Who'll Fill a Coward's Grave? ↣ Harmione

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter 13 - Order Being Restored

It was a much more cordial Percy who greeted his father at the Ministry that morning. Percy also understood his father required immediate access to the Minister. On entering, Arthur couldn't quite hide his surprise that the odious Umbridge witch was sitting there waiting on him too.

Seeing this confusion, Cornelius quickly offered an explanation. "Madam Umbridge, in her role as Senior Undersecretary, had overall responsibility for the dementors. I thought her presence could be useful here."

This news actually had Arthur pleased to see Umbridge, not something he could ever recall thinking before. "She may be the exact person I need to speak with. I'll give you the details first, then we'll have time for those questions. Voldemort and a large group of Death Eaters portkeyed onto Azkaban Island late last night. That is a fact, some of the rest of what I have to tell you is pure supposition. It would seem the Dark Lord then convinced the dementors to join his cause, they promptly turned on all the staff in Azkaban. That couldn't have been pretty, every single member was kissed. While this was happening, it would appear Voldemort was attacked..."

This had Cornelius and Dolores on their feet, both demanding answers.

After letting them blow off some steam, Arthur calmly continued his story from where he left it.

"When the dementors flocked down from the prison to join Voldemort, they witnessed his Death Eaters having to carry an unconscious Dark Lord as they portkeyed away. We now have an Azkaban still full of prisoners but with no one to care for them. There is also still quite a contingent of dementors there, and those are two problems needing immediate attention. As to who attacked Voldemort, and we found a large amount of blood to corroborate this attack actually took place, I have a pretty good idea. Since having to head to Azkaban at first light though I simply haven't had time to confirm what happened."

Cornelius had been sitting awaiting the bad news breaking, and wondering if he should resign before getting pushed. Here though was news that could possibly save him from all of that. "Dolores, since this used to be part of your remit, I'm putting you in charge of Azkaban until we can get a new governor appointed. We need to get the other shift of guards out there as soon as possible, then begin looking toward what happens in the future."

While not exactly happy at hearing those orders, Dolores thought it was at least a step up from the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office. She somewhat reluctantly nodded her agreement. Arthur was just happy to see the problem land on someone else's desk, and was now ready to answer the questions that were sure to be coming his way.

The Minister didn't hang about. "Arthur, can you at least tell us your suspicions of last night?"

"I think it was Harry Potter who attacked the Dark Lord..."

This again resulted in a barrage of questions, most of which Arthur wasn't going to answer. "I need to talk to Harry or Sirius before I say any more, and can't emphasise enough that this information doesn't leave this office until we get that confirmation. If what I suspect actually happened, Harry and Sirius are the last two people we want to be upsetting over this."

Getting both to agree to that, Arthur then told them what Harry had planned. "We all saw the memory of Harry's blood being forcibly taken to be part of the ritual that restored Voldemort to a body. Sirius and Harry were working with Gringotts on a ritual that would see Harry calling his blood back. If they were successful, I'm sure they will soon want that news made public. Until then though, we have two very powerful people, and Gringotts, that the Ministry don't really want to be upsetting by releasing nothing but half-truths and rumours."

With both quickly agreeing that was a reasonable request, since they still didn't have any sort of confirmation yet, Arthur then began asking his questions.