Chapter- 20 : Desperation Part - 2
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you're eager to delve deeper into the story, consider joining my Patreon for exclusive content and early access to new chapters
50+Advanced Chapters there.
(P).(A).(T).(R).(E).(O).(N)
patreon.com/Kun_Blig
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Madam Amelia Bones was still alive and Head of the Department for Magical Law Enforcement.
He rubbed his hands together in glee. Excellent. Her reputation was solid, even if he had only learned that after she died back home when people lamented that she hadn't survived the first purge. If he could get her on his side she would send them all straight to Azkaban.
Speaking of... when had she been killed, anyway? If memory served, her death had been front-page news while he was still at Privet Drive that summer. Well, this summer now, blast all apparent time-travel to eternal dimension-hopping hell.
Still, if he could warn her in time that might buy him some goodwill with the woman. After all, one didn't just waltz into the DMLE and demand to speak to its head. Especially during wartime.
"Tilly!" he called loudly. Belatedly he realised that most people were still asleep while the sun had barely risen, but the elf popped in looking like it didn't bother him one whit.
"Master Harry is up early," he said with approval.
"Nightmare," Harry grunted. "Can I get an early breakfast?"
Tilly nodded and popped back out, returning minutes later with a plate piled high with scrambled eggs, toast, bacon and a single sausage.
While Harry ate the elf sniffed before scowling at the fireplace and snapping his fingers. An unpleasant odour Harry hadn't even noticed until now was replaced by a faint citrusy smell.
Huh. Note to self. Next time, burn lethifold bedhangings in Dumbledore's office.
He didn't comment out loud, however, but instead relished how his last few bites tasted better without a whiff of stench. When it was done he sat back with a satisfied sigh.
Now, how to best warn the woman...
Harry tapped his index finger against his bottom lip, deep in thought.
"Tilly, can you check if there is a pensieve in the Room of Hidden Things?" he asked suddenly.
Without a word Tilly disappeared. Harry made and discarded a few plans before the elf showed back up, sadly without a big stone bowl.
"Tilly is sorry," he said, head bowed and eyes downcast. "There is being no pensieve."
"That's all right. Can it make one for me though? If I really need it?"
Tilly perked up. "Oh yes, Master Harry. The Come and Go Room can make copies of anything in the castle. Master Headmaster Dumblydore is having pensieve so Come and Go Room can be making copies of it." He wilted. "But the copy can not be leaving the room."
"That's quite all right. It just means I have to get dressed first," Harry said quickly. He crouched down on one knee and put his hand on the green bony shoulder. "Thank you, Tilly. You've been a great help."
Bulbous eyes went wide and Tilly let out a sqeak before vanishing with a pop.
Harry rolled his eyes. Someday he would meet a well-adjusted house-elf.
Half an hour later saw Harry in the Room of Requirement. It was bare, barring a single sparsely populated bookcase to the side but Harry didn't spare it a single glance as he rushed to to the marble pedestal in the centre. On top of it sat a stone basin adorned with symbols and runes turning the simple bowl in a work of art. The shimmering liquid inside was lit up faintly by luminous whirling blue-grey clouds just below the surface.
He skidded to a halt just before touching the thing, reaching out his hand towards it before restraining himself.
Blood rushed to his face and he could feel the heat on his cheeks as he withdrew his arm and ran his hand through his hair. Reflexively he looked both ways to see if someone had caught that. How did one go about extracting a memory, anyway?
The presence of a bookcase was a big hint and Harry resignedly plodded towards it. He wanted action, like throwing the lot of them in prison, not reading stuffy books.
He almost set fire to the whole thing when he saw one of the books was on Occlumency but just barely managed to tone down his response to throwing the book across the room instead.
Fortunately there was a booklet on pensieves and their usage. Unfortunately using one turned out to not be quite as straightforward as Dumbledore had made it seem.
The headmaster had made it look easy and he had been right when it came to actually entering a memory, which didn't require more than touching the liquid. The rest, however, was quite complicated. Besides spells for retrieving a memory – depending on if it pertained to one's own mind or a hostile or willing other, with many tweaks depending on age of the memory – using the pensieve required a manual. Harry was very glad he flipped through the rest of the booklet otherwise he may never have figured out how to exit the pensieve again when he was done.
All in all, it took him until lunchtime before he felt confident enough to try.
That gave him time to think of a strategy though, and when he was finally ready to pull out copies of his memories he focussed on the summer after his Fifth year and specifically memories of him reading the Daily Prophet.
Retrieving a memory felt slippery and weird, a little like when Dudley had put long strands of grass in his nose when he was five and he had taken care pulling them out very, very slowly. He drew thick, sirupy, silvery strands from his temple, rotating his wand all the while so they pooled around it like a cocoon. When it was complete he flicked it towards the pensieve, muttering under his breath in faux Latin and watched the whole thing slide off and uncurl in the basin.
Harry dove into the pensieve headfirst and let himself fall until he once more stood in Dudley's hated second bedroom on Privet Drive. His fifteen year old self was lying despondently on the creaky bed, a newspaper lying discarded on the wooden floor.
Instead of a clear view of the hell-hole, though, it was decidedly rough around the edges.
Harry grumbled as he got to his knees near the paper and twisted his head this way and that to try and make out the details. Instinctively he tried to adjust the paper – smooth out crinkles, look at it from another angle – but his fingers passed right through, the paper dissolving into so much parchment-coloured smoke before slowly reforming into exactly what it had looked like before.
He sighed. Nothing was ever easy, it seemed. Fortunately he could make out the headline, proclaiming the death of the DMLE head. Reading the article was beyond him though, so he didn't have any details. Worse, he couldn't read the date, which was really what he went through all this trouble for.
However, back then, like a true and seasoned inmate he had counted the days of his imprisonment. A sheet of paper on the wall was partitioned into boxes, with a depressingly small number crossed off in red ink. Crude though it was, it served as a calendar in a pinch and Harry wiggled his wand to exit the pensieve, lost in thought.
Amelia Bones was going to be attacked soon, it seemed. And by telling her as much, he would have an in to speak to her.
He asked the room for a desk and writing implements and bit the end of the quill as he composed a note.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
If you're eager to delve deeper into the story, consider joining my Patreon for exclusive content and early access to new chapters
50+Advanced Chapters there.
(P).(A).(T).(R).(E).(O).(N)
patreon.com/Kun_Blig
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~