081.asc

// 14457
//== Taboo Tradeoffs, Pt 3

// 14458
//In rising half-circles of dark stone, a great sea of upraised hands.

// 14459
//The Lords and Ladies of the Wizengamot, in plum-colored robes marked with a
//silver ‘W’, stared down in stern rebuke at a young girl trembling in chains. If
//they had, in any particular ethical system, damned themselves, they clearly
//thought quite highly of themselves for having done so.

// 14460
//Harry’s breath was trembling in his chest. His dark side had come up with a
//plan - and then rotated itself back out again because speaking too icily would
//not be to Hermione’s advantage; a fact which the only-half-cold Harry had
//somehow not realized…

// 14461
//“The vote carries, in favor,” intoned the secretary, when all the tallying was
//done, and the upraised hands fell back down. “The Wizengamot recognizes the
//blood debt owed by Hermione Granger to House Malfoy for the attempted murder of
//its scion and ending of its line.”

// 14462
//Lucius Malfoy was smiling in grim satisfaction. “And now,” said the white-maned
//wizard, “I say that her debt shall be paid -”

// 14463
//Harry clenched his fists beneath the bench and shouted, “By the debt owed from
//House Malfoy to House Potter!”

// 14464
//“Silence!” snapped the woman in too much pink makeup sitting next to Minister
//Fudge. “You’ve disrupted these proceedings quite enough already! Aurors, escort
//him out!”

// 14465
//“Wait,” said Augusta Longbottom from the top tier of seats. “What debt is
//this?”

// 14466
//Lucius’s hands whitened on his cane. “House Malfoy owes no debt to you!”

// 14467
//It wasn’t the world’s most solid hope, it was based on one newspaper article
//from a woman who’d been False-Memory-Charmed, but Rita Skeeter had seemed to
//find it plausible, that Mr. Weasley had allegedly owed James Potter a debt
//because…

// 14468
//“I’m surprised you’ve forgotten,” Harry said evenly. “Surely it was a cruel and
//painful period of your life, laboring under the Imperius curse of
//He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, until you were freed of it by the efforts of House
//Potter. By my mother, Lily Potter, who died for it, and by my father, James
//Potter, who died for it, and by me, of course.”

// 14469
//There was a brief silence within the Most Ancient Hall.

// 14470
//“Why, what an excellent point, Mr. Potter,” said the old witch who’d been
//identified as Madam Bones. “I, too, am quite surprised that Lord Malfoy would
//forget such a significant event. It must have been such a happy day for him.”

// 14471
//“Yes,” said Augusta Longbottom. “He must have been so grateful.”

// 14472
//Madam Bones nodded. “House Malfoy could not possibly deny that debt - unless,
//perhaps, Lord Malfoy is to tell us that he has misremembered something? I
//should take quite a professional interest in that. We are always trying to
//improve our picture of those dark days.”

// 14473
//Lucius Malfoy’s hands gripped the silver snake-handle of his cane like he was
//about to strike with it, unleash whatever power it kept -

// 14474
//Then the Lord Malfoy seemed to relax, and a chill smile came over his face. “Of
//course,” he said easily. “I do confess I had not understood, but the child is
//quite correct. But I do not quite think the two debts cancel - House Potter was
//only trying to save itself, after all -”

// 14475
//“Not so,” Dumbledore said from above.

// 14476
//“- and therefore,” intoned Lucius Malfoy, “I demand monetary compensation as
//well, for the redemption of the blood debt owed my son. That, too, is the law.”

// 14477
//Harry felt a strange inward flinch. That had also been in the newspaper
//article, Mr. Weasley had demanded an additional ten thousand Galleons -

// 14478
//“How much?” said the Boy-Who-Lived.

// 14479
//Lucius was still wearing the cold smile. “One hundred thousand Galleons. If you
//have not that much in your vault, I suppose I must accept a promissory note for
//the remainder.”

// 14480
//A roar of protest went up from Dumbledore’s side of the room, even some of the
//plum-colored robes in the middle looked shocked.

// 14481
//“Shall we put it to vote of the Wizengamot?” said Lucius Malfoy. “I think few
//of us would like to see the little murderess go free. By a show of hands, that
//additional compensation of one hundred thousand Galleons would be required to
//cancel the debt!”

// 14482
//The clerk began tallying, but that vote was also clear.

// 14483
//Harry stood there, breathing deeply.

// 14484
//__You’d better not even have to think about this,__ Harry’s inner
//Gryffindor said threateningly.

// 14485
//__It’s a major purchase,__ observed Ravenclaw. __We ought to spend a
//lot of time thinking about it.__

// 14486
//It shouldn’t have been hard. It __shouldn’t__ have. Two million pounds was
//only money, and money was only worth what it could buy…

// 14487
//It was strange how much psychological attachment you could have to ‘only
//money’, or how painful it could be to imagine losing a bank vault full of gold
//that you hadn’t even imagined existed just one year earlier.

// 14488
//__Kimball Kinnison wouldn’t hesitate,__ said Gryffindor.
//__Seriously. Like, snap decision. What sort of hero are you? I already
//hate you just for having to think about it for longer than 50 milliseconds.__

// 14489
//__This is real life,__ said Ravenclaw. __Losing all your money is a
//lot more painful for real people in real life than in heroic books.__

// 14490
//__What?__ demanded Gryffindor. __Whose side are you on?__

// 14491
//__I wasn’t advocating for a particular answer,__ said Ravenclaw, __I
//was just saying it because it was true.__

// 14492
//__Could a hundred thousand Galleons be used to save more than one life if
//spent some other way? __said Slytherin. __We have research to do, battles
//to fight, the difference between being 40,000 Galleons rich and being 60,000
//Galleons in debt is not trivial -__

// 14493
//__So we’ll just use one of our ways to make money fast and earn it all
//back,__ said Hufflepuff.

// 14494
//__It’s not certain those will work,__ said Slytherin, __and a lot of
//them require starting cash -__

// 14495
//__Personally,__ said Gryffindor,__ I vote that we save Hermione and
//then gang up and kill our inner Slytherin.__

// 14496
//The clerk’s voice said that the tally had been recorded and the vote had
//passed…

// 14497
//Harry’s lips opened.

// 14498
//“I accept your offer,” said Harry’s lips, without any hesitation, without any
//decision having been made; just as if the internal debate had been pretense and
//illusion, the true controller of the voice having been no part of it.

// 14499
//Lucius Malfoy’s mask of calm shattered, his eyes widened, he stared at Harry in
//sheer blank astonishment. His mouth had opened slightly, though he wasn’t
//speaking, and if he was making any peculiar noises it couldn’t be heard over
//the roar of simultaneous gasps from the Wizengamot -

// 14500
//A tap of stone silenced the crowd.

// 14501
//“No,” said the voice of Dumbledore.

// 14502
//Harry’s head jerked around to stare at the ancient wizard.

// 14503
//Dumbledore’s lined face was pale, the silver beard was visibly trembling, he
//looked like he was in the final throes of a terminal illness. “I’m - sorry,
//Harry - but this choice is not yours - for I am still the guardian of your
//vault.”

// 14504
//“__What?__” said Harry, too shocked to compose his reply.

// 14505
//“I cannot let you go into debt to Lucius Malfoy, Harry! I cannot! You do not
//know - you do not realize -”

// 14506
//__DIE.__

// 14507
//Harry didn’t even know which part of himself had spoken, it might have been a
//unanimous vote, the pure rage and fury pouring through him. For an instant he
//thought that the sheer force of the anger might take magical wing and fly out
//to strike the Headmaster, send him tumbling back dead from the podium -

// 14508
//But when that mental voice had spoken, the old wizard was still standing there,
//gazing at Harry, long dark wand in his right hand, short black rod in his left.

// 14509
//And Harry’s eyes also went to the red-golden bird with its claws resting on the
//shoulder of Dumbledore’s black robes, silent when no phoenix should have been
//silent. “Fawkes,” Harry said, his voice sounding strange in his own ears, “can
//you scream at him for me?”

// 14510
//The fiery bird on the old wizard’s shoulder didn’t scream. Maybe the Wizengamot
//had demanded that a spell of silence be put on the creature, otherwise it
//probably would have been screaming the whole time. But Fawkes hit his master,
//one golden wing buffeting the old wizard’s head.

// 14511
//“I cannot, Harry!” the old wizard said, the agony clear in his voice. “I am
//doing as I must do!”

// 14512
//And Harry knew, then, as he looked at the red-golden bird, what he had to do as
//well. It should have been obvious from the beginning, that solution.

// 14513
//“Then I too will do what I must,” Harry said up to Dumbledore, as though the
//two of them stood alone in the room. “You do realize that, don’t you?”

// 14514
//The old wizard shook his trembling head. “You will change your mind when you
//are older -”

// 14515
//“I’m not talking about that,” Harry said, his voice still strange in his own
//ears. “I mean that I will not allow Hermione Granger to be eaten by Dementors
//under any circumstances. Period. Regardless of what any law says, and no matter
//what I have to do to stop it. Do I still need to spell it out?”

// 14516
//A strange male voice spoke from somewhere far away, “Be sure that the girl is
//taken directly to Azkaban, and put under extra guard.”

// 14517
//Harry waited, staring at the old wizard, and then spoke again. “I will go to
//Azkaban,” Harry said to the old wizard, as though they stood alone in the
//world, “before Hermione can be taken there, and start snapping my fingers. It
//may cost me my life, but by the time she gets there, there won’t be an Azkaban
//anymore.”

// 14518
//Some members of the Wizengamot gasped in surprise.

// 14519
//Then a greater number started laughing.

// 14520
//“How would you even get there, little boy?” someone said, from among those who
//were laughing.

// 14521
//“I have my ways of going places,” said the boy’s distant voice. Harry kept his
//eyes on Dumbledore, on the old wizard staring at him in shock. Harry didn’t
//look directly at Fawkes, didn’t give his plan away; but in his mind he prepared
//to summon the phoenix to transport him, prepared to fill his mind with light
//and fury, to call for the fire-bird with all his might, he might have to do it
//upon the instant if Dumbledore pointed his wand -

// 14522
//“Would you truly?” the old wizard said to Harry, also as if the two of them
//stood alone in the room.

// 14523
//The room went silent again as everyone stared in shock at the Chief Warlock of
//the Wizengamot, who seemed to be taking the mad threat completely seriously.

// 14524
//The old wizard’s eyes were locked only on Harry. “Would you risk everything -
//everything - only for her?”

// 14525
//“Yes,” Harry said back in reply.

// 14526
//__That’s the wrong answer, you know,__ said Slytherin. __Seriously.__

// 14527
//__But it’s the true answer.__

// 14528
//“You will not see reason?” said the old wizard.

// 14529
//“Apparently not,” Harry said back.

// 14530
//The gazes stayed locked.

// 14531
//“This is terrible folly,” said the old wizard.

// 14532
//“I am aware of this,” answered the hero. “Now get out of my way.”

// 14533
//Strange light glinted in the ancient blue eyes. “As you will, Harry Potter, but
//know that this is not over.”

// 14534
//The rest of the world faded back into existence.

// 14535
//“I withdraw my objection,” said the old wizard, “Harry Potter may do as he
//wishes,” and the Wizengamot exploded in a roar of shock, only to be silenced by
//a final tap of the stone rod.

// 14536
//Harry turned his head back to look at Lord Malfoy, who looked like he’d seen a
//cat turn into a person and start eating other cats. To call the look confused
//did not begin to describe it.

// 14537
//“You would truly…” Lucius Malfoy said slowly. “You would truly pay a hundred
//thousand Galleons, to save one mudblood girl.”

// 14538
//“I think there’s about forty thousand in my Gringotts vault,” Harry said. It
//was strange how that was __still__ causing more internal pain than the
//thought of taking an over-fifty-percent risk to his life to destroy Azkaban.
//“As for the other sixty thousand - what are the rules, exactly?”

// 14539
//“It comes due when you graduate Hogwarts,” the old wizard said from high above.
//“But Lord Malfoy has certain rights over you before then, I fear.”

// 14540
//Lucius Malfoy stood motionless, frowning down at Harry. “Who is she to you,
//then? __What__ is she to you, that you would pay so much to keep her from
//harm?”

// 14541
//“My friend,” the boy said quietly.

// 14542
//Lucius Malfoy’s eyes narrowed. “By the report I received, you cannot cast the
//Patronus Charm, and Dumbledore knows this. The power of a single Dementor
//nearly killed you. You would not dare venture near Azkaban in your own person
//-”

// 14543
//“That was in January,” said Harry. “This is April.”

// 14544
//Lucius Malfoy’s eyes remained cool and calculating. “You pretend you can
//destroy Azkaban, and Dumbledore pretends to believe it.”

// 14545
//Harry did not reply.

// 14546
//The white-haired man turned slightly, toward the center of the half-circle, as
//though to address the greater Wizengamot. “I withdraw my offer!” shouted the
//Lord of Malfoy. “I will not accept the debt to House Potter in payment, not
//even for a hundred thousand Galleons! The girl’s blood debt to House Malfoy
//stands!”

// 14547
//Again the roar of many voices. “Dishonorable!” someone cried. “You acknowledge
//the debt to House Potter, and yet you would -” and then that voice cut off.

// 14548
//“I acknowledge the debt, but the law does not strictly oblige me to accept it
//in cancellation,” said Lord Malfoy with a grim smile. “The girl is no part of
//House Potter; the debt I owe House Potter is no debt to her. As for the
//__dishonor__ -” Lucius Malfoy paused. “As for the grave shame I feel at my
//ingratitude toward the Potters, who have done so much for me -” Lucius Malfoy
//bowed his head. “May my ancestors forgive me.”

// 14549
//“Well, boy?” called the scarred man sitting at Lord Malfoy’s right hand. “Go
//and destroy Azkaban, then!”

// 14550
//“I’d like to see that,” said another voice. “Will you be selling tickets?”

// 14551
//It went without saying that Harry didn’t pick this particular moment to give
//up.

// 14552
//__The girl is no part of House Potter -__

// 14553
//He had, in fact, seen the obvious way out of the dilemma almost instantly.

// 14554
//It might have taken him longer if he hadn’t recently overheard a number of
//conversations between older Ravenclaw girls, and read a certain number of
//Quibbler stories.

// 14555
//He was, nonetheless, having trouble accepting it.

// 14556
//__This is ridiculous,__ said a part of Harry which had just dubbed itself
//the Internal Consistency Checker. __Our actions here are completely
//incoherent. First you feel less emotional reluctance to risk your bloody LIFE
//and probably DIE for Hermione, than to part with a stupid heap of gold. And now
//you’re balking just at getting married?__

// 14557
//__SYSTEM ERROR.__

// 14558
//__You know what?__ said Internal Consistency Checker. __You’re
//stupid.__

// 14559
//__I didn’t say no,__ thought Harry. __I was just saying SYSTEM
//ERROR.__

// 14560
//__I vote for destroying Azkaban,__ said Gryffindor. __It needs to be
//done anyway.__

// 14561
//__Really, really stupid,__ said Internal Consistency Checker. __Oh,
//screw this, I’m assuming control of our body.__

// 14562
//The boy took a deep breath, and opened his mouth -

// 14563
//By this point Harry Potter had entirely forgotten the existence of Professor
//McGonagall, who had been sitting there this whole time undergoing a number of
//interesting changes of facial expression which Harry had not been looking at
//because he was distracted. It would have been overly harsh to say that Harry
//had forgotten her because he did not consider her a PC. It could be more kindly
//said that Professor McGonagall was not visibly a solution to any of his current
//problems, and therefore she was not part of the universe.

// 14564
//So Harry, who at this point had a fair amount of adrenaline in his bloodstream,
//startled and jumped quite visibly when Professor McGonagall, her eyes now
//blazing with impossible hope and the tears on her cheek half-dried, leapt to
//her feet and cried, “__With me, Mr. Potter!__” and, without waiting for a
//reply, tore down the stairs that led to the bottom platform where waited a
//chair of dark metal.

// 14565
//It took a moment, but Harry ran after; though it took him longer to reach the
//bottom, after Professor McGonagall vaulted half the stairs with a strange
//catlike motion and landed with the astonished-looking Auror trio already
//pointing their wands at her.

// 14566
//“Miss Granger!” cried Professor McGonagall. “Can you speak yet?”

// 14567
//Much as with Professor McGonagall, there was a certain sense in which it could
//be said that Harry had forgotten about the existence of Hermione Granger,
//because Harry had been tilting his neck back to look upward rather than
//downward, and because he hadn’t considered her a solution to any of his current
//problems. Though it was hardly certain, in fact it wasn’t at all probable, that
//Harry remembering to look at Hermione or think about what she must be feeling,
//would have helped anything in the slightest.

// 14568
//Harry reached the bottom of the stairs and saw Hermione Granger full on -

// 14569
//Without thinking, without being able to help himself, Harry shut his eyes, but
//he’d seen.

// 14570
//Her school robes around her neck, soaked all the way through with tears.

// 14571
//The way she’d been looking away from __him__.

// 14572
//And the eye of memory and sympathy, which could not be shut, which could not
//look away, knew that Hermione had recounted the worst shame of her life in
//front of the nobility of magical Britain and Professor McGonagall and
//Dumbledore and Harry; and then been sentenced to Azkaban where she would be
//exposed to darkness and cold and all her worst memories until she went mad and
//died; and then she’d heard that Harry was going to give away all his money and
//go into debt to save her, and maybe even sacrifice his life

// 14573
//and with the Dementor standing only a few paces behind her

// 14574
//she hadn’t said anything…

// 14575
//“Y-yes,” whispered the voice of Hermione Granger. “I c-can talk.”

// 14576
//Harry opened his eyes again and saw her face, now looking at him. It didn’t say
//anything like what he thought Hermione was feeling, faces couldn’t say anything
//that complicated, all facial muscles could do was contort themselves into
//knots.

// 14577
//“H-H-Harry, I-I’m so, I’m so -”

// 14578
//“Shut up,” Harry suggested.

// 14579
//“s-s-sorry -”

// 14580
//“If you’d never met me on the train you wouldn’t be in any trouble right now.
//So shut up,” said Harry Potter.

// 14581
//“Both of you stop being silly,” Professor McGonagall said in her firm Scottish
//accent (it was strange how much that helped). “Mr. Potter, hold out your wand
//so that Miss Granger’s fingers can touch it. Miss Granger, repeat after me.
//Upon my life and magic -”

// 14582
//Harry did as he was bid, thrusting his wand forward to touch Hermione’s
//fingers; and then Hermione’s faltering voice said, “Upon my life and magic -”

// 14583
//“I swear service to the House of Potter -” said Professor McGonagall.

// 14584
//And Hermione, without waiting for any further instructions, said, the words
//spilling out of her in a rush, “I swear service to the House of Potter, to obey
//its Master or Mistress, and stand at their right hand, and fight at their
//command, and follow where they go, until the day I die.”

// 14585
//All those words had been blurted out in a desperate gasp before Harry could
//have thought or said anything, if he’d been mad enough to interrupt.

// 14586
//“Mr. Potter, repeat these words,” said Professor McGonagall. “I, Harry, heir
//and last scion of the Potters, accept your service, until the end of the world
//and its magic.”

// 14587
//Harry took a breath and said, “I, Harry, heir and last scion of the Potters,
//accept your service, until the end of the world and its magic.”

// 14588
//“That’s it,” said Professor McGonagall. “Well done.”

// 14589
//Harry looked up, and saw that the entire Wizengamot, whose existence he’d
//forgotten, was staring at them.

// 14590
//And then Minerva McGonagall, who __was__ Head of House Gryffindor even if
//she didn’t always act like it, looked up high above at where Lucius Malfoy
//stood; and she said to him before the entire Wizengamot, “I regret every point
//I ever gave you in Transfiguration, you vile little worm.”

// 14591
//Whatever Lucius was about to say in reply was silenced by a tap of the short
//rod in Dumbledore’s hand. “Ahem!” said the old wizard from his podium of dark
//stone. “This session has carried on quite considerably, and if it is not
//dismissed soon, some of us may miss their entire luncheon. The law of this
//matter is clear. You have already voted on the terms of the bargain, and Lord
//Malfoy cannot legally decline it. As we have far exceeded our allotted time, I
//now, in accordance with the last decision of the survivors of the eighty-eighth
//Wizengamot, adjourn this session.”

// 14592
//The old wizard tapped the rod of dark stone three times.

// 14593
//“You fools!” shouted Lucius Malfoy. The white hair was shaking as though in a
//wind, the face beneath was pale with fury. “Do you think you’ll get away with
//what you’ve done today? Do you think that girl can try to murder my son and
//escape unscathed?”

// 14594
//The toad-like pink-makeup woman, whose name Harry could no longer remember, was
//standing up from her seat. “Why, of course not,” she said with a sickening
//smile. “After all, the girl __is__ still a murderess, and I think the
//Ministry shall be watching her affairs quite closely - it hardly seems wise
//that she should be allowed to wander the streets, after all -”

// 14595
//Harry was fed up at this point.

// 14596
//Without waiting to listen, Harry turned on his heel and strode forward in long
//steps toward -

// 14597
//The horror only he could truly see, the absence of color and space, the wound
//in the world, above which floated a tattered cloak; most imperfectly guarded by
//a running moonlit squirrel and fluttering silver sparrow.

// 14598
//His dark side had also noticed, when it was looking through the entire room for
//anything that could possibly be used as a weapon, that the enemy had been
//foolish enough to bring a Dementor into Harry’s presence. That was a powerful
//weapon indeed, and one that Harry might wield better than its supposed masters.
//There had been a time in Azkaban when Harry had told twelve Dementors to turn
//and go, and they had gone.

// 14599
//__The Dementors are Death, and the Patronus Charm works by thinking about
//happy thoughts instead of Death.__

// 14600
//If Harry’s theory was correct, that one sentence would be all it took to pop
//the Aurors’ Patronus Charms like a soap bubble, and ensure that nobody within
//reach of his voice could cast another one.

// 14601
//__I am going to cancel the Patronus Charms and prevent any more
//Patronuses from being cast. And then my Dementor, flying faster than any
//broomstick, is going to Kiss everyone here who voted to send a twelve-year-old
//girl to Azkaban.__

// 14602
//Say that, to set up the if-then expectation, and wait for people to understand
//and laugh. Then speak the fatal truth; and when the Aurors’ Patronuses winked
//out to prove the point, either people’s __anticipations__ of the mindless
//void, or Harry’s threat of its destruction, would make the Dementor obey. Those
//who had sought to compromise with the darkness would be consumed by it.

// 14603
//It was the other solution his dark side had devised.

// 14604
//Ignoring the gasps rising from behind him, Harry crossed the radius of the
//Patronuses, strode to a single pace from Death. Its unhindered fear burst
//around him like a whirlpool, like stepping next to the sucking drain of some
//huge bathtub emptying out its water; but with the false Patronuses no longer
//obscuring the level on which they interacted, Harry could reach the Dementor
//even as it could reach him. Harry looked straight into the pulling vacuum and -

// 14605
//__the Earth among the stars__

// 14606
//all his triumph at saving Hermione

// 14607
//__someday the reality of which you are a shadow will cease to exist__

// 14608
//Harry took all the silver emotion that fueled his Patronus Charm and
//__shoved__ it at the Dementor; and expected Death’s shadow to flee from
//him -

// 14609
//- and as Harry did that, he flung his hands up and shouted “BOO!”

// 14610
//The void retreated sharply away from Harry until it came up against the dark
//stone behind.

// 14611
//In the hall there was a deathly silence.

// 14612
//Harry turned his back on the empty void, and looked up at where the toad-woman
//stood. She was pale beneath the pink makeup, her mouth opening and closing like
//a fish.

// 14613
//“I make you this one offer,” said the Boy-Who-Lived. “I never learn that you’ve
//been interfering with me or any of mine. And you never find out why the
//unkillable soul-eating monster is scared of me. Now sit down and shut up.”

// 14614
//The toad-woman fell back down to her bench without a word.

// 14615
//Harry looked further up.

// 14616
//“A riddle, Lord Malfoy!” the Boy-Who-Lived shouted across the Most Ancient
//Hall. “I know you weren’t in Ravenclaw, but try to answer this one anyway! What
//destroys Dark Lords, frightens Dementors, and owes you sixty thousand
//Galleons?”

// 14617
//For an instant Lord Malfoy stood there with eyes slightly widened; then his
//face fell back into calm scorn, and his voice spoke coolly in reply. “Are you
//openly threatening me, Mr. Potter?”

// 14618
//“I’m not threatening you,” said the Boy-Who-Lived. “I’m __scaring__ you.
//There’s a difference.”

// 14619
//“Enough, Mr. Potter,” said Professor McGonagall. “We shall be late for
//afternoon Transfiguration as it is. And do come back here, you’re still
//terrifying that poor Dementor.” She turned to the Aurors. “Mr. Kleiner, if you
//would!”

// 14620
//Harry strode back to them, as the Auror addressed moved forward and pressed a
//short rod of dark metal to the dark metal chair, muttering an inaudible word of
//dismissal.

// 14621
//The chains slithered back as smoothly as they had come forth; and Hermione
//pushed herself out of the chair as fast as she could, and half-ran and
//half-staggered forward a few steps.

// 14622
//Harry held out his arms -

// 14623
//- and Hermione half-jumped half-fell into Professor McGonagall’s arms,
  //beginning to sob hysterically.

// 14624
//__Hmpfh,__ said a voice inside Harry. __I kind of thought we’d
//earned that one ourselves.__

// 14625
//__Oh, shut up.__

// 14626
//Professor McGonagall was holding Hermione so firmly that you might have thought
//it was a mother holding her daughter, or maybe granddaughter. After a few
//moments Hermione’s sobs slowed, and then stopped. Professor McGonagall suddenly
//shifted her stance and grabbed onto her more tightly; the girl’s hands were
//dangling limply, now, and her eyes were closed -

// 14627
//“She’ll be fine, Mr. Potter,” Professor McGonagall said softly in Harry’s
//direction, without looking at him. “She just needs a few hours in one of Madam
//Pomfrey’s beds.”

// 14628
//“All right, then,” Harry said. “Let’s get her to Madam Pomfrey’s.”

// 14629
//“Yes,” said Dumbledore, as he descended to the bottom of the dark stone stairs.
//“Let us all go home, indeed.” His blue eyes were locked on Harry, as hard as
//sapphires.

// 14630
//The Lords and Ladies of the Wizengamot are departing their wooden benches,
//leaving as they came, looking rather nervous.

// 14631
//The vast majority are thinking ‘The Dementor was frightened of the
//Boy-Who-Lived!’

// 14632
//Some of the shrewder ones are already wondering how this will affect the
//delicate power balance of the Wizengamot - if a new piece has appeared upon the
//gameboard.

// 14633
//Almost none are thinking anything along the lines of ‘I wonder how he did
//that.’

// 14634
//This is the truth of the Wizengamot: Many are nobles, many are wealthy magnates
//of business, a few came by their status in other ways. Some of them are stupid.
//Most are shrewd in the realms of business and politics, but their shrewdness is
//circumscribed. Almost none have walked the path of a powerful wizard. They have
//not read through ancient books, scrutinized old scrolls, searching for truths
//too powerful to walk openly and disguised in conundrums, hunting for true magic
//among a hundred fantastic fairy tales. When they are not looking at a contract
//of debt, they abandon what shrewdness they possess and relax with some
//comfortable nonsense. They believe in the Deathly Hallows, but they also
//believe that Merlin fought the dread Totoro and imprisoned the Ree. They know
//(because that too is part of the standard legend) that a powerful wizard must
//learn to distinguish the truth among a hundred plausible lies. But it has not
//occurred to them that they might do the same.

// 14635
//(Why not? Why, indeed, would wizards with enough status and wealth to turn
//their hands to almost any endeavor, choose to spend their lives fighting over
//lucrative monopolies on ink importation? The Headmaster of Hogwarts would
//hardly see the question; of course most people should not be powerful wizards,
//just as most people should not be heroes. The Defense Professor could explain
//at great and cynical length why their ambitions are so trivial; to him, too,
//there is no puzzle. Only Harry Potter, for all the books he has read, is unable
//to understand; to the Boy-Who-Lived the life choices of the Lords and Ladies
//seem incomprehensible - not what a good person would do, nor yet an evil person
//either. Now which of the three is most wise?)

// 14636
//For whatever reason, then, most of the Wizengamot has never walked the path
//that leads to powerful wizardry; they do not seek out what is hidden. For them,
//there is no __why.__ There is no explanation. There is no causality. The
//Boy-Who-Lived, who was already halfway into the magisterium of legend, has now
//been promoted all the way there; and it is a brute fact, simple and
//unexplained, that the Boy-Who-Lived frightens Dementors. Ten years earlier they
//were told that a one-year-old boy defeated the most terrible Dark Lord of their
//generation, perhaps the most evil Dark Lord ever to live; and they just
//accepted that too.

// 14637
//You are not meant to question that sort of thing (they know in some unspoken
//way). If the most terrible Dark Lord in history, confronts an innocent baby -
//why, how could he __not__ be vanquished? The rhythm of the play demands
//it. You are supposed to applaud, not stand up from your seat in the audience
//and say ‘Why?’ It is just the story’s conceit, that in the end the Dark Lord is
//brought down by a little child; and if you are going to question that, you
//might as well not attend the play in the first place.

// 14638
//It does not occur to them to second-guess the application of such reasoning to
//the events they have seen with their own eyes in the Most Ancient Hall. Indeed,
//they are not consciously aware that they are using story-reasoning on real
//life. As for scrutinizing the Boy-Who-Lived with the same careful logic they
//would use on a political alliance or a business arrangement - what brain would
//associate to __that,__ when a part of the legendary magisterium is at
//hand?

// 14639
//But there are a very few, seated on those wooden benches, who do __not__
//think like this.

// 14640
//There are a certain few of the Wizengamot who have read through
//half-disintegrated scrolls and listened to tales of things that happened to
//someone’s brother’s cousin, not for entertainment, but as part of a quest for
//power and truth. They have already marked the Night of Godric’s Hollow, as
//reported by Albus Dumbledore, as an anomalous and potentially important event.
//They have wondered why it happened, if it did happen; or if not, why Dumbledore
//is lying.

// 14641
//And when an eleven-year-old boy rises up and says “Lucius Malfoy” in that cold
//adult voice, and goes on to speak words one simply would not expect to hear
//from a first-year in Hogwarts, they do not allow the fact to slip into the
//lawless blurs of legends and the premises of plays.

// 14642
//They mark it as a clue.

// 14643
//They add it to the list.

// 14644
//This list is beginning to look somewhat alarming.

// 14645
//It doesn’t particularly help when the boy yells “BOO!” at a Dementor and the
//decaying corpse presses itself flat against the opposite wall and its horrible
//ear-hurting voice rasps, “__Make him go away.__”