Year Six - Chapter Twenty-One
I smiled. I couldn't help but smile.
"Silence! Silence!" Cornelius Fudge's attempt at calming down the Wizengamot were, unfortunately, not working quite that well. There were a lot of missing wizards, after all. The room was packed full of people; journalists of the wizarding kind had pushed themselves in, and what few Hit Wizards weren't busy holding back the tide of curious onlookers were instead busy trying to calm down the screaming Wizards and Witches that sought my head on a pike for having killed their precious family members.
I remained a smiling oasis of peace in an ocean of screams.
"Silence!" a voice boomed, rippling through the crowd like a whip of steel. Albus Dumbledore then cleared his voice, and spoke in a considerably softer tone, "Minister Fudge, you wished to begin the proceedings?"
"Ah, yes, yes of course," Cornelius acquiesced with a nod. He then coughed. "The accused stands here of his own will to answer to a series of accusations-some quite grievous, and which will require a full explanation. The usage of Veritaserum has been requested, yet also denied? Under what basis?"
Dumbledore nodded from his spot, "Professor Snape has claimed he has been teaching Occlumency to Mister Umbrus as a part-time activity; as such it cannot be considered an acceptable method of recovering information from him." Also, it kept the Death Eaters that survived from being able to ask questions to a forcefully drugged me.
"Why are there no Dementors to guard the prisoner!?" a peculiarly vicious sounding witch shrieked from the stand, pointing an accusing finger in my direction, "This is favoritism! Clear favoritism!"
"The Dementors chose to vacate the premises of their own accord," Dumbledore answered before Cornelius could, "The reason for their departure is as mysterious as their origin, I am afraid." His eyes twinkled as he said so. I had no doubt that if they could speak, they would tell of a history of quietly threatening the very foundation of Azkaban with a thermonuclear weapon, just in case the Dementors ever tried being sassy with the likes of him. Clearly, the thermonuclear option wasn't the answer, but I suspected I had gone quite close, judging by how Cornelius simply nodded along.
"Very...very well," the Minister for Magic said. "We will begin with the first criminal charge-assault on the figure of the Headmaster of Hogwarts-"
"Of course, being I in perfect health and utterly unwilling to press charges, I feel that this accusation can be safely discharged as facetious," Dumbledore answered, causing Cornelius to quiet down, near-immediately. The Minister coughed, cleared his voice, and then read the next criminal charge.
"Concerning the second criminal charge, that of breaking and entering into the private property of the Malfoy family manor, and the mass murdering of many members of Pureblood houses of the Wizarding British community, how does the defendant..." he paled as he kept on reading, probably making a quick head count of the number of dead, before his fingers began to shake while trying to hold on the papers themselves, finally, in a soft, barely audible voice, he croaked out, "Plead?"
"Innocent," I said, amiably.
Chaos erupted once more. People screamed, shrieked, and roared. Though they came mostly from the side of the ancient Pureblood lines that had probably been neatly trimmed, it was clear that it took the Aurors to intervene in conjunction with the Hit Wizards to get the situation to calm down once more.
"Innocent?" Cornelius Fudge whispered, "We have proof, great and terrible proof-of human remains within the jaws of Gargoyles clearly meant for the acts of murder and bodily harm-and as the law dictates on the manners of non-sentient yet moving objects, they must all be rendered safe for the Wizarding community, rather than weapons...unless a specific license is acquired for each and every single one of them. That too is, incidentally, another criminal charge."
"Hogwarts does possess such a license due to its own Gargoyles, and since a proper count was never made, it extends to any and all Gargoyles made for the purpose of the protection of the castle and its students, using materials taken from the castle, or the castle grounds themselves," Dumbledore answered, very calmly. "For what concerns the accounts of invasion of a private property, Mister Umbrus was indeed invited by none other than Mister Malfoy himself, to render aid to his family against a great evil that lurked within his mansion. Since the defeat of the Basilisk has made him well known, whom better than to defeat another, far more dangerous, foe?"
Cornelius fumbled with the papers, and then glanced at Dumbledore, "There is nothing about Mister Malfoy's eyewitness of the events-"
"Mister Malfoy is recovering together with his wife at Saint Mungos. I am led to believe his testimony, brought at a later date, will corroborate everything Mister Umbrus says." He glanced ever so briefly at me, and his eyes remained twinkling pools of trollish-like behavior.
"The mass murdering counts can't be denied!" a peculiarly brave wizard roared from the stands. "Does he get away from it too!? How is he any better than He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!?"
"You will find that I am currently present here where I stand," I answered most gently, locking eyes with the man in question, "I dare think that Tom Riddle would never be able to claim the same." I exhaled, softly. "After all, he who has committed no crime has nothing to fear from justice, as long as that justice is righteous."
"The accused sh-should stay silent unless queried," Cornelius fumbled for his next words, and then found them. "We-We have yet to hear any rebuttal to the mass murdering."
"Well, do you have any claims that I was actually there?" I replied. "I mean, I got there in the aftermath. Blood everywhere-the Gargoyles clearly doing their best to protect my good friend Draco from harm, as they had been instructed to, and not a living soul can say the opposite, well, unless they wish to explain why they were wearing Death Eaters clothes and...ritually murdering one another, I think?"
"That's preposterous!" a witch shrieked. "You killed them! You murderer!"
"Ma'am, please, I understand your hate at the idea that a murderer could walk away freely, but think about the past cases of this very court!" I clapped my hands, once, and the sound propagated. The wizards and witches fell silent, much as I would have liked to remain quiet myself, I dimly realized that I could not. No, rather, I didn't want to. "Have you not discussed, and called innocent, some of the very dead that were found clad in Death Eaters' clothes? Are you not guilty of letting criminals roam free, because their blood granted them enough friends to do so? Why are you angry, at seeing injustice? Are you not standing there in your seat because injustice was had during your times? Are you not a product of injustice yourself? Why do you accuse me so? Because for once, the weight of the scale is against you?"
With my arms, I encircled in a gesture the whole of the Wizengamot. "When we let something other than merit, something other than truth, something other than justice cloud our eyes, then we allow for these things to happen. I could walk away a free man, a free wizard. I could, but I will not."
The murmurs that had grown with my words now died. Not even an echo of them chirped through the assembled masses of wizards and witches.
"I wish to impart a teaching moment to the bumbling masses of fools that inhabit this place. I demand justice. I demand real, unquestionable justice. I have killed Death Eaters. I have killed Death Eaters who sought my death, who cherished it, who yelled for it to happen. I have killed them, and I stand proudly in front of you to claim thus what follows. I will do so again, and again," I slammed my right hand against the wooden lecturer's desk, glancing to the right and to the left. "What right do I have to be a judge, a jury and an executioner? None! I guarantee you, I have none! Yet I cannot tolerate watching you fumble about! I cannot stand watching your stupidity, your idiocy, your incredible incompetence tear at the very foundation of what should make a great Wizarding community work! If you cannot make your people feel safe, if you cannot show that you are representing them, if you let the purity of someone's blood dictate their innocence over their guilt...then you are what is wrong in our community of wizards, and make no mistake," I smiled, "You will find no safety in your manors or in your secret clubs with silly masks and names from the likes of me."
I took a deep breath. "So I ask of you this; do you choose to claim me innocent, to prove that true justice is late, but unquestionable, or do you claim me guilty, and prove that as long as you are not a Pureblood, then you can have real justice done in the Wizengamot?" I smiled. I smiled as I drank from the shock over their faces. I clenched both of my fists, and then squared my shoulders. "Condemn me or free me, but know this! I will hold you accountable for the choice you make today! I hold all of you accountable for what has happened! For the sins you committed, and those you could have avoided, but chose not to! I hold you accountable, and guilty, of not being there when you were needed, and of showing up only when it was too late! I hold you guilty for every death, every tortured witch and wizard, every Dark Mark that blotted the sky! I hold you accountable, and I will have you brought to the same justice you will now give me!"
I caught my breath, my speech nearly finished.
"So I ask you this," I hissed out, "Condemn me as guilty, I care not. But look at yourself first, and then tell me...are you really innocent yourself?"
To that, there was no answer but silence.
I turned, my eyes glancing towards Cornelius Fudge who was as white as a sheet. I turned, and looked at Dumbledore who looked to be grieving, even though he didn't show it with more than the sadness of his eyes. I looked into the eyes of many witches, and wizards. Some were angered, some were troubled, others looked guilty themselves, a few began to mutter, and the mutters finally grew into whispers, and then a frenzy of those.
The screaming between a witch and a wizard finally snapped Cornelius out of his funk, and he turned with a shaky look towards Dumbledore, as if seeking his permission before announcing the verdict.
"The Wizengamot must...must make a decision," he said. He turned to look at the stand of witches and wizards, and then took a small breath. Truly, what a small and scared man was Mister Fudge.
"Those in favor of Mister Umbrus' guilt...raise your wands," hands rose from some wizards and witches, but those were few, and sparse.
Those few looked at their peers, at those around them, and then screamed at the injustice being perpetrated in front of them. They screamed of their fathers, of their mothers, of their brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, of their friends and how I was just a murderer, just a plain, bloody murderer.
"Shut the hell up, Crabbe!" an old, snappish woman with the demeanor of a dragon snarled as she stood up from her seat, "Good riddance to your Death Eater husband! And if you want to follow him, I'm ready to take you on whenever you want!"
She lifted her wand, "I wasn't scared of you back in the days, and I ain't scared of you now! You want to fight? I'll curse you in ways you'll never forget! It's high time someone with a backbone took the fight to the likes of you!"
That had to be Augusta Longbottom. It couldn't be anyone but her.
"T-Then, I proclaim Mister Umbrus innocent of all charges-" Cornelius muttered, and then ran for his dear life.
I literally had to stare at the retreating back of the man and wonder just what the hell he had seen. Had someone spiked his drink with something that caused terror? He wouldn't normally be such a scared little man, would he? I wasn't expecting him to be a great man, but at least...something.
Not even a token of resistance was had from him.
I glanced to my sides, where the Aurors stood with their faces as puzzled as mine. "You heard him," I said. "Free to go."
With a sight and a swift movement of my hand, my wand returned to me from the open door that Cornelius had left.
The Elder Wand stood wrapped in the Invisibility Cloak, tightly pressed against my chest. The funny thing was that as long as the cloak was folded with its outer layer around an object, then the object itself would be invisible. Not without mass, or form, or weight of course, but enough to be hidden from the view of the Aurors. And as long as you deliver one wand to them willingly...they do not generally look for the second.
"A pity," I said as Dumbledore neared me, "I would have loved to head to Azkaban to finish what I started."
Dumbledore looked pensive, if briefly, and then gingerly shook his head. He extended his hand, and as I took it we materialized with a pop away from the proceedings, and onto the fresh grass of Hogwarts lake's shore. He then sighed, and crossed his arms over his chest as he stared at the sun gleaming off over the surface of the water.
"I leave that peculiar wand in your care, Mister Umbrus," he spoke slowly, his voice tight, yet tranquil. "I no longer have the fire to fight wars, and I realize, even if so late, that it is high time I took a step back, and sit the rest of this out." He patted my shoulder, squeezing it gently. "Good luck, with everything you seek to do. Do remember to send me some owl post every now and then."
I blinked. I cocked my head to the side. I filtered the words my ears had just received.
"Wait. You're leaving!?"
"Tended my resignations as of a few minutes ago from every single job and title they had given me," Dumbledore admitted, "Even those they believed I wouldn't ever find out about. I'll be seeing the world in all of its wonders, and enjoy my much needed retirement."
"But-But there are still-" I quieted down as Dumbledore shook his head. He lifted his index finger to his lips, and then winked.
"It is no longer my battle. I am too old, too senile, and too foolishly emotional. For decades I wondered if I'd ever find someone who could take my place, and now that I have..." he smiled, and exhaled, "I feel it is time for me to go."
I had no words. I was, and remained, wordless even as we gave each other the mother of all parting hugs. It wasn't like he'd die, or we'd never see each other again. He had just...just decided to leave and enjoy some retirement.
Yes, it was all in the norm.
It was the day before Christmas, and yet...yet it felt like I wasn't in the clear yet.
Something, in my mind, felt odd.
Yet, I couldn't place it.
Was there something, or someone, I was missing?
Oh right, the snake-Gargoyle in Draco's bag.
Well, shit, thank God that had been the mother of all bluffs.
