Seeking Justice

Madam Bones had quickly given up on Veritaserum and switched to forceful memory withdrawal on Dumbledore. She managed to obtain all of the relevant memories from Dumbledore by the end of September, and the Goblins had spent the next month tracking down the rightful owners or heirs of the many items he had stolen. Harry and Neville had each received quite the haul, as had many other families at the school. Once those items were returned, the Goblins had liquidated the rest and finished paying out restitutions. Others found guilty of bribery or similar backroom shenanigans were also forced to make reimbursements to those they had harmed. Several prominent families had been paupered over the scandal, including Dumbledore, Fudge, Umbridge, Bode, and Gibbons.

Many others were furious about losing their tuition discounts, but the heirs managed to pass those complaints off to the board. Madam Longbottom was always willing to go show them the error of their ways. Without offering such hefty discounts to the rich old pureblood families that Dumbledore had favored, the tuition vault increased substantially; even with the "discounts" to those muggleborn who had been overcharged. At Hermione's insistence, the tuition price and the rules for discounts would be printed in all future Hogwarts literature for prospective students.

Madam Bones did a little research and directed the trio to the legal firm of Macmillan, Turpin, and Entwistle, who had served both the Longbottom and Potter families for generations. Eugenia Turpin had, in fact, been the Potter family Solicitor for Harry's parents, until Dumbledore had had her fired while working as Harry's "guardian." The firm, working with Sirius and Madam Longbottom, began building a number of court cases in the trio's name. While the goblins and the DMLE were going after Death Eaters and those involved in Dumbledore's bribery scandals, there were several other cases the trio wanted pursued.

First, the Dursleys were on the chopping block for their horrible mistreatment of Harry as a child. Two Assistant Healers at St. Mungo's had been implicated in the continued incapacitation of the Longbottoms, and Augusta and Neville wanted the book thrown at them. Harry also had Mrs. Turpin go after anyone who had written books about him or used his name to promote their goods; a long list over the past ten years. Then there were those who had claimed his family home for the Ministry, or who had "sold" land in Hogsmeade.

With her tough stance on crime wiping out many political opponents, and the backing of the three Heirs, Madam Bones easily won the official election for Minister of Magic. Once she was confirmed as Minister, Madam Bones and her new DMLE head, Auror Scrimgeour, were kept busy in the courts for most of the fall. Dumbledore and Fudge both had prominent trials, as did several Ministry members accused of bribery. Most of the remaining "former" Death Eaters who had not been caught in the initial sweep at Hogwarts had been hunted down, and trials were scheduled to begin in the new year. Of course, as soon as those were concluded, MacMillan, Turpin, and Entwhistle had an avalanche of cases pending for them. It was going to be a busy year for the courts.

Things had been no less busy inside the school. After the first dozen students were pulled from Hogwarts and enrolled in other schools, no other families followed. Since all of the students had already been suspended, and since all were the children of "former" Death Eaters, frankly the Heirs were glad to be rid of them.

The initial cascade of punishments had also slowed by Halloween, as those older students who were used to the former system eventually learned to adapt to the new Hogwarts. Gryffindors found they could no longer pick on younger Slytherins for being "filthy snakes." And without Snape covering their tracks, Dumbledore looking the other way, and most teachers having their hands tied in the name of "staff unity," the Slytherins found that their own bullying and name-calling would be quickly found out and harshly punished. Words like mudblood and squib were no longer acceptable language at Hogwarts, much to the surprise of all four Houses. All three heirs had been bullied when they were younger, and they had no tolerance for it in their home. With the paintings and ghosts reporting to the Headmaster and heirs, and even Hogwarts herself speaking through the Sorting Hat, very little escaped notice or punishment.

While those upheavals were happening, all three heirs were also finding a few spare minutes to work on their pet projects. Neville was working on de-stigmatizing the idea of taking more than seven years at Hogwarts, for those who wanted to study further. Hermione was working on fair treatment rights for House Elves, with a goal to eventually seeing their race return to the powerful, unshackled freedom they had once known.

Harry was working on a sensor array to detect passive magic. He was determined to prevent those children from being seen as squibs or simple muggles. He had a suspicion that the parents and siblings of several muggleborns would actually display passive magic, just as Neville did. He just couldn't understand how, as strong a witch as his mother was, her sister had no magical ability whatsoever. As a ghost, Helena was bound to Hogwarts and so unable to read his aunt's aura. However, she knew of a young girl with the same power as her, and Harry had made plans to borrow Professor Lovegood's niece Luna over the Christmas Hols for a quick trip to Surrey. Knowing if his aunt or cousin had passive magic would give him excellent guinea pigs for his sensor array.

Of course, each of their pet projects were going to be years in the making, but slowly but surely some of the other things they were working on were going to be turned over to other hands. The Parent-Teacher board would be handling the new testing system, the teaching staff would be the leaders in curriculum changes, the Headmaster and the rest of his administrative team would run the school, and the various specialty elves they had bought would keep Hogwarts sustainably fed and maintain the grounds and new sport areas, while training some of the existing elves to assist them. The heirs might have provided the kick in the trousers to start everything, but they had surrounded themselves with experts to carry on their visions.

That said, Harry was still looking forward to relaxing a little over the Holidays.

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The story is almost over, i will be uploading the last three chapters tomorrow. You can call them a time skip or a summary of the next 10 years.