Means to an End

The Entrance Hall was as cold and eerie as it had been mere hours ago. Perhaps more so, thought Morgan as a chill raced down his spine, now that I've actually seen these people 'alive'. Towards a set of now glittering staircases and through clusters of barely-breathing statues, the archaeologist noticed an especially familiar face, and he felt anguish seep into his heart and mind.

Seamus was frozen mid-wand wave with a determined look carved into his youthful features. Morgan stared at his many-times great uncle for a long time, silently willing him to smile and wink as he had in the meadow; willing Seamus to guide him, to tell him of the other way.

There is always another way out.

"Morgan?"

Hermi was directly behind him. Harry and Hermione were standing a few meters away, almost entirely outside the castle, with their backs towards the older pair. He sighed at her and turned to look at Seamus one more time.

"There are so many unanswered questions," he heard Hermi say quietly. "And there's something wrong...very wrong."

"What makes you say that?" he asked, deadly sarcasm dripping from each word.

"Did you notice the look he gave her when he told us there was nothing we could do to save these people?" she continued. "They're hiding something from us, I just know it."

"What kind of something?"

"It's a bad something, but that's all I can say for sure."

"When did you become an empath?"

Morgan could feel her scowl burn the back of his back. "Don't be stupid, Finnegan..."

It was like saying the password in front of Ali Baba's secret hideout and having a wall of solid rock open before astonished eyes.

Seamus Finnegan sneezed, and Morgan and Hermi literally fell down from the shock.

A few moments passed without another sound. Hermi, from her spot of the cold stone floor, let a small strangled cry loose from her throat. She began to speak but suddenly found herself with a full head view of Harry. Hermi could tell he was trying to fight a wild grin. The Boy-Who-Lived placed a finger to his lips in a quieting motion, and she knew Hermione was doing the same to Morgan.

With minimal noise, the two teenagers led the older pair to a spot directly outside the grand oak doors. The enormous slabs of wood attempted to close after them, but Hermione froze them with a wave of her wand.

"It's ok to talk now," Harry said, though his voice was barely above a whisper. "Just don't mention the name of anyone inside the castle."

"Why not?" inquired Morgan in the same quiet tone.

Hermione rubbed her face and was staring off into nothing. "You saw what happened when Harry and I were talking about him," she said absently.

She's in mild shock, thought Hermi, shock about that.

"There's something about being removed from the castle that must trigger that effect," stated Harry softly. "I believe the castle has been purposely trying to listen into our conversations."

"But its magic--it's all flowing into you!" said Hermi.

"It has nothing to do with the castle's magic," replied Hermione, snapping out of her stupor. She turned to face her friend. "He knows about that now, I presume."

"Naturally," was the reply. "He's been listening since Morgan and Hermi first arrived. I'm pretty sure it was him who Obliviated their assistants and sent them away; at least now I am. It's one of his specialties."

"What is going on, exactly?" demanded Morgan, his face a perfect picture of confusion and indignation.

"I found something out when I was trying to stop the magic flow," explained Harry after a significant glance at Hermione. "Do try to keep your voice to a dull roar, if you don't mind."

"What are you talking about?" Hermi and Morgan whispered in unison.

"Voldemort, of course," said Hermione, as if those words would explain all the mysteries of the universe. "You know, the evil lord who tried to make himself immortal and destroy the peace between Muggles and Wizardkind..."

"It seems that I spectacularly botched everything up," stated Harry calmly. "I, uhh, accidentally helped Voldemort down the road towards his ultimate goal of world domination."

Hermi and Morgan stared at him.

"He won't get there anytime fast, but I may have neglected to monitor what he's been doing these past few centuries and allowed him access to the library."

Their eyes bored flaming holes into his face. Both teens squirmed impatiently within their silence.

"Well," Hermione broke into the silence, "say something! Anything!"

"I--I can see how this is a problem." The hoarse whisper erupted from Morgan's mouth.

"I think I need to hear more before I go off the deep end," Hermi said, sliding down the carved stone wall and settling down on the grass.

Harry and Hermione exchanged looks and sighed at the same time. "We need to start from what happened before I let the school loose," said Harry. His friend nodded in agreement.

"Before Harry...did what he did," began Hermione, "he mentioned to me that he and I didn't belong in the wizarding world."

"But you're magic-users!" exclaimed Morgan. Hermione smiled at him.

"That was my reaction at first," she continued. "But after a while, it began to make sense to me. Oh, there were five hundred years in between him saying it and me thinking about it, but it does make sense."

"How?" demanded the archaeologist.

"Imagine," Harry said, "that you're a Muggle and you have citizenship in both Germany and China..."

"That's a ridiculous combination, Harry."

"I'm trying to make a point, Hermione. Anyway, you have dual citizenship. Let's say you receive the two visas when you turn eleven, and you start spending six months out of the year in Germany and the other six in China. After a period of time spent in this manner (seven years, perhaps?), you start to get tired of having to move to an entirely different culture every six months; you get weary of having to restart friendships put on hold; all you want is one place to call home.

"But, throughout the past seven years, one of the cultures you've been exposed to has had more of an impact on you than the other. When you're finally given the chance to settle down in one place, it's easy to say 'China' because you prefer lo mein over Wiener schnitzel any day of the week.

"Now, think about Muggle-born children. On their eleventh birthday, the child in question receives an invitation to learn and experience something they've considered unreal for years. Naturally, the excitement of being something special and unique draws them in; and so they accept and leave for Hogwarts, or whatever school into which they've been accepted. Seven years later they are graduated and given a choice: return to the Muggle world, where you must keep everything you've done for the past seven years a secret and you're on your own, or stay in the Wizarding world where everyone can do the same things you can.

"Which would you choose?"

Hermi and Morgan were silent.

"The first thing that came to my mind," said Hermione quietly, "was 'yes! Let me stay and hone my abilities so that I can work with fifty other people who did the same exact thing!' Well, perhaps it wasn't exactly what I thought, but it was very close. When Harry told me we weren't meant for the wizarding world, I believed he meant 'we' as a collection Muggle-born and/or Muggle-raised group.

"But all he was saying was that he and I weren't meant to stay."

Hermi's face was twisted in confusion. "Why on earth would you think that? Harry's a Potter, a pure-blood, of course he's meant to live within his world! And Hermione--you're so talented! From what I've read and what I've witnessed, you could topple the Ministry and rebuild it in a day! What could make you think that?"

The two teenagers smiled at her.

"From what you've read and what you've witnessed," said Harry, "could you really imagine Hermione wasting her bravery and talent in a place where remarkable people pop up every century or so? She's too good for that."

"And while Harry did feel more at home at Hogwarts and in the wizarding world, he could never fully give up the world for which his parents fought and died," explained Hermione.

Morgan drank all this in steadily, wondering what this had to do with their current situation.

"Anyway," continued Harry, "I'd always hoped that the two worlds would somehow collide."

"They sort of do," interjected Morgan. "Magic is still kept a secret, but there are no more wizarding communities of any size."

Harry and Hermione exchanged another look. "Not exactly what we were looking forward to, but it's a start," said Hermione cautiously. "But Voldemort was always looking to permanently seal the bridge between the two societies."

"You mean Muggle-borns and Muggle-raised?" inquired Hermi.

"Yes. He believed that Muggle-borns were unworthy of the magic they possessed, and Muggle-raised children were tainted by the deficiencies of Muggle life."

"He must have been a real hoot at the philosophy club socials."

"How many times do we have to tell you to be serious about him?"

"It's not old yet, I'm afraid."

"Whatever. As I was saying, Voldemort decided he was going to rid Wizardkind of its scourge and return glory to the afflicted pure-blooded families," Hermione said. "He murdered hundreds of people until Harry here banished him for a while. He returned fourteen years later and began doing the same things."

"Which leads us to our seventh year," interjected Harry. "When I let the school have its life back."

"You make it sound as if you were organizing a rave," murmured Morgan under his breath.

"How did Voldemort get into the school?" asked Hermi.

"He must've been planning his attack for months beforehand because no one was expecting it," explained Harry. "He entered the wards with his Death Eaters and nearly massacred the student-teacher body in the early morning. I think the teachers, Hermione and I were the only people really awake at the exact moment. The people frozen just inside the Entrance Hall are mostly professors with maybe ten or fifteen older students mixed in with them."

"So once Voldemort was inside the castle you did your little awakening ceremony and froze everything within the wards," concluded Morgan. Harry hesitated, and then nodded.

"That's pretty much it in a nutshell, yes."

"What happened that your evil dark lord is now running amok inside the castle?" the archaeologist inquired sweetly.

"I wasn't paying attention, really," admitted Harry. "I just thought the school was having a bit of fun, throwing things around in the rooms..."

"But it was really Voldemort reading up on things to make his evil just so much more than that?"

"Umm, yes, that's basically it."

"Excellent."

"I thought so too."

Hermione growled deep in her throat. "What Harry was doing, or not doing, these past five centuries has very little to do with what we've found out today." Hermi nodded her head.

"I agree," said the heiress. "What exactly did we discover?"

"I discovered that Harry is an idiot and deserves the mess he has to clean up now," stated Morgan.

"I discovered that Hogwarts is going to fall apart in a few hours, literally, and I'm going to have a lot of extra magical energy inside me," said Harry.

"I'd say that's enough to be going on," concluded Hermione. "Now can we please find a way to wake everybody up with these two conditions: a) we do it before the castle crumbles atop them all, and b) without Voldemort realizing what it is we're doing."

"All in a day's work, eh?" muttered Hermi.

"I have to contest the second condition," stated Harry. Three pairs of eyes were suddenly fixed on him. "The three of you can wake up everyone from here; Hermione just needs to find a roster of everyone in the castle."

"What about the Death Eaters, Harry?"

"You can leave them out of the list."

"I normally would call that inhumane, but I'll make an exception for them."

"I'm sure I appreciate it. Anyway, while you're calling them out, I'll take care of our old friend Voldemort and try to hold the castle up for as long as possible. Agreed?"

The other three nodded. Harry smiled at them before re-entering the castle.

"Oh," he said over his shoulder to them, "Hermi, when you meet, err, your relatives later, ask them what exactly happened to the twins and everyone. It's quite funny, actually. Have fun!"