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Narcissa Militant	By : Lomonaaeren Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 17885 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I am not making any money from this story.

Chapter List
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Part Nine
“Are you going to tell me what changed your mind?”
Minerva grimaced. She and Narcissa had been in her office for five minutes, and Minerva had still done nothing more than sip from her cup and look at the wall. Now she turned around—she had a chair in the middle of a mostly circular desk, replacing the one that Narcissa remembered standing here in Dumbledore’s day—and scooped up a drift of paper.
“Albus left all sorts of parchments and notes. This is a bunch that I didn’t look at until the other day. I didn’t know.”
Narcissa gave her a quiet glance and bent down to read the parchments. In a few seconds, she understood. Even though Dumbledore never used the word, it was all too clear he was talking about Horcruxes.
“He knew Harry was one of these things.” Minerva’s eyes were closed when Narcissa looked up at her, tears slowly trickling from underneath them. “He knew it, and he planned to sacrifice him.”
“He would have killed Harry?”
“No—I don’t think so, not personally. I think he would have sent Harry out to face Voldemort and let Voldemort kill him. There are other notes that say that’s the only way to get rid of a living Horcrux. Have someone who made the Horcrux cast the Killing Curse at him.”
“That’s the only way to get rid of it if you only care about getting rid of it,” Narcissa said, making sure to emphasize the last few words. “If you don’t care at all about him. Sirius and I have a different way.”
“I did hear that Sirius had his trial.” Minerva carefully dried her eyes with a handkerchief that was far too tartan for Narcissa’s taste. “What is the method?”
“I don’t know that I should tell you until I hear more about why you’re on our side. Is it just that the former Headmaster would have killed Harry?”
Minerva gave a soundless sigh that pursed her lips. “No. I thought about what Harry has been doing in the last little while. How he protected other students, how he challenged You-Know-Who almost on his own. And I’m sure that he had something to do with Professor Umbridge’s death.” She gave Narcissa a sharp glance.
“Perhaps you should keep accusations that could cut to yourself,” Narcissa suggested gently, but let her voice turn cold enough that Minerva could expect to see her breath soon.
Minerva looked away. “He’s a protector. A defender. And he’s taking on all these burdens that I know Albus would never have asked him to take—because he was intent on keeping him a child, innocent until he had to face You-Know-Who.”
“You mean ignorant.”
“Yes, all right, ignorant. That’s really what it was.” Minerva’s hands clenched in front of her as if she was growing claws through her fingertips. “Even now I don’t know why he chose that way. Is it somehow connected to how you have to act to destroy one of those things?”
“I think that he might have thought it was. But there’s no evidence of that. If anything, perhaps he was afraid that Harry might survive a duel with Voldemort if he didn’t keep him unprepared and untrained.”
“Harry couldn’t really do that.”
“Harry is a powerful wizard. And he has depths that neither you nor that other former Head of Gryffindor House have ever plumbed.”
“All right. I can—accept your word on that. Now, can we discuss what we’re going to do about Fudge and his blatantly illegal attempt to arrest a fifteen-year-old with a detachment of trained Aurors?”
“Gladly.” Narcissa spun her wand between her fingers for a moment. “If I can get an oath that nothing of what I say to you will leave this office, unless we both agree that the person you want to tell can be trusted.”
Minerva tried to glare for a moment. She didn’t have nearly as much practice as Narcissa did, and she was smart enough to admit that after a second. She nodded and drew her wand. “I swear on the dragon heartstring that makes the core of my wand that I will never communicate, by word, writing, or any other method, any information that Narcissa Malfoy and I exchange in this office tonight.”
“Cute, but repeat the oath so that it includes information you learn from me.”
Minerva blinked. “I truly wasn’t trying to have that be a loophole.”
“Do it anyway.”
Minerva did, and said, “Now, what do you intend?”
“I’ve thought for a while that we need a new Minister. Fudge is fixated on destroying Harry somehow, and at the moment, he’s a greater threat than Voldemort, who shows no inclination to move again soon. We need to remove Fudge.”
“You mean—”
“Not kill. That would be messy, and there are subtler ways. Now, let me tell you what plan I have in mind, and you can refine on it.”
*
“Headmistress! Headmistress, can we ask what’s going on?”
The Aurors had been trailing behind them shouting that for a few minutes now. Not as many of them recognized Narcissa, or else they might think it prudent to keep quiet. Narcissa kept quiet herself, walking beside Minerva. Minerva kept her gaze aimed ahead.
“Headmistress, please.” An Auror finally stepped in front of them as Minerva aimed for the Minister’s office. “We can’t let you go in there unless you tell us what’s going on.”
Minerva drew herself up. She was impressive when she wanted to be, Narcissa could admit, if what you thought was impressive were actions that made someone pay attention to you instead of dismiss you until it was too late. “I am going to tell Minister Fudge what I think of him sending six Aurors to arrest a fifth-year.”
“What?”
“Yes, his fulminating against Harry Potter crossed the line into illegal action last night. Six Aurors, and a Ministry representative who protested when I wouldn’t let her ‘do her duty,’ as she thought it was. You may well be shocked.”
Some of the Aurors looked more than shocked, Narcissa thought as she glanced around with the slight motions of her eyes beneath lowered lids that would keep people from noticing she was looking at them at all. There was smugness there, and outrage, and some cautious relief.
They’re as embarrassed as the rest of us. They’ve been looking for some excuse to get rid of Fudge, and now they have it. They’ll want to make sure it sticks.
One of the relieved Aurors was Kingsley Shacklebolt, and he moved forwards to bow to Minerva. “You’re here in your official capacity as Headmistress of Hogwarts School, madam?”
“I am.” Minerva looked him full in the face, and seemed for a moment as if she would speak in contempt, but then she seemed to recognize him. “Kingsley Shacklebolt?”
“That’s right, Headmistress.”
“Then escort me to see the Minister, please. There’s something in Hogwarts’s charter that he needs to be reminded of.”
Narcissa smiled. She was glad now that she hadn’t got rid of Minerva. She wouldn’t have been able to invoke the charter. It had little place in her world. She would simply remove the threat and make sure no one could find the body.
But sometimes the legal way was preferable, if slower.
Shacklebolt led them the rest of the way, and other Aurors followed them or lingered in the corridor or went back to their desks as their temperaments permitted. Narcissa watched intently as Shacklebolt knocked on the Minister’s door. She couldn’t see any poisoned needles or other traps coming out of the door. It didn’t mean they weren’t there.
Then she considered how intelligent Fudge actually was, to have sent those Aurors to arrest Harry in the first place, and revised her opinion.
A ginger-haired young man opened the door. Narcissa recognized him as Percy Weasley, one of the students she’d helped to teach when she was working with Aurora two years ago. He looked down his nose at all of them now, although Shacklebolt was well over his height.
“The Minister is busy with affairs of state. Unexpected interruptions will have to wait—”
“Like the unexpected interruption of him sending six Aurors and one of Madam Bones’s assistants into the school last night? Thank you for giving me a name to hang on it, Mister Weasley. And excuse me.”
Minerva pushed easily past young Weasley. Narcissa hid her smile as she followed. There was an advantage to spending years instructing so many young wizards and witches. Minerva would have faced lies and insinuations and excuses from them all before this, although about detentions and late assignments rather than Aurors in the school. She knew exactly how to handle them.
“Headmistress, you can’t—”
“What is the meaning of this?” Fudge demanded, standing up so fast that his bowler hat almost flew off his head.
“I would like to know that, indeed,” Minerva said, and her eyes glittered and her robes moved as if they were made of metal on the edges and Narcissa held back her laughter because it would do no good right now. “What is the meaning of sending Aurors into Hogwarts at midnight to ‘destroy’ a fifteen-year-old?”
Fudge went pale so fast that Narcissa thought he might faint. “That’s not—there’s not—”
“I’m sure that the Minister had a good reason,” Weasley tried to intervene, his voice so pompous that Narcissa thought she could prick it and it would leak hot air. “Let’s calm down and talk about it, and let him say what it was.”
“I’m done listening to the Minister unless he learns better from his mistakes,” Minerva all but spat. Narcissa smiled. She had told Minerva that she would need to be impressive to carry off this part of the plan, and it seemed she had listened. “That means, among other things, that he explain to me now why he sent Aurors, and without permission, and at night, and six of them.”
“That fifteen-year-old is spreading lies and sedition!”
“Such as?”
“That You-Know-Who is back! Ridiculous nonsense—”
“Even after the Pensieve memories that I understand you saw? Even after the reports of other students, and myself, and other adults who saw Voldemort manifest at the gates of Hogwarts?” Minerva shook her head. “Find better excuses for your obvious fear and jealousy of a child, Minister.”
“Fear! Jealousy!”
“Yes. Now that you understand the emotions, you should find them easier to explain. Well, Minister? I’m waiting.”
Narcissa savagely bit down on her lip. She wouldn’t laugh. She couldn’t laugh. It would mean that she would simply start howling and wouldn’t stop.
Fudge decided to launch himself at a different target instead of answering Minerva’s question. “I am not answering any questions in front of that woman!”
“I’m afraid that Narcissa Malfoy has a perfect right to be here, as the foster mother of the boy whom you tried to arrest. Or exterminate. Whichever it was, Minister. That’s in the school’s charter, too.”
“If he’s really her son, why hasn’t she stopped him spreading all these vicious rumors and getting involved in politics that could harm his health?”
“Because I don’t encourage my children to run and hide,” Narcissa said, thinking that was the outside of enough. “And there should be no danger to him in politics that doesn’t come from Voldemort and his supporters. Or so I thought. But it seems that I’ve mistaken his enemies. You are one of them, aren’t you, Minister Fudge?’
He looked at her, and his sweat seemed to crystallize on his face. He was far from the smartest of men—which had proven useful in the past when Lucius needed to manipulate him—but he could read her expression.
“You don’t need to threaten me,” he whimpered. “I never intended to kill your—your son.”
“I don’t know that that’s true,” Narcissa said. “And anyway, I’m not the one you need to speak to. It’s the Headmistress’s domain that you invaded. I know she has some choice things to say to you.” Then she shut up, and handed control of the conversation back to Minerva.
“The charter of the school says that no one except those connected to Hogwarts can intrude without permission,” Minerva said. Her smile made it seem like her Animagus form was a lioness, which Narcissa approved of. “Even the members of the governing board need to ask permission to visit. So do parents. They are not considered to belong to the school. Even more so, then, the current Minister who neither visited me nor intended to help a student.”
“Headmistress—you can’t mean—”
“I do mean it. I mean that you’ve violated Hogwarts’s boundaries, the boundaries of an institution six centuries older than the Ministry. No one has ever dared attack us for long.” Minerva reached into her robe pocket and took out a heavy iron ring. Narcissa had heard of it, and so had Fudge, by the way his sick gaze settled on it. “For this reason.”
“I don’t—I didn’t mean to! It’s just that the boy is dangerous—”
“And again, there are paths you could have followed if you believed that. We don’t keep dangerous students around once we know they’re dangerous.”
“Then why is that boy still there?”
“Because he is not a danger.”
Fudge should have heeded the warning in Minerva’s voice, but then again, he should have heeded it long ago. He blustered ahead. “I say he is! Besides the rumors that he’s been spreading, his mother—”
“I did warn you, Cornelius.” Minerva raised the iron ring, reached across the desk, and touched it to the middle of Fudge’s forehead. He froze and stared, then began to blubber. But no sound passed his lips.
“I invoke the right of Hogwarts to judge if one who interferes in Hogwarts is a righteous leader.”
The room filled with the sensation of a distant thunderstorm, and Narcissa felt the hairs on the outside of her arms rise. For a moment, symbols flashed above the iron ring. They moved so fast that Narcissa only knew what they were because the cycle repeated more than once. A golden lion with a scarlet sword clutched in its teeth. A black badger with a yellow cup in one paw. A bronze eagle crowned with a glowing blue diadem. And a silver serpent with an emerald locket around its neck.
The images blended a second later, and a creature that looked like a chimera—except for its distinctively feathered wings and the badger’s head that had taken the place of the goat’s—leaped from the ring and flowed towards Fudge. He might have ducked if he could. Narcissa knew it wouldn’t have made any difference.
He sobbed as several objects in the office shattered. Narcissa noticed that one of them was the signet ring that Ministers still sometimes used to seal official documents, and another was an upright case that had broken and sagged open. Inside were the robes that Fudge presumably wore to the Wizengamot. They spilled out and began to bubble and hiss as black fire destroyed them from the inside out.
Minerva pulled back her ring. Weasley was gaping at her. Minerva gave him a faint smile and said, “Percy Ignatius Weasley is the witness to the Minister’s dismissal from his post at the pleasure of Hogwarts. We trust that an election for a new Minister will be held shortly, and an Acting Minister appointed until then.” She nodded to Weasley, completely ignoring Fudge as if that part of the room had ceased to exist, and then swept out. Narcissa followed.
There was an uproar behind them, but no one dared to stop them. Minerva sailed serenely down the corridors and made people back away from her. Narcissa waited until they were closer to the fireplace they’d come in by to ask, “Why did Dumbledore never do that?”
“Fudge was more of a benefit to him when he was alive,” Minerva murmured as she reached for the Floo powder. “It was only later that he started being obstreperous.” She hesitated. “And the ring needs absolute faith in its power to work, a righteous cause, and no negative bias against one of the Houses. Otherwise, it strips the Headmaster or Headmistress who tried to use it of their position, instead.”
Narcissa understood without Minerva having to explain further. Of course. Albus Dumbledore would have doubted, and he had had a bias against Slytherin House.
It was good to have help this time, Narcissa thought, as she smoothed out her robes from the journey and went to reassure Harry and Draco that they had nothing to worry about for the rest of their fifth year. The more difficult it is for an enemy to trace this back to me, the better.
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Narcissa Militant