Companions of the White Warlock

Smoke Year VII - Companions of the White Warlock Chapter XX Tuesday, November 18, 1997

"Would you take down the shutters before you go to bed?" George asked Ron, as the twins sat down to breakfast and Ron sat down to a late snack, "and help Fred watch the store for about an hour?"

Ron shrugged. "Sure, no problem." He yawned, having been up patrolling Hogwarts the previous night. "What are you up to?"

"He has to meet with the pin-head," Fred snapped.

"Why would you have to meet with Percy?" Ron demanded.

"Because part of his duties are to be one of the liaisons between the Ministry and Diagon Alley," George answered. "Unfortunately, our shop lies within his beat."

"Beat him," Fred muttered, dishing out the eggs and toast.

"And, as you might tell, I have a slightly less destructive attitude towards our beloved brother," George pointed out.

"Is there a problem?" Ron asked.

"When isn't there a problem where Percy is concerned?" Fred demanded.

George shrugged. "I don't know if the problem is Percy or those people in that new bakery next door, or both."

"Twits," Fred growled.

George shrugged. "Apparently, they claim some of the, well, the explosions that sometimes. . . ."

"On very rare occasions!" Fred added.

". . . sometimes occur here may have caused some of their rising doughs to fall flat," George admitted.

"They knew what kind of business we were when they moved in!" Fred protested. "One reason they moved there from up the street is because we get so many customers throughout the day! They can't have it both ways!"

"I know," George agreed. "Still, they complained to the Minister, and Percy has to look into things first. Come on, it's not like he can make any decision."

"Why not?" Ron asked.

"Because while WE know Percy would decide against us, unless we were totally in the right. . . ." Fred started.

". . . The bakery would assume the opposite, since he is our brother," George concluded.

"By birth only," Ron and Fred said together.

George shrugged. "He's always been this way, so far as any of us remember."

"We should ask Bill if he remembers Percy ever being just a normal boy," Ron commented.

"Or at least a normal Weasley," Fred agreed.

"I asked him that once," George said with a smile. "The answer was 'no'."

Promptly at 8:59, George opened the front door and walked out. Ron followed, and let in three early customers, and then finished opening up the store by taking down the front shutters. It was a chill and misty morning in London, and both George and Ron missed that all three men looked quite a bit alike under their heavy hooded cloaks, since the cloaks themselves did not match.

Had they seen under the cloaks, they would have seen that the three wizards were actually remarkably alike.

"I do not think it appropriate that you adjudicate this dispute," Marcus the Baker stated to Percy Weasley.

"I of course cannot decide this matter," Percy agreed. "However, my transfer to another part of Diagon Alley is not finalized until the start of next month. Therefore, I must at least make the initial report. I know these two can be noisy and bothersome -- I had a bedroom next to them for sixteen long years -- but as George pointed out, you did know what kind of place you were moving next to. Isn't there some temporary accommodation we can come to? Some scheduling, perhaps?"

Marcus and George looked at each other.

"Maybe," Marcus agreed.

"Possibly," George said.

Percy sighed in relief, glad that only one of the twins had come. Together, they tended to bring out the worst in each other.

Suddenly, there was a wailing in the air. "What is that?" Percy demanded from George, since the sound came from the direction of the Wheezes.

Marcus had been born and raised in Diagon Alley. He already had his wand out and was heading for the door. "Someone used a major hex next door! That's the Alley ward alarm!"

Percy was startled, and so was a full step behind George. Marcus was rushing into the Wheezes, followed by George (who had his wand out) and Percy (who did not). George ran into Marcus, who had come to a full stop just inside the shop. George therefore did not see what had caused Marcus to pull up short.

Percy, however, did see why. Floating along the ceiling was a very small, but very clear, Dark Mark.

George untangled himself. He got over the shock of seeing the Mark first. "Fred! Ron!"

"Ron?" Percy demanded.

"Ron and Hermione had a fight," George said, standing and looking around in a panic. "He's been sleeping here since Hagrid's funeral."

"Oh, Merlin," Percy said pointing, just as the first aurors entered the shop.

"Wot's all this th . . . shite!" the young auror exclaimed when he saw the Dark Mark.

Percy pointed wordlessly again and swallowed his horror. "Someone call St. Mungo's!" he finally exclaimed.

The auror shook George slightly. "Where's your floo? I need backup and a trauma team!"

"This way," Marcus called. "It will be easier to get to mine!"

"What's happened here?" Ollivander demanded from the doorway. The rest of the Diagon Alley crowd melted away from him as Marcus and the auror ran out. The elderly wandmaker entered the shop, and quickly pulled his wand and hurried to George's side. Ron and Fred Weasley had been stabbed multiple times. "They're still bleeding, so they're still alive," Ollivander stated, pushing George out of the way. "Secure that one! Alive!" Next to Fred was another body, holding a knife. It was clear that Ron or Fred had hexed this attacker, which had set off the alarms.

"Look, Moody, you are retired. You have no standing here," Scrimgeour stated firmly.

"And you know the two Weasleys are part of the White Warlock's Council," Moody pointed out. The two were arguing in a corridor at St. Mungo's

"And you aren't. So, bugger off!" Scrimgeour had once been Moody's subordinate, and the two had never gotten along well on a personal level, although they had often worked together professionally. "Or do I have to have you escorted out?"

"You wouldn't dare, boy."

"Oh, wouldn't I?"

At that point, there was a commotion behind them. The two old men turned to look down the corridor, and saw the crowd of on-lookers, reporters, Ministry yes-men, and the like scatter. In a few seconds, it was clear why.

The White Warlock was coming.

Harry Potter was still a slim, short, 17 year old wizard, but magical power was literally radiating from him. He was clearly not to be stopped. Hermione Granger and John Russell, each a few steps behind him, looked equally determined, if not as dangerous. Ginny Weasley, a few steps further behind, was clearly crying, and was escorted by Neville Longbottom.

"Where are they, and where is their attacker?" Harry demanded.

"The Weasleys are still being treated," Scrimgeour said. "They were each stabbed at least six times, and the knives were poisoned. The person that one of the Weasleys hexed is recovering, but cannot yet be questioned."

Harry turned to Russell. "Prof? Take care of that."

"No," Scrimgeour said firmly. "Engaging in a firefight is one thing. I will not, I cannot, allow you to interfere once a suspect is in custody." He stepped back when Harry rounded on him.

"I did not say the Prof was to torture him," Harry snarled. "I said he as going to get the information we all need out of him. He's done the same thing for the Ministry in the past, so don't give me any backtalk. I will NOT allow another attack on my people to go unanswered. YOU cannot allow ANY of the business people in Diagon Alley to be attacked. So, BACK OFF!" Some the hangers-on who had recovered enough to come a bit closer to the Minister again scattered in a panic.

The Minister, however, stood fairly firm. "Don't you threaten me, Potter!" Scrimgeour snapped. "You can probably take over the Ministry with little more than a snap of your fingers, but remember, that means you have to assume ALL the responsibilities."

"I am not trying to take over, you st. . . ."

Hermione stopped Harry by putting a hand on his wrist. Russell looked Scrimgeour in the eye. "You know perfectly well that I am qualified and allowed to participate in the questioning," he stated firmly. "I will share all information equally."

Scrimgeour scowled, but a flick of his hand satisfied Russell, Moody, and one of the Ministry hangers-on who had again sidled back. The three left in a hurry. Hermione nudged Harry. He scowled and put his hand out. Scrimgeour reluctantly took it, and managed not to express any surprise when Harry passed him a note. "Percy and the other Weasleys are down the hall, fifth room on the left."

Harry nodded, and Harry and his friends moved off. Scrimgeour glanced at the note, which merely said, 'TONIGHT, YOUR OFFICE, 9:00'

Meanwhile, Harry had barely had time to enter the waiting room and see the grief-striken Weasleys before Percy was in his face. "Fred is dead," Percy spat. "Ron probably won't survive. Are you happy, Potter?" Harry said nothing, but Ginny quickly slapped Percy's left cheek, snapping his head to the right, where Hermione instantly connected with a left-handed slap nearly as stinging.

"Neville!" Harry commanded. Neville took the two women by the arm and lead them over to the grieving Mrs. Weasley, who was crying so hard that she hadn't heard what had happened. Harry took Percy by the chin and engaged his eyes. "Be at the Minister's office tonight at Nine," Harry barely whispered.

Percy blinked, never expecting that response. By then, Harry was already gone, over to comfort Mrs. Weasley. Percy felt a stab of jealousy, as he admitted to himself that Harry was better at comforting his mother than he was. Worse, Percy had to admit, was that his mother obviously was comforted by Harry more than she had been by him.

Percy turned and stared blankly into a corner, ashamed.

"What are you doing here, Weasley?" Scrimgeour asked after he returned to his office from dinner.

"Potter asked that I come," Percy answered simply.

Scrimgeour looked at Percy, and shrugged. Potter might not be shy about opening up if he had invited young Weasley. The two men walked towards the Minister's Office together. When they approached the main entrance, they stopped. Potter was waiting for them with Luna Lovegood.

The pair were dressed in what would soon be recognized as their uniform -- black dragon-hide combat boots, jeans, denim shirts and jackets, and, since they were in the magical world, denim cloaks.

"Minister, Percy," Harry greeted. "Hermione and the Prof are running a little late, but they are on their way."

"I'll see they get here," Percy said, turning back.

"That's not necessary," Harry said. Hermione and John Russell silently appeared right behind Harry. They were dressed much like Harry and Luna, although Hermione was wearing a long denim skirt.

"How. . . ?" Scrimgeour started, but he quickly regained his poise. Percy just stood there with his mouth open.

"It's just a matter of power," Harry said. He took off his cloak, and the other three followed suit. "We have a lot to tell you."

"And Percy?"

"You may need someone to run errands and messages connected to this information," Harry said. Percy winced. Harry glanced at Percy, saying, "The messenger has to be completely trustworthy, and able to travel all around the world." Percy looked a bit mollified.

"Well, come in," Scrimgeour said, opening his office door.

When they were all seated, Scrimgeour said, "Well?"

"What do you know about eugenics?" Harry asked.

"Nothing," Scrimgeour admitted. "Percy?"

Percy scowled. "I never heard of it, either."

"Hermione?" Harry requested.

"Until last month, I thought it was a Muggle movement which started in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries," Hermione said. "In some respects it was science, but in the end it was much more of a pseudo-science. The more scientific aspects moved to genetics, biology, and anthropology, the rest is still espoused mostly by racists and similar types."

The last statement caught the Minister's and Percy's attention, as they could see some possible connections.

"Essentially, eugenics believed humanity could be improved by government and scientific policies, designed to discourage and later eliminate undesirable elements from humanity. They didn't have very good models for disease, let alone heredity, and even at their best most practitioners had many fundamental errors underlaying their ideas. At their worst, they faked their data to prove racial, sexual, and other differences which do not exist."

Scrimgeour snapped his fingers. "You mean like the Nazis, those Muggles influenced by Grindelwald's people."

"Exactly. The Nazis wanted to eliminate birth defects, mental and emotional diseases and handicaps, and what they considered inferior races. It turns out that many of these ideas had filtered through to the Muggle world in the Nineteenth century from a group of wizards operating in central and southern Europe."

"Binns never teaches anything about Grindelwald," Russell said to Percy. "While he preached the superiority of wizards over Muggles, he was not totally hostile to the Muggle-born wizard. Like Voldemort, he did preach that the Muggle world must be enslaved by the magical. He helped trigger two Muggle world wars in the hopes that the Muggles would weaken themselves to the point where he and his followers could take over."

Luna took up the story. "In the early 1700s, a wizard who went by the name of Martin of Pecs wrote a monograph in Latin which pointed out that wizarding families had tended to become small over the previous two centuries. In fact, for the last four hundred years, the average European fully magical family has had only 2.9 children, which, for various interesting actuarial reasons I should go into. . . ."

"No," Harry and Hermione said.

Luna pouted for a moment, but went on. "Anyway, that is too low a number of children to fully replace the magical population. As we all know, if there weren't magical people interbreeding with Muggles and the Muggle-borns, we would die out. His book was the first in the field, and it still forms the basis of the debate."

"And?" Scrimgeour asked.

"It is far less known that he had a group of followers operating by the 1750s. Martin died in 1758, age one hundred and twenty. This inner group, which seems to have no known name, is primarily dedicated to finding out how to determine if a child of a wizard and Muggle woman would likely be magical or not. There have been several articles in wizarding journals whose members can be traced back to Martin's group, and a rather infamous nineteenth century group, who took direct action in forcibly joining the Muggle-born to the magical community, and in the forcible creation of mixed-bloods."

"What?" Percy demanded.

"The Knights of Walpurgis kidnaped the Muggle-born when they were under five, so that they could be raised in magical families," Russell said. "They also raped Muggles related to the Muggle-born, trying to create magical children to be kidnaped."

"The article writers are all associated with the Knights, although some rather loosely," Luna admitted. "Grindelwald wrote three of these articles before he turned to preaching the undermining of Muggle cultures, and of course later admitted to being a member of the Knights. In addition, of course, the Knights believed that European wizards, especially northern and western Europeans -- those that can trace their magic and their racial background to the Celtic and Germanic worlds -- were the apex of humanity."

"And?" Scrimgeour asked.

"According to Snape, the Knights had a third group, other than the kidnaping rapists and the writers," Russell said. "Supposedly, Martin himself set up a breeding area in Transylvania, and perhaps elsewhere."

"Breeding?"

"They are attempting to breed the ideal wizard, ideal in term of magic, and in racial composition as well," Russell said. "That Germanic wizard who was in on the Hogwarts attack was one of what Snape claims are called the Companions of Walpurgis -- the first generation they've let out, but still far from what they hope are the ultimate wizards. From what little I have been able to gather from the assassin, Voldemort has made an alliance with the Knights."

"Is that it?" Percy demanded, to Scrimgeour's surprise.

"That's as far as I can go, without authorization from the Minister to question our attacker with stronger methods," Russell pointed out.

Scrimgeour thought about that briefly. "Make out the documents in detail, and then we'll discuss it." Russell nodded his understanding.

"Fine, enough about that. What about Ron? How is he?" Percy demanded dismissing what to him was the lesser concern, looking at Harry. Ron had barely been hanging on when Percy had torn himself away.

"The knives were poisoned," Harry admitted. "His wounds are healed, but magic doesn't affect the poisons."

"Poisons?" Percy asked.

"Multiple poisons, reenforcing each other, although that also means that they act slowly."

"And what's being done about it?" Percy demanded.

Harry's face twisted in disgust. "Everything we can."

"I was woken up in the middle of the night to meet you?"

"What else do you have to do?"

Severus Snape grimaced. He turned to the sullen guard and said, "He's a werewolf, you know."

The guard said nothing. Snape shrugged. "I need to pick up more Spanish."

Remus smiled nastily. "The interior guards don't usually speak much Spanish. You're in Incan territory."

Snape processed that, and then shook his head. "Why am I not surprised? Very well. What do you want from me, Lupin? Russell can't run his own errands?"

"He can, but we're not after that sort of information."

"Well, what sort are you looking for? I have had very little sleep, and I am NOT in a good mood."

"I have never seen you in a good mood, and I've known you for over twenty-five years," Remus retorted. He pulled out a stack of parchment. "Three Companions of Walpurgis staged an attack. One was captured. They used poisoned knives; knives poisoned with multiple poisons at that. The combination resists all attempts at treatment, although we have a list of what the poisons contain." He shrugged. "I won't swear that the actual poisons are correctly separated."

"Who was stabbed?" Snape leered, and asked. "Potter? the oh-so-smart Miss Granger? the delectable Miss Weasley? Longbottom the buffoon? the bumptious Ronald? the. . . ."

"Oh, shut up, Severus," Remus snapped, shoving the parchment at Snape and pushing him into a chair.

Snape sighed and looked at the parchment. Remus sat and prepared to wait. "Who was stabbed?" Snape asked in a serious, normal tone of voice.

"The three companions hit the Weasleys' joke shop in Diagon Alley. The wards there protecting against major hexes are no doubt why they used the knives. Fred Weasley died more from the wounds than from the poisons, although those most likely finished him off. Ron Weasley is still hanging on. They give him a week to ten days more."

Snape merely nodded and kept reading, nodding as he went.

In less than five minutes, Snape tossed the parchments on the low rough table. "I know of this combination. The Dark Lord was in an expansive mood a few times, and shared some interesting potion lore. I think he was grateful to speak to someone he considered to be near his own level in one small area." Snape gave Lupin a twisted smile. "He knew I could never have ambitions, like Lucius."

"Is there an antidote? Do you know it?" Remus demanded.

"No, there is no antidote," Snape said, seemingly with regret.

"No cure?" Remus asked in horror.

"There is no antidote," Snape agreed, "but there is a cure."

"There is?"

Snape smiled grimly. "It is a six part process. The fifth and sixth steps are incredibly Dark ceremonies, especially the fifth."

"How Dark?"

"Well, the fifth part starts with the victim being bathed with the entire life's blood of a young girl who has not started menstruation. . . ."

"Stop!"

Snape nodded. "I would hope so. I still think you are something of a monster, but I know you and YOUR Master well enough to know that he, and you, would not trade one innocent life for another."

"So, there's no hope?"

"There is some," Snape said. "You can do the first three steps. That will awaken Weasley, and for about a week he will not be in unbearable pain, although he will be weak."

"And then?"

"And then, if he does not carry on to the fourth step, he will become more and more sleepy, until he falls asleep, and never awakens in this life." Snape shrugged. "I saw MY former Master employ this poison once, after we talked. He brought the man around at the last moment, just to watch him die again."

"And the fourth step?"

"It's not Dark, per se," Snape said. "However, once Weasley takes the first sip, he must keep up a fairly rigid dosing with the potion. If he falls too far behind, he will sink into that final coma in about two hours on the outside. If he takes the potion, he will not be able to function very well, and he will be in some pain and discomfort for a few weeks, and then more pain after some time. No potion will alleviate that."

"You're implying the Ron will, at some point, either die by being forgetful, or perhaps even decide to let himself go," Remus said.

"That is what happens, sooner or later," Snape agreed. "So, do you bring him back, with a suspended death sentence hanging over him, and a fair amount of bearable pain, leaving the decision to him, or just let him go?"

"Will you come back to supervise all this?" Remus asked, "assuming that the Weasleys agree?"

"As a free man?" Snape asked.

"No," Remus replied. "You can move up to a house arrest, with facilities for your own potion research."

"Potter never came up with that!" Snape exclaimed.

"Hermione did," Remus agreed.

Snape sighed. "Almost anything is better than having a cell next to Pettigrew. As much as I despised James Potter, as much as I hated Black, as disgusted as I am by even seeing you, Pettigrew is worse than all of you rolled together."

"So you agree?"

"I agree."

Neither man was interested in shaking hands on the deal.