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Harry Potter and all of its characters belong to J.K. Rowling.
I own nothing but the original characters I make.
"Dialogue"
'Thoughts'
-Author notes-
Chapter 106: A Change of Tactic
On Friday night, the doors of the Great Hall opened, just as they were about to serve dinner.
"Look! They are back," Sirius exclaimed.
"Yeah, great..." Remus huffed.
"I thought they would be angrier when they came back," Frank commented.
"You think they'll come for u—ouch!" Peter got smacked on the head before he could finish.
"Shut up," Sirius gave him a glare.
They were not supposed to talk about that fight. James told them that he had erased their memories, but people were already suspicious of them, so they had to be very careful with what they said.
It took almost a week for the Lestrange brothers and the rest of the Slytherin boys, whom they fought, to return to school.
By then, people had come up with all sorts of hypotheses about what happened to them. Of course, none of them knew how serious their injuries were. Students had just been told that several Slytherin seniors were attacked and were sent to St. Mungo's to heal.
The only thing that James found curious was how long it took them to come back from the hospital.
He knew better than anyone else what kind of injuries they had been inflicted. Cuts, bruises, and broken bones may take a while to heal for Muggles, but in the magical world, any qualified healer would have gotten them fixed in an hour or two.
They should have been back the day after the attack at most.
James could only think of one reason for this long delay. They must have gotten into some legal trouble with the Ministry.
And the cause of this had to be the Obliviate spell that James had used on them.
He never finished his Auror training, but he still knew well enough how they operated.
Every time memory charms are involved, it is protocol for the Aurors to perform a full investigation. Since they didn't have a culprit to arrest, they must have analyzed everything in the possession of the boys, including their wands.
Rodolphus had used the Cruciatus Curse on him, and James had used his brother's wand to cast an Imperio.
A single use of those curses was enough to put someone in Azkaban for life, even if they had been used in self-defense.
The Aurors must have detained the boys after realizing that, forcing their families to come help them.
However, James was not surprised to see them back. The Unforgivables are only illegal to use on humans. If the Ministry wants to send you to jail for their use, they need to prove that they were used on someone.
With their memories wiped out and the attacker missing, there was no way to do this, even if logic dictated that they must have been fighting someone.
With a lack of damning evidence and pressure coming from several important pureblood families, the Ministry must have had no choice but to let them all go.
"Look at Rabastan, he looks so smug…" Sirius frowned.
"Of course he does. The Slytherins got away with it… again," Remus whispered.
James saw the food appear before him and began eating. "Don't concern yourself with those guys, just enjoy your dinner."
"I don't know how you can always be so calm…" Peter said.
James looked over at the Slytherin table as Rabastan and the others went to take their seats.
They were being received with cheers, as if they had accomplished something great.
He doubted the other Slytherins knew many details, so they must have their own theories about what happened.
Rabastan went to sit next to Bella and was welcomed with a look of disgust.
This at least had the effect of taking away his smug look and replacing it with his usual angry one.
'That's better.' James thought.
As much as he wanted to distance himself from school drama, he was going to need to keep an eye on those guys.
The Slytherins from this era were much bolder than the ones he remembered.
He had been overlooking a lot of things so far because they only went after him.
These children were as much of a threat to him as a few ants to an elephant, so he had been responding with minimal violence and trying to de-escalate things.
That obviously didn't work.
His amber eyes moved to Malfoy. He was now talking about something with the Lestrange brothers and Snape. By the face he was making, it was something serious.
'I have to admit that Lucius Malfoy is much more dangerous than Draco ever wished he was.' James was reasonably certain that the attack had been something Malfoy planned, and he was not going to stop here.
And now he had a good idea as to why he was escalating things so much.
James stopped his meal for a moment and took out a letter. The envelope carried the symbol of the House of Black. This was a message from the Patriarch that he had received that afternoon.
His mind went back to a few hours prior, when he had read its contents.
Lord Pollux had made up his mind after performing a thorough investigation into the Malfoy, Lestrange, and Carrow families.
The old man had finally decided to end the engagement contracts with these three families. This also meant that he was going to reject Voldemort's offer.
Nothing had been officially announced yet, so Bella probably didn't know. But the Malfoy Lord must have been suspecting that this was going to happen sooner or later.
James had no doubt that this was going to devolve into violence. Those families and the Dark Lord were not going to take the insult without fighting back. The most likely scenario would be for Patriarch Pollux to be killed.
'The old man must have known this… I cannot let that happen.' James pulled out a piece of parchment, a quill, and began to write.
"James? What are you writing now? We're having dinner, mate," Sirius glanced at his friend.
"I'm writing an important letter." James had made up his mind. He could not let that old man die. He was too important for that.
Without him, the Black House would end up in Voldemort's hands, and things would be the same as in his past.
'I'm going to have to intervene directly this time.'
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