Kingly Adventures

( Author's Note: This is a chapter giving others' reactions to the happenings occuring in the world.)

Charles Potter was worried. The man called Alexander Fortis was dangerous that much Dorea had told him and he had seen his eyes and his disregard towards others. Charles had contacted his friends and informed them about his encounter with this man. He had shared his suspicions but Alexander knew that they would not easily believe him. Nobody who had seen the horrors of the war was not ever willingly enter into war again. Charles also hoped so but the morning Daily Prophet dashed his hopes. The picture of a blown up Gringrots was screaming at his face that a new war was on horizon. Charles knew that this was not a result of some valiant fight of goblins but the after effects of a muggle device called bomb which has similar effects as Bombarda spell but was much more lethal and bigger. Charles saw Dorea entering the living room while humming a happy tune. Charles, in order to not to worry Dorea tried to hide the paper but was not successful in his attempt. Dorea snatched the paper from him and Charles saw the lines of worry appearing on her face when she read the paper.

Dorea took a deep breath and turned towards Charles who had a grave face and said, " This is his doing."

Charles, " But, how?"

Dorea, " I don't know but we should ȧssemble everyone for a meeting."

Charles, " Dumbledore must not be invited."

Dorea, " Charles!!! This is not the time."

Charles, " No Dorea!!! That man is a liar and a manipulative old bastard. He told the world that he took down Grindlewald alone but it was us who had weakened Grindlewald enough that he managed to win against him. I don't care about fame but he threatened you and Leo and made us take a vow of silence. His ŀȧpdog proclaimed the fight as the greatest duel. If you and Leonard were not injured, Arcturus and I would have ended him then and there. I am not blaming you, Dorea. I don't want to see the face of that man. I don't care if there is a war coming but I would never allow any harm come to you. You have already suffered enough, Dorea. I know, you always wanted a child. I.... Am..... Sorry, Dorea, because of me, you joined the war and lost the ability to bear children. For this, I will never forgive myself and Dumbledore. If that bastard had not stopped us, we could have healed you on time, Dorea. Only the promise, I made to you, is preventing me from marching into Hogwarts and kill that man."

Dorea smiled sadly and cupped Charles' face, " I never blamed you, Charles. I would have joined the war even if you would have tried to stop me. Grindlewald was a danger to the whole wizarding world and someone would have to stop him at one point. Even if I cannot bear a child, I am happy with you. As for killing Dumbledore, it would be possible but you would also lose your life. I am not doubting your capability but that man is connected to the wardstone of Hogwarts and can draw power from there. Moreover, he has somehow managed to bind a pheniox to him, a magical species who never comes near a human. I don't know how he did it but no good person will ever do this."

Charles, " Why don't we just expose him?"

Dorea, " The people is wizarding world see him as the second coming of Merlin. No one will ever believe us and the public would demand ours heads."

Charles sighed, " You are right. Let's gather others. We will meet at the Black Manor. It's safest due to the amount of wards Arcturus had put up on that manor. I will floo the others."

AT THE BLACK MANOR:

There was a group of men and women waiting in the hall of the Black Manor. Arcturus said, " That Potter is always late. He called for a meeting about such a important matter but himself is not present."

Leonard, " He must be late because of something important."

The Floo flared to life and Charles and Dorea stepped out. Dorea said, " Sorry, we are late. This man here, despite being a war veteran forgot where he kept his own wand."

Arcturus turned to Leonard and said, " See, this was his important work. You,Hufflepuffs are too trusting. Thankfully, I was the brain of our team during the war or we would not have survived beyond the first day."

Charles snorted, " Brain of the team, he says!!! He got fooled when that female spy made eyes at him.It was me and Leonard who saved this fellow."

Ophelia, Arcturus' wife turned to stare at him and said, " Dear Husband!!! We are going to have a long talk about your war adventures after this."

Arcturus sweated and then turned towards Charles and said, " Griffindor Menace!!! You said there was something important to discuss between us."

The atmosphere of room turned grave and Charles muttered " Spoilsport" under his breath for which he earned a blow on his stomach by Dorea. Dorea then turned towards the rest and said, " There is a possibility of a new dark lord in the town."

Charles, " He is a dark lord. He blowed up Gringrots for heaven's sake. Well!!! I didn't liked them but according to my sources, thousands of goblins died."

Ophelia asked, " The goblins let him go, just like that."

Dorea, " He was not even there when the Gringrots blew up. According to my sources, the explosion took place in the forges."

Charles, " You have sources. How did I knew nothing about this? How do you have this information, even I didn't knew this. We are going to have a talk about this."

Dorea, " Charles!!! This is not the time. Now, my sources tell that the explosion was so great that several floors of the bank were completely disintegrated."

Arcturus, " How? Every inch of the bank is magically reenforced. The amount of power behind that explosion must be tremendrous."

Charles, " I think it was a muggle bomb."

Leonard, " We have seen the effects of those muggle devices. Even the ones the muggle drop from their flying contraptions don't cause that much damage to a magically enforced building."

Charles, " Those flying contraptions are called fighter planes. Muggles are bloody brilliant to come up with something like this."

Arcturus, " This is not the time for discussing the muggles and their contraptions. I think that we should focus on this fellow. What is his name?"

Dorea, " Alexander Fortis, that's what he told us."

Arcturus, " I will contact my spies in the ministry to find information on him. Dorea give me a description on how he looks. We should also prepare safe houses. Our safe houses must be under Fidielus charm. We will also put up siege wards on them. We should also contact people we know in the foreign countries, to keep an eye out on anything suspicious."

Leonard, " Sending letters would not be safe anymore. We should meet here every week to discuss what we have learned."

Charles, " You are right. We should all inform our trusted friends to be on alert and ready to go into hidding at the shortest notice." Everyone nodded and left the manor.

AFTER THE CAPTURE OF WEREWOLVES:

Once again, a meeting took place in the Bones Manor. The room was very tense and there were new additions in the room. Amelia Bones, Leonard's daughter who was also an Auror, was also present. Fleamont and Euphemia Potter were also present.

Charles, " Arcturus!!! I don't understand why did you included Fleamont and Euphemia into this."

Leonard, " Same for Amelia also "

Arcturus, " Fleamont is a well acknowledged potioneer, he would be very helpful if the war happened. As Fleamont cannot hide anything from his wife so she is also here. Amelia is one of the Aurors who went to investigate the disappearance of the werewolves."

Charles and Leonard both looked unhappy but gradually accepted this.

Dorea turned towards Amelia and said in serious voice, " Tell us what you know?"

Amelia already knowing the reason of the meeting from Arcturus said, " The Auror department was notified late at night of a spellfight occuring deep in the forests of Galloway. The man reporting was drunk so the senior Aurors present ignored it thinking it of as the light from muggle torches who had come for adventuring in the forest. Only my team mate, Alastor Moddy thought differently. He wanted to investigate alone as nobody was taking it seriously but I went with him. We reached the Galloway Forest and searched for the signs of any spell fight. We didn't find any signs but Moddy found tracks of running coming from inside the forest. We reached the end of the tracks and saw a field of grass that was completely empty. That raised alarm bells in my mind."

Charles, " Why?"

Amelia replied, " That portion of forest was too cleaned. There were no animal tracks, no dried leaves, hell!!! there was not a single animal anywhere near that area. I immediately knew that something was not right. It was Moddy who found an important clue which was initially overlooked by me."

Leonard, " What did he find?"

Amelia, " You know that powerful wizards and witches can sense the magic around them, right." Everyone nodded. Amelia continued, " He found that that there were traces of powerful wards around the perimeter of the area we were investigating. We passed on the results of our investigation to the higher ups and continued to investigate the surrounding areas."

Charles, " Did you find anything else?"

Amelia nodded and said, " Yes!!! At first we had thought that the animals had ran away due to fight but then we found a squirrel sleeping away without a care. Generally, if a spell fight of the level reported occurs animals are the first to bolt but here was not the case. Then, we changed our approach. We started tracking animals."

Dorea, " Why?"

Amelia, " Normal animals run away from magically charged area. We don't know why but it happens. There is not a single non magical animal in the Forbidden Forest. We tracked animals to know the center of the fight or whatever that took place there. We found normal animal tracks but no tracks of animals running in panic."

Charles, " Where did you learn this? I think Aurors don't train their recruits in this."

Amelia, " We were tracking Greyback. He uses animal tracks to disguise his movements so we learned to track animals"

Delia Bones, Amelia's mother said, " You were tracking Greyback!!! Young lady, we are going to have a talk about this. He is a monster. You should not be anywhere near him."

Leonard," Delia!!! She is an Auror now and if the war comes, she will face much more worse things than Greyback."

Amelia looked towards her father in relief and then continued, " We were confused. That's when I noticed that the forest was eerily silent. We became alert of any unforeseeable danger but thankfully we were wrong but what we found was more worrying."

Arcturus, " What did you find?"

Amelia, " All the animals in a radius of 20 kilometers were asleep. Alastor casted enervate on a bird but nothing happened. We examined the bird and found that it was magically put to sleep."

Fleamont, " How can someone charm so many animals to sleep in such a large area?"

Euphemia suddenly exclaimed, " Sleeping ward!!!!"

Charles, " What is this thing?"

Euphemia, " I took up healing recently as Fleamont often gets injured while inventing his potions. My healer friend told me that the hospitals use a ward to make their long term patients sleep as generally these patients become resistive to sleep inducing potions due to long exposure. But to cast it over such a large area and with so much power that animals did not even know something before they fall asleep."

Ophelia , " How? Animals have better senses than humans. They would have already sensed the humans intruding upon their territory." As she was speaking, a Bones family elf appeared in room carrying tea and snacks.

Dorea's eyes widened in realisation and she said, " House Elves. That's how it was done."

Charles, " What?"

Dorea, " Alexander Fortis used house elves to lay the wards."

Leonard, " But house elves are not powerful enough to put up these kind of wards."

Arcturus, " I think she is right. You know that I am interested in warding. "

Charles muttered in low voice, " He is obsessed with it." Since the room was quite, his voice echoed in the room.

Arcturus pointedly ignored Charles and continued, " The curse breakers use temporary wardstones to lay down counter wards against whatever wards they are trying to break. I think this fellow used such wardstones to lay down the wards."

Amelia, " The wards were too powerful for temporary wardstones to handle."

Dorea, " Then, how did he do it?"

Arcturus, " I don't know. When did you came to know that werewolves had gone missing?"

Amelia, " According to the seniors, it was Dumbledore who told the Head Auror."

Charles, " What was that man doing with Head Auror at that time of night? I knew that the man was somewhat strange."

Amelia blushed at the implications of Charles' statement and Charles earned glares from all people present in the room.

Dorea, " Amelia!!! Don't pay attention to him. Continue."

Amelia cleared her throat and spoke, " As you know new Hogwarts' year is starting in 3 days, Dumbledore had come to discuss the security detail on the Hogwarts Express and the platform with the Head Auror. When our report was transported there, Dumbledore was present there. He told the Head Auror that the werewolves were living in that forest."

Charles, " How did he knew this?"

Amelia, " It was Dumbledore who subtly suggested that place to the werewolves as he wanted them to be kept where he could keep his eyes on them. He had suggested such places to various packs."

Delia, " How many werewolves packs are there?"

Amelia, " According to ministry records, there are ten packs but unofficially we don't know. Dumbledore made us aware of 5 more packs. The Head Auror was not happy with Dumbledore for withholding such a crucial information."

Arcturus, " It's Dumbledore's old habit, to keep all the information with him in order to appear more important in the eyes of the people. What happened next?"

Amelia, " The Auror department send teams to the location of all known packs and found similar traces in all those areas. One thing was clear to us, this was not an isolated incident. As we didn't know the exact number of packs and their location, we could not check up on them. But, one extremely worrying thing was pointed out by Moddy."

Arcturus, " What did he found?"

Amelia, " There is a mole in the Auror Department. At first, I didn't believe it but later on I was also became sure of it."

Charles, " How can you be sure of this?"

Amelia, " The last few sites of inspection had more clues than before. There were more evidences of spell fight, the tracks were not properly erased as before, there were traces of blood around the site of investigation. Things that indicated that the preparators were in a hurry. They knew that we were onto them."

Leonard, " This is worrying. From now on, don't discuss anything about this outside the sanctuary of our homes. Don't send any letters. Also, we should include your teammate in all this."

Suddenly, a voice came from the corner of the room, " I am in."

Everyone except Amelia jumped and pointed their wands at the source of the voice. They saw a young man with blond hair and blue eyes coming out from a invisibility cloak. The young man bowed and said, " Alastor Moddy, at your service."

Arcturus, " Leonard!!! We should have a talk about the security of your manor."

Leonard, " I don't know how he get here."

Arcturus, " This is going to make our talk a lot more difficult for you."

Amelia, " I brought him here as I also have access to the wards. He is a very capable Auror and also my teammate. He was also very helpful in investigation and arriving at some important conclusions."

Charles, " What did you find, Auror Moddy?"

Alastor said in a serious tone, " This operation was conducted by this Alexander fellow at a very large scale. He had hit multiple packs at the same time and was successful in capturing all the werewolves present there. This shows that he has a massive amount of followers behind him. I have estimated on the information of Dumbledore and Ministry that the number of captured werewolves should be in thousands. The werewolves are magically resistant so the sleeping ward would not have immediate effect on them so they should have put up a fight. Now, there is another theory that the ward was so powerful that the werewolves' magical resistant was nothing in front of it and they immediately lost conciousness. The implications of both the theories are very worrying. My instincts are saying that this fellow has both, massive number of followers and high magical power."

Charles snorted, " Alexander Fortis is a monster. He has more magical power than Dumbledore and Grindlewald combined."

Alastor Moddy, " How do you know this, Mr. Potter?"

Charles, " There are some things that should not be revealed."

Dorea, " I think we should trust them, Charles."

Arcturus and the rest just looked in curiousity.

Dorea, " I can sense magic and estimate the amount of magical power of a person. Alexander Fortis is the most powerful person that I have ever sensed and I have sensed both Dumbledore and Grindlewald. Moreover, he has full control over his power."

Amelia, " How did you know this?"

Charles, " A goblin had irritated him pretty bad. He got angry but he didn't release any magical aura from his body if we had not fought in the war, we would have not been able to sense the displeasure he had towards the goblin. Well!!! Gringrots paid for their rudeness."

Amelia, " You mean that the incident at Gringrots was his doing."

Charles, " The damage at Gringrots was similar to the destruction caused by a muggle device called bomb but we don't know how that bomb reached the forges of the goblins."

Alastor Moddy, " What if it was a spell? A time delayed spell."

Arcturus, "Spells that can cause this much damage to a magically fortified building like Gringrots require quite a few wizards and some preparations. Goblins would not have allowed someone to just cast such spell in their forges."

Amelia, " If Alexander Fortis is as powerful as you say. It would be easy for him to use such spell singlehandly or he could have made a new spell."

Dorea, " Creating spell of such a caliber is not easy."

Arcturus, " But, intent and power can do anything."

Charles, " What?"

Arcturus, " One of the oldest sayings of the magical world, With enough intent and power you can do anything. If Alexander Fortis is powerful enough, he doesn't require any spells, just his intent is enough to shape his magic."

Leonard, " The magical power behind such ab endevour would be tremendrous. When you met in Leaky Cauldron, was his eyes or body showing any signs of tiredness? Casting powerful magic suddenly makes one feel somewhat tired."

Dorea, " He was as energetic as a horse. There was no changes in his complexion. Hell!!! He had transfigured one of his men's appearance after existing the bank and send him back to the bank. Maybe that man planted the bomb. We can't be sure."

Charles, " We should not focus anymore on past events but try to stop this fellow's advance. We should alert our contacts in foreign ministries as sure as hell, our ministry would do nothing. Sometimes, I think that the higher ups of the ministry have rotten brains!!!"

Arcturus , " Yes!!! We should do this. Let's end this meeting and move to complete our goals. Amelia and Alastor, you two would have to be extra alert."

Everyone nodded and left after having dinner. But one thing was clear to everyone that something big was going to happen in future.

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