Anti-American sentiment intensifies, with whispers spreading about "those Yanks spying on us" and "stealing the Silverlight spell." People start eying Professor Fisher carefully, in the halls. (He ignores it, rather pointedly.) People write in to the Headmistress complaining; why did they bring in those Americans in the first place, why does that man Fisher still work there, similar nonsense. She develops a curt form letter assuring parents that Hogwarts hiring standards are of the highest quality, with a strong undertone of none of your business. The letters continue anyway.
Students graffiti the Transfiguration classroom with insulting suggestions for places Professor Fisher can take himself. Filch catches those responsible and they clean it up as their detention. McGonagall makes a displeased speech that night at dinner about respecting faculty and innocence until proven guilty. Some students listen.
After a week's gone by- it feels longer to all involved, particularly Tamara, but only a week- there's a new article.
Gilderoy Lockhart Apprehends Silverlight Culprit
By Russell Peasegood
Gilderoy Lockhart, Order of Merlin, Third Class, Honorary Member of the Dark Force Defence League, and five-time winner of Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award, has done it again!
Only recently released from St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, most wizards would need rest, more time to recover from the horrors of a Memory Charm gone wrong, but not Gildery Lockhart. Known throughout the magical world for his daring feats of magic, Lockhart is back in the game with a bang.
"It never made sense to me," Lockhart told the Prophet. "Why steal a wand of someone you're chaperoning? Of course you'd be under suspicion! She couldn't have hoped to get away with it. So, of course, I had to investigate."
Lockhart used his famed powers of deduction to locate prime Ministry suspects. In the course of interviewing them, he was able to identify the janitor who had stolen the wand. "Poor man wasn't right in the head," according to Lockhart. "Thought the wand made him special, powerful- attacked me when I tried to get it away- just look what he did to my cloak! But I got it back from him, never fear."
The wand is now in the possession of Ministry Officials, and will shortly be returned to its rightful owner, Miranda "Silverlight" Swan. Tamara Reed can be expected to be released shortly.
When commended on his actions, Lockhart said, "Of course, of course. Couldn't let the poor girl go without her wand- couldn't let the Ministry officials bungle it like that- something had to be done!"
Asked about his future plans, Lockhart told us, "Why, doing whatever good I can, of course. Britain needs all the wizards it can get right now!"
If Lockhart's past adventures are any guide, that will be quite a lot of good indeed.
As promised, the next day, Hogwarts sees two arrivals: Professor Reed, released by the Ministry, and Gilderoy Lockhart, Miranda's wand in hand.
"Ah, it's the fabulous Miss Swan!" he beams upon spotting her. "So good to meet you, I'm a great fan of yours, you know. I believe this is yours?" he offers it to her with a flourish.
"So precocious, with that Silverlight spell! You remind me of myself as a boy," Lockhart says nostalgically. (Whether this is intentional self-delusion or a lingering effect of the Memory Charm he's barely recovered from is unclear.) "How is fame treating you, then? It's not all it's cracked up to be, you know, celebrity is as celebrity does. I'm sure you know of my own exploits," he beams proudly at this, "and I'd be happy to assist you with your own new-found celebrity! Book signings? Publicity photos? I'm the expert!"
"Being eleven is no obstacle! Why, just look at Harry Potter. He was in my class, you know, when I taught Defense Against the Dark Arts here- learned most of what he knows from me, said it was the best class he ever took," Lockhart brags. "I heard about that issue at the Ministry. It's a shame, really it is. If you can't teach anyone- do you know what you're doing next?"
"Well, I wanted an Auror to tote me around and make sure I can kill Dementors that aren't - giant, and to help me find them in the first place, so I can kill them, but I'm not sure if they'll want any Aurors near me after I wrecked their Patronuses. I'm not sure if they have spare Aurors with any Patronuses at all left."
"Oh, that's no trouble at all," Lockhart assures her grandly. (It is in fact no trouble, because the Ministry has already pinpointed a few spots with Dementors, noted as rural, low risk- to be handled, low priority. Lockhart feels no need to explain this.) "I'll make all the arrangements, of course. Talk to McGonagall- arrange for the photos- a press release, we'll need a press release," he murmurs distractedly. "Being famous is such a slog sometimes, you know. But ah, to be on the road again! Two weeks from now? Would that do?"
"Age before beauty," he jokes, then laughs. "I was quite famous in my day, you know! Order of Merlin, third class, and an honorary member of the Dark Force Defense League, no less. I have a world wide reputation for taking care of Dark creatures." He leaves unspoken not just one Dark creature, once. "Don't worry," he says kindly, "you'll get there! Being seen with me will only help, of course."
She has a tutoring session with Hermione, though, and there is vague muttering about Lockhart - softened with a "I don't know much about his condition post-hospitaliziation, admittedly" but still enough to spook Miranda.
Miranda still really needs an escort, and the aurors aren't jumping to supply one. But...
Memory Charms?
Eegh.
She owls Lockhart. She needs to postpone. Academic reasons. She apologizes. She will let him know when she's available.
She talks to Hermione and she reads up on Occlumency.
If she was obsessed with Dementors, before, she is devoured by Occlumency.
"It's not homework and it's not Dementors and some of it's from the regular library or Hermione. It's something called Occlumency," says Miranda. "It's a defense against mind magic, but I can't actually know if it's working until I let somebody try something and I'm putting that off until there's nothing else I can do."
"Well, mostly Legilimency, but if you're good enough at it, supposedly it will do Veritaserum and Obliviation and so on. When I need to test it I'm going to ask Hermione to try to Confund me just a little bit because that's pretty safe if it's a small casting and it eventually wears off, and it'd be easier than getting ahold of Veritaserum."
"Hermione says that Lockhart was in the hospital because he was trying to cast a Memory Charm on someone and it backfired. She doesn't know if he's different now after being in the hospital for so long and probably not remembering what he used to do, but I don't want to go anywhere with him until I'm pretty sure he can't Memory Charm me. It's just the Confundus is a safer test."
"Oh, yeah, um-" Emma digs around through a pile of things, and finds a copy of the Prophet article about Miranda's wand. (She keeps the ones about Miranda clipped out; she thinks they're cool.) Since Lockhart was the one who found the wand, there's a picture of him standing with it proudly next to the article, smiling his usual smile and posing for the camera. "That guy. He used to write books about his trips, before he was in the hospital, he goes and kills Dark creatures all over the world."
She takes a couple of weeks to get through all the available reading on Occlumency, and a while after that before she's pretty sure she's not detecting any progress with the meditative exercises, and then, only a couple of weeks before exams, with Karen too busy freaking out about how she has to study to do anything, Miranda goes looking for Emma.
"Unforgivable is just a word somebody made up for exactly three spells. Lockhart spent years and years in the hospital because he got memory charmed, just the once, a little too hard. People who've been Imperiused or even Cruciated can get up and walk around after a lot of the time."
Emma thinks about this. All of these spells fall under 'scaryscaryscary', she's never tried to sort them into amounts of 'scaryscaryscary'. "I think I'm still more afraid of Crucio...?" she says, more questioningly than she really intended. "If nothing's messed up, I mean. They're both really scary, though."
"I mean - it depends on what the person doing the memory charm wants to take. If it's only a little thing it's not as bad as if it was - a whole year, or all your memories of your friends, or something. But it's more likely that somebody will want to Obliviate me than that somebody will want to torture me, now that Voldemort is gone, I think. Obliviator is a government job that people can get."
"Yeah," she says slowly, trustingly. "You're probably right." She looks around. "What classroom are we going to, anyway?"
The door opens and in comes Hermione. "Hello, Miranda - who's your friend?"
"This is Emma. Emma, this is Hermione. I brought Emma along because - I might not be able to throw off a Confundus and I'm scared and I might need to be brought back to Ravenclaw."
"All right, she can sit in," says Hermione. "It's nice to meet you, Emma."
"Well, remain calm as you can - I understand you have a fear of mind magic, but the fear itself won't help," Hermione says.
"I know," sighs Miranda. "Give me a minute."
"I won't Confund you hard. Just a little bit. Even if it hits, it'll be like walking into a room and forgetting what you needed there," soothes Hermione.
"I know. That's why we picked it. I'm just." Miranda shivers and shakes her head and closes her eyes and takes more deep breaths.
"Okay," she says after a minute, "go."
Hermione points her wand at Miranda's head and says gently, "Confundus."
"That was weird," says Miranda. "I - I don't think I'm Confunded. I don't think so. How do you tell whether I'm a little bit or not at all?"
"Let me have a look at your eyes," says Hermione, and she compares the size of Miranda's pupils and concludes, "Not even a little bit. That's amazing, good for you!"
"When we were in fourth year our Defense professor had special permission to cast the Imperius curse on us," muses Hermione. "I don't think I can get that, but if you want to try something that's stronger but doesn't have the side effects I could ask...? But then, some people throw that off even without Occlumency. Harry never learned any Occlumency to speak of and he could do it every time."
"Is there, uh, anything else she could try?" Emma asks timidly. While she somewhat hero-worships Hermione Granger and trusts her to Not Be Evil, the fact that Imperio is an Unforgivable Curse is currently winning. "You said you didn't do it hard... maybe just. Um. Again?"
Not Imperio, not an Unforgivable, not on her friend.
Miranda shakes her head.
"- is reversible, you know. I cast it on my parents once -"
Miranda looks at Hermione in total horror.
"- but then I fixed it when it was safe for them to come back into the country and they're entirely back to normal."
"Not that," says Miranda, "thank you."
"I've got it," says Miranda. "I wouldn't even need you for that, right? Just to taste it and see if I can beat it."
"You could do it with someone else asking you questions, although someone should ask you questions," says Hermione. "If you have the right dose, and I'm sure Professor Slughorn would help with that."
"Okay. Thank you. Um, I won't take up any more of your time I know you have NEWTs." Miranda gets up and shuffles to the door.
Hermione waves.
The one time she'd gone into the Ministry with her parents, to prove that they were purebloods, they asked her a lot of probing questions. Do you know anyone who might have stolen a wand from a Real Wizard? Have you met any Muggles pretending to be witches or wizards? They had seemed to think children were worse liars than their parents, worth interrogating to make sure the adults' stories held up; but Emma barely knew other pureblood children, certainly no Muggle children, and she wasn't old enough to be allowed to talk to her parents' friends. The questions just confused her and scared her, and she spent most of the ordeal afraid that they would decide she was lying and do Unspecified Horrible Things to her, and she still remembers the whole ordeal vividly. Enough to- get it. Kind of. That was just the polite questions, the ones they ask verifiably pureblood children. What would they have done to Hermione Granger's parents?
"She was with Harry Potter. What if they'd, they'd, left but gotten caught? And had to tell where Harry Potter was?"
"They left without getting caught with a Memory Charm on them, I don't think it would have been very much harder for them to get on an airplane in on the pretending to be other people plan - and what if Hermione had died in the war, who would have put them right? She - she said they were in Australia then, she'd mentioned that before, like me and Mum, but who would have put them right if Hermione had got herself killed? They'd have forgotten forever. They'd have been dead too basically. They were until she undid what she did to their heads. Made-up people were walking around in Australia in their bodies. And if they'd left knowing why they were going they still wouldn't have known anything about where Harry Potter was! Why would they know anything about that? Why would she tell them? She didn't even care about them knowing who they were, why would she tell them what their daughter was up to!"
She doesn't disagree that Memory Charms are bad, and Miranda's probably right that there were better ways to handle it, but- it's Hermione, she helped save everyone, what if knowing her parents were Charmed was the only way Hermione could do it? Emma doesn't want to second guess Hermione or Miranda.
"I don't really... she helped defeat Voldemort! It's hard to think of her that way, she's a hero."
"I don't need you to agree with me as long as you never try to cast anything bad," says Miranda. "But I don't want to argue about it. It's like trying to argue about whether it's really that bad to - fling primary schoolers out of windows or slip somebody love potions or kidnap people's children so they'll do what you want. Maybe later."
Having found the cabinet he's looking for, he taps it with his wand; the doors open and he picks out the vial of Veritaserum. He measures very, very carefully a tiny dose into an empty vial, and offers it to her.
"You'll be careful, won't you, Miss Swan? Strong stuff, this is."
"What do you want to do?" Emma asks instead. "I mean... you're the one who's doing the test, if something goes wrong- if you want more, or less, or we could even wait for your mom I guess? If she could visit on the weekend, or something, you said she can Apparate."
She waves when she sees Emma and Miranda walking up. "Hi Em, hi Silverlight," she greets them cheerfully.
Miranda produces quill and paper and starts thinking up questions, like what is your mother's maiden name and how many braids do you have and what is the title of your transfiguration essay. "You guys can help think of things if you want."
Alli provides a number of unhelpful suggestions, all with a grin and in air-quotation marks, such as "least favorite Ravenclaw" and "most embarrassing memory." There's a couple more useful ones thrown in, though, like "what was your last dinner over hols," and "did your mum have a pet as a kid."
Lockhart arranges to borrow them brooms from the school. Fortunately Hogwarts does have a couple nicer ones than the training brooms lying around, a legacy of a professor in years past with a horrible phobia of Apparating and a tendency to wander the nearby countryside. Lockhart presents one to Miranda with a bow.
He's not sure exactly where they are- the Ministry hardly has GPS coordinates- but he should be able to at least get them close enough to follow by the cold.
Shaking, Lockhart pulls out his wand. "Expecto Patronum!" he ventures.
Nothing happens. He backs away as the Dementor approaches, clutching his head. "No," he whimpers, "I'm smart, I'm talented, Mother said."
The Dementors, meanwhile, are encountering the Silverlight Patronus charms Miranda sent after them. It's not going well for them. They don't vanish quite instantly, but they get visibly small much faster. After only a second or two of contact with the Silverlights, there's nothing left of them but cloaks.
She wrestles with the charm for a minute - then shakes her head.
"Hermione said you might try that," she says conversationally, putting her regular wand back in her hair and drawing the chimaera again. "Score one for paranoia. Don't try it again."
"That girl," he sighs, almost snarling. Then he plasters back on a smile. "Well, then. Miss Swan, breaker of Patronus charms." No reason to admit he's never had a Patronus, she's broken them before, hasn't she? He didn't say- "What comes now, then?"
He's rather grateful that this is, in fact, true. Except for the part where he succeeded in learning it, of course, but he did at one point try, and the teacher in question was one of the Auror casualties in retaking the Ministry.
(He's tried anything considered "for exceptional wizards only" at some point in his life. It's just that only if he immediately succeeded that he would continue.)
He hasn't the faintest idea if any of that's true, but it sounds plausible.
"Makes a much better story, doesn't it? You're casting Silverlight- surprised from behind by another Dementor!- and then I heroically fend it off!"
"I do still need somebody to find Dementors for me to kill and take me to and fro because I'm eleven. I obviously don't actually need anybody protecting me from them, just somebody who's more than seventeen years old. Are you going to keep helping, or are you bored now you know you can't Obliviate me, or do I have to worry about you casting other spells on me, or what?"
"Then maybe we have a deal. How about you encouraged me to try having both Patronuses out just in case that would work, and I tried it before we went into the woods and wouldn't you know it worked fine, and two Dementors weren't a problem and you never had to cast your own to begin with and you're very proud of me."
"Okay. I'm probably going to stick to the literal truth, but I don't have to mention everything or tell it in the right order. And that can be the implication. As long as you don't get on my nerves." Pause. "Memory Charms - on anybody - get on my nerves - and now I know that you're still the sort of person who wants to cast them even after all that time in the hospital. But if you stop -" She shrugs. "Then I have better things to do than try to punish you."
He doesn't think he can get away with pretending to be going on separate adventures while simultaneously chaperoning Silverlight after Dementors; he doubts this will lose him any fans. As nearly as he can tell, most of the wizards who would go on story-quality adventures have been wrapped up in the war for the past few years; he'd have little material in any case.