,” Harry said defensively. “And it did get him out of the tent.”

“So now we’ll have to expect Ron to plot his revenge next time we’re in that situation?”

“And what situation is that, Dear?” her Mum teased. “Don’t tell me that Harry checks you for overnight messages as well?”

Hermione and Harry both blushed, as he stammered, “Erm, I’m sure she meant the next time that we slept in the tent.”

“Oh, really?” asked Roger. “And when will this next time be?”

Hermione’s blush grew before she realized that her parents were only teasing her. But as she had no interest in continuing this sort of banter with them, she ended the discussion with a huff and a “Never mind.”

oo00OO00oo

Given their proximity to Hogsmeade Village, it was decided that the easiest way for Ron and Luna to get to the Ministry for their internships was for them to floo from The Three Broomsticks. Hermione had suggested this, not fancying the idea more of Luna’s hugs as she side-along apparated her back to London.

There was only incidental physical contact as Luna squeezed in next to Hermione on the middle bench of the Bluebottle. But Hermione soon decided that the Ravenclaw’s hugs would have been preferable, once she began to effusively (and explicitly) describe how she and Ron had made use of all of the Love Shack’s amenities.

It was only the shortness of the trip that kept Luna from getting too far down the road towards “Too Much Information!” A Notice-Me-Not charm applied to the broomstick kept them from being “noticed” once Harry flew out beyond the Notice-Me-Not wards that surrounded Glengairn. Once Ron and Luna were dropped off, Harry piloted the broom back up into the air and down the path towards Hogwarts.

Hogsmeade and Hogwarts sat on either end of an “L”-shaped valley whose limbs pointed east and north. The magical village anchored the east end of the closed valley, and was surrounded by high hills and mountains on three sides. Glengairn Lodge sat south of Hogsmeade, at the top on the only walkable pass out of the valley.

Hogsmeade Station sat just west of the village, with tracks that led north, and then along the northern shoreline of the lake. The TPOMS squadron had followed these tracks the day before, looking for where they led out of the valley and connected into the Muggle railway system. They had found a second pass on the north end of the valley, and were surprised to discover that the tracks that had been used by the Express not six weeks disappeared under a thick blanket of heather and heath.

It had taken Neville’s inspection of the foliage and a side trip to the train’s engine house just past the Station to suss out what was a work. The heath that covered the tracks was an “instant-growth” magical hybrid variety that could cover a bared area in seconds. The Express’s locomotive had localized banishing charms attached to its front. This magical equivalent of a Muggle locomotive’s cow catcher cleared the heath and other obstacles as the train passed over the tracks. Once the train passed, the thick brush immediately reestablished itself, and quite literally covered the magical train’s tracks.

This thick mass of vegetation would make it difficult for anyone, Muggle or magical, to walk along the tracks and out of the valley using the northern pass. But as it was a “known” route between the magical and Muggle worlds, TPOMS had established a manned lookout station at the top of the pass.

Keeping live eyes watching the magical valley from both Glengairn and the northern pass had become the TPOMS squadron’s latest assignment. The Phoenix Teams were taking rotating eight-hour shifts, and Harry took the opportunity to fly by the northern pass to check on the lookout station.

Lee and Stout were disappointed when the Grangers played “I spy” and sussed out their concealed location using Muggle thermal imagery equipment. Solace was taken by the fact that Harry and Hermione hadn’t been able to spot them with their bare eyes, as that was how a “normal” witch or wizard would scan the hills.

Once visual contact had been made with the northern lookout station, Harry doubled back to the station. Dropping down to low altitude and striking out over the lake, he followed the route Hagrid took with every class of First Years, four to a boat, so that Hermione’s parents to see Hogwarts Castle for the first time just as he had …well, almost. Harry and Hermione hadn’t needed to use electronic “wizard glasses” to see through the illusion of a ruined hovel that disguised Hogwarts’s location from unaware Muggles. But Roger and Emily’s first sight of the castle was no less breathtaking because of it.

Had Hagrid gotten any better at keeping secrets, Harry would have stopped by and introduced him to Hermione’s parents. But as the half-giant wasn’t, Harry bypassed the wooden hut and (after a single lap about the castle that allowed Hermione to play tour guide for her mum and dad), headed back to Glengairn Lodge. Once there, the house tour focused on a three-dimensional table-top model of Hogsmeade Valley that the magical members of the squadron had constructed in the dining room.

Roger looked at the model not only as a freshly-minted military man, but as the Steward of Clan Potter and the manager of Harry’s finances.

“So all of this valley is now yours, then?”

Harry nodded. “Yes and no…the Queen has given me clear title to the land, the Forbidden Forest, and the lake, but the Hogwarts and all of the buildings in Hogsmeade Village are privately owned.”

“So the inhabitants lease the land?”

“Most of them do,” Harry said with a smile. “Nobody has ever dared ask the Centaurs to pay rent.”

“Did the Queen say how much she receives in lease payments?”

“Yeah,” Harry said with a snort. “She doesn’t receive a knut.”

“How could that be?” asked Emily.

“A bit of coercive magic during negotiations, no doubt,” Harry replied. “All of the payments go to the Ministry…not just here, but in Diagon Alley as well.”

“The Queen owns Diagon Alley, too?”

“Sort of,” Hermione replied. “The Alley is actually part of the Duchy of Cornwall…remember our discussion about Edward the Black Prince and how all of the magical lands in England were protected by incorporation into the Duchy?”

“But Scotland was a separate nation at the time, so this valley wasn’t part of that?” Roger asked.

“Exactly,” Hermione replied. “Hogsmeade Valley was owned by the Hogwarts Board of Governors and individual magical families up to the Treaty of Carlisle and the final separation. At some point the land was ceded to the Muggle Earl of Huntley, and then changed hands several times…the details are still a muddle, according to the Royal Historian. The important point is that when Balmoral was purchased by Prince Albert and Queen Victoria in the mid 1800’s, the Valley got the same sort of royal protections that Diagon and all of the other magical lands already had.”

“But how does that relate to the lease payments going to the Ministry of Magic?”

“Discriminatory tax rates,” Harry said with a rueful grin. “Witches and wizards don’t appreciate why their tax burdens are so low.”

“How is that?”

“It all goes back to the Treaty of Carlisle,” Hermione replied, dropping into lecture mode. “The Minister of Magic is the Queen’s magical Justice of the Peace, and the Ministry of Magic is nominally part of her government. The Treaty allows the Minister of Magic to collect taxes from witches and wizards on the Queen’s behalf, and to use these funds to run the “her” magical ministry. But then the Ministry building was destroyed in the 1700’s during one of the Goblin Rebellions, and there wasn’t enough tax money to rebuild it. So, the Minister of Magic convinced King George to “redirect” the annual lease payments paid by witches and wizards who lived on Royal lands to the Ministry, rather than to the Crown. And the rest, as they say, is history. Nobody let the Crown know when the Ministry had been rebuilt, so the rent money on Royal lands has been added to the Ministry’s coffers ever since.”

“Hmmm,” thought Roger. “So when Prince Albert bought Balmoral, that ‘redirection’ of lease payments began to apply here?”

“Exactly,” Hermione replied. “Brought in so many galleons that the Minister of Magic was able to drop income tax rates by two-thirds. And by amazing coincidence, that particular Minister still holds the record for longest term of office.”

“But now that this land is back in Harry’s private hands?”

“The Goblins figure that by giving these lands to Harry, the Queen’s cut the Ministry’s current annual revenues in half.”

“Wow,” remarked Emily. “So even if things don’t change on Saturday, the Queen’s hobbled the Ministry?”

“That’s right,” Harry said brightly. “Wasn’t until I was told that point out that I started to like the deal.”

Emily looked at her watch and frowned.

“I should be getting back to Cumberland,” she announced. “Dean’s doing a fine job as its Head Boy, but with the ICW folks staying there, and the seminars that they’ve volunteered to teach…”

“How’s that all going?” Harry asked.

“Wonderfully,” Emily replied. “The King’s Wizard is doing a short course on magical world history this morning. The Emperor’s Wizard is giving a talk on magic and Muggle mysticism this afternoon, the Swedish witch is Muggleborn, and is going to work with the new Muggleborn parents, and then there’s Rongo…”

“What’s he up to?” Harry asked with a smile.

“He’s taking over part of the physical education curriculum,” Roger said with a grin. “So if you see an invoice for a hundred and fifty black rugby jerseys, that's why.”

“Oh, it’s going to be more than that, Daddy,” Hermione admonished. “The Maori mages are world famous for their wandless magical rituals.”

“Right,” Roger said dismissively. “Next thing you’ll tell me is that the haka is really a magic dance.”

“Why yes, actually…it is,” Hermione said with an arched eyebrow. “How did you know?”

Roger snorted, but was too smart to be shocked…during his tenure as the father of a witch he had become accustomed to such implausibility.

 

9:45am, Minister of Magic's Office

Despite the grim discussion topic, Rufus Scrimgeour found himself enjoying his morning meeting with the Head of the Department of Mysteries. He’d leave it to others to link this positive attitude to the fact that the meeting didn’t involve Dolores Umbridge (who was busy finalizing a rationalization for her staff’s performance in Edinburgh) or Percy Weasley (who was still absent).

“We need a back up plan in case this Project Arcanum doesn’t pan out,” he stated. “Anything come to mind?”

The Head Unspeakable gave his boss the kind of blank, noncommittal stare that one would expect from a man of his position.

“And just how….defiant…of the ICW should any such back-up plan be?”

“Best not to be openly defiant at all,” Rufus decided. “And if you’re right about how bad this meeting with the Muggle Queen could go, it wouldn’t have to cover that much time.”

“So you expect that if the Queen strips you of your power that the ICW will take your side?”

“Why wouldn’t it?” asked the Minister. “It’d be Muggles against magicals….the ICW would have to take our side.”

“I wouldn’t be so certain,” the Unspeakable cautioned. “Still, there is merit in distractions on a grand scale.”

“Shipping them off to Azkaban would be a big distraction, wouldn’t it?” Rufus mused.

“I was thinking about the Muggles,” replied the Unspeakable. “They are taking advantages of differences between factions in the wizarding world…yet they are no strangers to factional strife on their side of the fence.”

“Sounds like you have something in mind, then?” the Minister asked hopefully.

“Perhaps.”

An airborne magical memo interrupted the conversation. Scrimgeour frowned as he snatched the “highest priority” message from the basket and read it.

“Damn.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Percy’s shown up with a Dutch charms master.”

“But that’s what we wanted, isn’t it?”

“I’d rather hear your ideas without being distracted by his presence, and if I let him in without Dolores here she’ll throw a fit.”

“If that’s how you feel, why do you keep them around?”

“He knows too many Ministry secrets, and she’s too good at blackmail.”

“Ah, I see,” replied the Unspeakable. “So you found a way to keep him out of your hair for a day…find a way to keep him busy for an hour more.”

“Excellent idea,” Rufus said with a grin. He inked a quill, jotted down a quick reply on the parchment memo, and sent it flying out the door.

“Tell me about Muggle distractions,” he said.

The Head Unspeakable nodded.

“So how much do you know about Muggle Ireland?” 

oo00OO00oo

The Minister of Magic smiled as the Head of the Department of Mysteries fleshed out his idea. Meanwhile, the Minister’s Secretary smiled as she read his reply memo. Percy Weasley had always treated her poorly, so she was going to enjoy this.

“I’m sorry, Special Assistant Weasley,” she said to Percy. “The Minister has asked that he not be disturbed for the next hour.”

“But…but…this is important!” Percy whined. “I’ve been on an important mission, and brought back an important person that the Minister would want to meet right away.”

“Minister Scrimgeour is aware of the situation,” the secretary replied. “He’s instructed me to have you complete a vital aspect of your important mission while you wait.”

“And what could that be?” Percy asked dismissively.

The secretary narrowed her eyes, but decided to let her magical command speak on her behalf. She drew her wand and pointed towards a file cabinet.

“Accio blank expense report form!”

Percy winced as the magical document was levitated into his hands.

The Dutch wizard who was traveling with the Special Assistant looked over his shoulder and whistled.

“Merlin, there’s some powerful magic laid down on that parchment.”

“Compulsion and truth charms,” the secretary said with a grin. “Percy came up with that idea himself…said that the ‘junior staff’ couldn’t be trusted.”

“Ah, I see,” Peter replied. “Well, no worries.”

“How can you say that?” Percy asked weakly.

“Look at all of the lines under ‘Miscellaneous Expenses,” the Dutchman replied. “There’s plenty of room there for all of the drugs, and the booze, and the porn.”

The Minister’s secretary smiled evilly.

“Do you need a copy of the scroll that you wrote on ‘Allowable Expenses,’ Mr. Special Assistant?”

Percy moaned, and tried to muster all of the haughty contempt that he possessed as he dismissed the secretary’s offer.

He failed miserably.

 

 

Chapter 41: Taking Offense

Author’s Note: This chapter introduces “Sir John,” a cricket-loving former Conservative Party PM into the mix, and alludes to two princesses high up in the line of succession. I should therefore reiterate that all characters in this story are fictional, although they may resemble real life counterparts. Some real life persons who “should” have fictional counterparts in this story don’t necessarily have them (don’t expect to see somebody named Camille, or references to somebody named Diana, for example). Also worth repeating is that the story takes place in the summer of 2006, rather than 1997, with a timeline pushed up nine years from canon. So, Prime Minister “Tony” has been living at Number 10 for a while now, after chasing “Sir John” and the Tories out of power in 1997. Oh, and The Princesses York….they are 18 and 16 years old, respectively.

This chapter is dedicated to the memory of fenriswolf, who reviewed it only a few months before his untimely passing.


Thursday, July 12, 10:15 am, The Round Tower, Windsor Castle

The Queen’s Wizard carried a bag of deluxe owl treats with him as he badge jumped to Windsor Castle. It had been a few days since he had been “home” to the Round Tower, and he felt rather guilty for it. His familiar was quick to remind Harry of that fact, and didn’t let the treats stand in the way of nipping his ear. She also showed no inclination to let Harry out of her taloned grip, which is why the Queen’s Wizard entered the State Apartments and was announced to The Prince with an owl perched on his shoulder.

“Ah, Good morning, Sir Harry…come in, come in. Oh, and I see that Hedwig is joining us….welcome to you both.”

“Thank you, Your Highness,” Harry replied. His familiar responded with a bob of her head that was almost as easy to interpret.

“How are spirits holding up at Balmoral?”

“Pretty well, Sir…they flew the Queen’s corgis up from Edinburgh last night, and that’s helping keep things lively down in the Bunker.”

“And what of the morale of my magical squadron and its commander?”

Harry snorted. “They’ve settled into the new mission. As for me, well…no shortage of surprises to hold my attention.”

“Yes, I imagine that to be the case,” The Prince replied, as he waved Harry towards a pair of high-backed chairs. “Shall I have someone bring in a perch for your friend?”

Harry winced as Hedwig tightened her grip on his shoulder.

“Erm, no thank you Sir, Hedwig seems to be happy right where she is.”

“I see,” The Prince said with a smile. “So…what is your opinion of the Balmoral defenses?”

“They seem impressive, Sir,” Harry replied. “I can’t imagine that it’s all that comfortable for Her Majesty to be holed up in The Bunker, even with her pets…but I also can’t imagine a safer place right now, unless we could put her under a Fidelius…makes me think that you should be there as well, frankly.”

“Yes, well there’s still a rather robust defense here at Windsor,” The Prince replied. “And the Lines of Succession must be preserved.”

“Sir?”

“Need to keep the Queen and those of us nearest in line to the throne apart,” The Prince explained. “It wouldn’t do to have all of us in one place these days, in case the next attack were more successful.”

“Which is why you weren’t in attendance at the Garden Party?”

“Exactly.”

“So Prince Harry, then?”

“He’s stationed at Buckingham, while my oldest son is out at Sandhurst. Meanwhile, my younger brother has been dispatched to Sydney for a Commonwealth financial conference, and my two nieces are presently on hols visiting their mum in New York...that covers the next six in line.”

Harry snorted. “Five different places on three different continents? Nothing half-done about that level of detail, except…”

“Yes?”

“Well, Sir, we’ve only got TPOMS at Balmoral…Sir Evan being posted here gives us an anchor to your location, but we don’t have any magical protection for the others.”

The Prince nodded. “You’ve got enough on your plate, Sir Harry.”

“But I’m to protect the Queen and her family, Sir.”

“And you’ve done a smashing job so far,” replied The Prince. “As for Andy and his Princesses...I had opportunity to meet with some of your foreign witches and wizards when they returned to London yesterday, and they offered to pass along word to their overseas counterparts.”

Harry nodded as he swallowed his response.

“You don’t look pleased.”

“No Sir…I mean, it’s not that I’m not pleased, but I feel responsible for….”

“Harry, you aren’t the Prince’s Wizard, are you?”

“Erm…no Sir.”

“How about the Princess’s Wizard? I understand that one of my nieces might wish it were so, but it’s not the case, is it?”

Harry frowned, and tried not to wonder which of the Royal teen-agers The Prince might be talking about.

“No Sir, I’m the Queen’s Wizard.”

“So let others worry about the rest of us, then…it isn’t as if you aren’t having even more dropped into your lap.”

“Sir?”

“I was referring to our meeting this morning,” replied The Prince. “Have you been briefed in?”

“Just from the bit that Her Majesty mentioned this morning, Sir...Hermione has been sent to Carlisle to scout out the location for Saturday’s meeting, and I’m to take her place and help you inform the Shadow Government about magic and recent events, in case the Prime Minister gets sacked.”

The Prince nodded. “That covers it, save for the fact that Her Majesty has called in reinforcements for us.”

“Sir?”

“Exactly,” The Prince replied with a wink. “Sir John should be here shortly. The drive into town should give us enough time to bring him back up to speed.”

“Back up to speed, Sir?”

A low-pitched chuckle escaped from The Prince’s lips. “Sir John was in a position to know about the wizarding world before he retired to the cricket fields of Surrey. With any luck he’ll bring a few bats along to keep his party’s Young Turks in line for us.”

Harry arched an eyebrow, then smiled as he solved The Prince’s riddle. He had heard the former Tory Prime Minister’s name disparaged dozens of time on Privet Drive...Vernon had never forgiven the man for losing Number 10 to Hermione’s “Socialist” boss.

The Prince stood, and the Queen’s Wizard followed suit.

“Harry, you have had perfectly good reasons to be cautious when dealing with politicians, but I do hope that you give Sir John a chance…he’s a decent chap.”

“Yes, Sir,” the young wizard replied. “My Uncle Vernon cursed the former Prime Minister almost as often as he cursed his replacement…so that’s got to be a good sign, right?”

The Prince laughed as he led Harry out of the room and into the courtyard. Nodding towards Harry’s familiar, he added, “Well, then, it appears that all that is left is to apologize to Miss Hedwig.”

“Apologize, Sir?”

“We’re meeting the Shadow Cabinet in the Opposition Leader’s offices within Parliament,” The Prince explained. “And I am afraid that there is a tradition that animals are not allowed on the grounds, other than seeing eye dogs.”

Harry turned his head to say a few words to Hedwig, only to watch his familiar launch herself off of his shoulder and towards the top of the Round Tower.

“Guess she likes these sorts of meetings almost as much as I do,” Harry said with a chuckle.

The Prince smiled and nodded his head. “Proving yet again just how amazingly intelligent certain magical creatures can be.”


 

oo00OO00oo

11:00 am, The Minister of Magic’s Office

The meeting between Rufus Scrimgeour, his Special Assistants, and the Dutch Charms Master had gone south rather quickly (or north, if you have an antipodean perspective).

"Refusing to provide a cost estimate up front? There is no way that we should work with this boy under these conditions," spat Umbridge.

"Fine, suit yourself," replied the Dutch Wizard. "As soon as you make the transfer into my Gringott's vault I'll be on my way."

"What transfer?"

"The one that Percy here agreed to make when he signed my consulting contract," the Charms Master said with a shrug of his shoulders.

"I don't remember singing any such contract!" Percy objected.

"I'm not surprised, given that it was after you ordered that third plate of brownies."

"What are you....where is this contract?"

The young Charms Master smiled as he pulled a thick parchment scroll from his coat pocket.

"Give me that..."

"Ah, ah, ah!" chided Peter, as he snapped the document away from Weasley's grasp.  Drawing his wand from a sleeve, he used a duplication charm thrice over, and handed out copies.

The Dutch wizard enjoyed watching the faces of the three Ministry officials fall as they got further and further down the scroll.

"What? This is outrageous!" Umbridge hissed.

"This must be a forgery," whined Percy. "I would have never signed this kind of contract."

"That is your signature down at the bottom, isn't it?"

"Well...."

"And you did say over and over again that as Special Assistant to the Minister, you had the authority to sign on the Minister’s behalf..."

"He did, did he?" asked Rufus. "If that's the case, it won't be the case much longer...."

"Of course I wouldn't have said that I had that kind of authority, Sir," said Percy.

"Section 4, subpart 6 suggests otherwise," noted the Former High Inquisitor, as she worked her way through the document.

"Must not have been in my right mind," Percy muttered (he was more right than he knew). He then turned towards the young Charms Master and said, "You tricked me, or magically coerced me...either you or Katja...."

"Who's Katja?" Rufus demanded.

"She's....." began Percy, who suddenly decided that he didn't want to finish.  Peter decided to do it for him.

"She listed under ‘Miscellaneous Expenses’ on Percy’s report."

"Why would a witch be itemized...," muttered Scrimgeour, as he glanced over at Percy's financial reckoning.  "The name Katja isn't written here."

"Oh, really?"  asked Peter. "Maybe it's under her nickname."

"What's her nickname?"

"A good time."

"Two hundred galleons ‘for a good time’…what in Merlin's.....Percy?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Might you explain why you spent 200 galleons for 'a good time'?"

"Erm, not really, Sir...all a bit hazy."

"Just like your employment status is a little hazy, right?"

"Now Minister, don't be too hard on the boy," replied the Dutch ’consultant.’  "If he hadn't been willing to get naked in Oslo or Holland, I wouldn't be here now."

"What's this about getting naked…there's nothing about that in your report!"

"Erm…well…it's not something I was comfortable reporting, Sir...not that there’s room on the expense report for it. But between the hobgoblins, and turning my shorts into a portkey...."

The Minister of Magic reached for his wand.  But rather than hex Percy, he cast a silencing spell on Umbridge...it was the only way that was going to be able to think this situation through.

Rubbing his temples in a futile attempt to ease his burgeoning headache, he finally stated, "There will be a full investigation...after our business with Mr. Vanderwood has been completed."

Rufus then turned to address Madame Umbridge, who was turning blue in the face with frustration. "Yes, yes, I know...we'll discuss a revised organization chart in the near future.  But for now...as one-sided as this contract appears, it does stipulate at the risk of Mr. Vanderwood's magic that he is capable of casting a Fidelius Charm."

"Ah, well said, Sir...no wonder you're in charge here," Peter said with a smile.

The Minister of Magic winced, wondering how much longer that statement might hold. "Yes, well...perhaps Mr.Vanderwood, you might explain why we needed to pay more for your consulting services than for your charms work."

"Oh, don't be too sure that the actual magic won't cost you more...depends on what secret you decide to protect."

"But...more than this 15,000 galleon consulting fee?  You mean that the charm is priced separately?"

Peter shrugged. "It's all spelled out in that contract."

"But why...."

"Because there have been too many situations where either my father or I have been blamed for failed charms that were really the client's fault."

"How could we be held at fault if you can't cast a proper charm?" demanded Percy.

"I thought that you went through this already with my dad?" the Dutch wizard asked. "Some secrets can't be protected by the Fidelius Charm, no matter how powerful the Charms Master is."

"And why is that?"

"Because magic is a bitch that demands balance," quipped the young wizard.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, Sir...there is no single, all-powerful spell, or all-powerful spell caster out there.  Every use of magic has its limitations...by design."

"Could you be a little more specific?"

"Right...we're talking about the Fidelius Charm, so we'll use it for an example.  Do you have any idea just how powerful I would be if there were no checks on my ability to cast that specific charm?”

Scrimgeour rolled his eyes. "No...just how powerful would you be?"

The Dutch wizard responding by nicking a quill and piece of parchment from the Minister's desk.  He wrote a quick line of text, folded the parchment in half, and passed it across the desk.

"So let's pretend...Abracadabra-hocus-pocus-Fidelius....I've just pulled the secret that I've written down on that bit of parchment out from the world and placed it inside you, Minister.  You are now the only person in the world that knows the secret."

Rufus opened the note and read, "Lord Voldemort is a Wizard."

"So if I am the only one that knows that fact,” he mused, “then he doesn't, right?"

Peter nodded. "Do you know what they call a wizard that doesn't know he's a wizard?"

"No, what?" asked Percy.

"A squib," stated Scrimgeour.

"Hey, that's pretty good," admitted the Dutch wizard. "No wonder you're the one sitting behind that desk."

"We've not time for flattery...though at your billing rates it should be expected."

"Fair enough...so what if I cast a new charm about the statement 'There are British-born witches and wizards’?"  How much do you think the French Ministry would pay for me to cast that spell?"

"Yes, yes...so you aren't omnipotent...why should we have to pay for you to reveal your limitations?"

"Because I know them, first off," Peter replied. "Secondly, I can usually do a good enough job of suggesting the right secret...so long, of course, as the client is forthcoming."

"What do you mean 'right secret' or if 'the client is forthcoming’?"

"What I mean is what I said," the young wizard replied. "I know what level of magical opposition I can overcome when I cast the charm, but I can't guarantee success if I'm not told what kind of opposition exists."

"That's rather a cloudy answer."

"Fine, let me be specific...no extra charge for that, by the way," the Dutch wizard said with a grin.  "You want to hide the Ministry of Magic's location from others, right?"

"How did you...I never told you that!" Percy exclaimed.

"You didn't need to," Peter quipped.  "So why do you need to hide?"

"What business is that of yours?" asked Percy.

"Have you been listening at all to what I've been saying?  Never mind...the answer to that question is 'no' and the answer to my previous question is because you want to keep an ICW delegation from gaining access to Ministry files."

"How did you...."

"Time is money...am I wrong?"

Scrimgeour cast his eyes back down onto the parchment in front of him.

"You are contractually bound to client confidentiality?"

"Magically bound, too," Peter said with a nod. 

"Let us assume that you are partially correct, then," replied Rufus. "How does that impact your work?"

"Percy here has agreed to allow this ICW delegation to visit the Ministry tomorrow morning and gain access to your files, correct? Don't bother asking how I know, am I wrong?"

"No."

"And did he do this willingly?"

"No, I had to acknowledge the Writ of Inquiry,” Percy explained. “But it’s really not my fault, when you think about it….”

A spell caught Percy mid-sentence, and struck him as silent as Umbridge.

The Dutch Wizard glanced at the Minister’s extended wand and smiled.

“Thanks, he was beginning to get on my nerves as well…and I’ve only been with him for a day. How do you manage to put up with him for longer than that?”

“Practice,” Rufus said with a sigh. “Practice…and judicious use of the Obliviate spell.”

He then cast two separate memory charms that sent his “Special Assistants” scurrying out of the office in the belief that their meeting had ended and that the Minister asked for briefs outlining their proposed changes to the Ministry’s org chart.

The Dutch wizard let out a low-pitched whistle. “Wow, I like how you operate.”

“I don’t, but I seldom have any choice in the matter,” the Minister replied gruffly. “Now where were we?”

“The Writ of Inquiry,” Peter replied. “Do you have it?”

Scrimgeour nodded, and pulled open a desk drawer.

“Oh, and while you’re at it, you might as well show me the Orb.”

Rufus arched an eyebrow, but did as he was asked. There would be opportunity to learn how the Dutch wizard learned about the Orb later on.

The young Charms Master dropped the necklace almost as soon as he touched it.

“Yeow!….burns my hands just at the thought of it!”

“At the thought of what?”

“Trying to cast a Fidelius that would overpower the magic that went into the making of this artifact, and the treaty that stands behind it,” Peter relied. “I’d die trying to protect ‘The Ministry of Magic has lost its home rule authority over Magical Britain and Ireland’  …not that you’d be saved from paying my fees were that to happen, mind you.”

“So…are you saying that it’s impossible to hide the secret…or just that it’s impossible for you?”

“The former,” the young wizard said seriously. “You could bring in another Charms Master and ask his opinion, but given all of the time and effort that it took to get me here…”

“Right…what about the ICW’s Writ of Inquiry?”

The frown that formed on the Dutchman’s face was almost as intense as the one produced by his handling of the orb. It wasn’t until he finished reading through the document that Scrimgeour saw a glimmer of hope in his eyes.

“Well?”

“This is a tricky one,” Peter replied. “The way that this writ is worded…I doubt that I could match its power right now, but maybe once you’ve provided them initial access?”

“What?” asked the Minister of Magic. “I don’t understand.”

The young wizard sighed. “Most of the magic bound within this document is likely linked to allowing the ICW delegation access to the Ministry and its records. If you asked me to protect the secret that ‘The Ministry of Magic has documents that the ICW would want to review’ then I’d be butting head-on with this writ.”

“But….”

“But once you meet the initial obligations, most of the power attached to this writ should dissipate.”

“Most?”

“While it isn’t spelled out on this parchment, there is a tacit assumption that the ICW delegation would be allowed access to the Ministry not just tomorrow morning, but any time afterwards, so long as access was needed for their work, right?”

“Yes, I would think so.”

“So, it would be easier for me to cast a successful Fidelius Charm if I was only overpowering an implicit promise, rather than an explicit one.”

“So….,” drawled the Minister, as the gears ground in his head. “We wait until tomorrow morning, let the ICW in the door, and then kick them out just as soon as you cast the charm?”

“Charms.”

“What?”

“Charms, plural,” the Dutch wizard replied. “You are going to need two of them.”

“Why would we need that…just so you get paid twice over?”

“No….well, okay, yes…that would mean I’d get paid twice, but the fact is that you’ll need two charms because you’ve got two separate problems.”

“Yes, but can’t you solve both problems with the protection of one secret?”

“Like what?”

“Like…I don’t know, something like, ‘The Ministry of Magic is located beneath Central London’.”

“That’s something that I could do, once you let the ICW in, but it wouldn’t completely solve your problem.”

“Why wouldn’t it?”

The young wizard rolled his eyes. “I went through this with your flunky last night…how does your floo network work?”

“What do you mean…they don’t have floo’s in Holland?”

“Of course they do…look, for all that I know, we are presently underneath High Street in Bolton, right now, rather than Central London.”

“Why would you think that?”

“Percy and I stayed in a Muggle hotel last night. This morning, he took me to his flat, so that we could floo here.”

“And…?”

“And what address do you think he told me to use?”

“The Ministry of Magic?"

“Right…not ‘Sixty Feet Beneath a Telephone Box in Central London’.”

“Why would…oh, now I see your point,” the Minister admitted. He shook his head and let out a deep breath.

“So what bright ideas do you have, then?”

The Dutch Charms Master replied by writing two statements down on separate pieces of parchment. He folded each slip once, and then pushed them across the desk. Scrimgeour opened each slip and held them open for a few minutes.

When a smile crept onto his lips, the Dutch wizard asked, “So what are you thinking?”

Rufus vanished the two slips of paper with a spell, and then leaned back in his chair.

“I’m not thinking, so much as wondering,” he finally replied.

“What are you wondering, then?”

“Whether, when the time comes, these secrets have to be shared with my two Special Assistants.”
 

oo00OO00oo

12:30 pm, The Palace at Westminster, London

“Right, well that was lovely, wasn’t it?” asked The Prince as they left the meeting room.

Not waiting for an answer, the man with almost as many titles as Harry turned to an attendant stationed just outside of the door.

“Be a good chap and inform Sir John when he is finished that Lord Gryffindor and I shall be in the Peers’ Dining Room, would you?”

“Of course, Your Highness,” the man said with a bow.

“This way, Harry,” The Prince then said, leading his young colleague by the arm. “There’s a round-about route that will avoid most of the crowds.”

“Sounds good to me, Sir,” the young wizard replied.

A five-minute traverse of one of the many long corridors of the Parliament complex brought them into a restricted area open only to the members of the House of Lords and their guests. Though it was called “The Peers’ Dining Room,” most of the space was taken up with a long mahogany bar with brass railings and several shelves of liquor bottles behind it.

“Good afternoon, Basil,” The Prince called out to well-dressed man who was standing behind the bar. He then added, “It is afternoon, isn’t it?”

“Yes, Your Highness,” the man said with a curt nod, as his arm automatically arched out towards a bottle of The Prince’s favorite single malt whisky.

“Doubles, if you will?”

The bar man didn’t flinch at the request for two glasses full of neat whisky, but The Prince knew what the yeoman was thinking well enough.

“No worries, Basil…I daresay Gryffindor needs a drink more than I do right now.”

“Of course, Your Highness.”

The Prince’s assessment was true enough in Harry’s mind as the burn of alcohol hit the back of his throat. A deep sigh escaped his lips as he placed the empty tumbler back down onto the bar.

“Need I concern myself with the ease with which you downed that drink, Gryffindor?” The Prince asked.

“Erm…I don’t think so, Sir,” Harry replied with a smile. “Wizards hold their liquor better than Muggles for some reason.”

“Because of the magic?”

Harry shrugged. “Hermione thinks so, but I reckon it might have more to do with the fact that we’re served in wizard pubs beginning in Third Year…not that this drink didn’t hit the spot, Sir.”

“It’s Cornwall.”

“Sir?”

“Things are slightly less formal inside this room…members refer to each other by simple title…Cumberland, or Argyle…or Gryffindor.”

“There’s some choice in your case then, Sir?”

“It’s Cornwall, Gryffindor.”

“Erm, yes, Sir…I mean, Cornwall…why not Wales, then?”

The Prince shrugged. “Switched a few years back, when it began to remind me of my expanding waistline.”

Harry chuckled at the first thing he’d found funny over the past few hours. Dying to talk about the meeting they had just held with the Shadow Cabinet, he looked over his shoulder and around the room.

“Safe to talk, here… Cornwall?”

The Prince nodded. “In general terms, yes…peers come here when they want a bit of space.”

A shout came from across the room.

“I say! Cornwall!”

The Prince winced a bit, and then muttered, “Although there are notable exceptions to the rule.”

Putting on a brave face, he turned to greet a white haired man who was hobbling towards them with aid of a cane.

“How are you, Melbury?”

“Excellent, Cornwall, excellent,” the man replied. Finally noticing Harry, he asked, “Who’s your friend, then?”

The Prince smiled thinly.

“Lord Melbury,” he replied, “May I introduce to you Her Royal Majesty’s Wizard, The Right Honorable Earl Gryffindor, Major Sir Harry Potter.”

There was a pause as the old man looked over Harry’s mixture of military and tartan attire and whispered the title to himself.

“Royal…no…Wizard….no, not that either…Oh! Gryffindor! Yes, yes…I remember it now,” he loudly proclaimed, holding out his hand. “That’s quite a stylization for someone your age, isn’t it?”

“Yes, well…” Harry replied, as he shook the man’s hand. “Had I the choice, ‘Just Harry’ would be perfectly fine with me.”

“Figures,” the old man muttered. “The young ones not appreciating….I’ve heard about you, you know!”

“You have, Sir…erm, Melbury?” Harry asked.

“Of course I have!” the man shot back. “Your Letters Patent caused quite the stir…hasn’t been a peer created that was under the age of twenty-one in centuries!”

“Wasn’t exactly by my choice, Sir,” Harry protested.

“So, how did you manage it, Gryffindor?” the old man asked. “Get cozy-rosy with one of the Princesses?”

Harry choked in response.

“Gryffindor was reestablished when Harry here became Queen’s Wizard,” The Prince explained. “He has neither been cozy nor rosy with any member of the Royal Family.”

“So far as you know, eh Cornwall?” the man replied. He laughed at his own wit, and then added, “So…Her Majesty has finally gotten around to sending out the Writ of Summons? Giving Gryffindor a tour of his new offices?”

The Prince smiled. “No writ yet, Melbury…Gryffindor and I needed a bit of respite after a meeting with ‘The Chameleon’ and his lot.”

“Ah, that explains the doubles, then,” the old man said with a nod. “Damn Commoners, thinking they can push their betters around…”

“Yes, well, Melbury…it was a pleasure seeing you again,” The Prince stated, lying through his teeth.

“Oh, I’m sure that it was,” the old man replied. He then turned his head sharply, frowned, and began to wander off in a rather aimless direction.

“So, Melbury is a Member of the House of Lords?” Harry hissed, once some distance was gained between the table and the old man.

“As far as he can recall,” The Prince replied with a smile. “Best justification I’ve ever seen for booting twits like him and all of the remaining hereditary peers from the Upper House.”

“But…you said that I’ve got a hereditary peerage as well?”

“That’s right,” The Prince noted. “So when The Lady Gryffindor and you have a child, they’ll inherit your title.”

“Oh, Hermione isn’t The Lady Gryffindor yet,” Harry stated.

The Prince smiled. “I’m afraid that I was speaking in general terms, Gryffindor…or is there reason for me to expect that Dame Hermione will soon gain that title?”

Harry blushed. “How did we get on the topic of my love life?”

“I was trying to steer clear of talk on the Shadow Cabinet.”

“Oh…well it worked, then,” Harry had to admit.

“So how were your accommodations last night, Gryffindor?” The Prince asked with a slight eyebrow waggle. “Wasn’t too much of an imposition to share a room?”

Harry shook his head in disbelief. “That story has made its way down here already?”

The Prince snorted. “I’m afraid that I know first hand just how efficient the gossip network is within the Royal Household.”

“Erm, right…sorry, didn’t mean to offend.”

“You aren’t Gryffindor, you aren’t….I was the one trying to lighten the mood with allusions to witches-in-waiting and potential harems.”

The self-admission that The Prince had indeed lightened the mood didn’t mean that Harry didn’t want to change the topic.

“So what’s this Writ of Summons that Melbury was talking about?” he asked.

“A letter from the Queen, inviting someone to become a Member of the House of Lords.”

“She can do that?”

“Absolutely,” The Prince replied. “All but ninety-three hereditary peers are appointed by the Queen, on the advice of the Prime Minister.”

“Okay, then….she would do that to me?”

The Prince let out a laugh. “Relax, Gryffindor…the Queen has other plans for you.”

“Other plans?” asked Harry nervously. He decided that this was a good time to finish off his drink.

“Buck up, Harry,” The Prince chided. “It’s nothing more than the contingency plans for reconvening the Magnum Concilium.

“Oh…the ones where the Queen’s Wizard plays a very small part in advising The Queen on the rule of her magical subjects?”

“Yes, those plans,” The Prince replied. “And on a related note…what’s your impression of Sir John?”

Harry arched an eyebrow. “I like him…seems far more even-tempered and reasonable than the others at that meeting…but why is the question a related note?”

“Because the Queen has plans for him as well,” The Prince said enigmatically. “Unless you’d like to make a pitch to become the first Lord High Steward in five hundred years?”

“Erm, thanks, but no thanks,” Harry replied quickly. Noticing some activity at the door, he added, “Speaking of which?”

The Prince followed Harry’s glance to where someone was blocking the entrance to the room.

“Oh for heaven’s sake,” he muttered, before calling out in a much louder voice, “He’s with us, Melbury!”

“Oh, right then…carry on,” the old man said pompously, as he stepped back and allowed the former Prime Minister of Britain to enter the room.

Sir John gave the peer a thin-lipped smile as he adjusted the placement of his glasses on the bridge of his nose, and walked past him.

“Sorry about that,” The Prince said. “You know Melbury…”

“Far too well, I’m afraid,” Sir John replied.

Basil didn’t have to be asked whether a third glass was needed, or whether the first two should be refilled.

Harry waited until Sir John put down a long draw on his single malt.

“So did things end any better then were they stood when we left?” he asked.

The former Tory Prime Minister nodded. “They’ve agreed not to push for a no confidence vote, and to openly support the current Prime Minister’s efforts against the terrorists.”

“They came to reason, then?”

“No,” the retired politician admitted. “They finally came to realize just what kind of mess they’d be getting into if they were to gain power right now.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “It was as if Percy had a twin Muggle brother.”

“Percy?” asked Sir John.

“Oh, just somebody within the Ministry of Magic that has far too much power for our own good,” Harry explained.

“Yes, well…that may change, from what I understand?” asked Sir John.

“It may indeed,” replied The Prince. “Which reminds me…might we impose on you for a few more hours, Sir John?”

“Well…of course. What do you have in mind?”

“A stop on the drive home to Surrey…there’s some people at the Cumberland Lodge that we’d like you to meet as part of our contingency planning.”

“Planning for what, if I might ask?”

The Prince glanced around, and then lowered his voice.

“Planning that might bring you out of retirement, Sir John.”

The former Prime Minister stared at The Prince for a moment, then let out a very small (but audible) sigh as he finished off his drink.

“As Her Majesty commands,” he finally replied.

Harry couldn’t help but smile, and reached out to offer a consoling pat on the back.

“If it helps any, Sir John,” he offered, “I know exactly how you feel.”
 

oo00OO00oo

2:30 pm, The Summer Institute, Cumberland Lodge, Great Windsor Park

There was nothing lovely about The Queen’s Wizard’s attitude when he bolted from his next meeting. Hermione, who had shared a spot at the table after completing her tour of Carlisle Castle, was right behind him, and near enough to hear as he activated his Art Club badge.

“Emily?”

“Yes, Harry?”

“Is there a bar within Cumberland Lodge?”

“Erm…not that I know of…this is a school, after all…”

“Right, sorry to have bothered you.”

“Wait…Harry…is something wrong?”

“No, nothing that a stiff drink or a flash of sword might fix.”

“Harry?”

The Queen’s Wizard turned on his heel.

“They’ve got to be kidding, Hermione!”

“Harry…I know it seems like a lot, but what the Emperor’s Wizard said did make sense…”

“But why me?” he asked. “Okay fine…the ICW thinks it best if the new Lord High Steward were magical…why can’t it be you or Tonks…or Ron? He’s short a few titles, I’m sure that he could use an extra one.”

“Harry?”

A rather distraught young wizard let out a deep breath.

“I’m sure that Sir Evan has some gin at the Tower,” he muttered. “Although…why waste time with the weak stuff? Dobby?”

His aide-de-camp was immediately by his side.

“Yes Sir, Major Harry Potter, Sir?”

“Can you bring me a bottle of firewhiskey? Don’t bother with a glass.”

“Don’t listen to him, Dobby,” said Hermione. “Firewhiskey is the last thing he needs right now.”

Harry gave Hermione a sharp look that was cut short only when he heard Dobby’s nervous whimpering.

“Oh, what to do…Private Dobby knows he must be following the Great Major Harry Potter Sir’s orders, but…but…the Great Harry Potter Sir should be listening to Harry Potter Sir’s Hermione’s orders, too!”

“Thank you, Dobby…I always knew that you know what’s best for Harry,” Hermione said with a smile.

A look halfway between a frown and snarl grew on the Queen's Wizard’s lips.

“Well, if that’s the last thing I need, then what’s the first thing?” he asked.

Hermione bit her lower lip in thought, then pushed Harry into an unused classroom and locked the door.

“Get undressed,” she ordered, as she as took off her jacket and began to unbutton her blouse.

Her boyfriend lost his eyebrows to his hairline.

“Honestly, Harry,” Hermione said dismissively, as she pulled her shirt out from her long Potter Plaid skirt and slipped it off her shoulders. “Who taught you that a stiff drink was the best way to deal with stress?”

The Queen’s Wizard caught his breath at the sight of his girlfriend’s black dragonhide vest that was doing double duty as a skintight undergarment.

“Erm…The Prince?” he replied.

“Well, I’ll just have to have words with him, then,” Hermione muttered, as her skirt slipped to the floor.

The thong, black stockings and hold-ups that Hermione wore underneath the skirt weren’t as protective as the vest, but Harry found it difficult to find fault with how they looked.

“Words with The Prince?” he asked. “Might want to cut him some slack…it’s not like he could hold my attention like you are right now.”

“Hold your attention?” Hermione asked with a smirk, as she slipped off her shoes and rolled down her stockings. “Is that why you think I’m taking off my clothes?”

“Erm, finding it hard to think coherently about much of anything right now.”

Hermione shook her head and smiled.

“This isn’t going to work if I’m the only one doing this, you know.”

“Why not?” Harry said with a roguish grin. He then grabbed hold of the hem of his kilt, lifted it several inches towards his belt and added, “Kilt-wearing commandos are always ready for action.”

“Fine, keep your kilt on…I’m sure that some of the other boys will as well.”

“Whaa….other boys?”

Hermione waggled her eyebrows. “Why not? Potter Plaid kilts are now part of their Summer Institute uniform, after all.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. “Are we talking about the same thing?”

“Probably not,” Hermione replied with a giggle. She then called out, “Dobby?”

The house elf popped back in.

“Hermione…but you’re barely dressed!”

“So? It was your idea to…tell me, Dobby, how many naked human bodies did you see yesterday at the Garden Party?”

“Seven thousand, eight hundred and fifty two, Miss Harry Potter’s Hermione Ma’am.”

“There you go,” she stated with a declaratory hand wave.

“So what is that, then…Dobby is going to stand here and watch us?”

“That’s up to him,” Hermione decided with a grin. “Dobby…would you bring us our physical education kits?”

The house elf bobbed his head emphatically.

“Dobby can do that!” he exclaimed, before popping away.

A moment later he returned with two separate boxes. Hermione thanked him, and opened the one on top.

“This one’s yours,” she announced, passing Harry the box. “Another early birthday present.”

Harry arched an eyebrow, then shrugged his shoulders and pushed the tissue paper away from a short-sleeved black rugby jersey. The number 8 was sewn on the back, below a nameplate that read “Just Harry.”

“Hurry up,” Hermione ordered. "Rongo’s got a class of upper years starting in a few minutes.” She then pulled her own All Blacks jersey from the other box. It read “Potter 7”.

“Potter?” Harry asked.

“Always wanted to wear your Quidditch jersey,” she said with a smile, as the shirt slipped over her head.

Harry snorted as he stripped off his shirt and tie and slipped on his own jersey.

Harry snorted much louder when Hermione pulled out a pair of Potter Plaid spandex shorts, looked down at her thong, and banished it to her purse.

“Erm…mmmm….Hermione?”

“What?” she asked, as she wiggled her bare bum into the skin-tight pants. “I don’t care for panty lines when I wear spandex…do you?”

Harry let out a low-pitched belly laugh and stepped up so that he could pull her into a tight hug from behind.

“I think that Luna’s rubbing off on you,” he whispered huskily into her ear.

“Is that a complaint?” Hermione purred.

“Certainly not,” Harry replied, as he dragged his hand up her thigh. When his fingers passed over a thin rectangular bump underneath the fabric, he asked, “What’s this?”

“My GPS beacon, hidden under a patch of dragonhide.”

“Why do you have it pasted on down there?”

“Thought I’d see if the electronics would last any longer if I kept it farther away from my wand.”

.”Hmmm,” Harry growled. “Shall we check to see if my wand causes interference if it gets too close?”

“I think we already know just how well you wand is working, Mister,” Hermione replied, as she rubbed her bum against his front. She then grabbed his hands and stepped out of his embrace. “And if you don’t get it holstered, then everyone else in class will know as well.”

Harry took a step forward and waggled his eyebrows. “Well, I think that my wand would fit quite nicely in your holster, Hermione.”

“Come on, Harry,” Hermione said with a smile. “Rongo might have something useful to teach us, if what I learned about Carlisle pans out.”

“Okay fine,” he replied. “Are you sure that Dean and the other guys are going to be wearing kilts in the scrum?”

“Yeah, they’re calling it the Highlander Look,” Hermione said brightly. “The other girls like it, and the kilts aren’t that much different than what Rongo’s wears with his jersey.”

“So what look do you prefer, then?” Harry asked.

Hermione waggled her eyebrows as she walked up to Harry, grabbed the spandex shorts that were still in his uniform’s box, and tossed them aside.

“I can’t wait to watch you play the eight man in your kilt.”

“Eight man?” Harry asked. “Where did you learn about rugby positions?”

“A book.”

“Of course….so that explains my number. But why put me at the back of the scrum?”

“Bent over in the last row while I play the back line…where else would I want you?”

“Back in Hannah’s bed?”

“You mean Parvati’s,” Hermione replied with a smile

“What?”

“It’s Parvati’s turn for third shift tonight.”

“Wouldn’t put it past her to skive off and join us,” Harry said with a grin.

“In your dreams, Potter.”

Harry nodded. He thought to inform Hermione that it was actually their kids that joined them in his dreams, but that just brought him back around to his nightmares.

“What’s wrong, Harry?”

“What? Erm…nothing.”

“It didn’t look like nothing.”

“Oh, well…you mentioned dreams, and that got me thinking about the nightmares…and that family in Edinburgh…and why we can’t chase after the Death Eaters that abused them.”

“Now Harry…we’ve been through this, right? Am I going to need to gather up those captured portkeys and hide them from you?”

“No, I suppose not,” Harry replied. A glance back towards Hermione’s sexy uniform gave him reason to smile.

“Nice patch line, sweetheart.”

“What?”

“No panty lines…but I can see the outline of your dragonhide patch,” Harry replied, pointing towards the front of Hermione’s shorts.

She looked down and shrugged her shoulders.

“Well, can’t be helped, unless I was going to swallow it.”

“Not a bad idea, actually.”

“What…to swallow my GPS locator?” Hermione asked with surprise. “And are you going to be the one fishing for it in a day or two when it pops out?”

“No…I was thinking about something less messy,” Harry replied. “Like Malfoy’s portkey tooth.”

“Don’t fancy the thought of giving up one of my molars, for…..Harry? Why do you think that’s a funny thought?”

The Queen’s Wizard shook his head. “A different idea, Hermione…I was thinking of….these GPS tracking devices…they still work after a portkey is used, right?”

“Yes, we tested that the other day…why do you ask?”

“Because…Tonks is on-duty for a few more hours, still, right?”

“Yes, why?”

“Need to talk with her about our prisoners,” Harry replied. “One of them just might be lucky enough to earn a pardon tonight.”

“Earn a pardon?” Hermione asked. “And exactly what will they need to do to earn their release?”

“Put us on the offensive again.”
 

oo00OO00oo

10:30 pm, The Palace at Holyrood House, Edinburgh, Scotland

The low-level Death Eater woke up face down on a cold stone floor, with a high-level headache, a sore arm, and a foggy memory.

“What the…where are….”

The reach for his wand came up empty.

“Looking for something, wizard?”

The Death Eater rolled over and pushed himself up into a sitting position facing the questioner, who stood on the opposite side of jail cell bars. The man dressed in a Muggle police uniform had a smile on his face as he twirled a wand in his hands.

“Who are you?”

“I’m your worst nightmare, wizard….somebody who knows the truth about you lot.”

The Death Eater frowned…he had no memory of where he was, or how he had gotten there. The last thing he could remember is apparating with Rodolphus LeStrange into the attack, but appearing not in the middle of the Muggle crowd, but in mid-air.

Stalling for time, he asked, “And what truth is that?”

The policeman snorted.

“That wizards are weak and pathetic creatures who hide in the shadows, waving their wands about. And that you wizard…you tried to kill my Queen.”

“I…I did nothing of the sort.”

“Oh, so you just showed up with your friends and crashed the party because you fancy the cucumber sandwiches?” the jailor snarked. He then looked over his shoulders, and smiled.

“But no matter…I’m so glad that you finally decided to wake up.”

“Why is that?”

“Because I dislike killing scum like you without there being a bit of sport to it,” the policeman replied casually. To emphasize this comment, the man stopped twirling the Death Eater’s wand and pulled his handgun from its holster.

The Death Eater’s eyes went wide. Thinking the situation desperate enough to risk a bit of magic, he closed his eyes and focused on the “three D’s.”

He went nowhere.

“Something wrong, wizard?” the policeman asked with a smile.

“Erm…please don’t kill me…I haven’t done anything wrong…”

“Right, right…I believe you,” the Muggle replied. “So we’ll just call this an experiment.”

“Experiment?”

“Yes…a test to see what is more powerful…a wizard with a wand, or a real man with a gun.”

The Death Eater raised an eyebrow as his own hopes for escape rose just a bit. If this Muggle was that stupid or that arrogant…

A list of painful hexes began to form in his head.

The wizard’s spirits rose even higher when he slipped a hand into his robes and took hold of the candy wrapper portkey that his captors must have missed when his wand was taken from him. He now had a clear way out, once he had that wand in hand…and made this Muggle pay for his hubris.

Masking his emotions as best he could, he asked, “So some sort of duel?”

“Yeah, you against me…what do you say?”

“I’d say that you have me at a disadvantage, Sir,” the Death Eater replied, as he nodded towards the wand in the policeman’s hand.

“Oh, right…you want your wand back, huh?” the Muggle said with a grin. He then held the wand out perpendicular to the floor and pressed it against two of the jail cell bars.

“Oh, darn…it doesn’t fit through!”

“What?” asked the Death Eater, wondering whether this Muggle was really that stupid. “Just slip it through the other way.”

“Oh, right,” the jailor replied. He then rotated the wand a half turn and pressed it back up against the bars. “No, it doesn’t work when it’s pointed in that direction either.”

“Merlin,” the Death Eater muttered. “Here, I’ll take it….”

The wizard only got a step towards the front of the cell before the Muggle pushed hard enough on the wand for it to snap in half against the bars.

“Ah…there it goes,” he said with an evil grin, tossing the two pieces through the bars. “All yours.”

“You….”

“On the count of three, then?”

“What?”

“We’ll open fire on the count of three,” stated the Muggle. “One….”

The Death Eater swore as he scrambled to pick up the two pieces of his wand. It had broken closer to the handle, so that there might be just enough….yes. There was faint warmth when he grabbed the larger piece by its thicker end.

“Two…”

Thinking quickly, the Death Eater decided that he couldn’t risk a misfired hex…or risk that he could even cast a hex. But there might be just enough magical power within the wand to make his escape. He shoved his broken wand tip into his pocket, touched the candy wrapper portkey, and cried out the activation word just as his opponent yelled out “Three!”

He disappeared before learning whether the Muggle had fired his weapon.

He reappeared in a place where the odds of being shot were only slightly lower.

“Stay where you are!” yelled a wizard whose wand was pointed directly at the Death Eater’s heart.

“Wait, don’t fire…it’s me…Jacobs! I’m one of you!” he called out.

“Then why are you wearing Auror Robes, then!”

Rodolphus LeStrange entered the room that the Death Eater had portkeyed into, quickly assessed the situation, and then cuffed the wand-holding sentry on the back of the head.

“Because we were dressed that way when we launched the attack, you dolt!”

“Oh, thank Merlin, Rodolphus…at least you believe me…”

“Don’t take a step from there, Jacobs…or whomever you are,” Lestrange shouted, as he drew his own wand out and plopped down on a chair.

“But Rodolphus…it’s me…I escaped from the Muggles…”

“Or you are Potter on Polyjuice,” Lestrange replied. “Strip down naked…let’s be sure that you aren’t hiding anything under those robes.”

The Death Eater bit his lip, but complied with the order.

“See…Dark Mark and everything,” he said, showing the other two in the room his left forearm.

“No different than what somebody’s arm would look like if they nicked a strand of your hair,” the senior Death Eater replied. “Now…we’re just going to sit tight over the next hour, and have a little chat. You tell us what happened, and we’ll decide whether or not we should wait for the full hour before we AK your sorry arse.”

“But…you can’t…the Master forbade us from using magic within a safe house!”

Rodolphus arched an eyebrow. “True enough…and a bit of trivia that speaks in your favor.” He then turned to the other Death Eater and said, “Go check downstairs and see if we’ve still got the beater bats…just in case.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Rodolphus return his steely gaze to the naked Death Eater in the center of the room.

“It won’t be as quick as an AK,” he said with a thin smile. “But that’s okay…I could use the exercise….now start talking.”

The Death Eater nodded grimly, and began to tell his tale.
 

oo00OO00oo

A far less tense atmosphere could be found back in the faux jail cell underneath the Palace at Holyrood House.

“Outstanding acting job,” Harry said, as he slapped Roger Granger on the back. “I was hoping that you’d slip into the Dirty Harry routine, or some Python, but….”

“I was too nervous to think of it,” Roger admitted, as he stripped off the uniform that he’d worn as the Death Eater’s pretend jailer.

“But I was in the corner the whole time, underneath my cloak, right?”

“Yes, well…still…”

A flash of Harry’s Art Club badge interrupted the banter.

“What’s the good news, Wally?” Harry asked, after “picking up” the call.

“It’s working,” the MI-5 ¾ agent replied brightly. “Got a location lock on the bastard in Salisbury.”

“Right where Lucius wanted to go before we nicked him,” Harry said with a nod. The excitement over the fact that his plan had apparently worked was tempered by a sudden realization.

“So this might be headquarters,” he stated softly. “Maybe even Voldemort in residence….”

“We’ll know more when surveillance sets up, Harry,” Wally replied.

“Won’t take that long, since we’d already been looking in Wiltshire, right?”

“Yes, had that team on standby…should be at the address within ten minutes.”

“Great,” Harry said, fingering his wand. “And all they are going to do is watch, right?”

“Yes, Harry.”

“Not going to be any SAS teams barging in and mucking things up again?”

“No, Harry…not unless you want them too.”

A smile crept onto the Queen’s Wizard face. He’d sat around enough meetings that day, and was looking forward to the possibility of some exercise of his own.


 

oo00OO00oo

Friday, July 13 2:30 am, 25 Meadow Road, Salisbury, England

Harry couldn’t decide which hat he was wearing as he surveyed the target through his field glasses. There were elements of both the Order of Arthur and TPOMS at the scene, but as everyone was comfortable with the idea of Harry’s leadership it didn’t really matter…at least inside the perimeter established by a ring of heavily-armed Muggle sentinels.

From a literal standpoint, the answer was obvious. Harry, along with the rest of his team, was wearing a black balaclava that coordinated with the rest of his black commando “night operations” kit.

The Queen’s Wizard handed his binoculars to Roger Granger, and shifted his gaze from the run-down row house to the display of a high-tech electronic device that Hermione was monitoring.

“Looks like this one’s settled down after the trip to the loo,” she whispered, as he pointed towards the bright false image display of a detailed thermal profile of the structure’s entire interior.

Harry nodded. The secret agent surveillance device clearly showed four people inside the house…three sleeping upstairs in two separate bedrooms, while the fourth watched late-night telly in the ground floor sitting room.

“What do you think?”

“Neighbors have been evac’d,” Hermione noted. “Maybe we should send the robot in??

“Make it so, Number One,” Harry intoned, in his best Picard voice.

Hermione rolled her eyes as she called for their Muggle MI-5 ¾ colleagues who had established a perimeter line to send in the robot. They both watched as a small, remote controlled electronic device normally used for bomb disposal slowly made its way to the front steps of the house and then back again. That it made this trip without having its very sensitive insides shut down by the interference of magical wards suggested that there weren’t any.

“Right then,” Harry said, mainly to himself. He then turned to Roger and said, “Give us a shout out on your badge if you see anything on the display that we should know about.”

“Yes, Sir,” Roger said with a combination salute/smirk.

“Right behind you, Captain,” Hermione replied.

“Thought I was a Major?”

“Thought you were stealing bits of Trek dialogue?”

Harry shook his head, and then stabbed his face forward so that he could steal a kiss from his heavily armed girlfriend. Hermione had just begun to whisper a protest when a flash of white swooped down and landed on Harry’s shoulder.

“Ouch!” Harry hissed, as Hedwig’s talons dug in. “What’s that about?”

Roger smiled. “Maybe she doesn’t like the idea of my daughter being your Number One.”

“No, but what…Hedwig, why….do you have a message for me?”

His familiar looked down at her unladened legs; then back up again at Harry, and shook her head.

“Okay, okay…stupid question,” Harry hissed. “Look, Hedwig…if it’s about me not spending enough time with you…now isn’t the best time to be asking….”

The white owl shook her head, and then glanced over at Hermione.

“Yeah, sometimes I wonder, too,” she whispered conspiratorially to the bird.

The owl nodded once, and then launched herself up towards a perch on the highest chimney top along the street.

“Think that’s an omen, or something?” Harry asked.

“Yes…it’s a sign that you shouldn’t take the women in your life for granted,” Hermione said with a smile.

Roger leaned over to give his daughter a hug, then did the same to Harry.

“Stay safe, you two,” he ordered.

“Yes, Sir,” Harry replied smartly, with a crisp salute and smile. He then gave the thermal imager one last glance, and activated the “party line” feature of the Art Club badge.

“Okay, folks, let’s show Sport and Social how it’s done properly.”

“Sir, Yes, Sir!” Fred and George Weasley whispered back.

Harry ignored the faux respect as he double-checked his goody bags and scabbard, then slipped his invisibility cloak over his head. Hermione did the same, only with a high quality concealment cloak. She then followed Harry as they made their way to the front of the building on silenced-charmed boots.

The Queen’s Wizard pulled out the Portable Hole that had served him so well on Privet Drive and pressed it against the exterior wall of the house. He flinched as the television’s sound escaped out through the hole, but didn’t flinch enough to catch the notice of the Death Eater who was sitting with his back to them.

It was a challenge to slip through the hole on one’s hands and knees whilst underneath an invisibility cloak, but Harry had actually practiced this maneuver, and was able to execute it flawlessly. Once clear of the magical entrance, he crawled over to the front corner of the room and waited for Hermione.

Meanwhile, portable holes had been slapped against the walls of the two upstairs bedrooms, where the assigned tasks for Fred and George on one broom, and Remus and Tonks on the other, were a bit simpler. Placing these holes high up on the walls gave the assault teams clear shots towards the three sleeping Death Eaters, without need of entering the building.

The operation had been necessarily stripped down to simple elements that had already been proven in battle, in order to gain authorization from the highest of “higher-ups” (i.e. The Queen, The Prime Minister and the COBRA team). But even the simplest of military plans rarely survives first contact with the enemy, whether due to the quality of the plan, the cunning of the enemy, or sheer bad luck.

It was bad luck that turned this plan pear-shaped. The telly-watching Death Eater, wondering whether he could bully the next watch into taking his shift early, looked up at a wall clock just as Hermione entered the hole. The clock didn’t betray her presence, but the mirror next to it clearly showed a round hole in the wall where it shouldn’t be.

Had Harry been in position to see the wizard’s eyes narrow, or his hand reach for his wand, he would have jumped and fired first. But the Queen’s Wizard was still hidden behind the Death Eater, so his first indication that they’d been caught out came only once the wizard flipped around in his chair and fired a blind spell towards the hole in the wall.

“Reducto!”

“Hermione!”

“Bollocks!” swore Remus across the badge line. “Open fire!”

While stunning spells flew upstairs, Harry Potter flew into action downstairs.

The invisibility cape sailed off of his shoulders as his left hand drew the Sword of Gryffindor from his shoulder scabbard, matching the wand already held in the right.

“You bastard!” he shouted, closing the distance between himself and the Death Eater in a flash.

The target turned and swept his wand arm out for the start a second blasting curse. It was met by a slash of silver metal that caught the Death Eater’s arm in mid-air. The blade struck so sharp fast and true that the wizard finished the wand motion and yelled out “Reducto!” before realizing that the spell wouldn’t work without his wand.

Or the severed hand that had been holding his wand.

The momentum behind Harry’s sword attack, and the ease with which the blade cut through the arm caught him off balance…literally. Thrown forward with the swing, his instinct was to follow it in a shoulder roll that carried him past the Death Eater. But having practiced this move as well, he came out of the roll on his feet, and immediately turned on his heels in a motion that facilitated the start of his own spell casting.

“Diffindo!”

The Death Eater, who had been staring at the stump of his arm in disbelief, didn’t see it coming. He therefore didn’t see anything ever again, as the spell struck his neck and he slumped to the ground dead.

Harry stared at the Death Eater’s corpse until his brain could catch up with what just happened. He then turned back towards the front wall of the house, and caught sight of a much larger and more ragged hole then what he had used to enter.

“Hermione!” he yelled out in anguish.

“I’m here, Harry,” said a soft voice to his side.

He jerked around, in a motion that swung his sword in a dangerous arc.

“Harry!” Hermione yelled more loudly, as she ducked under the sword blade. “It’s me…it’s me!”

The Queen's Wizard stared at her for a moment in disbelief…there wasn’t a scratch on her.

Too relieved to wonder how that was so, he dropped his bloody sword and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug.

“The mission,” Hermione murmured into his shoulder. “Need to secure the scene.”

“Upstairs is clear!” Remus called out on his badge.

Harry glanced down at the body near their feet.

“Downstairs clear,” he said with a shake of his head. Whatever else might have been said was lost as he pulled Hermione’s balaclava from her head and buried his face in her bushy brown hair.
 

oo00OO00oo

It was the smell of too many humans out too late at night that first alerted Peter Pettigrew that something was off as he scampered back towards the safe house in his animagus form. He had gone out for a late night meal…something tastier and more filling than the scant rations that had been left behind when his Master had abandoned the location a few days past.

Keeping to the shadows, he crept forward for a closer look. There were Muggles surrounding the house…Muggles and their firesticks! But they weren’t doing anything more than standing guard, and there were other smells and other voices coming from the house itself.

He caught the whiff of blood just before he smelled werewolf. A specific werewolf, to be exact.

A rat-sized whimper escaped from Peter’s rat-sized lips and he shuddered in fright. They had been found out….found out in the safe house that the Master had ordered him to keep under watch! This was not good….not good at all.

He had to see what had happened, on the off chance that this information would save his life when he reported to the Dark Lord. It was risky, but the risk paid off as he safely made it past the Muggle sentries peered inside the large ragged hole in the house’s wall.

“I knew that these badges would come in handy,” said a red haired boy that Peter knew all too well.

“Yes, well, it worked for Sir Evan…badge-jumping was all that I could think to do when I was on my hands and knees and heard the spell cast,” said Hermione Granger.

The other boy…Potter!…was holding the witch tightly with one arm.

“I’m just glad you were smart enough and far enough away to duck when I turned,” he said.

“It is supposed to transport us to a safe location by the anchor point, right?” asked the witch. She shook her head and smiled. “Not that it wasn’t scary enough.”

“Yeah for us both,” Harry replied.

Hermione pulled Harry into a kiss. “Speaking of which…think you can let me go long enough for me to find a loo? I should check if my knickers to see if they need a Scourgify spell.”

“Thought that you weren’t wearing any today?” Harry asked with a grin.

“Too much information…la-la-la-la…” said Ron, as he covered his ears.

Peter watched as the witch separated from the two wizards and left the room. There were others there, but they were Muggles. Well, except for LeStrange, who was clearly dead on the floor. A nearly-headless LeStrange. He could smell Lupin, and the witch that wore Lupin’s scent, but it was feint…perhaps they were either upstairs, or down in the basement.

What to do?

Tired of worrying about the life-debt he owed to Potter or Potter’s witch (he couldn’t remember which), and terrified of what would happen to him should he be the bearer of this bad news, Wormtail decided to risk acting. He scurried behind the sitting room sofa that Harry was standing in front of, transformed back into human form, and rose up to cast a non-verbal spell that he would only dare use in Snape’s absence.

“Sectumsempra!” Wormtail thought, with a slash of his wand.

Ron was the first to make sense of what was happening, and reacted with far more instinct than premeditation.

“Harry!” he yelled, as he dove towards the Queen’s Wizard.

The momentum carried Harry out of harm’s way, and dropped him to the ground.

Most of Ron went with him.

“Aaaaarrgh!” the Clan Champion yelled, as blood sprayed in an arc from his head up towards the spell-severed ear that had been left behind.

TPOMS squadron members New Six and Coley were almost as quick to respond, and fired off a spray of bullets towards Pettigrew’s head even before the ear hit the ground. They would have hit their mark, had Peter’s head not already been shrinking down to rat-size.

“Where’d he go?” yelled New Six, as he pulled his combat knife and dove behind the couch. He froze for just a fraction of a second at the sight of a silver-pawed rat running away from him. That delay was all it took for Peter to escape out the large hole in the wall before the thrown knife could catch up to him.

The Muggle warrior was immediately on the radio relaying the news and calling for everyone to be on the look-out for either a wizard or a rat.

Wormtail had beaten the odds of being found out when he scurried into the safe house. He hadn’t noticed the owl who had been keeping watch over the area, so he didn’t know just how incredibly lucky he been on the first run.

He wasn’t so lucky the second time. The baffled feathers of a white owl’s wings allowed for a silent approach as a very hacked-off familiar swooped down from the rooftop.

Hedwig and the other owls that had patrolled the skies of Little Wizarding and Windsor had been given specific instructions concerning the capture of the silver-pawed rat…he was to be taken alive, if possible. Harry’s familiar had followed those orders once, and where had that led? The rat was captured, released, and allowed to attack her human again. So this time….

Had she ever been asked, Hedwig might have been forced to admit that she had swept down on Wormtail just a little too fast, and dug her talons into her prey just a little too hard. And banging the vermin’s head against the ground until its neck broke?

The owl shook her head, and would have smiled if she could. Her human companion was so silly, to think that he didn’t need her around to keep him safe!
 

oo00OO00oo

By the time that Hedwig decided to proudly show off her catch, her human was gone. Harry had gathered a barely-conscious Ron and Ron's ear and the two badge-jumped to the Hogwarts Infirmary using Emily Granger as an anchor point (she had been pre-positioned there for just this kind of medical emergency).

“Poppy!” Harry called out. “We need help now!”

“What is it…oh my,” the Hogwarts Matron said, as she ran towards the two blood-covered boys. “What happened?”

“Sectumsempra, I think,” Harry announced, as he lifted Ron up to a bed and rolled him onto his side.

“Oh my! My Ron! My Ron! Not My Ron!” shouted Molly Weasley, from a bed across the way.

She fainted before a magical sedative could be administered. The results were the same…Madame Pomfrey was able to work without interruption.

“Fetch the blood replenishing potion, Mr. Potter…over there on the shelf.”

“I’ve got it,” announced Arthur, who was in the room and closer to the medicine. “How many?”

“As many as we have,” Poppy announced, as she began to cast intricate coagulation spells towards Ron’s head.

The situation was touch and go for a few minutes...Ron lost consciousness, and required the administration of Draught of the Living Death to keep from bleeding out. Finally, Madame Pomfrey was able to lower her wand, exhale deeply, and announce that she’d managed to stop the flow.

Harry smiled, and let out his own sigh of relief. He then turned to Arthur and announced, “He saved my life tonight, Mr. Weasley…definitely need some subtraction from that list that you insist on carrying about.”

Arthur nodded. “What happened, Harry?”

The Queen’s Wizard was about to describe the raid before a separate thought came to him.

“Madame Pomfrey…I brought the ear along for you,” he announced, grabbing the bloody bit of body from where he’d set it next to the bed.

Poppy shook her head. “I’m afraid there’s nothing that can be done with it. That horrid spell is so Dark…there’s no way that I’d be able to reattach it.”

“Are you sure?” asked Arthur.

“I’m sorry, Arthur,” the Matron said with a sigh.

Harry furrowed his eyebrows. “Madame Pomfrey…how exactly does the curse get in the way of your healing?”

“It actively fights my healing magic,” Poppy responds. “That’s what makes the spell so much more dangerous than a simple Diffindo.”

“So if we were to….” Harry mused. He then activated his badge phone.

“Hermione?”

“Go, Harry.”

“Poppy stopped Ron’s blood loss, but says the curse’s magic will fight hers if she tried to reattach the ear…think that the MI-5 trauma team could give it a look?”

“That’s what we had them on call for,” Hermione replied. “Give me a few seconds to get there.”

“Roger that,” he said. He then looked over towards Arthur. “Mr. Weasley…if the curse is effective because it fights against magical healing…there’s a chance that Muggle healing might not be affected.”

Arthur’s eyes went wide, then immediately went towards his wife’s bed. Thankfully, she was still unconscious, and couldn’t voice her opinions.

“So…they could reattach the ear?”

Harry shrugged. “I know that they’re capable of reattaching fingers, and arms…even legs sometimes, depending on circumstances.”

“So they’d get out their sewing kits, like when I was bit by that snake?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” Harry replied truthfully. “But if the sewing doesn’t take hold, he’ll be no worse off than he is now, right?”

Arthur pursed his lips. “Poppy?”

“I don’t even want to imagine what they might try to do,” she said with a shake of her head. “The worse that could happen would be for them to bugger up the magical blood clotting…not that I’d know how they could manage it.”

“But if you were there, Poppy…if that were possible…then you could step in?”

The Matron turned to Harry and raised an eyebrow.

“Well?”

“I think I have enough sway to make that happen,” he said with a thin smile.

When Hermione called back with word that she was ready to receive the patient, Arthur helped Harry pull Ron up to his feet and into his grasp.

“With Ron unconscious, I'll have to side-along him to hospital," Harry told Arthur. "We’ll get you down there as soon as possible.”

“Thank you, Harry,” the Weasley patriarch said.

The Queen’s Wizard didn’t take time to argue over who should be thanking whom, and apparated to London.

They arrived in a mostly empty room that was close to MI-5's emergency medical facility and the designated arrival point for injured magical secret agents.  Hermione was there waiting for the two, kitted out in medical scrubs, a mask, and a cloth cap that did a poor job of constraining a mass of bushy-brown hair. She helped Harry lay Ron out on a wheeled gurney and aimed it towards the exit.

“Hermione? Why are you dressed like a doctor?” asked Harry.

“Just push…I’ll steer,” she replied sharply, as they wheeled Ron down the hallway.

Ten seconds later, they were met by a pair of surgical nurses who were dressed similar to Hermione.

“We’ve got him,” one said. “You’re to follow, then, Agent Granger?”

Hermione nodded, and then turned to Harry.

“Somebody needs to be there in case the magic interferes,” she explained. “What’s he been given?”

“Four units of blood replenishing potion, and some Draught of the Living Death,” Harry replied.

“So that solves the question of anesthesia,” Hermione announced. “How long ago?”

“Ten minutes, maybe?” Harry asked. “Poppy could tell you for sure…she and Arthur wanted to come down to help.”

“Good idea,” Hermione replied, as she headed towards the operating room. “Have Tonks and Remus side-along apparate them to the front gate and meet them there to clear the wards and security checkpoints.”

“Erm..right…I’ll do that,” Harry said…mostly to himself, as Hermione had already disappeared into the operating room.

There would be a time later on when Harry would replay events, and decide that his girlfriend was not only the brightest witch in her generation, but at times the most assertive. But for present purposes, Harry had some magical transport to arrange. He activated his Art Club badge, and called out, “Tonks?…Remus?”
 

oo00OO00oo

The Muggle aide assigned to lead Harry, Remus, Tonks and Arthur to a waiting area didn’t have high enough clearance to know about magic, or the nature of MI-5 ¾’s work. Still, she had experience with the odd injuries and odd situations whenever “normal” secret agents were brought in for emergency repair, and therefore paid no mind to the group’s strange attire, and even stranger conversations.

She paid a little mind to the blonde haired girl who was waiting for the group at their destination...but who wouldn’t notice someone who was reading an upside-down newspaper while her MI-5 credentials hung from a necklace made from fizzy drink caps?

“Luna!” Harry exclaimed, as he pulled her into a hug. “I’m so glad that you’re here….but...how did you know? How did you get here?”

“The thestral knew where I was needed,” she replied simply.

The Muggle aid ignored the comment, and announced, “There’s coffee over there, and water for tea, if anyone needs it.”

“Thank you,” Harry replied, as he glanced over towards a small kitchenette. “You’ll be back when there’s word, then?”

“Yes, Sir,” the aide announced, as she eyed something strange over his shoulder. But she said nothing of it, and left the room.

Harry turned to find Arthur Weasley opening and closing a refrigerator’s door.

“They have a light…a light that turns on and off whenever the door opens!” he said with amazement. But once he noted that they were alone, he focused his interest where it was most needed.

“So, Harry…can you tell me what happened tonight?” he asked.

“Yes, Harry…I would like to hear, too,” added Luna.

The Queen's Wizard nodded, and gave a brief recount of their actions, up to the point where Ron stepped in front of a curse meant for him. The story was then interrupted by a badge call from Hermione’s dad, announcing that he had something to share with Harry, and that TPOMS was demobilizing from the scene at Salisbury.

“Good…I was just getting to that point in the story,” Harry replied. “Can you jump in to provide an update?”

“Is it safe?” Roger asked.

Harry looked around. “Yeah, the kitchen appliances don’t look all that high-tech.”

Roger laughed, and appeared in the surgery’s waiting area a few moments later.

“So what happened after I left?” Harry asked.

“Not much…after-action mop up,” Roger replied with a thin smile. “Although magic worked far better than a mop against that blood on the floor. Looks like Ron was the only causality on our side.”

“How about the DE’s?”

“Two dead, three captured,” said Roger.

“And Rookwood wasn’t one of the ones sleeping upstairs?

“No, he wasn’t there,” said Roger. “But Pettigrew was…he’s the one that fired the curse that Ron caught.”

“Too bad that he got away,” said Harry. “Hold on…you said two killed?”

Remus stepped up and grabbed Harry by the shoulder.

“The rat bastard is finally dead,” he announced. “Can’t decide whether I wish him to hell, or worse.”

“Worse than hell?” asked Arthur.

“I think it would be, for him at least…if Peter ended up where Sirius could prank his sorry arse for all eternity,” Remus said with a grim smile.

“How did we get him?” Harry asked.

“Close air support,” Roger said with a smile.

“Air support…what kind?”

“A very familiar kind, Harry,” Tonks quipped. “Hedwig must have been keeping watch over you tonight…she spotted him and swooped down before he got away.”

“Yeah, she was there…and you’re sure that it’s not a regular old rat?”

“A were-enhanced sense of smell,” Lupin said sagely, tapping the side of his nose.

“Not that a regular old witch’s sight couldn’t have determined the same,” chimed in Tonks. “Unless there are other rats out there with a silver paw?”

“Wow,” Harry said, as he slumped into a chair. “Guess I owe Hedwig a deluxe bag of owl treats.”

“That you do.”

They sat quietly for a moment, before the stress of a very long and difficult day got to him.

“So, Roger…you sure it was Peter Pettigrew, and not just some parrot resting after a prolonged squawk?”

Hermione’s dad arched an eyebrow, and then broke out into a brilliant smile.

“This was a dead Peter, Harry…not a dead parrot.”

“So it wasn’t just pining for the fjords?”

Roger shook his head. “Pining for the fjords? Only Norwegian Blues do that, Harry…beautiful plumage, the Norwegian Blue.”

“So it was really a dead Peter?”

Roger winked. “If he wasn’t nailed to the perch he’d be pushing up the daisies.”

Harry and Roger broke out into loud laughter, leaving everyone else in the room very confused.

Well…almost everyone.

Which became evident when Luna Lovegood began to sing softly to herself as she continued to read her upside-down Quibbler.

“Spam, spam, spam, spam...Spam, spam, spam, spam...”




 

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• Knight Protectors of the Realm, Part 1 Knight Protectors of the Realm, Part 2 Queen's Wizard, Part 1 Queen's Wizard, Part 2 Senior Advisor, Part 1 Senior Advisor, Part 2 Officer and Gentleman, Part 1 Officer and Gentleman, Part 2 Special Ambassador, Part 1 Special Ambassador, Part 2 Lord High Steward, Part 1 Lord High Steward, Part 2 Ch 45: Ringa Pakia
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