CHAPTER 13

May 28, 2001

1930

Harry left the staging area. He had caught a short kip and a good bite to eat. Ron had several good bites. They had changed clothes, looking like students taking the first week of classes during a summer term seriously. Each had a notebook and a text book regarding the intricacies of late Victorian and early Edwardian diplomacy among the great powers. It was enough of a cue to keep almost anyone from engaging in a long conversation with them as they found their way to a waist high wall eighty yards from the hotel hosting the convention. So far, nothing unusual had been seen but the unofficial Auror creed of CONSTANT VIGILANCE had to be maintained as the dignitaries swayed to the music of a band that had been floo-ed in from Helsinki.

Hermione closed her laptop. She was done with this draft. There would be at least another five drafts of the methods section and the limitations of her analysis were notable but she could worry about those problems another day. She would find Ginny and they would find wine.

Ginny had found refuge in the dueling lounge of Grimmauld Place. Half a dozen dummies had been blown up. Sweat weighed down her ponytail as she finished casting the last chain of offensive spells. She cast a quick diagnostic spell, her heart rate was recovering nicely; down to two beats per second from a peak of almost seven beats every two seconds.

Harry had been distant to her during their afternoon tea. She had little reason to expect anything else from him today. He was on call even if he was on a break but his mind was barely hovering over his cup of tea as he kept the constant flow of people and the patterns that they fell into circling through his memory. This was their life and usually she had no reason to complain, but seeing Harry as Auror Harry instead of Lover Harry or Seeker Harry or God-dad Harry was still uncomfortable.

Hermione had grown up with Harry and his overwhelming sense of responsibility and "Saving People" thing narrowing his world down to the immediate threat inventory, so she passed his distraction off to his natural behavior; Ginny had seldom fought shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip with Harry. She had to deal with this, or she could not spend her life with him. She would deal.

John Houlihan, regimental sergeant major and tonight, the senior non-commissioned officer bunking down with the alert troop went through the reports and the evening schedule. B Troop was maintaining overwatch on the conference. Tonight the dignitaries were being entertained while the real work would be done at the staff level over good wine and better gin while a band played along in the background. D Troop was on alert. They had come into the ready room an hour and a half ago and would wait, hoping for inaction, but ready for sudden chaos. A Troop was asleep and C Troop was preparing to rest as well.

Leah tucked her hair back before picking up her bag. The shoot was long, her jaw was sore, her back was stiff. The camera man had fucked up the first scene so she had to take everything over again. But the director at least was kind, he had rearranged the shooting schedule, allowing the actors from the mis-shot scene to rest and reblock the action for three hours before performing again. A similar fuck-up had occurred in one of her first jobs; she had thirty five seconds to recover and reset. She never worked with that director again. Now that she was back into civilian clothes, she was ready to go for a walk, collect a breath and a good night sleep before coming back to work tomorrow. Her fingers barely caressed her wand as she left the sound stage.

Kingsley smiled. The conference was going well. The Bulgarian delegation was getting along marvelously with the Dutch, and somehow the Greengrasses had already lined up a trio of potential contracts with Spanish and Italian suppliers. The speeches of the distinguished guests had been short, pithy and informative. The food was plentiful and tasty. The participants had a pleasant energy of a conference that would produce long lasting collaborations and innovative work while still allowing for most of the people to leave with smiles and a laugh at the good times that were had in the social sessions.

His assistant looked him over. His hands smoothed his collar, and then the Minister of Magic came out from behind the curtain behind the dais. A dozen witches could conceivably have the slight honor of having his first dance. He glanced at a young debutante from Issel, she was not connected well enough. A beauty from Andorra had the lineage but not the power, so his eyes sought out a Swiss witch just a few years younger than him, but still in the height of her beauty. Yes, she was the one he should ask for a dance, an enjoyable spin with a witch holding a mastery in charms and a doctorate in transfiguration. Madame Lavoille would be a safe choice as her husband would smile at his wife's enjoyment while Kingsley could have a pleasant four minute conversation with someone far smarter than him.

As he approached her, the band changed tunes to something slower and muggle. A waltz, his feet could follow that.

Even as the violins whined in tune and to the beat, three vans turned a corner two miles away. The blue van had a single driver. It was heavily weighed down with seven hundred kilograms of ANFO. The driver was nervous as the checkpoints that had been put up after Bishopgate would have kept him from achieving his mission. The checkpoints had been taken down after the traitors had ended the Struggles. He called in a number on his mobile and muttered a few authentication phrases and gave a ten minute warning that a major bombing would occur.

The green and white vans had five and eight men in them respectively. They were parked in pre-paid spaces and the men waited. A few smoked, a trio drank fresh Cokes and the rest waited for the signal.

Everyone waited.