Chapter- 32 :Interrogation Part - 7

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Dumbledore pursed his lips. "You know that nothing we did was illegal. Pursuing this serves no purpose."

"Then you shouldn't be worried," he retorted, not giving an inch. Really, he had already agreed as much with Madam Bones, so this was not really a victory for Dumbledore even if it appeared that way.

"Very well," the old man said reluctantly. "I cannot agree to leave you alone, however. It is both too vague a statement and would prevent us from making use of the information you possess on the war in your reality. That information could save lives."

Harry shook his head again. "I will not reward you for your actions, Headmaster. I refuse to have you feel vindicated by getting something out of me that you would not have otherwise."

"Now see here, boy!" Moody exclaimed angrily. "You're going to tell us what you know or so help me-"

"Alastor!" Dumbledore chided, but the ex-Auror would not hear of it.

"No, Albus. The lad is blackmailing us without giving us anything in return and I will not stand for it." He clambered to his feet and hobbled over to Harry, glaring. "You talk a whole lot while people are bleeding in the streets. Did you not hear Shack just now? Over a hundred Muggles dead. Any decent human being would get off their arses and do something about it instead of whining about injustice like you're doing."

Harry sucked in a breath at the jab but glared right back at him. "Tell me, Moody, about the one that took your eye. Did you talk to him and go, 'It's my own damn fault for not dodging fast enough so I forgive you; constant vigilance!?'"

Moody's leathery face contorted in a hideously vicious grin. "No lad, I got even and shot a piercer in his skull." He poked Harry in the chest hard enough to unbalance him and force him to take a step to the side. "Difference is, while we fought nobody else got hurt."

Harry bristled and got right up in his face, trying not to get seasick from seeing the wildly revolving eye dart every which way. "Then you'd best give in so you can go back to fighting and protecting people instead of dragging my bloody carcass all across the universe."

"Gentlemen!" Dumbledore barked as he sprung to his feet and got in between the pair of them, putting a hand on each of their chests. "While some emotion is expected I would hope for a little decorum from grown men like yourselves." He looked over Moody's shoulder to the black-skinned Auror. "Kingsley?"

Kingsley Shacklebolt got up and with a firm hand on Moody's shoulder led the ex-Auror back to his seat, though he couldn't get the stubborn man to sit down. Harry remained where he was, breathing a little heavily and scowling at Dumbledore's hand still on his chest.

"I mean it, Headmaster. I will not reward you for what you did to me."

"And yet, through your inaction a lot of innocent lives may be lost," Dumbledore said sadly. "Is that not the greater injustice?"

Harry's head jerked around from Moody to look Dumbledore in the eye and he growled low in his throat. "Are you defending your actions as for the good of the many?" he asked incredulously.

He took himself loose from Dumbledore's grip and stepped backwards quickly until his back was once more against the cold stone wall.

"There was a book published a few months after you died, you know?" he said ominously, narrowing his eyes at the Headmaster and ignoring the multiple sharply indrawn breaths at that little revelation. "The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore was quite the bestseller."

The Headmaster smiled faintly. "It does sound quite riveting."

The calm geniality infuriated Harry and as he heard the blood rushing in his ears he couldn't keep his tongue in check. "I've always wondered if it was true," he spat. "Tell me, after your father was sent to prison for torturing Muggles, were you or were you not lovers with Gellert bloody Grindelwald?"

A deep and heavy silence fell in the Great Hall as everyone looked at Harry incredulously before slowly turning towards the Headmaster when he did not immediately refute the accusation.

Dumbledore sighed and slumped a little. "I do not like remembering those days," he said softly. He looked up and met the eyes of every Order member unflinchingly, cutting a powerful figure of strength and defiance in the face of adversity. "Yes, my father was sent to prison after lashing out at the Muggles who had viciously beaten my sister, irreparably damaging her magic. And yes, as a young man just out of Hogwarts I fell in love with Gellert, which made it all the more painful when he fell to the Dark Arts and I was forced to fight him years later."

"You're gay!?" Tonks blurted before turning a mortified pink, her metamorphmagus talents colouring her in a unique full-body blush that included her hair, teeth and eyelashes.

Dumbledore's chuckled and his eyes twinkled merrily. "I am delighted that your faith in me is so strong that none of these events bother you beyond the surprise at my preferences."

There was a woosh of exhaled air as the tension slowly ebbed away, even if people were throwing the Headmaster looks of surprise and curiosity as if they were re-evaluating him. Dumbledore ignored them completely and instead turned to Harry as his expression lost some of its merriment.

"Inadvertently you have made our point, however," he said with a hint of steel in his voice. "You have knowledge. You know things that may prove invaluable to us."

Harry hesitated. Inwardly he was berating himself for shooting off his mouth with no reason but to vent. More importantly, he had already given Amelia Bones the useful intel he had regarding attacks and Death Eaters. In reality they were quibbling over an empty argument, beyond his resolve not to do anything that could remotely be construed to be a reward for their high-handed actions.

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