The Lewis House 35 страница

Mick was strapping on a fireproof vest and demonstrating its cords to Lavender's sister, who was jotting things down on a notepad. Cho pointed out something on the map to Charlie, and he listened to every word she said, his brow furrowed in concentration. When she stopped talking, he gave her a light clap on the shoulder.

"Good call," Harry heard him say. "Don't know how I've done without you all summer."

Cho didn't seem to notice that Charlie's neck was pink when he said this; she thanked him, turned back to the map, and studiously trailed her wand across certain areas as if memorizing them. But Harry, who had a lot of experience watching Ron go red, narrowed his eyes at Charlie and wondered what was happening there.

Malfoy looked somewhat unnerved by his trainer, a blonde woman called Lisa, which Harry found amusing considering that she was a good six inches shorter than he was. Harry could hear her talking very quickly about breakaway harnesses and wildly waving her hands about to demonstrate while Draco leaned back to avoid getting hit. On the other hand, Viktor and his trainer, Andras, seemed to get on well. Andras also had a thick accent, but it seemed to help their communication, rather than hinder it.

"Yes," Viktor was saying. "I am vell-schooled in Vind Charms."

"Good," Andras grunted. "You vill need them to keep dragon fire from flying back into your face as you ride."

Harry swallowed, and tried to concentrate on something other than the vision he'd just had of a giant cloud of orange fire flying towards his head. It was good that they weren't riding today, he thought. He'd had enough, really. It would take all night to get used to the idea of all this gear - not to mention Malfoy's presence. Better, really, to wait until tomorrow to throw dragons into the mix.

"Everyone!" Charlie clapped his hands. "Oi!" He pointed his wand to a spot on the map, and a section of shoreline glowed blue. "This is where the dragons are kept. Mind you don't Apparate right into the enclosure." He grinned. "See you outside it." He Disapparated, with Mick and Cho close behind him. One by one, the other riders left the room, until Harry and Burke were the only ones left.

"Ready to meet your new partner?" Burke asked, slipping on a pair of fireproof goggles and handing a pair to Harry. "You'll want these."

Harry did want them - he would have liked to encase the whole of himself in a fireproof bubble, actually - but he accepted the goggles without a word and Disapparated after Burke.

The Scottish shoreline was wide and cold. Harry shivered and looked around nervously, hoping he hadn't Apparated right between a pair of giant beasts.

"Harry," Charlie said, approaching him, "you first. Come on with me. Entrance is this way."

It was invisible - Rose Brown had told them about the Diversion Enchantments, but Harry was stunned to see how perfectly they worked. Charlie walked him between two standing stones, through which there appeared to be nothing but cliffs and sky. The moment Harry passed between them, however, he gasped and took a giant step back.

Dragons. They were Stunned in their enclosures, but they were still massive and frightening; Harry had an unhappy sensation that he remembered from his fourth year, of being nothing more than a bit of toast to these creatures. Huge snorts of smoke came out of their wide nostrils and their wings curled and uncurled slightly as they breathed. The tips of their fangs showed. Their talons gleamed. And these were the "tame" ones.

There were keepers all over the place, too - running about and floating food in the air in front of them - enormous carcasses, which they dropped into even bigger troughs. Harry grimaced when blood slopped out of one. He was smaller than the meal that the dragon had just been served.

"Beautiful, aren't they?" Charlie breathed, sounding more like Hagrid than ever. He sighed happily and folded his arms. "Glad you've decided to give them a chance, Harry. You won't be sorry. They're the most fantastic beasts on earth, dragons. Wait till you've got one under you - there's nothing like it."

Harry agreed that there probably wasn't, and Charlie walked him between the sleeping giants, pointing them out and calling them by name. They passed one that wasn't a Welsh Green, and Harry gaped at it.

"That's a Chinese Fireball," he said slowly. "But..."

Charlie rolled his eyes. "Ruddy Malfoy's too good for a regular flight dragon," he hissed under his breath. "Had that one brought from home. Calls it Mordor. Bet it served in the Dark army." Charlie glared at the dragon, which snored and shot two tiny, mushroom-shaped balls of smoke out of its nose. "I love Fireballs, but that one's going to cause trouble, I can feel it. Still, we had to let Malfoy come when he offered, and this was his stipulation. 'I want my dragon!' Spoiled little -" Charlie called Malfoy several names, all of which Harry agreed to, then led him to the last huge stable. "Here's yours," he said, pointing to the motionless mountain of an animal. "Recognize him?"

Harry narrowed his eyes. This dragon wasn't a Welsh Green, either. "I thought you said only the Common Welsh were trained," he protested. "Why are you giving me this one?"

"Look close." Charlie smiled. "Bet he'll recognize you, when he wakes up - smart beasts, they are. Remember scents for years. Had him since he was a baby - usually this type's monstrous, they'll even feed on other dragons - but he's the tamest of all our crew."

Harry gave Charlie an incredulous stare. "Feed on... other dragons?" he asked, his voice breaking. He looked warily at the jet-black ridges on the dragon's back, its lizard-like expanse of skin, and its sharp, shining bronze horns. "What kind of dragon is it?" he asked, gulping in fear as Charlie stepped up to the Stunned beast and patted him gently on the side of his snout. But he yanked his gloved hand away when the dragon burped in sleep, sending a burst of fire at Harry, who yelped and jumped back.

"He's a Norwegian Ridgeback," Charlie answered cheerfully, giving the dragon a fond look. "Aren't you, Norbert?"

~*~

The Court of Magic in Diagon Alley had always seemed like an enormous playground to Ron when he was very small. He could remember visiting his father at the Ministry, and then rushing ahead of his mother to the courthouse’s wide stone steps. The courthouse sat adjacent to the main Ministry building, at the foot of a grassy lawn. He and Ginny would rush to the top of the steps (there were eighty-seven or eighty-eight, depending on how you decided to count), and after resting for a moment at the top, take turns seeing how far they could run up the sloping columns. Then you could actually lie down on one of the wide steps, and, if you turned your head at just the right angle, look across to the Ministry and feel as though the enormous building went up into the sky forever. The Ministry was a complicated jumble of triangular additions and protruding turrets and Ron used to like to pretend that he could tell behind which windows rested the Department of Mysteries, and the Magical Law Enforcement Squad. Eventually, he would slide off of the steps and join his brothers in trying to jump into one of the white, giant-sized stone scales which balanced in midair over the courthouse lawn.

He had never actually had reason to go inside the courthouse until today, and as he followed Sirius up the steps, which somehow seemed to be much more normal-sized than they had when he was five years old, he felt a knot form in his stomach. They were stopped at the door by two security wizards, who let Sirius enter with a nod. Sirius waited patiently as Ron turned over his wand for inspection and allowed a restriction spell to be placed on it. A gold badge, stamped with “VISITOR” in blinking red letters, appeared on his robes, and finally, the guards waved him into the building.

“Wow,” said Ron, following Sirius into the depths of the building, “what are they worried about?”

“Everything,” Sirius answered, waving his wand over a plain wooden door. “You can’t be too careful. We still don’t have a firm idea of who might be lurking around outside of Culparrat.” He mumbled a spell, sparks flew out of his wand, and then he gently pushed the door open. “Welcome to my office - one of them, at least.”

Ron let out a snort when he stepped over the threshold and saw an office after his own heart. Sirius had only been in residence since the beginning of the summer, but already there were filing cabinets overflowing with paper, stacks of parchment on the floor, and numerous bunches of documents nailed to the walls. It was in stark contrast to the neat, yet cozy, library at Lupin Lodge.

“Has Remus seen this office?” he asked, gingerly stepping over a pile of law books and lifting a stack of paper so that he could sit down.

“Yes,” Sirius answered, adding a stack of files to an already teetering pile on top of a file cabinet and then sitting down across from Ron. “That’s why he prefers to help me from home.”

"I thought he wasn't allowed to come -" Ron began, but stopped in mid-sentence when Sirius clenched his jaw, and picked up one of the law books from the floor: Can You Handle the Truth? by Nicholson Moore, authority on wizard law. Beneath it were several history books, and several volumes of the Annotated Code of Wizard Regulations. It occurred to Ron that he didn’t know much about Sirius’s career before Azkaban. “Were you into all of this legal stuff before -?” he asked. He was still never sure if he should refer to Sirius’s time in prison – it seemed like the kind of remark that would make Hermione nudge him in the ribs and say "Shhhhh!"

Sirius shrugged. “I'd thought about it. I was much more interested in riding my motorbike and working for the Order. But law was always a hobby. I had to know how much trouble I was technically allowed to get into.” He laughed – such a rare sight that Ron stared in disbelief. “I had to know exactly how far I could push James without the Head Boy being able to turn me in.”

Ron laughed too, and it was the first real laugh he’d had since Hermione had left. “Yeah, well, I can understand that. It’s also very important for the Head Boy to know all the rules. Did you know, for example, that nowhere in any of the Hogwarts handbooks does it specifically say that students are not allowed in the kitchens?”

“Ahhh,” Sirius answered, leaning back in his chair and raising a finger, “but it does. It says –” he closed his eyes in concentration “- No student shall remove food from the kitchens…”

“Exactly!” Ron interrupted. “It does not say that you can’t go into the kitchens. It does not say that the house-elves can’t carry it out of the kitchen for you at any time, although Hermione did always put them off by trying to pay them. It merely says that a student cannot remove food from the kitchens. You can also go down to the kitchens and eat the food there. Whoever wrote that handbook was an idiot, although I’m not complaining.”

There was a knock at the door, and Sirius pointed his wand at the knob and opened it without rising from his chair. An eagle swooped in, carrying an enormous parcel. Ron had never seen an eagle up close and leaned forward to get a better look, but the bird dropped the parcel in Sirius’s lap and turned to leave, hitting the side of Ron’s head with his wing as he flew out the door.

“Ow!” Ron yelled, rubbing his ear. Sirius’s face had returned to its usual grim, stony expression. He was reaching over his desk and pulling papers out, left and right.

“Thought you might want to see this,” he said, handing the bunch to Ron. “I keep meaning to bring these home for you, but then I get preoccupied.”

There were several pieces of parchment, on which were scrawled hasty-looking notes. The top of the pile said “Malfoy/Weasley Case” in bold, official-looking letters. “Ah,” said Ron, feeling his good mood dissipate. There was something sick about seeing his name that close to Malfoy’s. Sirius had risen from his chair, and was now bent over, digging through a pile on the floor. Ron looked back down at the files. Sirius had written things all over the margins. Things like ‘Quine and MacMillan testimony’, and ‘report from Dr. Buckey at St. Mungo’s indicates that slimy git was not badly injured.’ Ron choked back a laugh at that one. Attached to the St. Mungo’s report were several photographs. Ron watched in amusement as Malfoy, in St. Mungo’s blue and white striped hospital robes, climbed out of his bed, shared a joke with his mother (Ron was amazed to see that she could actually smile), and did a series of push-ups on the floor.

“Interesting,” said Ron. He was starting to feel better. If Malfoy was acting like this, then there was no way that anyone would believe that Ron's punch had caused permanent damage. Although, he thought to himself, Malfoy did look rather idiotic exercising in those robes.

Sirius glanced over at Ron and then down to the photographs. “Yeah,” he said. “I don’t think you need to worry about anything. That Daily Prophet reporter, Creevey? He gave them to me yesterday. Seems to dislike Malfoy as much as you do.”

“So,” asked Ron, hesitantly. “Do you think people will believe this stuff? I mean, the judges and everything, they’re fair?”

“You’ll see today, won’t you? This is a slightly different trial than the one you’re up against. Much more serious, after all, it’s a Death Eater case. As for yours, I’ve tried to get Malfoy’s defender to realize that it would be much easier to drop this whole thing, but, of course, he can’t do that unless he persuades Malfoy, and that git seems to have it in for you. Still, I'm hoping all you've got in store is a monetary fine."

"Hoping?" Ron repeated uneasily.

"Perhaps community service. At worst - I won't lie to you - at worst, I can see a short jail sentence, if the jury decides to overcompensate on grounds that you're the Minister's son and they don't want to be seen as showing favoritism. You could get held in one of the lower security Ministry dungeons - but nothing serious, not like wizard prison." Sirius winced as he said this, and breathed heavily through his nose. "They want to get you in prison, of course, but 'Assault with the Intent to cause Grievous Bodily Harm'? They have to know that’s ridiculous.”

“Well, I’d like to kill him now,” Ron mumbled, wondering what a "short" jail sentence was. He couldn't imagine what he'd do, if that happened.

Sirius raised his eyebrows. “Watch what you say, Ron. Not here, but in public. Especially because of your father - someone will always hear you.”

Ron shrugged, and balanced the pile on top of some other files on the desk, thinking that being well known wasn't as much fun as he'd once hoped it would be. He didn’t want to think about Malfoy any more. It'll be okay, he told himself.

“Are those for today?” he asked, trying to change the subject. He pointed to a group of papers that Sirius had fanned out on the floor in front of him.

“Mm-hmm,” Sirius answered, not looking up. He pushed aside some brightly-covered pamphlets that looked like junk mail - Loopholes in the Law: How to Get Anyone Off on a Technicality and It Pays to Get Injured! – and handed an enormous law book to Ron. “Look up ‘Mens Rea’, would you?”

“Sure,” said Ron, grunting as he picked up the heavy book. Hermione had to have arms of steel, after hefting volumes like this one around for seven years. “The Encyclopedia of Wizard Law,” he murmured, and then flipped through the pages, which were so thin that he could see the outline of his hand through the paper. There must have been a thousand entries under 'M', but eventually he found the correct one. Ron cleared his throat and read, “’Mens Rea’ means 'guilty mind'. Conviction for certain crimes require that the defendant intended to carry out the crime; in such cases the prosecution must prove that there was mens rea at the time the offense was committed.”

“Hmph,” snorted Sirius, tapping a quill absentmindedly on the palm of his hand, “that still won't help.” He yawned and continued to mumble quietly, as if Ron weren't in the room. “'Guilty mind’ - but, how can we really know the truth if - DAMN!” Ron jumped as Sirius slammed a fist down on the desk. Parchment flew everywhere, and from the state of the office, Ron figured that Sirius probably did that all the time.

“Sirius,” Ron said, perplexed, "why don't you just check and see if they've got Dark Marks?"

"Voldemort alone could make those visible. At least, that's what we've determined so far - no one else seems to have the magic. Anyway, not everyone affiliated with Death Eating was an official member of the group."

“Then why can’t you just administer Veritaserum to these people? It'd tell you immediately who’s telling the truth.”

Sirius shook his head. “I wish it were that simple.” He rose from his chair and leaned against the large filing cabinet. “The Death Eaters made liberal use of the Imperius Curse, among other things.”

Ron shuddered, flashing unwillingly back to an extended, unshakable, floating feeling, and the sound of soft laughter all around him - Death Eaters interrogating him, wiping away his loyalties and forcing him to compromise the people that he loved. There were few things worse than the Imperius Curse. The pain of the Cruciatus haunted him far less. “So just ask the defendant to tell you if they were being controlled," Ron said, burying his thoughts again. "If they're under Veritaserum, they'd have to tell you, right?"

Sirius leaned forward. “Say, for example, I put you under the Imperius Curse right now and made you … bark like a dog.” Sirius grinned, and Ron gave a weak smile. “If I then administered Veritaserum and asked you what you’d just been doing, you’d tell me that you’d been barking like a dog. It’s the truth. But you weren’t doing it of your own free will, were you?”

“I still don’t understand. You should just ask me if I was under the Imperius Curse.”

“Would you know?”

Ron laughed softly. "Oh, I'd know."

“You'd think so," Sirius agreed, "but it's common practice for Death Eaters to lay a Memory Charm on top of the Imperius, in case a useful captive should be rescued, or escape. And breaking a Memory Charm can ruin an otherwise sound mind."

"Bertha Jorkins," Ron muttered.

"Right. This makes it nearly impossible to depend on an individual’s own testimony in defending their case. If they’re innocent, then they can still say things that would sound horrendous, yet have no memory of having been placed under the Imperius Curse. On the flip side, anyone can lie and say that they were being manipulated. We have to look to witnesses and other outside evidence. We have to look at a history of behavior - incidents before the rise of Voldemort have to be taken into account. And then it gets circumstantial, and that's more of a nightmare.”

Ron furrowed his brow. This was all very complicated. “Don't you always have witnesses?”

Sirius sighed. “We do, but they're not faultless, are they? There were dozens of witnesses who saw me kill Peter.”

It occurred to Ron that he knew next to nothing about how the Wizard court worked. “So,” he asked, trying not to sound stupid, “that’s what you do then? You try to defend all the supposed Death Eaters and gather as much evidence as you can to give them a fair trial?”

Gathering a bunch of papers in his arms, Sirius rose from his chair. “I’ll explain as we walk down to the courtroom – we’re going to be late.”

Ron had to walk quickly to keep up with Sirius, who seemed to be trying to get his legs to catch up with his head – he walked with a determination that kept his whole upper body thrust forward. “We had to restructure the system after the war,” he explained, “precisely because of people like this.” He patted his papers with one hand. “Your trial with Malfoy will be more traditional, with a judge, and defenders, and a jury. But the Death Eater trials are conducted differently. There’s not one judge, but three in every trial. We call them the Judicial Council – today we've got Mundungus Fletcher, Viviane Simpson, and Joseph Zug.

“How did you choose them?” Ron asked.

“They're all appointed by your father.”

Ron blinked. It still surprised him to hear about the things that his father did as the Minister of Magic. It seemed so far removed from the Dad he knew at home. His chest swelled with a bit of Weasley pride.

“And then what do you do?” Ron hoped he wasn’t annoying Sirius with his questions.

“Whatever I have to,” Sirius answered, turning a corner without losing speed. “It’s my job to gather the information, witnesses, and all the other stuff, and try to separate fact from fiction. There is a jury, but they really serve only as an advisory board. They can’t make the final decisions, only the Judicial Council can do that.”

“And you defend every case?” Ron knew that Sirius had been working himself too hard, and now he understood why.

“Wish I could,” said Sirius, stopping outside a set of enormous stone double doors. “The best I can do is look over every case and decide who handles it. But I make sure to take every case that has a high potential for being unfairly and prematurely judged. I take the guiltiest-seeming prisoners." Sirius smiled grimly.

Ron nodded, thinking that taking all the guiltiest-seeming prisoners didn't really lighten Sirius's workload. Most Death Eaters seemed pretty guilty, to him. "And you just do whatever you can to figure out the truth."

"Yes. The woman we’re trying today – Darla Courtenay – she was a defender by profession. She was a Ravenclaw when she was at Hogwarts and very respectable throughout her career. She actually worked for the Ministry. But about ninety percent of the people that she defended during the war turned out to be Death Eaters, and I have no idea if she's innocent, or if she helped to facilitate their crimes.”

Waving his wand, Sirius opened the doors, and Ron’s mouth fell open when he recognized the grand main courtroom from his history books. It was intimidating. A few witches and wizards were seated in the spectators’ gallery that surrounded the room, and Ron recognized Mundungus Fletcher sitting at the front, deep in consultation with the other two members of the Council.

“Nice of you to join us, Mr. Black!” Mundungus yelled, not looking up from his desk. Sirius made a rude gesture in the direction of the Council, and then showed Ron how to get to the spectators’ gallery. “See you at lunch,” he said. “I can guarantee you that this trial will take that long, at least.”

Ron climbed the stairs and found a seat where he could have a good view of the prisoner’s face, and of Sirius. The room was cold and dim, and Ron felt a bit like he was back in one of Snape's Potions lessons. He looked across the room at the jury. There was a mix of young and old witches and wizards. He recognized his mother’s school friend, Mrs. Cheshire – he’d forgotten to ask Sirius how the jury was selected. He wondered if Mrs. Cheshire could be on his jury? With his luck these days, he’d get Millicent Bulstrode.

A loud voice that echoed throughout the room startled Ron out of his thoughts. “PLEASE RISE FOR THE MINISTER OF MAGIC!” said a squeaky voice that seemed to come from the ceiling. Ron looked up, but couldn’t see anyone. It sounded like a house-elf. Ron was surprised to see his father enter the room from behind the Council; he wondered how his father had time to come to trials every day, with all the other things that a Minister of Magic must have to do. Arthur was wearing fancy purple robes and a very ornate, pointy wizard hat that winked with stars, and Ron snickered, despite himself. His dad was starting to go daft about dressing, just like Dumbledore.

Sirius walked up to Arthur and handed him a piece of paper, and Ron saw his father point his wand at his throat. “On this day, let it be said, for the record, that the Ministry of Magic calls to trial one Darla Courtenay, under charges of conspiring against the forces of good and of acting as an accomplice to the Dark wizard, Voldemort.” Several of the people sitting near Ron gasped at the mention of Voldemort’s name. Arthur then said, “The Minister of Magic defers to the judgment of the Judicial Council,” and turned and left the room.

There was silence in the room except for the shuffling of some papers and then, a creaking noise as one of the side doors to the courtroom opened. Two young Aurors-in-training floated the limp body of a woman to the chair in the middle of the room and strapped her in. After they made sure that she was secure, Sirius pointed his wand at her and said ‘Ennervate’. When she awoke, she seemed unaware and disoriented, but a moment later, she opened her mouth and started screaming.

“Ms. Courtenay! You must calm down.” Sirius’s voice was surprisingly calm, but his eyes burned intensely and his wand was pointed at the prisoner.

The woman stopped screaming, but she was anything but calm. She tried to draw herself as straight as she could in the chair, and looked around as if expecting to be struck dead at any moment. Ron realized that she’d probably been Stunned for a long while, although someone must have awoken her at some point to let her know about her trial.

The Judicial Council explained the procedures and the charges in detail. “I know all of this,” she interrupted, her voice shaking, “it’s already been explained to me.”

Then Sirius began asking Darla questions. They started out simply.

“Were you ever a Death Eater?”

“Like you, you mean?”

Sirius went white with anger, and Fletcher stood up behind him. "Mr. Black was pardoned by this Ministry in the autumn of 1997," he barked. "You were Stunned in the spring of 1998, so don't pretend ignorance, young woman. Now answer the question."

Ron wondered how often people did that, to Sirius.

"No," Darla spat. "I was never a Death Eater."

“Were you ever in the service of Lord Voldemort?”

“No.”

“Did you ever knowingly let a guilty man walk free?”

“My job was to defend people.”

This went on for quite a while, and Ron began to wonder if Darla Courtenay was telling the truth. He tried to guess if she was guilty just by looking at her, but he really didn’t have a clue. She looked normal enough – Ron could tell she was attractive, even though her hair was pulled back and her robes torn. She looked a little bit angry, and that made Ron suspicious, although he supposed he’d be angry as well. He leaned forward in his seat and strained to hear every word.

The questions became more specific.

“Were you aware, Ms. Courtenay, that Gavin Fannon went on to kill seven people in the service of Lord Voldemort, a mere two months after you fought for his innocence?”

“I am a defender, Mr. Black. I defend people, which is more than I can say for you. You seem determined to prove that I’m guilty. I did my job – it wasn’t my fault that some of my clients didn't tell me everything. At least I spoke to my clients before letting them go into a courtroom.” She paused, and sat as far forward as she could in her chair, pointing a finger at Sirius. “Maybe you should spend more time trying to prove my innocence, and less trying to prove my guilt. I don't have a guilty conscience and you'd better make sure that you don't act in a manner so as to place guilt on your own head, Mr. Black.”

Дата добавления: 2015-11-04