Before she was Professor McGonagall, she was Minerva Macnair. After an arranged marriage forces her into an impossible situation, Minerva does what she must to survive. When she makes a new life for herself, her secrets follow and threaten everythin...
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"I need to tell you something."
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2 July 1978
The door to Minerva's quarters banged open, and she swept through, dropping her bag on the table as she made a beeline for the liquor cabinet to pour herself two fingers of Cardhu. But she couldn't enjoy it; she was still too angry.
She'd kept her temper in check all afternoon, but now it threatened to erupt full force and needed an outlet. She yanked her wand out of its pocket to point it at one of the cushions on her settee. It exploded in a riot of feathers, their indolent fluttering only stoking Minerva's ire. She Transfigured them into needles that hovered in the air, and imagined them pricking Sirius bloody Black until he screamed.
Her fury was stemmed by the image but not scotched.
I can go one better.
She Transfigured the crimson velvet of the other cushion into a reasonable approximation of Black's too-handsome face, then sent the needles hurtling through the air to embed themselves in the cushion-cum-portrait. Black's fuzzy smirk changed to a silent scream of horror.
The effort involved in the magic she'd just performed served its purpose, and she felt calm enough to have her drink.
Those idiots!
Hadn't Albus's instructions been clear? Of course they had. But as usual, Black and Potter had ignored the agreed-upon parameters of the job and broke into the house instead of simply watching it. Bad enough that they'd thus managed to alert the Death Eaters that the Order knew about their latest meeting place, but the dunderheads had also made a typical spectacle of their stupidity and put a pair of Muggle policemen in danger for good measure!
It had taken Minerva all of yesterday and the better part of today to persuade the Ministry not to charge Black and Potter with breaching the International Statute. Albus probably could have sorted it in a few hours, but Minerva was not Albus Dumbledore. She'd been tempted to allow them to warm their cockles with the Dementors in Azkaban until Albus returned from wherever he'd gone, but she didn't know how long that would be, and now that the ranks of the enemy had grown so alarmingly, the Order needed more witches and wizards with quick wands. Even arrogant louts like Sirius Black and James Potter.
