Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (143 page)

Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres, who was at this point feeling more frustrated with the entire situation than anything really
productive
, snapped at her that
yes
, he knew something had to be done.

After Susan Bones left, Harry looked over at the other end of the Ravenclaw table, where Hermione had sat down away from him or Padma or Anthony or any of her other friends.

But Hermione didn’t look like she was in a mood where somebody going over and bothering her would be taken very well.

Later, looking backward, Harry would think of how, in his SF and fantasy novels, people always made their big, important choices for big, important reasons. Hari Seldon had created his Foundation to rebuild the ashes of the Galactic Empire, not because he would look more important if he could be in charge of his own research group. Raistlin Majere had severed ties with his brother because he wanted to become a god, not because he was incompetent at personal relationships and unwilling to ask for advice on how to do better. Frodo Baggins had taken the Ring because he was a hero who wanted to save Middle-Earth, not because it would’ve been too awkward not to. If anyone ever wrote a true history of the world - not that anyone ever could or would - probably 97% of all the key moments of Fate would turn out to be constructed of lies and tissue paper and trivial little thoughts that somebody could’ve just as easily thought differently.

Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres looked at Hermione Granger, where she’d sat down at the other end of the table, and felt a sense of reluctance to bother her when she looked like she was already in a bad mood.

So then Harry thought that it probably made more sense to talk to Draco Malfoy first, just so that he could absolutely positively definitely assure Hermione that Draco really wasn’t plotting against her.

And later on after dinner, when Harry went down to the Slytherin basement and was told by Vincent that
the boss ain’t to be disturbed
… then Harry thought that maybe he should see if Hermione would talk to him right away. That he should just get started on unraveling the whole mess before it raveled any further. Harry wondered if he might just be procrastinating, if his mind had just found a clever excuse to put off something unenjoyable-but-necessary.

He actually thought that.

And then Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres decided that he’d just talk to Draco Malfoy the next morning instead, after Sunday breakfast, and
then
talk to Hermione.

Human beings did that sort of thing all the time.

It was Sunday morning, on the 5th of April, 1992, and the simulated sky above the Great Hall of Hogwarts showed great torrents of rain pouring down in such density that the lightning flashes were diminished and scattered into small pulses of white light that sometimes transformed the House tables, paling their faces and making all the students appear briefly to be ghosts.

Harry sat at the Ravenclaw table, wearily eating a waffle, waiting for Draco to make an appearance so that he could get started on sorting this whole thing out. There was a
Quibbler
being passed around which had somehow ended up with Hannah and Daphne on the front page, but it hadn’t gotten to his place yet.

A few minutes later Harry finished eating his waffle, and then looked around again to see if Draco had arrived yet for breakfast at the Slytherin table.

It was odd.

Draco Malfoy was almost never late.

Since Harry was looking in the direction of the Slytherin table, he didn’t see Hermione Granger entering through the huge doors of the Great Hall. Thus he was rather startled when he turned back and discovered Hermione sitting down directly beside him at the Ravenclaw table, just as if she hadn’t not-done that for more than a week.

“Hi, Harry,” Hermione said, her voice sounding almost exactly normal. She started to put toast on her plate and a selection of healthy fruits and vegetables. “How are you?”

“Within one standard deviation of my own peculiar little average,” Harry automatically replied. “How are you doing? Did you sleep okay?”

There were dark bags under Hermione Granger’s eyes.

“Why, yes, I’m fine,” said Hermione Granger.

“Um,” Harry said. He took a slice of pie onto his plate (as his brain was occupied with other things, Harry’s hand simply took the tastiest thing within range, without evaluating complex concepts like whether he was ready to eat dessert). “Um, Hermione, I’m going to need to talk to you later today, is that okay?”

“Sure,” said Hermione. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

“Because -” Harry said. “I mean - you and I haven’t - for the last few days -”

Shut up,
suggested an internal part of Harry that seemed to have been recently allocated for governing Hermione-related issues.

Hermione Granger didn’t look like she was paying much attention to him in any case. She just stared down at her plate, and then, after about ten seconds of awkward silence, began to eat her tomato slices, one after another, without pause.

Harry looked away from her and began to eat a slice of pie which, he discovered, had somehow materialized on his plate.

“So!” Hermione Granger suddenly said after she’d polished off most of her plate in silence. “Anything happening today?”

“Um…” Harry said. He looked around frantically, as though to find something-happening that he could use as conversational fodder.

And so Harry was one of the first to see it, and wordlessly point, although the sudden swell of whispers that swept through the Great Hall showed that a number of other people had seen it too.

The distinctive crimson tinge of the robes would have been recognizable anywhere, but it still took Harry’s brain a few moments to place the faces. An Asianish-looking man, solemn, and today looking rather grim. A man with a piercing gaze that swept over the room, his long black hair waving behind him in a ponytail. A man thin and pale and unshaven, with a face so blank that it was like stone. It took Harry a few moment to place the faces, and remember the names, from that long-ago day in January when the Dementor had come to Hogwarts:
Komodo, Butnaru, Goryanof.

“An Auror trio?” Hermione said in a strange bright voice. “Why, I wonder what they’d be doing here.”

Dumbledore was in their company as well, looking as worried as Harry had ever seen him; and after a moment’s pause while the old wizard’s eyes scanned the Great Hall and the students whispering over their breakfasts, he pointed -

- straight at Harry.

“Oh, now what,” Harry said under his breath. His inward thoughts were a lot more panicked than that, as he wondered frantically if anyone had connected him to the Azkaban breakout somehow. He looked at the Head Table, trying to make the glance casual, and realized that Professor Quirrell was nowhere to be seen, this morning -

The Aurors swept toward him with swift strides, Auror Goryanof approaching from the other side of the Ravenclaw table as though to block any escape in that direction, Auror Komodo and Auror Butnaru approaching from Harry’s side, the Headmaster following straight on Komodo’s heels.

All conversation everywhere had ground to utter silence.

The Aurors reached Harry’s place at the table, surrounding him from three angles.

“Yes?” Harry said, as normally as he could. “What is it?”

“Hermione Granger,” Auror Komodo said in a toneless voice, “you are under arrest for the attempted murder of Draco Malfoy.”

“Hermione Granger,” Auror Komodo said in a toneless voice, “you are under arrest for the attempted murder of Draco Malfoy.”

The words dropped into Harry’s consciousness and shattered his thoughts into a hundred shards of incredulity, the shock of adrenaline running into so much confusion that -

“She -” Harry said. “She - she wouldn’t - WHAT?”

The Aurors weren’t paying any attention to him. Komodo spoke again, still in that colorless voice. “Mr. Malfoy has regained consciousness in St. Mungo’s and named you, Hermione Granger, as his assaulter. He has repeated these accusations under two drops of Veritaserum. The Blood-Cooling Charm you cast upon Mr. Malfoy would have killed him if he had not been found and treated, and it must be presumed known to you that this was a fatal curse. I therefore arrest you upon the serious charge of attempted murder and you will be taken into Ministry custody to be interrogated under three drops of Veritaserum -”

“
Are you mad?
” the words burst out of Harry’s mouth, as he shoved himself up from the Ravenclaw table, an instant before Auror Butnaru’s hand clamped down hard upon his shoulder. Harry ignored it. “That’s
Hermione Granger
you’re trying to arrest, the nicest girl in Ravenclaw, she helps Hufflepuffs with their homework, she’d
die
before she tried to kill
anyone -
”

Hermione Granger’s face had crumpled. “I did it,” she whispered in a tiny voice. “It was me.”

Another huge rock fell on Harry’s thoughts and crushed their fragile order, bursting fragments of comprehension into dust.

Dumbledore’s face seemed to have aged decades over the course of seconds. “Why, Miss Granger?” Dumbledore said, his own voice barely above a whisper. “Why would you do such a thing?”

“I’m,” Hermione said, “I’m, I’m - sorry - I don’t know why I -” She seemed to collapse in on herself, her voice was formed of nothing but sobs, and the only words that could be made out were, “I thought - killed him - sorry -”

And Harry should have said something, should have done something, should have jumped up out of his seat and stunned all three Aurors and then gone on to some incredibly clever next move, but the twice-shattered fragments of his thought processes could yield no output. Butnaru’s hand pushed Harry gently but firmly back into his seat and Harry found himself
stuck
there like he’d been glued, he tried to grab his wand for a
Finite
and it wouldn’t come out of his pocket, the three Aurors and Dumbledore escorted Hermione out of the Great Hall amid a rising storm of outcries and the doors began to swing shut behind them - nothing made sense, it was surreal beyond all reckoning, like he’d been transported into an alternate universe, and then Harry’s mind flashed back to another day of confusion and in a moment of desperate inspiration he finally realized what the Weasley twins had done to Rita Skeeter, and his voice rose in a scream, “
HERMIONE YOU DIDN’T DO IT YOU’VE BEEN FALSE-MEMORY-CHARMED!”

But the doors had already shut.

Minerva couldn’t possibly have stood still, she paced back and forth through the Headmaster’s office, the back of her mind half-expecting Severus or Harry to tell her to shut up and sit down, but neither the Potions Master or the Boy-Who-Lived seemed much concerned with her, both of their gazes focused on Albus Dumbledore where he had emerged from the Floo. There were sounds in the background that nobody heard. Severus seemed as passionless as ever, sitting in a small cushioned chair beside the Headmaster’s desk. The old wizard stood terrible and upright by the still-burning fireplace, robed in black like a starless night, radiating power and dismay. All her own thoughts were of utter confusion and horror. Harry Potter sat on a wooden stool with his fingers gripping the seat, and his eyes were fury and freezing ice.

At 6:33am, Quirinus Quirrell had Flooed St. Mungo’s from his office for immediate pickup of Draco Malfoy. Professor Quirrell had found Mr. Malfoy in the trophy room of Hogwarts, on the verge of death from the continuing effects of the Blood-Cooling Charm slowly lowering his body temperature. Professor Quirrell had immediately dispelled the Charm, cast stabilizing spells on Mr. Malfoy, and levitated him to his office to Floo him to St. Mungo’s for further treatment. After this, Professor Quirrell had informed the Headmaster, stating the facts briefly before vanishing through the Floo; the Aurors, notified by St. Mungo’s, had demanded his presence for questioning.

The clear intent of the Blood-Cooling Charm had been to kill Draco Malfoy so slowly that the wards of Hogwarts, set to detect sudden injury, would not trigger. Under interrogation, Professor Quirrell had told the Aurors that he had cast several tracking Charms upon Mr. Malfoy’s person in January, shortly after Mr. Malfoy’s return to Hogwarts from Yuletime break. Professor Quirrell had cast tracking Charms because he had learned of a person with a motive to harm Mr. Malfoy. Professor Quirrell had refused to identify this person. The tracking Charms which Professor Quirrell had cast were triggered by Mr. Malfoy’s health falling below an absolute level, rather than by sudden changes, and had therefore alerted Professor Quirrell before Mr. Malfoy had died.

Two drops of Veritaserum, sufficient to prevent Mr. Malfoy from withholding any meliorating or moderating information in his statements, had shown that Mr. Malfoy had - legally under the laws of Noble Houses, illegally under the regulations of Hogwarts - challenged Hermione Granger to a duel. Mr. Malfoy had won the duel but had then, as he left, been attacked from behind by Miss Granger with a Stunning Hex. After this Mr. Malfoy knew nothing.

Three drops of Veritaserum, requiring her to volunteer all relevant information, had caused Hermione Granger to confess that she had stunned Draco Malfoy from behind, and then, in a fit of anger, cast the Blood-Cooling Charm on him, with the deliberate intention of killing him slowly enough to evade identification from the Hogwarts wards, whose workings she had read about in
Hogwarts: A History
. She had been horrified at herself upon awakening the next morning, but had not told anyone of what she’d done, believing Draco Malfoy to be already dead - as he certainly would have been after seven hours, had his body’s own magic not been resisting the effects of the Blood-Cooling Charm.

“Her trial,” said Albus Dumbledore, “is set for tomorrow at noon.”

“
What?
” the word burst out of Harry Potter. The Boy-Who-Lived didn’t rise from his chair, but Minerva saw his fingers whiten where they gripped the wooden seat beneath him. “That’s insane! You can’t do a police investigation in one day -”

The Potions Master raised his voice. “This is not
Muggle
Britain, Mr. Potter!” Severus’s face was as expressionless as ever, but the bite in his voice was sharp. “The Aurors have an accusation under Veritaserum and a confession under Veritaserum. So far as they are concerned, the investigation is
done
.”

“Not quite,” said Dumbledore, just as Harry seemed ready to explode. “I have insisted to Amelia that this matter be given the utmost scrutiny. Unfortunately, as the ill-fated duel was at midnight -”

“
Supposed
duel,” Harry said sharply.

“As the
supposed
duel was at midnight - yes, you’re quite right, Harry - it is beyond the range of any Time-Turner -”

“Also
supposedly
,” the Boy-Who-Lived said coldly. “And rather
suspiciously
, since the alleged murder suspect doesn’t know about Time-Turners. I hope that an invisible Auror was immediately sent back in time as far as possible to observe -”

Dumbledore inclined his head. “I went
myself,
Harry, the moment I heard. But by the time I reached the trophy room, Mr. Malfoy was already unconscious and Miss Granger had gone -”

“No,” said Harry Potter. “You reached the trophy room and saw Draco unconscious. That is all you observed, Headmaster. You did not
observe
Hermione there, or watch her leave. Let us distinguish observation from inference.” The boy’s head turned to look at her. “Imperius, Obliviation, False Memory Charm, Legilimency. Professor McGonagall, am I leaving out any mind-affecting spell that could have made Hermione do this or make her believe she’d done it?”

“The Confundus Charm,” she said. And the Dark Arts had never been her study, but she knew - “And certain Dark rituals. But none of those could be performed in Hogwarts without alarm.”

The boy nodded, his eyes still directly addressing her. “Which of those spells can be detected? Which would the Aurors try to detect?”

“The Confundus Charm would wear off in a few hours,” she said, after a moment to gather her thoughts. “Miss Granger would remember the Imperius. Obliviation cannot be detected by any known means, but only a Professor could have cast that spell upon a student without alarm from the Hogwarts wards. Legilimency - can only be detected by another Legilimens, I think -”

“I requested that Miss Granger be examined by the court Legilimens,” said Dumbledore. “The examination showed -”

“Do we trust him?” said Harry.

“Her,” said Dumbledore. “Sophie McJorgenson, whom I remember as an honest student of Ravenclaw, and she is bound by the Unbreakable Vow to tell the truth of what she sees -”

“Could someone else be Polyjuiced as her?” Harry Potter interrupted again. “What did you
observe,
Headmaster?”

Albus said heavily, “A person who looked like Madam McJorgenson told us that a single Legilimens had lightly touched Miss Granger’s mind some months ago. That is from January, Harry, when I communicated with Miss Granger about the matter of a certain Dementor. That was expected; but what I did not expect was the rest of what Sophie found.” The old wizard turned to gaze into the Floo fire, letting the orange flames reflect on his face. “As you say, Harry, a False Memory Charm is one possibility; they are, when cast perfectly, indistinguishable from true memory -”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Harry interrupted. “Studies show that human memories are more or less rewritten every time we remember them -”

“Harry,” Minerva said softly, and the boy’s mouth clamped shut.

The old wizard continued. “- but a False Memory Charm of such quality requires as much time to create as a true memory. Creating a detailed memory of ten minutes would be ten minutes’ work. And according to the court Legilimens,” Albus’s face now seemed more tired and lined than before, “Miss Granger has been obsessing over Mr. Malfoy since the day that Severus… yelled at her. She has been thinking of how Mr. Malfoy might be in league with Professor Snape, how he might be planning to harm her and harm Harry - imagining it for hours every day - it would be impossible to create false memories for so much time.”

“The appearance of insanity…” Severus murmured softly, as though he were speaking to himself. “
Could
it be natural? No, it is too disastrous to be pure accident; too convenient for
someone,
I have no doubt. A Muggle drug, perhaps? But that would not be enough - Miss Granger’s madness would have to be
guided
-”

“Ah!” Harry said suddenly. “I get it now. The
first
False Memory Charm was cast on Hermione after Professor Snape yelled at her, and showed, say, Draco and Professor Snape plotting to kill her. Then last night that False Memory was
removed
by Obliviation, leaving behind the memories of her obsessing about Draco for no apparent reason, at the same time she and Draco were given false memories of the duel.”

Minerva blinked in startlement. It would have been a thousand years before she thought of that possibility.

The Potions Master was frowning thoughtfully, eyes intent. “The
reaction
to a False Memory Charm is hard to predict in advance, Mr. Potter, without Legilimency. The subjects do not always act as expected, when they first remember the false memories. It would have been a risky ploy. But I suppose that is one way Professor Quirrell could have done it.”

“
Professor Quirrell?
” said Harry. “What motive does
he
have to -”

The Potions Master said dryly, “The Defense Professor is always a suspect, Mr. Potter. You will notice a trend, given time.”

Albus raised up a hand, a silencing gesture, and their heads all turned to look at him. “But in this case there is another suspect,” Albus said quietly. “Voldemort.”

That deadliest of unspeakable words seemed to echo around the room, canceling all the heat from the orange flames of the fireplace.

“I do not know,” the old wizard said slowly, “I know all too little, of the methods of Voldemort’s immortality. He searched out those books before I did, I think. All I could find were ancient tales, scattered across too many volumes for him to remove. But to find truth among many stories is also a wizard’s mastery, and this I have endeavored to do. There is a human sacrifice, a murder, of that I am certain; committed in coldest blood, the victim dying in horror. And old, old tales of wizards possessed, doing mad deeds, claiming the names of Dark Lords thought defeated; and there is usually a device, of that Dark Lord, which they wield…” Albus looked at Harry, the ancient eyes searching the younger. “I think, Harry - though you will call it only inference - that the act of murder splits the soul. That by ritual of blackest horror, the torn fragment of soul is chained to this world. To a material thing of this world. Which must be, or which then becomes, a device of power.”

Horcrux.
The terrible name echoed in Minerva’s mind, though it seemed that - for what reason she did not know - Albus would not speak that word in front of Harry.

“And therefore,” the old wizard finished quietly, “the remainder of the soul is bound to its chained part, lingering here when its body is destroyed. A sad and painful existence, I think it would be; less than spirit, less than the meanest ghost…” The old wizard’s eyes were locked on Harry, who gazed back with his eyes narrowed. “It would take time for that mutilated soul to regain a mockery of life. That is why we have had our ten-year reprieve, I believe; why Voldemort did not return at once. But in time… that revenant would become capable of rising again.” The old wizard spoke with grim precision. “It is clear, from the stories, that the Dark Lords who return by possessing another’s form, wield lesser magics than they once knew. I do not think Voldemort would be satisfied with that. He would take some other avenue to life. But Voldemort was more Slytherin than Salazar, grasping at every opportunity. He would
use
his pitiful state,
use
his power of possession, if he had reason. If he could benefit by another’s… inexplicable fury.” Albus’s voice had fallen to almost a whisper. “That is what I suspect happened to Miss Granger.”