Love Among Muggles

On the day of Caractacus Potts' trial, Ted hung around the Ministry lobby remembering how Michael had been here to support him on the day of Maggie's trial. Now he was here to take care of Jerry Gribbins. The little man had completely gone to pieces since his friend's murder. Jerry's tiny talent for Divination was probably what had made him sick on the day of the killing and had probably saved his life, but Jerry believed if only he'd been there, Michael would still be alive. Ted still sometimes found himself thinking 'I must tell Michael...' and then recalling his friend's demise. He'd drink a pint of beer and it would remind him how much he'd enjoyed drinking with Michael. Football results made him think of his friend. Michael had supported Wimbledon, the fool.

With Michael dead, the Muggleborns had to find somewhere else to hold their meetings, and they were having trouble doing so. Where could they find as completely non-magical as the BBC? Geraldine had offered her barn, but Ted firmly believed that after the attack on the hippies, that part of Wales was a weak spot. He was thinking about dragging everyone down to the coffee bar on the King's Road. They'd look an odd bunch, but only young Muggles would wonder why they were there.

Ted knew Andromeda would be at the trial and he'd have to pretend he didn't know her. Who will you be today, my girl? Ted wondered. An elegant, highly-strung racehorse of a girl or a snooty Siamese cat?

Every few minutes his mind drifted back to Michael. Ted still couldn't quite get his head round what had happened to Maggie, and losing another friend on top of that struck him as absurd. Every so often he'd wonder if everyone was playing one big joke on him, and Michael would walk around a corner and they'd all laugh. Then he'd return to reality and remember his friend was really, truly dead.

"He's gone," Jerry said. "It's not a joke."

Ted smiled faintly. Stress seemed to have made Jerry's abilities more acute. "I just can't believe it. I'm back here for another friend."

"I think I'm going to be sick," Jerry confessed.

"Throw up in a fireplace if you have to." Ted wasn't exactly sure where non-Floo items thrown into the fireplaces went; he suspected they just burned up.

"Thanks for coming," Jerry told Ted. "I don't know why they want to talk to me. What can I tell them?"

Ted shrugged. He'd received an owl the previous night telling him to be sure to attend the trial as the Wizengamot would want to ask him some questions too. He didn't know what about. He hadn't even been in England when Michael was murdered.

As people started to get in the lifts to down to the courtrooms, Ted noticed the external lift, the one leading up to a London street, descend. Michael would have used Floo, Ted thought. Then he gasped. Moody was leading a couple of the hippies out. The lift ascended and descended again, and Rufus Scrimgeour and Gawain Robards got out, accompanied by the remaining surviving hippies. Gladys saw him and ran towards him, slipping her arm free of Robards as he tried to grab her.

"I don't know who you are," she said breathlessly, hugging Ted. "Not really, but thank you. Thank you for saving us."

Not knowing what to do, he hugged her back. "I'm glad you're all right." He meant it. "Why are you here?"

'They caught him,' Gladys said. Ted looked over her shoulder and met Moody's grim face. Ted felt a twinge of anxiety. They'd caught who? Potts hadn't been in Wales. He was too short to have been the killer. What's more, Moody didn't seem pleased at having had to bring his charges here. What was going on?

"You'd better go back with the Aurors," Ted told her. "This isn't a safe place for Muggles - people without magic, I mean - to wander around."

As Gladys rejoined her friends, several of whom were gazing in awe around the impressive blue-and-gold lobby, Ted and Jerry went to get into a lift. They were standing, surrounded by wizards, when he heard a woman's shriek. "What are THEY doing in here? Oh, I don't believe it. It's all too much."

Through the closing door Ted saw a scrawny witch in expensive robes pointing at the Muggles. Andromeda Black was gently but firmly pushing down the witch's hand and wore an expression of common sense. With them, a younger, equally thin witch in Hogwarts robes was watching the scene. That's my girl, Ted thought. She's the pure-blood princess today. There's not a witch in here to match her.

**

Andromeda was regretting saying she'd accompany Venus to the trial. She hadn't expected Professor Dumbledore to allow her to do so, but he surprised her, saying he felt Venus would need the support of someone dependable. She'd felt confused when he'd said that. Did the Headmaster think she was like Venus, or completely the opposite? Despite what her parents thought of him, she'd always admired Albus Dumbledore for his intellect and had always hoped he had a good opinion of her.

Mrs. Potts was being worse than useless. She'd cried her way through a dozen hankies since Andromeda and Venus had met her on the Knight Bus. Venus had been left to act in a sensible and restrained manner, and Andromeda had been proud of the way Venus tried to keep her emotions in check. Andromeda uttered calming words to Mrs. Potts while wanting to slap some sense into her. She met the gaze of the Muggle girl who'd been talking to Ted. He never mentioned a girl, she thought. Why didn't he tell me about a girl?

"You hate them too," Venus commented.

Andromeda looked at her in alarm. "What?"

"It's all over your face," Venus smiled. "The way you were glaring at that girl..." She turned to her hysterical parent. "Come on, mum-mother, there's no point making a scene."

Andromeda noticed the switch in the way Venus addressed her parent, who was paying no attention and starting on a fresh handkerchief. Venus was aiming up the class structure even now. "Showing obvious hostility to Muggles might prejudice liberal-minded jurors, Mrs. Potts," Andromeda said, and helped Venus drag the woman over to the lift.

When they reached the room where the Wizengamot was meeting, Andromeda swallowed hard and hoped no one she loved ever had to face this court. The circular room was packed almost to the rafters with senior witches and wizards. The Pottses, and she, would be sitting right in the front row. As they moved to their seats her awe subsided she looked around. She was surprised at how many people she didn't know. She knew about half the people in the room very well indeed. They were the people who came to her parents' fancy dinners, who attended functions at her uncle's home on Grimmauld Place and invited each other to garden parties. The other half' who were they? She'd seen some of them at the Ministry party the previous summer, but many were unknown to her.

"Who are all these people?" Andromeda wondered aloud as they sat. Abraxas Malfoy was beside them, and Andromeda's skin crawled at being in such close proximity to a man she knew supported the poisonous politician, Lord Voldemort. She noticed that he was wearing a ring; he'd clearly already begun making money from supplying Portkey objects to the Ministry, recovering what he'd spent on supporting the campaign to make Gerontius Mulciber Minister. Politics could be a lucrative interest as long as you were on the successful side.

Mrs Potts stopped sniffling long enough to pat Andromeda's hands and say, 'You're better off not knowing, dear."

Venus looked around the room. "That's one of the Prewetts, over there with Harfang Longbottom. He's the old bloke with the green hat. Next to him is Lovegood... what's his name, mother?"

"I don't know," Mrs Potts said, as though such families were beneath her notice and she would be embarrassed to know them. "But there's Osmond Edgecome," she added. She blew into another handkerchief. "Your poor father, being tried by such a crowd - half of them aren't fit to clean his office."

'Marius Edgecombe's dreamy,' Venus breathed, remembering to add, 'although not as nice as Pongo, obviously.' She didn't convince anyone.

The room fell to a hush as the trial began. The first part of the trial seemed fairly clear-cut. Moody had been a few minutes behind Caractacus Potts when he killed Michael Osborne, had caught up with him and performed Priori Incantatem, which revealed that the last spell cast with it had been the Killing Curse. Caractacus Potts confessed. Case closed. Venus gripped Andromeda's hand, her own mother being useless for support. Andromeda squeezed it. She didn't like Venus much, let alone her parents, but she pitied her for being tainted by association with a known murderer. The trial then took a more interesting turn. Potts had, it turned out, also confessed to killing a number of Muggles.

A low chuckle came from Abraxas Malfoy. 'Bravo, Caractacus,' he said. Andromeda shuddered.

Mrs Potts muttered, 'But that's hardly a crime!' Andromeda looked across the room to see Ted looking astonished, and he was the first witness called to the stand. As he described the events of that cold January night when he'd fought a Dark wizard, Andromeda was glad to have Venus' hand to hold. Ted had played down the incident in the letter he'd written her, but now she got to hear every gory detail. Ted declared that he thought the wizard he'd been fighting was taller and thinner than Potts. The Minister, who was running the trial, dismissed the statement out of hand, and with it Ted. He then called for one of the Muggles to be brought to the stand. Several people around Andromeda recoiled in disgust. A pretty girl stood in front of the assembled court and identified Potts as the killer. Andromeda wasn't sure the girl had a good grasp of where she was or what she was saying, If anything, she looked slightly stunned.

Ted looked angry, but it was the small, scared man beside him who stood up and shouted, 'He was wearing a mask! How can she identify him?"

Ted was startled when Jerry stood up and tried to drag him back into his seat. "Jerry, sit down," he hissed. He didn't believe the confession any more than Jerry did, and from the looks of things neither did Moody, but this was one occasion when drawing attention to oneself would be bad, possibly fatal in the case of a Muggleborn.

"This is a fix-up," Jerry yelled. "I suppose he killed the Muggles in Warwickshire too."

Potts smiled wryly. "I Apparated there once I'd finished demonstrating spells in Wales."

Ted dragged Jerry from the room, as much to stop himself from shouting at the liar as to keep Jerry quiet.

***

For his confessed crimes - killings that ran into double figures - Caractacus Potts was sentenced to ten years in Azkaban. Five years of the sentence were for killing a wizard, Michael Osborne, and three more for resisting arrest. Eighteen months were for using magic where Muggles could see. The deaths of all the Muggles together only added six months onto his sentence. Mrs Potts seemed to collapse like a failed soufflé when the sentence was announced.

Venus stood, brushed down her robes and smiled weakly at Andromeda. "Well, that's that. Poor old dad." Venus was clearly struggling to retain her composure, and Andromeda felt proud that she'd helped the younger girl acquire a little self-control. "I suppose we'd better get back to school so I can get used to being even more of a pariah than usual," Venus commented.

"You won't be a pariah," Andromeda insisted.

"She most certainly will not," Abraxas Malfoy agreed, standing. "Your father has committed a crime against a law many of us think unjust, and you, Venus are a good girl, aren't you?"

Venus was astonished to be noticed by a person as grand as Abraxas Malfoy. "Oh yes, Mr Malfoy," she said fervently.

Mr Malfoy put one paternal arm around Venus shoulders. "Nothing bad happens to good girls. Now, I want to talk to you about something, but first I want to see Marius Edgecombe. Why don't you come with me?"

Andromeda could scarcely believe it when Venus all but skipped across the room with Abraxas Malfoy to meet the handsome young man she'd always been ignored by in the past. Andromeda wanted to slip off to find Ted, but with so many people who knew both of them milling about, it really wouldn't be safe. Instead she sat by foolish Mrs Potts and doled out clean handkerchiefs, feeling embarrassed by the woman's blubbering. Even little Narcissa, a gentle child, would never be caught snivelling in public.

"He's a good man," Mrs Potts sniffed. Andromeda said nothing.

"What will I do? Oh, my children!" The cries were starting to rise in volume.

"Stop worrying," Andromeda said firmly. "See, Mr Malfoy is taking care of Venus already? I'm sure your family won't suffer."

"Your uncle..." Mrs Potts ventured. "He always liked Caractacus..."

Andromeda strongly doubted her uncle Orion was able to do more than tolerate most people, and would have nothing but disdain for the likes of Caractacus Potts, but didn't want Mrs Potts to cause a scene. "I'm sure your husband is still very popular," she told the woman, hoping that she would soon be able to return to Hogwarts and make sense of what was going on.