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Professor Monroe	By : Athey1024 Category: Harry Potter AU/AR > Slash - Male/Male Views: 15724 -:- Recommendations : 8 -:- Currently Reading : 25
Disclaimer: I am not J. K. Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter. This is a work of fanfiction and no profit is being made. It is a for-fun endeavor and no infringement is intended.

Chapter List
- 9
- 10
- 11
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“Harry!”

Harry cringed and stopped at the foot of the stairs and turned back to see Hermione jumping up from her seat and racing over to him. He sighed, resigned to his fate and gave her as innocent an expression as he could manage.

“Where have you been!? We were worried sick!”

“I'm fine,” Harry insisted instantly.

“But where have you been? We were supposed to meet up at the Three Broomsticks but you never showed up. Ron and I looked all over Hogsmeade for you!”

Harry grimaced again before sighing and looking around the common room. It was just Hermione – no Ron, which Harry was secretly thankful for. There were certain details he didn't really want to share with Ron, but that he knew Hermione would demand for the sake of her own never-ending curiosity and insistence on knowing everything.

“Where's Ron?” Harry asked.

Hermione made an exasperated sort of sound and rolled her eyes. “He's out on the pitch,” she groused.

Harry looked back at her and cocked a single eyebrow, but he couldn't be that surprised. Their first Quidditch game of the year, against Slytherin, was this coming week and Ron had been having random bouts of excessive nerves for more than a week.

Harry heaved a sigh and turned back to her. “Okay, look, if you really want the details we need to go somewhere private, because some of it's sensitive.”

Hermione's expression became more serious and thoughtful. “We could use an empty classroom and lock the door,” she suggested. Harry shrugged and nodded, motioning her out the portrait hole. It took a few minutes before they found a room that Harry was satisfied with. There were no portraits inside it to eavesdrop and gossip about them. Harry still wasn't sure about it – he worried that he was getting excessively paranoid, but after all he'd been through, up to and including being kidnapped and used in an evil dark ritual – he figured he'd earned the right to be cautious.

Harry cast a locking charm on the door and then an imperturbable charm, hoping that would be good enough because he didn't know any privacy wards. Finally, he turned back to Hermione who was now looking a mixture between wary and worried.

“What's going on, Harry?” she asked, seriously. “What happened to you today?”

A small bark of a nearly-hysterical laughter escaped from his mouth before he managed to get control over it and shut his mouth. It was just such a loaded question – one that he mostly couldn't answer, either.

He sighed heavily and pulled an old wooden chair out from one of the dusty unused desks. He sat down heavily and paused, gathering his thoughts. Hermione hesitated but finally seemed to give in and pull out a chair for herself, watching him and waiting patiently.

“My meeting with Mr. Jennings was... educational,” Harry said bitterly. “You know how I discovered at the start of term that Dumbledore is my legal guardian proxy?”

Hermione nodded her head, her brow furrowing with concern.

“Yeah, well, it seems like he's done a lot more than just neglect to attend to his responsibilities in that area,” Harry grumbled before flowing into a long, embittered retelling of his discoveries and suspicions on Dumbledore's actions and possible motives. He told her about the Wizengamot seats and his political power. He talked about how it was supposed to be Dumbledore's responsibility as his Proxy to explain Harry's future duties in the House of Lords to him, and to keep him fairly up-to-date on the legislation going through the Wizengamot so Harry could be prepared and learn about the whole thing.

Hermione was quick to pick up on the fact that Harry did not know for a fact if Dumbledore had been voting on any legislature using Harry's seats, and Harry granted her that, but said he was going to be writing Mr. Jennings a letter as soon as they were done there to get more details on that.

He told Hermione about his fears that Dumbledore was intentionally stringing Sirius along, but not really helping him, just so that he could maintain his legal control over Harry and his Wizengamot seats.

“Harry, you can't seriously believe that!?” Hermione had gasped in disbelief. “How can you believe that of the Headmaster? He's a good man, Harry! He would never do something like that!”

“How can you know that for sure?” Harry shot back. “What do we really know about him? I've been looking at his political voting record, and I don't like it, Hermione. I don't agree with even half the bills he's sponsored over the last few decades, and he's been spearheading the effort to slim down, and weaken all of the legislation that got passed back in the 60's that I do like. And what if it was my votes that were used to neuter the Magical Proxy act? What if he used my political power to weaken the legislation that could have saved me from the Dursley's?!”

Hermione looked lost and frustrated. “Harry, I just don't know enough about this stuff to say anything for sure. You've been doing all of this political digging, but it's not something I've investigated much. If Dumbledore's been trying to slim down the legislation, I'm sure he had some good reasons for doing it.”

“No, he didn't! It's all about politics and whose got the upper hand. It's all about sides, and which side is winning, and then people forget that there are real people being effected by this stuff. From Dumbledore's point of view, any legislation that gives magical people the power to take a magical child away from a muggle family is evil. It's just the work of blood-purists and bigots who don't think that muggles are suitable to raise a magical child. So they neuter that legislation, and weaken it until it can't do anything, and there's no protection left.

“Sure, there are probably loads of muggle parents who love their kids and treat them wonderfully – people like your parents – and I don't think it's okay to take magical children away from their family, if they're parents are good and loving people, but what about the parents that hate magic? The ones that don't understand it and punish their children just for being what they are? What about the ones that use the child's differences as an excuse to beat the shit out of them whenever they feel like it, or turn a blind eye when others do it? Or they treat the kid like scum, and don't feed them and lock them in their room!

“You're always going on about the rights of House-Elves to be treated like people, but what about when a muggle treats magical child worse than the worst wizard treats a house elf!? That child deserves some bloody fucking protection too, and in the 60's they had it! If people like Dumbledore weren't so hung up in taking sides of an issue and turning a blind eye to the reality that some muggles actually are fucking monsters, and that children deserve all the protection we can give them, maybe he wouldn't have turned a blind eye to what happened to me! Because if he doesn't think that muggles will mistreat a magical child – that they'll lock them in a cupboard and refuse to let them out to use the loo, or feed them for days – then all he had to do was actually attend to his responsibilities as my Proxy, just once, and take one damn good look at the Dursley's!” Harry roared, feeling his throat tighten and the painful prickle of tears behind his eyes.

He closed his eyes firmly and turned his head away, feeling horrified that he'd gotten so worked up, and said so much.

Hermione was gaping at him in utter horror and disbelief. She sat there in silence, lost for words.

“Harry...” she whispered after several long beats of nothing had passed.

Harry pulled in a slow, deep breath, trying to calm down. He turned slowly and looked at her with slightly deadened eyes and she flinched. “I'm so sorry...” she said hoarsely.

Harry snorted bitterly. “If anyone owes me an apology, it's Dumbledore. But he won't even look at me anymore. You know, before I was just afraid it was ignorant neglect, and as his political stance on the whole thing became more apparent, the more digging I did, I started to think that his refusal to attend to his duties as my Proxy was some sort of political thing – like he wanted to prove that the whole Proxy thing was pointless and unnecessary, so he was just ignoring it, but... but this whole thing with the Wizengamot seats – I don't know, Hermione, but it's really unsettled me. And really – how could he have not thought of habeas corpus, as a possible way to help Sirius? Dumbledore is the Head of the Wizengamot! He writes bills! He presides over legislation once a month, and has to sit in on any really big legal hearings, at least once every several months, if not more often than that. He knows the law. Not only that, he has connections with people in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and all over in the Ministry. He could have done something for Sirius. Why hasn't he?”

Hermione's lips were parted and she shook her head, helplessly. “I – I don't know, Harry.”

“Everyone says that Albus Dumbledore is a great man. He's a powerful wizard – magically and politically – but only by way of his connections and influence. In the Wizengamot, he has one vote in the House of Commons, and can cast a deciding vote in the case of a tie in the House of Lords. He can sponsor bills, but he still only has minimal legal influence over what gets passed. He has to convince others in the House of Lords and House of Commons to cast votes in it's favor, and I'll admit that he's got enough sway with enough people that he could probably get a lot done this way, but having a whole fifteen votes at his disposal would be awfully tempting, and terribly useful, don't you think?

“Dumbledore may have repeatedly refused to run for Minister of Magic, but I think he's probably got more influence over things where he is right now – so why run? He'd have to give up his position in the Wizengamot if he became Minister. Why would he do that? Everyone always made it sound like he'd made some grand sacrifice in not running for Minister – that he didn't want power and influence – he'd much rather stay in the simple position of Headmaster of Hogwarts and attending to his other responsibilities. What's more influential than running the only sizable wizarding school in all of Britain, and what's more powerful than heading the legislative body of the wizarding world? It's all rubbish! He's not the man I thought he was, Hermione!”

Harry growled and leaned over in his seat, burying his head in his hands while he clawed at his hair, pulling it in frustration before heaving a defeated sigh.

“It's my own fault, really. I just believed what I was told and blindly followed along without doing any actual research for myself. I never looked into it, so I've only got myself to blame. People told me that Albus Dumbledore was the greatest wizard in the world – he defeated the Dark Lord Grindlewald and was loved by generations of students. And I just took that and believed it like it meant something. Okay, so back in the 40's Dumbledore dueled a Dark Wizard and won – brilliant. Does that make him a 'Great Man' or just a 'Powerful Wizard'? The assumption is that the two are the same thing, but they're not!

“He projects this impression of a slightly mental, but happy wizard who is brilliant and powerful. He's this lovable but sort-of-crazy old wizard who twinkles at you when he's proud and comes off as omniscient and knows things he shouldn't, but he's still just a man, and he's not perfect or all-powerful. He has his own motives and his own agendas, and the more I learn about them all, the less and less convinced I am that he has my best interests at heart. I used to think that I knew Dumbledore – that I knew what sort of man he was and what sorts of things he'd be willing to do and what he wouldn't, but you know what? I don't think I know that at all, really. He's clearly willing to do things if he things the ends justifies the means. Even if that means turning his nose up on his legal responsibilities and allowing a helpless child to suffer.”

Hermione was obviously terribly conflicted, but her confidence had clearly been shaken. She pulled in a calming breath of her own and waited a moment while Harry stewed in bitter silence.

“What happened after your meeting with Mr. Jennings?” she asked softly.

Harry sighed and sunk a bit into his seat. “I... I was a mess. I was really unsettled, obviously. I wasn't really watching where I was going and I ran right into Professor Monroe – like, literally, I ran into him.” Harry let a weak chuckle escape him before it morphed into a sigh. “He could see that I was a mess and led me back to the castle, had an elf bring me camomile tea to help me calm down and we just talked. He let me vent, and it helped me sort through my thoughts. I lost track of time until just a bit ago when he realized we'd missed dinner and that I should probably get back to Gryffindor tower.”

Hermione's face was clouded and she was giving Harry a speculative look. Harry flushed, remembering Maximilian's statement earlier that Hermione probably suspected that Harry fancied his Defense professor. He ducked his head, avoiding her gaze.

“Harry...” Hermione hedged hesitantly and Harry cringed at the tone in her voice, “is there anything about Professor Monroe that you... would like to tell me? You've been spending a lot of time with him after classes, and I see you sort of... watching him in class and...” she trailed off hesitantly.

Harry flushed deeper, scowling at his inability to hide his emotions and reactions. He understood suddenly just how difficult it was going to be to keep the new shift in his relationship with his professor a secret. He heaved a defeated sigh, trying to work out how to tell her enough to satisfy her without telling her too much.

“Not really,” he grumbled in mild annoyance. “I mean... I might sort of... well, I respect him. I think he's brilliant. He's the best Defense professor we've ever had – even you have to admit that.”

Hermione gave a conceding sort of nod and a shrug.

“He...” Harry let out a frustrated huff and shrugged, swallowing his nerves. “I'm gay. But he's a teacher. It's just a crush.”

Harry pulled his eyes up and looked at Hermione worriedly. Her eyes were wide for a moment before her features softened and she gave him a reassuring smile.

“Oh, Harry,” she said and in a move that Harry hadn't expected at all, she stood up wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into a rather awkward hug. “I'm so proud of you, Harry.”

Harry felt like gaping at her incredulously.

“Proud of what?” he asked in bewilderment, patting her back somewhat uncomfortably, since she was still hugging him.

“For finally having the courage to tell me that you're gay,” she said, finally pulling back and giving him an amused sort of look.

“How long have you suspected that I'm gay?” he squawked slightly.

Hermione rolled her eyes. “Harry, you've been eyeing up the other boys all term. I mean, you were especially obvious with your infatuation for Professor Monroe, but it hasn't been hard to notice you checking out others as well.”

Harry's face paled in horror. “Shite, you really think it's been that obvious?” he asked worriedly, suddenly equal parts mortified and terrified of when it would appear on the front page of the Daily Prophet. Maybe he should include a warning about this in his letter to Mr. Jennings so his solicitor could pass it on to the Public Relations wizard assigned to Harry.

“Well, it's been obvious to me,” Hermione said, emphasizing the last bit. “I rather doubt that Ron's noticed anything. He's a bit dense with those sort of things.”

“Yeah, but what about everyone else? Do you think other people have figured it out?” Harry asked worriedly.

“Oh... I don't know,” Hermione said, frowning and looking thoughtful. “I don't know if it's been that obvious. I think I noticed because I've sort of wondered about that since last year.”

“Last year?” Harry asked incredulously. He hadn't been checking any blokes out last year – had he?

“Well, it's just that you had such a hard time with the Yule Ball, and the whole Cho Chang thing seemed rather contrived and forced. It was like you picked her because she seemed like what would be expected, more than you actually liking her. I mean, honestly Harry, do you even know a single thing about her, other than the fact that she's pretty and she plays Quidditch?”

Harry flushed with embarrassment as he mentally acknowledged that, no, he didn't know anything about her at all.

“Plus it just seemed like you were hit especially hard when Cedric refused to stand up for you at all, and started avoiding you.”

“Well, I could hardly blame him,” Harry mumbled bitterly. “The way Dumbledore and I have been blasted in the papers was awful – if he could avoid the same treatment then he should.”

“Yeah, but it hurt your feelings, didn't it?” Hermione asked gently. “You would always watching him from across the hall and things. And the way you saved him at the end of the maze and offered to share the glory with him by both of you touching the cup... I don't know, but I sort of got the impression that maybe you fancied him a little, which was the real reason why you were upset when you found out that he was going out with Cho.”

Harry flushed, taken back slightly by what she'd said, but then he paused and wondered if she might be right.

Cedric was an amazingly attractive guy, and Harry often found himself watching the tall Hufflepuff during the morning workouts, since the bloke tended to be at every one. He had amazing shoulders and arms, and was one of the few people who came to the morning classes that could do more than a few pull-ups. And Merlin did he look amazing when he did them...

Harry flushed deeper. Well, he would readily admit that he found Cedric entirely fanciable now, but had he somehow subconsciously been attracted to him, even a year prior? He supposed it was possible. He was perfectly willing to admit – if only to himself – that he was not the most self-aware person on the planet.

Harry shrugged. “I dunno.. maybe, I guess. I hadn't really thought about it.”

Hermione made a humming sort of sound and nodded her head. “I had thought maybe that your lack of interest in girls was just because you were a bit of a late bloomer, or because of all the pressure and expectations people always have for you, but then I started to wonder if it was something else. So I was sort of looking for that something else, you know? That's the only real reason it seemed so obvious to me this school year when you started noticing other boys. I don't think you really have to worry that it's all that obvious to everyone else. Still... if you're worried about people finding out, maybe you should try to tone it down a little,” she ended hesitantly, looking at Harry apologetically.

Harry moaned in embarrassed misery but nodded.

After that Hermione wanted more details on what Harry and Professor Monroe had talked about, specifically, and Harry had told her bits and pieces and dodged some of her other questions. Part of him seriously wanted to vent to her about the discovery of the Prophecy and the fact that Dumbledore had been hiding it from Harry his whole life, but Maximilian had asked him not to tell anyone, and he supposed that was probably a good idea for now.

Finally, Hermione was satisfied and the pair left the room to return to Gryffindor Tower. Ron was there, playing exploding snap with the twins and Lee Jordan. He frowned at the sight of Harry and Hermione coming in together and asked them where they'd been, with an obvious air of annoyance at being left out. Hermione, indignantly pointed out that it was Ron who had run off to play Quidditch while she waited around worrying about Harry, and if he'd stuck around they would have taken him along for when they talked.

This really didn't seem to appease him at all, and after a bit of bickering and a few placating answers, the trio ended up on the couch and chair in front of the hearth doing their homework, in uneasy silence.

Later that night, after Harry had written his letter and sent it off with Hedwig, as well as finish up any homework he had due for Monday, Ron asked Harry what had happened to him in Hogsmeade. Harry told him the much more simplified answer than he'd given Hermione – saying that he'd learned some really unsettling things from his solicitor and was so upset that he left Hogsmeade, found himself a secluded spot, and took a nap. Ron, being Ron, accepted this abridged and highly edited version, and the two went to bed.

The following day passed in a bit of a numb blur with Harry oscillating between elated memories of the more intimate encounter's he'd shared with Maximilian, and worrying about the more disturbing things he'd learned from him and Mr. Jennings about Dumbledore.

The Debate club meeting, Sunday afternoon, offered an interesting distraction, and over the last three weeks Harry had come to enjoy the club for more reasons than simply the fact that Maximilian was the club sponsor and that Hermione thought such a club was a brilliant idea. Harry had come to find it remarkably interesting and surprisingly entertaining.

The debate subjects were often things Harry didn't know a lot about, but the debates taught him a lot about them, and more specifically, they taught him a lot about the two opposing sides of the issue, which wasn't usually something he got exposed to. Most of the time when he learned about an issue, it was either from a single person or source that already had formed an opinion on it, or it was from some dry book that was trying to remain objective. Either way, he either got a biased view, or a view that was lacking any substance behind it to explain why people got worked up over it. The debates, however, showed him exactly what points people were passionate about, and also showed him which of his fellow club members were most persuasive.

He sort of hated to admit it, but some of the Slytherins had the potential to be amazingly good public speakers. But he could also pick apart how they used their cunning and intelligence to manipulate certain details, bringing them to the forefront while lessening the value of others to the background, in order to point a person in the direction they wanted them to go. They certainly lived up to their house values.

Harry still hadn't felt up to volunteering to participate in any of the debates himself, but even so, he felt like he was getting a lot more out of the club than he had expected to when he'd signed up.

It wasn't until sometime after the club had ended, during dinner that evening, that Harry got an owl that turned his mood in a firmly sour direction. Harry had removed the letter from the owl's leg, seen the seal of his solicitor's firm and cut his meal short. He'd managed to beg off from his friends and left on his own, insisting he wanted some privacy, and ended up dodging into an empty classroom. He locked the door behind him, sat down on top of one of the desks and broke the wax seal with a sense of dread filling his gut.

The thick heavy envelope contained quite a few sheets of parchment, only the first of which was actually a letter. A quick scan told him that the others included details on all of his inherited Wizengamot seats – who'd they'd been left to him by and a brief summary of who had held those seats over the last two hundred years – and then a detailed record of what legislation each of those seats had voted on over the last twenty years.

The various seats were all left to him at different times, depending on when the previous holder had died, and if things were kosher, you would expect that each seat's voting record would be blank starting from the moment they came under Harry's ownership.

But they weren't.

Harry's blood felt hot in his veins and his head felt pressured with his tightly bound rage. He put the records down and went back to the letter from Mr. Jennings to see specifically what it said.

Mr. Jennings first told Harry that he'd spent Saturday afternoon in the Wizengamot records department getting him the details that were attached with the letter and briefly explained what Harry had already figured out about them. He told Harry that from what he could tell, Dumbledore had never voted on any of the original seven seats that Harry had inherited from his father, but Dumbledore had been consistently using the additional eight that had been left to Harry in the years since 'You-Know-Who's' downfall in 1981.

Mr. Jennings also stated that while he did not yet have proof, he had reason to suspect that Dumbledore might have even been the one to convince at least a few of those people who left their seats to Harry, to give them to him. No doubt that none of these people would be quite gullible enough to give their family seats away to Dumbledore himself, but could probably have been conned into giving them away to the poor orphaned boy who had 'saved' them all from Voldemort. Harry figured that Dumbledore probably eased his guilty conscious by telling himself that Harry wouldn't even have those seats if it weren't for him, but it didn't change the fact that his voting them without consulting Harry was entirely illegal.

Mr. Jennings said that he was already compiling a sizable file of evidence against Dumbledore's questionable actions against Harry and asked for permission to go interview Harry's muggle relatives. Harry felt a horrible sense of dread fill him at that prospect, but tried valiantly to squash it. Mr. Jennings promised to try to maintain confidentiality as much as possible and keep Harry's private life private, but there was only so far he could go and in some cases, getting public opinion and sympathy on their side might be necessary to go up against the political powerhouse that was Albus Dumbledore.

However, he also pointed out that once it became clear that Harry was trying to break ties with Dumbledore and his influence, it was likely that Cornelius Fudge would start trying to make nice with him, and having the Minister on his side would go a long way.

This left a foul taste in Harry's mouth. Harry did not like Cornelius Fudge. As far as Harry was concerned, the man was a pandering bastard who was putting the whole wizarding world at risk just for the sake of his own political ambitions.

One of the things that Harry had reluctantly included in his letter the previous night was to inform Mr. Jennings of his preferences and noting that he would really rather it not get out to the press that he was gay. Mr Jennings, with Harry's permission, had forwarded that bit to Ms. Matthews from their PR department so that she would be prepared to handle any such stories breaking in the press. He also assured Harry that the magical confidentiality contract that had been signed when he first enlisted the firms services included her and she would be unable to tell anyone else that information without Harry's explicit permission. Harry was still nervous about the whole thing, but the idea of taking a proactive step in the matter instead of just sitting around and hoping that the papers never got wind of it, was slightly reassuring.

Jennings also said that he had Ms. Matthews working with some contacts within the Prophet to start crafting some pieces to repair the public's perception of him, and that any stories would be passed through him first, before going to print. However, it might be necessary in the coming months for Harry to give a few interviews and asked Harry to outline some details for Ms. Matthews saying explicitly what he'd be willing to let out and what he specifically wanted to try and keep under wraps, like his sexuality.

After that, Jennings had written that, given all that they'd learned about Dumbledore and his deals, that it would be negligent to not start getting Harry out from under Dumbledore's legal control and that he was making it his priority to get the emancipation process started quickly and quietly. Just the same, he told Harry that if he really wanted to get into the Department of Mysteries and look at this supposed Prophecy, that they'd best do it soon before Dumbledore started to get wind that something is going on.

Harry found that he agreed with that. No matter how hard Dumbledore was trying to avoid Harry, he doubted that Dumbledore would remain ignorant of all this for very long. If Dumbledore really was hiding the Prophecy from Harry, he would probably do everything he could to keep Harry from hearing it. But so long as Dumbledore thought that Harry didn't know about it, he had a better chance of getting in unnoticed and hearing the thing for himself.

Jennings said he had many contacts within the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, but more important, he had several clients who were Unspeakables – however he couldn't tell Harry who they were. Just the same, he would use them as a backdoor to get Harry in legally, but bypassing any official Ministry channels that might take notice of his request and report it to persons unwanted. He would be doing that Monday morning and would contact Harry as soon as the opportunity to go to the Ministry was available. They would have to come up with an excuse to get Harry out of Hogwarts and into London, since they couldn't afford to wait the month necessary for the next Hogsmeade Weekend to come along.

Harry ended up sitting in the empty classroom flipping through the records of the votes cast with his seats and fuming for the next few hours. He made notes on things to look up in the library and finally just wrote a letter back to Mr. Jennings thanking him for all his help and hard work and responding to a few specific inquires from the letter.

He also reluctantly gave them the go-ahead to go visit the Dursley's, but said it was probably a good idea if they waited until after Harry had visited the Department of Mysteries, since he was pretty sure that Dumbledore had all sorts of wards and things on the house and if any magical person went there, he might be notified. Finally, with a grim expression set firmly on his face, Harry retreated to Gryffindor Tower to sulk and fume.

Ron questioned him a little, but gave up quickly, opting to just give Harry his space. Hermione was far more persistent, however, and Harry ended up giving her access to the vote records from the Wizengamot seats, while holding back the actual letter since it contained some sensitive points, and with the secrecy charms, she wouldn't be able to read it anyway. Harry did take the time to point out a few of the legislative measures that he was actually familiar with that his votes had been used to help pass. He didn't like any of them, and Hermione refrained from making any arguments in Dumbledore's defense when she saw the furious glint in Harry's eyes, and the hard set of his jaw.
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Professor Monroe