Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Made of Common Clay	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > General > General Views: 10987 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am making no money from this story.

Chapter List
- 16
- 17
- 18
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Seventeen—The House of Fame
“I can hardly believe that Lady Parkinson confessed to some of those things.”
“I know. Isn’t it incredible? And this way, Auror Londer and her son get justice, and none of us have to worry about whether the Ministry has the resources to conduct an actual investigation!”
Kingsley stares at Harry with narrowed eyes, but Harry only gives him back large innocent ones. Kingsley doesn’t have Legilimency talent; there’s no way on earth Harry will submit to Veritaserum; and Aurors Londer and Weston aren’t about to betray a cause that will get them justice for the sake of a frightened, timid man. Kingsley can suspect all he likes. He has no proof.
“I think you almost have a grudge against Lords and Ladies.”
“Would I have accepted a place in the Sun Chamber if I had a real grudge against them, Kingsley? Think about it, and be honest.”
Kingsley shifts around to look out the enchanted window on the wall of his office, which shows rain and more rain. Harry has never met anyone as fond of pretending there’s terrible weather outside. “No. People you have grudges against tend to disappear instead.”
Harry lets the words hang there for a second, and then smiles. “I don’t have grudges against them. I do think they could do better with running the wizarding world; they seem so concerned about it, but they won’t act right. But I think they have the potential to do better. Otherwise, I’d just get rid of them at once.”
Instead of over time, the way I’m doing.
Kingsley looks at him gravely. “Careful, Harry. Someone could decide you have a grudge after all and they should investigate you for murder.”
Harry rolls his eyes. “I killed Atlas Parkinson in fair combat. In fact, I offered him more chances than those two idiots Parkinson hired did me or Corin Londer. Who am I supposed to have murdered?”
Because there’s no one, of course, Kingsley can only go back to looking serious. Or constipated. At this point in time, Harry’s having trouble telling the difference. “I only warn you what people are going to say.”
“Oh, no, not gossip! I’ve never dealt with that before in my life! How ever will I cope?”
Kingsley scowls again. Then he says, “It seems you’ve been a little distracted from regular Auror work with the Lords and Ladies and the Sun Chamber, Harry. I’d like to put you back on it.”
“Of course. What would you like me to do?”
“There’s a group that may be connected to those rebels who protested in Diagon Alley and broke into this department. The problem is, we can’t trace the connection yet. It dies every time we find a lead. There’s burned evidence, or we raid and no one’s there, or the person we thought had a link to this group is clean. We think maybe you can find something.”
“Of course.” Harry’s a bit amused; he’s never been that good at subtle investigative work. “What’s the group’s name?”
Kingsley leans towards him and lowers his voice. “The Kingmakers.”
Harry blinks. He blinks again. He hopes that Kingsley takes the expression on his face for shock instead of the terrible, terrible laughter that wants to bubble forth instead. He manages to swallow. “R-really. Why do they call themselves that?”
“No idea, but we’ve found the name on the only scraps of parchment in the fireplaces that hadn’t been burned.”
“You can’t use spells to reconstruct the rest of the parchments?”
Kingsley snorts. “Of course not. They took precautions against that. And sometimes the parchments were so burned that it wouldn’t have worked anyway.”
Harry just nods and takes out a piece of parchment and a quill and an inkwell. This mix of sloppiness and subtlety fits Shafiq’s group, because of course it bloody does. “All right. How long have you been investigating them?”
As Kingsley starts to give him the details, Harry reflects on the fact that he’s glad Kingsley hasn’t actually, so far, believed him when he makes honest proclamations about his hatred of Lordships and the Ministry’s attitude towards Muggleborns. This is such a beautiful chance to play both sides against the other that he can’t resist.
*
“What do you think, Harry?”
Harry knows what Neville wants him to check. He folds his arms and directs his magic with his wand off to one side, which for whatever reason is more effective this way. He lifts his power and splashes it casually against the keystone in the arch of Neville’s front door.
A deep hum comes back. Harry grins and opens his eyes. “I think it sounds good. We don’t have all the magical signatures of the Sun Chamber yet, but it shouldn’t be long. It’s almost full.”
“It seems so easy for you to check that. I wish I was more like you.”
Harry reaches out and clasps his friend’s shoulder, shaking him until Neville reluctantly meets his eyes. “Don’t wish for that,” Harry tells him quietly, fiercely. “You have Hannah, and you love her, and you have your passion for your work. I might have the more powerful magic, but the only thing I have a passion for is tearing our world apart, and I can’t remember loving someone the way you love Hannah. If anything, I want to trade places with you.”
“Good thing for the future that you can’t,” Neville mutters, and straightens his robes out when Harry releases him. They’re standing in front of his house, in the gleaming garden that’s filled with blue flowers and sweet-smelling versions of venomous plants and other examples of his art. “We need you.”
“And then when all this is done, no one will ever need Harry Potter again.”
“You keep speaking like that. I think—mate, I’m worried that you’re going to kill yourself.”
“Don’t worry, Neville. That won’t happen unless I die of overwork. I just mean I can stop being Harry Potter, Hero, when this is done with, because he won’t exist. No one is ever going to think of me as a hero again when I pull down the Ministry and the Sun Chamber.”
“I will.”
Harry grins at him and punches him in the shoulder. “Go give that soppy look to Hannah, you great berk. I’ve got shit to do.” And he spins on his heel and Apparates before Neville can call him back.
There are still people who would try to talk him out of this, like Neville and Rolf and even Ron sometimes. And plenty of other people who would join them, like Ginny and Molly, if they had the slightest idea what he was doing. It doesn’t matter. Harry’s not going to spend enough time around them for it to matter.
And he’s been honest with Neville. In a little while, everyone is going to curse his name, not worship it.
Harry can hardly wait.
*
“What else are you going to do to get revenge for my son?”
“Auror Londer. I didn’t hear you come in.” Harry’s hand is curled around his wand, but he manages to convince the fingers to uncurl. He nearly cursed her. She ought to know better than to step into another Auror’s office when their back is to the door. “And I believe I told you something about what we’re going to do for Corin. It’ll move a little more slowly from now on, though. Too many dramatic reveals like Parkinson pulled in Diagon Alley, and someone will start suspecting the truth.”
“I want revenge now.”
Harry studies Londer as she sits down in the chair across from him, her fingers clenched so that it looks as though her knuckles are about to break through her skin. “That’s understandable, but it won’t happen right now.”
“Why not?”
“I already told you why.”
“If you think that I’m just going to wait around while you do the exciting jobs…”
Harry is beginning to regret, a little, that he let compassion overrule good sense when he accepted Auror Londer into his movement. On the other hand, it’s not like he could know that would happen. “There is one thing you could do. But it would require patience and subtlety, and those don’t seem to be traits you have right now.”
Auror Londer draws in her breath and holds it. Then she meets Harry’s eyes and relaxes her fists with what looks like intense concentration. “I want to avenge Corin, but I won’t let my emotions get in the way. What job?”
“Kingsley wants me to investigate a group of people who are giving him trouble and burning their evidence well enough to hide their tracks,” Harry says. “I know exactly who they are already, but I’m going to use my knowledge to get some more information from them. It would be helpful if you would do the investigation for the Ministry, and pass along what you do find. That will make it look as if I’m doing what Kingsley asked while actually avoiding tasks that would take my time from more important duties.”
“What’s in it for me?”
“The group is called the Kingmakers. Kingsley doesn’t know it, but their purpose is to make someone king of the wizarding world, and they’ve chosen me.”
Auror Londer stares at him long enough that Harry thinks she might disbelieve him, or she might get up and storm out. Then she shakes her head. “And you’re willing to go along with and support their nonsense?”
“Of course not. A lot of them are from the Sun Chamber, although not allied with Parkinson. But I have to seem like I’m going along with them and with Kingsley, in case someone figures me out and moves before I’m ready. Can you pacify Kingsley while I do the dance with them?”
“I repeat, what’s in it for me?”
“Learning more about just how corrupt the Ministry is. Being able to put aside some of your broken faith once you see how far they’ve already gone.”
Auror Londer is silent for long enough that again Harry thinks she’ll leave. Casually, he grips his wand. He can’t let her do that, as much as he likes her. There are the lives of his friends at stake, and the futures of longer-standing allies.
“All right,” she says abruptly. “But you’ll need to pass along any notes that Shacklebolt already gave you for the case, so I don’t look like an idiot when I prepare these reports.”
Harry nods and reaches for the folder under his desk. He’s listening hard enough to hear what she mutters under her breath a second later.
“How much more ammunition do I need to despise the Ministry?”
You’ll get whatever you need, Harry thinks, and sits up, and hands the folder to her with a minute shake of his head. He just hopes that she’s ready for what it contains.
*
Harry pauses outside the small house where Shafiq and Tessanon and a few other members of the Kingmakers have asked him to meet them, and closes his eyes. It takes him a bit, but he manages to summon up a memory of a case years ago when he honestly thought he was going to lose Ron. He’ll need to look sick and shaken when he enters this house, and reality won’t let him do it.
When he feels ready, he reaches out and knocks hard on the door.
The wards splutter and curl around his wrist and fingers, but Harry only stands waiting, tapping his foot, not showing how ready he is to lash out and destroy them. And sure enough, the wards fall back a second later, and Harry strides in.
The house is small and dark, but torches and fires in fireplaces flame to life when they realize who it is. Harry can see multiple faces he doesn’t know staring at him. He ignores them and focuses on Shafiq.
“Did you really have to be so obvious?” he asks her, with a slight sneer.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“The Ministry knows that your group is called the Kingmakers, and they’ve put me on your trail.” Harry rolls his eyes. “I thought no one was supposed to know about this and it was hush-hush? That obviously didn’t work.”
Shafiq gapes at him. But Tessanon shakes his head and chuckles a little, sounding almost as though he’s proud of Harry.
“At least you made sure that you were the Auror on the case, eh, Lord Potter?” he asks, and winks. “That’s a bit of cleverness. You can make sure that we aren’t caught and that false reports filter back to the Ministry.”
Harry steps back and looks as though he hasn’t thought of that. “But it’s putting my job at risk.”
“Compared to the glory that is to come, who cares? This is the best thing that could have happened. Better you than someone outside Auror who might actually pursue the case with some kind of bothersome tenacity.”
Harry pretends to consider it, and then bows his neck. “You’re probably right, sir. Thank you.”
“No need to call me sir at all, Lord Potter! Please. Roland.”
“Roland,” Harry sighs and nods. “I simply can’t get used to the fact that I’ll be a king in a few months’ time! I want to change things, but I never realized it would be this simple!”
He catches glimpses of the contempt on the watchers’ faces from the corner of his eye, and almost snorts. Why do they think things will be so much easier than they look? Why do they despise him?
For the same reason I despise them. We’re coming from such different philosophies and estimates of each other’s abilities…
He is determined to understand them, though, and not to underestimate them. He turns back to Shafiq and Tessanon. “Besides the investigation that I’ve been put on, what news can you give me of the Kingmakers?”
Shafiq looks around the room, but no one returns her glance with a conspiring one. Harry thinks she’s just trying to make sure that she’s the center of attention before she says something. When everyone is looking, she smoothes her hand down her robes again, and gives a small smile. “You will be glad to know that we have found an artifact that can advance our cause, Lord Potter.”
“I’m very excited! What is it?”
Again he gets some glances of contempt. He should probably sit there like a proper pure-blood and try to balance castles on his upper lip, apparently.
“It is,” Shafiq says, and lowers her voice, “the Muggleborn Mirror. It will trap the magic and memories of all Muggleborns, and make it possible for us to exile them back to the Muggle world where they belong.”
Harry doesn’t immediately panic. He’s heard of artifacts like this before, although not this particular one, and he knows very well that they never work the way the people involved think. “How exciting! Where did you find it?”
“Deep in a vault that an ally of mine willed to me, but which I’d had no time to explore before now.” Shafiq’s voice is mild, but her eyes shine. “This is an artifact collected long ago by the de Fleur family. The family lived outside Britain for some time, but they always believed in the purity of blood and wanted to see something accomplished for pure-bloods in their original homeland. I believe it will work.”
Harry smiles and nods and listens as Shafiq goes on to talk about the Muggleborn Mirror. The theory is sound: that the Mirror will distinguish between magical and non-magical parents and capture the memories of the wizarding world from anyone with non-magical parents who looks into it. Then it will bind their magic and make them ready to be exiled into the Muggle world.
The thing is, the theory is always sound with these pretentious pretend ways of distinguishing between Muggleborns and other people. Harry knows this won’t work, for the simple fact that blood purity theory is as wrong as the sun rising in the north.
And many Muggleborns come from Squib ancestors, distant or not. How is the mirror going to distinguish between Squib parents and Muggle parents? It can’t. Harry knows.
He does smile and nod again when Shafiq glances at him. “I still want to ask that my friend Hermione be spared.”
“She can have a year or two of grace.” Shafiq takes a step back towards the large fireplace, a warning note creeping into her voice. “But just because she’s useful and your friend doesn’t mean that she can be spared, Lord Potter. In the end, she’s a Muggleborn like all the rest of them. Untrustworthy. Unworthy of the gift of magic that she carries. You have to understand that.”
Harry smiles dreamily at Shafiq. He’s dreaming of her head exploding, not the time when he’s king, but it’s not like she’ll understand that. “Thank you. A year or two of grace is all I ask for. I know that I have to make sacrifices to become king…”
He continues in that vein, the kind of thing he can spin in his sleep after making so many speeches to the press and the Ministry. In the meantime, he’s watching faces, cataloguing mannerisms that will let him identify those he doesn’t know if they meet again under masks or other circumstances. And his veins pound with dangerous excitement, driven by his ultimate hatred of them all.
They are the ones unworthy of their gift of magic, or anything else. They are the ones who will either lose everything or die.
Why not both at once?
And that, Harry thinks as he accepts Shafiq’s congratulations and the toasts of the others, is also an excellent option.
*
Moodysavage: Yes, the curse is permanent unless Harry chooses to lift it. Don't worry, he won't want Pansy blabbing the truth to everyone either!
- 16
- 17
- 18
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Made of Common Clay