Chapter 26: Umbridge's Reprieve

A/N: The end is in sight! By which I mean, I may actually complete this story in the next few weeks. Hurray! Thanks to everyone who's following along.

The way forward was simple, but it certainly was not easy.

Hermione knew this as she sat in the dining room at Grimmauld Place, listening to Percy Weasley outlining the strategy for the campaign to elect Kingsley as Minister for Magic. Kingsley himself sat with them around the table, freshly discharged from St. Mungo's. He looked healthy, and exuded his customary air of calm confidence.

After Percy had finished speaking he rejoined them at the dining table. Kingsley paused for a moment before he looked around the table, his level gaze resting briefly on each of their faces.

"This will be hard." Kingsley did not rise, but he looked at each of them as he spoke. "As hard as the war, for all that there is less violence."

He stood, now, and made his way to the front of the room. He went on:

"The campaign may have my name on it, but as we all know, I alone would accomplish nothing. It is not enough to elect a Minister. There are many other places to think of. Ministry officials and Wizengamot members to persuade, appoint, and replace."

He paused, and Hermione, remembering, spoke up: "Half the Wizengamot membership will be up for replacement come late December. Whoever is elected Minister will have great say in those appointments."

"That is quite right, Hermione."

As the others joined with their own remarks, Hermione drank it all in, the suggestions, the conversations, the plans. She felt flushed and a little breathless. There was such energy in the room, and more energy within her than she'd felt since Remus had been taken. This campaign had been only abstract until tonight. Now it felt real, tangible, achievable.

Hermione stayed behind after the meeting, until only Kingsley, McGonagall, Molly, Arthur, and Percy remained. She moved to join them at the end of the table, a request upon her lips.

"Tell me what I can do," she said. "I haven't read up much on campaigns recently but I can learn quickly. Just tell me what to do."

Instead of laying out her role, however, Kingsley and McGonagall exchanged a glance. Hermione looked between them. But it was Molly who spoke.

"Of course you'll be part of this, Hermione. But––it must be thought of that––you too are at risk under the DMCSA."

"That's right," Kingsley said. "We wouldn't want to put you at risk, Hermione."

She stared between them all in disbelief. There was a pained expression on Arthur's face and Percy was examining the table. "It's not a problem," she said. McGonagall opened her mouth; Hermione pressed on. "They detained Remus because of––because they suspected impropriety on his part. They haven't the grounds to detain me."

"I'm afraid this Ministry has never been very concerned about adequate grounds. Should you become troublesome, they will––"

"It's a risk I'll have to take," she said, stubbornly. "I can't stand by and watch. I can't."

The campaign would be a short and brutal one: they had only four weeks before the election on December 5th. Hermione discovered that countless districts of wizarding England had been mechanically re-electing the same wizards and witches every year. Well, they spoke of districts; the actual turnout of voters each year was abysmal. As a child she'd heard her parents' friends lament the voting turnout in the muggle world, but the apathy in the wizarding world was even worse. It was odd, considering how much smaller the magical community was. Or perhaps it wasn't all that odd, considering how dispersed wizards and witches were across the country, and considering the relative independence from government granted by magic.

Those in the Order and their allies travelled wizarding England, travelling from door to door, fireplace to fireplace. It was frustrating how much of time had to be spent battling the Ministry's decades of propaganda, and the centuries-old prejudice against werewolves and their ilk. They were fortunate to have Phemea on their side, for she knew well the fears of others, being a recent convert herself. And of course it helped that they had Harry Potter, and Kingsley, with all the renown and experience between the two. It helped, too, Hermione thought, that Remus was who he was: calm, cool-headed, kind-hearted, when it would have been more understandable for him to write off the society that had treated him so poorly.

"Eat," said Ron to her at a campaign meeting toward the latter third of November. She refused; her hands were full, her heart and her mind too full with hope and fear.

"Eat," Harry agreed, taking sheaves of ink-filled parchment from her. Ginny had charmed a plate of sandwiches to nudge repeatedly at her hands, alternating exasperatingly between left and right.

"I don't want to not do enough," Hermione tried to explain as she attempted to fend off the sandwiches. "We've so few days left…"

Eventually, when the sandwiches began individual endeavours to crawl up her sleeves, she relented and took a bite. She thought of Remus as she ate; she thought of him constantly. She thought of the dementors that must constantly surround him, of the full moon that had just passed, one the detained werewolves had certainly endured without wolfsbane. All this was for him; for society, but in particular for him. They had to elect Kingsley…put an end to the Act…appoint to the Wizengamot those who understood…

But before any of this could happen, the situation became a crisis.

"If I could kill 'em all," Hart spat, an ugly look on his face, "I would. They deserve it."

"They come soon," came Scott's voice from his cell. "Wouldn't mind having this cage slip open…get my teeth on their neck…"

Remus stared up at the ceiling overhead, unseeing. Yes, it would be nice to hurt Umbridge, to hurt Rand. They would not be merciful to him; there was no favour to return, only a lifetime of bad blood.

There was a loud clanging toward the end of the cells, and he knew the door was opening. He could hear the approaching babble of what sounded like six or seven people. Flashes of light, faint at first, grew stronger, accompanied by thickening wisps of smoke. Now Remus could hear a familiar, high, and breathless voice:

"Oh, wonderful. I can see the creatures are kept separately and quite securely."

There was another flash of light, and Remus heard a wizard ask,

"When will the trials take place?"

"Quite soon, I expect," came the voice of Nyrian Rand. Their footsteps were drawing nearer to Remus' cell. Across from him he could see the look of murder on Hart's face. He wondered if he looked as haggard as Hart did, as wild and unkempt, as dangerous.

Remus stood as the group finally stopped in front of his cell. Rand gave him a look of great distaste, seeming especially displeased to find him standing. A camera-wielding witch turned and clicked, the flash and puff of smoke momentarily blinding. He counted three or four journalists, two clutching cameras, accompanying Umbridge, Rand, and two other Ministry officials.

"Remus Lupin," said Umbridge aside to one of the reporters, softly. "One of our most dangerous and depraved detainees. He worked with Fenrir Greyback during the war."

Remus did not say anything. He knew any defense would not be reported. It was pointless to grow angry.

Umbridge opened her mouth again, a smug, simpering expression crossing her features, when––

There was a deafening crash at the end of the row of cells. The reporters gasped; the witch seemed to try for a photo of whatever it was that had happened. There was a streak of grey, and then something or someone had launched itself at Umbridge and Rand.

In the commotion Remus realised that, somehow, Reinhold and Scott had been freed – their cells open, the two throwing themselves into the fray. He saw then that the streak of grey had been Wade, and he understood: Wade was making his rescue attempt, right here, right now.

Both hope and a terrible cramp of despair seized his gut. Hope, that they might escape; despair, that this could come to no good.

Umbridge, Rand, and the two junior Ministry officials had their wands out at once and were doing their best to incapacitate the attacking werewolves. The close distance was working to the advantage of the werewolves, who were more easily able to avoid wandtips, to grab wrists and force hands away.

"Expulso!" screamed Rand, throwing out his wand wildly just as Scott tackled him. The ensuing explosion sent Reinhold sprawling across the stone floor. Rand's wand flew out of his hand as he too hit the floor under Scott's weight. The wand rolled to a stop several inches from Remus' cell. Without hesitation, he thrust his fingers through the bars and willed it to come––accio––it came, and he raised it automatically, eyes following the action––

Two dementors had joined the skirmish, though whether or not they were under the Ministry's command he was not sure. The familiar chill descended over his skin. He watched Rand struggling with Scott, their moves growing sluggish as one of the dementors drew near them. Only one of the junior Ministry officials remained. Remus watched her cast a stupefy at Reinhold, who fell once again to the ground.

That left Umbridge, who had managed to drive Wade back against a wall. Even as Remus turned his gaze to her, Umbridge brandished her wand at Wade and hissed: "Crucio!"

A jet of light hit Wade in the stomach and he doubled over immediately, letting out a bone-chilling scream. Something brutal and base twisted in Remus' stomach. Fighting both the feeling and the chill of the dementors, he aimed at the snarling witch. "Expelliarmus!"

The spell was weaker than it would have been from his own wand, and weaker than if he had been at full strength rather than imprisoned with dementors for weeks, but it sufficed: Umbridge's wand slipped from her grasp, clattering to the floor several feet away, ending Wade's torture. "Incarcerous." Ropes shot from the tip of Rand's wand, missing Umbridge's torso but tangling around her legs. As Umbridge fell, Remus saw that Wade was recovering, shaking but no longer in pain.

"Wade," Remus said. He had too many questions. What was the plan from here? How had Wade freed Scott and Reinhold? "Relashio," he added, sharply, when Umbridge tried to reach for her wand. She recoiled from the spell, abhorrence seething across her entire face.

Remus fought the urge to do to her what she had done to Wade seconds earlier. But even as he thought this, the pervading coldness began to insinuate itself deeper under his skin. He learned the cause when he saw the second dementor glide by his cell. Remus watched it turn to Wade; his grip on Rand's wand tightened and he raised it, ready. But the dementor turned away to Umbridge. As if in slow motion he watched it bend, slowly; it lifted its rotting grey hands almost tenderly to its hood; he could see the terror in Umbridge's bulging eyes as it lowered its face to hers, closer…

"Expecto patronum."

He heard himself whisper the words. The patronus was corporeal; he hadn't the strength at that moment to avoid it. The silvery wolf burst from the tip of the borrowed wand. It blazed through the air, driving the dementor back from Umbridge, circling around to drive off the other dementor from Scott, who had been subdued by Rand.

There was a moment of silence. Remus could feel his heart thudding in his throat. The wolf loped back toward him, stopping to regard him a foot from his cell.

"Remus," croaked Wade.

But they all heard another crash as the door to the cellblock burst open once more. Ministry witches and wizards flooded in, several bearing Auror badges. The silvery wolf vanished as Scott and Reinhold and Wade were hit with stunning spells. It was all ending as he had feared. Wade must have attempted the rescue because he saw no end in sight to the detention. It had been brave, but it was a fool's errand.

"Disarm that werewolf," Rand was snarling at an Auror. Remus did not fight it; he felt the wand slip from his fingers. Umbridge was being helped up. She looked ill, her pouchy face pale, her gaze sweeping past Remus without attention as a wizard supported her out.

"You just wait," said Rand to them all before he left, his voice trembling with a cold fury. "You will all pay for this."