Harry Potter - Hellion!

 

Harry never had felt better: It was as if a cage had been broken, ropes shredded, and his blood freed. Unknown to him but deeply felt in his essence, all the magical bindings one Albus too-many-names Dumbledore had instilled on the child’s magic over the year and a third he had access to the babe had been blown to shreds by the Phoenix burn.

Albus had one, big, fear: to meet someone more powerful than he was, and he had made sure this baby, from the onset, would be just powerful enough to weaken his other mistake so he, Albus, could be credited with destroying another Dark Lord. The prophesy had served him well: he had virtually directed Voldemort’s attack on the Potters, and thus ensured that he and only he, could win the war he had pushed Tom Marvollo Riddle, I am Lord Voldemort, into triggering. Voldemort had done a good job until the last task: He had removed any contender to the Round Table Seats to the last family member. But the Potters had been a piece too big for him to swallow. Had he waited rather than rushed into things, Albus would have served the Potter heir on a rusty plate. Untrained, weak, and vulnerable. That the dreaded prophesy had been filled some twenty or so years too early had thrown a wrench in his plans, and it had taken some last-minute not so thought-out fixes to get things back on track. And the disappearance of the Potter line would fill his ultimate dream, to take in the shoes of Merlin, and usurp the muggle throne by being the only survivor of the Round Table, therefore the ultimate heir to the Throne of Magic, world-wide, and succeeding where Arthur Pendragon had failed due to Merlin’s interference, plus standing on the wrong side of the fence. A muggle that could not shave himself without cutting his own throat, as ruler of magic! Ridiculous! But things really did not go as planned. It was as if Magic itself was fighting him! Preposterous! Magic bent to Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, not the other way around! Albus marinated in his juices, in the lowest dungeons of the Tower of London, healed by magic as his body fed the Tower’s rats. It was as if the rats were taking malicious pleasure in eating the cheese, knowing that if they ate it all, it would not grow back! It was a painful, very painful, way to pass the time and ruminate on his revenge.

A very brilliant, icy-blue, bird flew over Sherwood forest, picking up rodents to feed from, and resting occasionally on the upper branches of denuded oak trees, barely visible against the sky’s own washed-out blue precursor of winter. It met many birds of prey, including a superb female white owl that sat sleepily on a branch, waiting for the sun to go down somewhat. A quick wing fluff allowed the Phoenix to catch a falling feather and to fly off, to later come back as a matching Owl. Another way to hide in plain sight for Harry Potter.

On the ground, one Evan Rosier, Death-eater Extraordinaire, had tracked the white Phoenix, waiting for an occasion to hit it with an immobilis totalus and capture it. He saw the bird land in the lower branches of a fir tree, beside a white owl, that chased it away with a fluff of wings. The damn bird never stayed in the same place long enough for him to take aim with any chance of a hit. He saw the bird fly through a thick thicket of trees, He ignored a white bird the size of a small owl take off from what he thought was its nest, unaware that the nesting season was long gone in November. The huge black vulture, one Evan Rosier, was experiencing humongous problems navigating the thicket to keep an eye with the much more agile Phoenix, and barely made it out of the woods without breaking a wing. He watched the other side, expecting the bird, whose size was impressive, to navigate the trees as slowly as he did.

The small owl came back to the rather big female and began courting her, too ignorant of the seasonal changes. The female ignored him superbly, not interested one bit in the juvenile’s clumsy courting. Discouraged, the Owl moved off, and began to fly south-west under the forest’s cover. The area was not very safe for a while, and instinct, however flawed it might have been when Harry tried courting the female owl, was still sharp enough to tell him to get out of the area while he could. He hid in barns, eating mice, and moved off in his preferred direction under cover of the night when he needed to cross fields.

Rosier, on the other hand, was not favored by his animagus form. He was a big, long-range flyer, yes, one that had good eyesight to spot carrion, but his night vision was poor, and he could not see through cover. And barns were not within his range of habitats, as farmers, for some reason, tended to receive his presence as sign of bad omen for their herds and met him, however protected by naturalists his ‘species’ may have been, with twelve-gauge guns. He had to hide in the long grass during the night, and wait for the day to fly. He kept being distracted by road kills, almost getting run over by a bus as he ate a deer carcass that had been hit by a truck barely half an hour earlier. It took two days for Rosier to make his way around half of Sherwood forest to where Harry had entered the woods, and another two days to complete the fly-around. Rosier had to admit the killer of his master had given him the slip, and he would have to report failure to the few Death-eaters still roaming the British Islands. Jugson, Rowle, and the Carrows would not be pleased. Maybe four others had survived free, out of three hundred declared and maybe twice that many sympathizers, but they had not made their presence or location known.

As he thought things out, walking to their hide-out, a rotten barn long since abandoned by the farmer as unrecoverable, and help up by magic more than physics, Rosier began analyzing the disaster that this mission had devolved into. The first part had gone relatively well: he had been able to use his muggle lordship and his belonging to their overview committee to find out about the ongoing search, the shark, the dragon, and then the wolf. All the reports pointed to a powerful mage, and only one was powerful enough to have many animagus shapes: Harry Potter. Even Dumbledore, with all his power, had only one animagus form, a fox, and it was not even magical. Dragons were magical. He had taken what was left of the Death-eaters with him to Sherwood forest, minus the Carrows, Rowle and Jugson, who was hurt from an attack on a blood-traitor family, and the single survivor, still unconscious from losing too much blood. Their arrival had been as discreet as possible, and he had flown off to check on the wolf. He noticed it was leading a bunch of muggles on a wild-goose chase, confirming in his book he was dealing with a magical animal. Keeping track of the wolf had led him to notice it was leading them along a narrow ledge, where neither it nor the muggles could mount a significant defense. He had his group lay a trap around a clearing by hiding them into tall trees, where they would have a clear shot at the wolf.

The first shot had been fired a fraction of a second too early, allowing the wolf to hide under a tree. From there, things turned sour very, very quickly. Rosier has watched things degenerate, going down to hell in the blink of an eye: The wolf had taken down a tree, sending it helter-skelter in a ravine and taking two of his glorious men with it. Then those that were still in trees began firing wildly, missing as they forgot to shoot where the wolf would be rather than where it was. The few rotten or badly anchored trees were brought down by the wolf, their human cargo quickly put to death as the wolf killed the groggy or wounded death-eaters. Then the horror really began. The wolf would quickly jump across the open forest floor, gaining speed and then jumping right up to where the death-eaters were now sitting ducks, and clamping his jaws on their belly, opening them like he had enjoyed doing to his own saw-dust filled toys. Bowels dangled from trees, sometimes caught in the upper branches while the torso cascaded down to the ground.

Rosier had watched all this with growing horror. But then, he saw his second line begin to fall. Trees were cut off at leg-heights, shocking his death-eaters by the sudden pain and insuring their death by blood loss if not falling off the trees they had taken station into. Some had been crushed by tree branches, and others by falling tree-tops. Others got speared by tree parts, or fell on the growing collection of spikes the tree parts were creating. Rosier could not see what was going on clearly, and he took off to watch from above.

He saw the last death-eater finally hit the wolf with an AK spell, only to be hit by a rebound, and four other spells that dismembered him in short order. Rosier too had seen the shadow of the Phoenix and concluded that this was another animagus form of his Master’s enemy. Anyway, the rebound of the killing curse was Potter the brat’s signature spell, so there was no doubt he was dealing with him. How many surprises could that little bugger have?

He had seen the flash of the Phoenix as it disappeared and saw a matching flash in his peripheral vision, so he took off toward it as quickly as he could. He managed to keep track of the bird by watching the flashes it made each time it ported. It seemed Potter was earning his wings and practicing flight by flashing each time he came close to hitting the ground. At some point, the bird took to flying for real, and landed in an oak. Rosier landed thirty yards off and tried to crawl to get a hit on the bird, only to notice it hop from the oak to a fir, to a pine... each time Rosier came close and was ready to take aim! Frustrating. The phoenix kept pulling him toward a tree clump in the distance, and then flew leisurely toward it, forcing Rosier to return to his vulture form to keep up. It was in that denser forest that Rosier finally lost the Phoenix and had to call the hunt off. The sun was down, and flying for a vulture was now highly dangerous.

At the Buckingham Dining Hall, rumors ran wilder than a fire in a conifer forest. The Queen had been mum as to whom the dais’ table had been reserved for, and the fact that Margaret was relegated to the floor had shocked everyone. When the introductions began, hushes were heard. Who the hell was that Remus Lupin to gardner a position closer to the Queen than Philip Mountbatten, the Prince Consort? And where were the three other children of the Queen? No one thought the three had shown such ill manners and temper tantrums they had been confined to their rooms with orders not to get out under any circumstance. Prince or not, you did not yell at mother Elizabeth when she was in a tiff, for whatever reason.

Then the others came forth, and were introduced as lords and sirs, and Ladies. The weight of each addition in the balance of power was estimated from their position at the Table of Honor, and the fact that one Lord Black sat right at the left side of the Queen shocked everyone to silence. Everyone had heard the introduction of Lord Longbottom and Lord Black as Knights of the Round Table, but not even the most knowledgeable could trace back the link from these two nobodies to the long-lost kingdom of Camelot. Eyes kept going to the chair, oh so empty chair, found to the right of the Queen, usually occupied by Prince Philip Mountbatten. Who would sit there? Was a divorce in the air?

The ten-course Official Diner went without the right seat being occupied. This added to the rumor mill. The dessert and tea were long gone, for those that had managed to stomach it that is, before the Queen gently hit her crystalline glass with a silver spoon, gathering the attention of everyone, minus the baby, who was snoring on his high chair, his face covered in chocolate ice cream.

She stood and addressed the assembled guests, numbering several hundred, and which included every single ambassador to the British Throne, and every member of the British nobility save those that had declined or were too sick to make an appearance. It even included a couple of visiting high officials, including the Secretary of State of the United States, Alexander Haig. The Queen stood, and addressed the now silent assembly.

"Yesterday, an event of unprecedented magnitude forced Us to reinstate the Primacy of the Throne over Parliament. A section of Our government had declared its sovereignty over Ours, in direct violation of article five of the Magna Carta. Said government was declared in state of High Treason, and the Laws and bylaws of the Magna Carta applied. Today, over five hundred members of Our government were beheaded in accordance to the Laws of the time, as the Parliament and its laws had been rolled back automatically by the application of this clause of said Magna Carta. Another three times that amount are waiting hearing and judgement."

After a sip of red port to help her settle her stomach, the Queen resumed:

"During the bloody cleanup, it came to Our attention that a good segment of Our subjects had been misled by this ministry into believing they were independent and not bound by Our laws. Further research revealed that, amongst those misled were two descendants of the Knights of the Round Table, Members in due form of King Arthur Pendragon’s Privy Council. Our research brought to light that these two were still on the rolls of Peerage, far outweighing any other members by predating them all. We decided to reactivate the Round Table and added Sir Lord Remus Lupin to the Peerage list as of today. His family can be traced to before William the Conqueror, and his family stood in defense of the Scottish Kingdom well before Mary Stuart died at our Namesake’s hands."

Another sip later and the Queen nailed the coffin of democracy:

"We are now under the laws of Camelot, which predate the Magna Carta and allow Us to bring to light the existence of that segment of Our subjects which had been forced into hiding by, first, King John, then Queen Mary of Scotland, and Queen Elizabeth I of England, to name a few misguided leaders of this poor Kingdom. We bring forth, in these three, the first openly magical members of Our Privy Council of Magic. Yes, magic. M A G I C, get it in your thick skulls. We are also reinstating all the laws of Magic as codified by one Merlin Ambrosius, King Arthur’s Court Mage. To my right is the seat reserved for Merlin’s magical and biological Heir, which We know to exist as his name is on the magical part of the Peerage list of Scotland, and therefore on Ours!"

A final sip of wine and the Queen concluded:

"Note that there is only one chair on my right. It is because that person has inherited the titles of the others by right of conquest, in conformity to Camelot’s Chivalry Laws, or by receiving the title as last Heir of the Line, again according to Camelot Laws, or, again, by receiving the title through a magical will. He, alone, controls the Magical British Empire. We control the mundane world, he the magical world. And no, We will not inform you of his name. Just be aware that, should someone try to claim said seat without just cause, his head will roll before Us without further ado. We know whom to expect, and the magical Peerage lists cannot be suborned. You are now invited to retire to the Ball Room for the rest of the evening."

Her Majesty made her way to the steps leading to the floor, followed by Lord Black, Lord Longbottom, and Lord Lupin, then the ladies of said families, her husband, the Heir to the Windsor line, and her Mother. She made her way to her private suite, where a Ceylon tea was served with crumpets.

"Mother, I wonder how the world will take that announcement," said Charles.

"Probably as badly as my siblings and yours, Charles. Why do you think none of your siblings were present? Too bad they are too old for a good smack on the ass. My siblings snubbed me, except for Margaret, probably because she thought she could court another male. She could, but I doubt young Neville was interested in anything but getting a chocolate mask painting on his face. Her looks at the messy boy was worth a picture. I hope the royal photographer got her good. And Mr. Turnpike did not help one bit, as he kept playing ‘airplane’ with the ice cream spoon to get it in Neville’s mouth, making the little tyke laugh and spit more out his mouth than he swallowed. I had to bite my lips to prevent myself from exploding in hysterical laughter."

"Should we show up at the Ball?"

"We have to, son. We just wish to take this time to remind you all that Lord Potter’s name must not be said even into each other’s ears. We have had issues with plants having ears in the past and this is too vital for any leak to occur. Especially with what Lord Black and his friends have brought to Our attention. We have dealt a severe blow to these terrorists, but the battle is far from over. You know as well as Us how long it took to clean the Nazi within our own government during and after World War II, and We are not even sure if all were caught. The ideals promoted by the Death-eaters and their leader, Voldemort, are too close for comfort to those of Hitler for Us to neglect the possibility of ties, especially since Lord Lupin brought to Our attention the hidden history of World War II, and how one Dark Lord guided Hitler in his successful bid for power and the following war until, in 1941, Hitler ignored his mentor’s guidance and turned toward Russia rather than conquer Great-Britain. We really came too close."

"Apart from us, who knows?"

"Outside of this room and within a select number of staff of the household, nobody. Not even your siblings, Charles, or mine. Even your aunt Margaret is in the dark. Probably a few death-eaters as well, but their numbers took a tumble. And one Albus Dumbledore, who must be finding the rats of the Tower a bit too cozy by now. We may give them a medal for services to the Kingdom if they break the bastard out of his mentality."

"He will get eaten alive before talking," said Sirius.

"Then my rat subjects will be fat and spend a warm winter dressed in blubber."

The magic-users shivered at the thought, but they knew Dumbledore. Death would welcome him before he revealed his plans.

"R I H, Dumbledore," said Remus.

"We thought it was R I P, rest in peace?"

"He will Rest In Hell, and somehow, given what we know now, I doubt peace will be on the menu," replied Remus.

"A lot of coal shoveling, prompted by white-hot forks in his too white ass," said Alice, as she wiped Neville’s face while giving him a bath. Shawn, strip! You need a bath too."

"But there are girls around!"

"So? Your mom was a girl too, you know. She washed you from birth. I do not see where the problem lies."

"But you are not mama!" replied Shawn, suddenly having a sudden bout of hiccups as he remembered he would not be seeing his mummy and daddy anymore. He missed them so much already.

The Queen lifted the boy on her knees and took a tissue to wipe his eyes and nose, much to Charles’ surprise.

"What do you think? That I never did that before?" she asked acidly.

After washing the boy’s face, the Queen turned to Frank.

"We require something a bit out of the ordinary from you, Sir Longbottom."

"What is it, your Majesty?"

"We wish you to adopt Shawn Turnpike, here, as pupil of your household. This would preserve Neville’s Heir status, Shawn’s family name, and yet allow Shawn all the support a loving parental pair could give him."

A quick nod from Alice and Frank accepted the proposal from the Queen.

"The writ of Adoption will be signed at dawn, Sir Longbottom. As such, Shawn will receive a title, as befits one of your own, probably an earldom, as your son will inherit your Duchy."

"I doubt Shawn understands even half of what is said."

"It will be your duty to bring him to rights, and see to it he makes Us proud."

"I wonder if he has other living family members, your Majesty, such as a godfather and a godmother. They should be notified of the events."

"We have some scribes rummaging through the Ministry of Magic’s records, but according to them, they are spotty at best. We do not despair as things seem to be even worse there then at our own Civil Records Office, even if the magical population is tiny compared to the mundane one."

"I suggest you have your people visit the Goblins. They are much more rigorous than the ministry in keeping track of things. After all, they make their money in finding tiny cracks in legal texts they can exploit for their own good," said Augusta, whom had been rather quiet since her arrival at Buckingham Palace.

"We shall do so immediately," as she wrote a note to drop by on a guard’s desk on their way out. "How about we make a token appearance at the ball? We shall not stay long, as tomorrow gives all signs to be as bloody as today was. We feel like We swam in liquid iron since sunrise, and We wish for a very, very, long soak. We even expect the water to turn rusty."

"Do not give Sirius ideas! He could well do so. After all, he managed to make the water in the Prefect’s bath color me Gryffindor Red, for a week."

"Remus! You talk too much! And it was easy! I used muggle food coloring that was activated by your magical signature. Until then the water was transparent. I expected you to check for magic, but not your own signature. It worked."

The Queen snickered, something she had not done since she was five.

"Let us get going. We want to be out of that ball as quickly as possible. By the way, when you leave, follow the guides to your suites. This castle is a labyrinth and even We get lost."

The kids at the nursery, her Majesty and her suite of Mages made their way toward the ballroom, to once again be introduced by ‘loud-mouth’ as Frank had dubbed the Public Crier. That one must have been overworked, he needed a throat potion!

The first thing that caught the Queen’s attention was the presence of the three other members of her family and their wives or friends of the day. Her frown gave ample warning she would not put up with any disgraceful incidents in public. Then she saw her sister Margaret in company of a man she had some reservations about.

"Lord Longbottom? Is it possible for you to, err..., enquire about the intentions of the man that is acting like a wasp in butterfly disguise around Princess Margaret?"

"I could, your Majesty, but my wife would be more effective as she can get closer without raising alarms from either. Alice?" indicating the group of courtesan around Princess Margaret.

Alice glided around the rather disorganized group that courted the Queen’s sister with limited success. Margaret had eyes only for the three new potential targets that now outshone in her eyes everyone else. Alice managed to stand behind the commoner, whose bank account inflated his ego and his ambitions, while blinding him to his rather unpleasant attitude and disgraceful social skills. He had this huge Cuban cigar, and was puffing on it as if he tried to imitate a 1890 steam locomotive. Alice gently whispered to his ear:

"Big cigar, small boy tool." and turned around, as the misguided individual swallowed a puff wrong and began coughing, turning red in the face, before being taken out to a water-closet so he could regain his composure.

"What did you tell this..., no We will not say the word in public, some malicious ears might hear," asked the Queen as she watched the man being escorted out.

Alice bent to her ear and repeated her short comment; the Queen began sniggering, before it blew out into an uncontrollable bout of laughter, shocking everyone in the room.

"That alone, was worth a trip to this pain in the posterior event."

Margaret made her way to Frank, and was surprised to be rebuffed kindly by the target.

"I am happily married, Princess, and, contrary to mundane marriages, magical ones are binding, mind, soul, and body. We share our souls, Princess, and that kind of bond can not be broken, even in death. When we say ‘forever’, we mean it."

"Are the other two married?" she asked, deciding some target practice might be in order before trying another run at Sir Longbottom.

"Sir Black is married to his job, and you can always try with Sir Remus, but somehow, I doubt your title of princess will be to his liking. He likes simple things, you see, and he has an indigestion of titles, especially since he got drowned in them by your sister, the Queen."

"Sir Black has a job? Is he poor?"

"No, he could buy you out ten times over with his pocket change; his job is taking care of his godson since his parents died."

"That must be a hellion if he mobilizes the care of a single man, and probably his household staff, all by himself," said the princess, while thinking if he was that rich, he might still be worth the trouble. After all, there are pensions for cumbersome kids, and once she had carried his child, the devil would be sent to a parking lot.

"Do not continue in that direction, princess. You are perilously close to visiting the Tower of London with your treasonous thoughts concerning Lord Black’s godson."

"What? How?..."

"Go sniff Lupin; he might be interested, but then the excess of the Opium perfume you seem to bathe in might turn him off. A werewolf does have more sensitive senses than us simple humans. He might even grace you with lifting a leg!"

Princess Margaret ticked on the ‘werewolf’ label, and discovered she was more then interested in getting to know Lupin. What was the meaning of the mysterious word?

"If he bites your head off, blame yourself," added Frank, turning to take a canapé and leaving a baffled princess.