Harry had decided to sleep in the next morning, and as a result he missed the initial reports on what was already being called the 'Massacre at Azkaban' on the radio. For many in the wizarding world this attack came as a complete surprise, although in retrospect it really should not have. It was suddenly clear that they were a nation at war and many people were not ready to deal with that yet.
At about 11:00 AM Harry finally rolled out of bed and turned the radio on, hoping to hear the questioning of Peter Pettigrew. But what he found was something completely different.
"… and we can now report that the death toll has risen to nine Aurors, all of whom were on the night shift at Azkaban prison. No names have yet been released out of respect for their families. Our sources tell us that there are typically fifteen Aurors assigned to the prison at that time of day but we have not been given final word on how many were there last night. Additionally another half dozen or so inmates appeared to have died during the early morning attack, however information on that is still scarce." Harry heard from Daphne's small radio. As he listened he sat back down on his bed in shock. He had been expecting Voldemort to make some type of move soon, but this was a bold one even for him.
"For those of you just joining us, late last night Azkaban prison was attacked by a group identified as Death Eaters and led by no other than You-Know-Who. This is the first confirmed sighting of the previously believed dead Dark Lord since his return was announced by Death Eater Peter Pettigrew before the Wizengamot one week ago. The purpose of the attack appears to have been to free Death Eaters which had been imprisoned. We do not yet have a full list on which prisoners escaped but a preliminary list includes Peter Pettigrew, Rastaban Lestrange, Rodolphus Lestrange, Bellatrix Lestrange, Antonin Dolohov, Augustus Rookwood, and Gabriel Greengrass."
Harry let out a gasp of surprise at the last name. He had completely forgotten that Daphne's uncle was still alive and being held captive in Azkaban. He did remember that the man had been a loyal Death Eater for several years before Voldemort's fall in 1981, and that he was imprisoned after a foolish attack on the Ministry in an attempt to uncover more information on his master's whereabouts. He wondered how Daphne and her family were reacting to the news, but without being able to send her a letter there was no way for him to find out.
Harry was still listening a few minutes later when he heard the doorbell ring. Curious as to who would be visiting, Harry walked downstair and opened the door. Again, he was surprised at what he found.
"Moony? What are you doing here?" Harry said as he smiled at his old Professor.
"Not glad to see me then? Perhaps I should go." Remus joked. "Can I come in?"
"Sure." Harry answered. "My aunt and uncle are supposed to be gone for the day, so hopefully you won't have to deal with them.
"Good, they weren't the nicest people around if I remember correctly." Remus replied. Remus sat down in the chair Harry had pointed him to and began to look around nervously, as if he wasn't sure about what he was going to tell Harry. "Harry, I need to tell you about something awful that happened last night…"
"The Azkaban breakout, right?" Harry asked.
"How did you already know about that?" Remus said in surprise.
"I have a radio upstairs that Daphne gave me. I haven't had anything better to do so I've been listening all week." Harry told him. Remus nodded at the answer and seemed a little relieved that Harry already knew.
"Then you already know that Wormtail has escaped." Remus said.
"Yeah, I know." Harry said with a little bit of anger evident in his voice. "Next time we catch him we'll just kill him, I'm tired of the little rat managing to free himself no matter what we do." Remus looked up at Harry with an odd expression on his face as if he had not expected to hear that from Harry but he did not say anything about it. He simply shrugged and continued on with the conversation.
"Well, then I guess I'll try and get to something that you don't already know. Dumbledore doesn't know that I'm here, he would never approve if he did. Sirius wanted to be here, but he knew Dumbledore would be watching him and thought it would be smarter for me to do it." Remus explained. "Harry, Dumbledore wants to keep you here the entire summer."
"It's ok, Moony. I already knew. My uncle let it slip on the way here." Harry answered. "And he's been withholding my mail, too. What I don't understand is why he is doing it. And what are we supposed to do about it?"
"We're already working on it." Remus assured him. "And in way, what happened in Azkaban will help us."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Dumbledore has been pushing to get Scrimgeour into office all week for some reason." Remus began. "Apparently he thinks he will be able to exert more influence over him than he would Amelia Bones. We think he was going to use that influence to slow down Sirius's application to become your guardian in the magical world. Even Dumbledore doesn't have the ability to stop it from happening, but he could slow it down so that you would have to stay here the entire summer."
"Why, though?" Harry asked. "It doesn't make any sense."
"All he will say is that you are safer here than anywhere else. Sirius doesn't buy that, either." Remus said. "It just so happens that Sirius and Amelia Bones were friends back before he got thrown into prison. Sirius was an Auror in those days and she was somewhat of a mentor to him. After everyone found out he was innocent Madam Bones invited Sirius over for dinner so she could apologize to her old friend for all that had happened to him. This wouldn't make much of a difference except now everyone is looking for someone to blame for what happened at Azkaban."
"And it's going to be Scrimgeour because he was Interim Minister, right?" Harry asked.
"Exactly, and that means Bones is now the frontrunner to become the next Minister of Magic." Remus replied. "Really though, it wasn't Scimgeour's fault. There wasn't anything he could have done in a week that would have prevented it. But the press don't care about that and are already calling for his head. Supposedly he is going to remove his name from consideration and claim that he would be better utilized dedicating his time to the war effort. It's a smart move, politically speaking. What it means for us is that Dumbledore has spent his time and effort on a losing candidate, while Sirius got lucky and is friends with the winner who just happens to feel like she owes him something."
"That's great!" Harry said with a smile on his face. "So can we leave now?"
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