Harry Potter and all characters, etc. belong to J. K. Rowling, not me.
Dumbledore Answers Harry - Chapter 10 - Attack of the Slytherins
Harry walked with Professor Dumbledore to the outside of the house. While they were walking, Harry asked the headmaster, "Do you think you could make Draco a portkey here? He might get in trouble in the Slytherin dorm and need to leave in a hurry, but I don't want to give him the one my father made."
The aged professor looked at Harry. "That is a thoughtful idea. If Voldemort does free Lucius, no doubt he will quickly spread the word about his son. Some Death Eaters may employ their older children to kill him." Dumbledore sighed. "He wouldn't be able to use the portkey lightly if I set it where it can't enter Hogwarts. I should probably set up protective wards around his bed at Hogwarts as well. If this does prove to be a problem, I may have to provide other accommodations for him."
Harry looked at Dumbledore strangely. "I don't think he'd be welcomed in Gryffindor Tower. Or Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw for that matter."
"There are other options. It is a rather large castle. Anyway, we must continue the task at hand. For the most part, you'll simply stand where you are as I perform some spells, but at a certain point you'll…" Dumbledore went on explaining what Harry's part of the ritual would be. After they finished it, Dumbledore took all the children back to Hogwarts, using a portkey he'd created out of a cotton sock.
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Within a week of Voldemort's resurrection, everybody knew he was back. A small percentage of children had been removed from Hogwarts, and Hagrid was gone. Dumbledore had told Harry that the half-giant had been requested to join the ministry in an attempt to either persuade the giants to take their side in the conflict, or at least remain neutral. Minister Bones had also removed the Dementors from Azkaban (much to the relief of the prisoners) and replaced them with aurors. Enrollment in the auror program had gone up incredibly since the announcement of Voldemort's return. Minister Bones had decided to create a different branch of law enforcement similar to the muggle military that had a faster and more intense training program to handle those that had signed up to fight Voldemort since there were many laws and procedures they really wouldn't need to know to fight Death Eaters. They would be called the 'Life Force.' Bones even came up with a 'Life Mark' for them to shoot into the sky over places they had victories to combat the Dark Mark. It showed a lion eating a snake (Slytherins didn't like it, but Bones didn't care).
Dumbledore had reorganized the Order of the Phoenix as an intelligence gathering organization, and agreed to share the knowledge that they gathered with Bones. Harry had been brought to the Department of Mysteries to destroy the copy of the prophecy that was there so Voldemort wouldn't get it. They replaced it with a thought sphere that contained a very rude message from Harry to Voldemort.
The only thing that the girls told Harry after watching his memory of the graveyard was that he was very brave and they were proud of him. The Daily Prophet had run an article describing his valiant battle with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Harry thought that the way the paper described it, you'd think he'd dueled Voldemort instead of just escaping.
A lot more students started attending Lupin's dueling club, and he started splitting the class up into two groups: those that had been attending since the beginning and the new people. He had Harry teaching the new people, including Draco Malfoy.
When Draco walked into the room the first time, every eye was on him. When he'd originally found out that Harry was second-in-command of the club he'd publicly refused to be a part of anything 'scar-head' was that involved with. Keeping with their agreement of open hostility, Harry glared at Malfoy, hissing, "What do you want?" as he reached for his wand.
Malfoy glared right back at Harry with contempt, drawing his wand. "I thought I'd amuse myself by watching your pathetic attempt at teaching defense, scarhead!"
"I'm not here to amuse the likes of you, MALFOY!" shouted Harry. "If you want to participate with everyone and maybe even learn something for the first time in your pathetic life, fine! You'll be in my group! If you start any trouble, I'll personally hex your bits off!"
"Potter, Malfoy!" shouted Lupin, joining the show, "calm down and take your places!"
"Fine," both boys said and went to the other side of the room where Harry began teaching the beginning spells.
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It was the day after that display in the dueling club that the news arrived in the Daily Prophet.
"Azkaban Attacked - Death Eaters Escape
By Rita Skeeter
Yesterday, You-Know-Who and several of his followers attacked Azkaban, which is now guarded by aurors instead of Dementors. The attack occurred in broad daylight. One minute everything was fine, and the next, several aurors had received the killing curse. The attacking group of Death Eaters hurried to start freeing prisoners, but were met by more aurors after they'd released three prisoners. Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange were successfully broken out while Antonin Dolohov died while attempting escape. There were no other Death Eater casualties…."
The article went on saying how terrible it was that Azkaban could be breached and that the Dementors would've done a better job guarding it. Dumbledore made an announcement to the school that, "The Dementors were occupied attacking muggles in London while the attack on Azkaban was going on, resulting in ten losing their souls. Unfortunately, Miss Skeeter must have overlooked this fact while writing her article advocating their return."
Harry snuck a glance toward Draco and saw his look of terror. He got up and walked to Lupin at the head table.
"Hello, Harry," said the werewolf. "What can I do for you?"
"I'd like to suggest that we combine our groups for the next few weeks and try teaching the Patronus Charm."
Remus looked a bit startled for a moment before saying, "I guess we should. With Dementors attacking people, we need to."
"Someone should also keep an eye on Malfoy. With his dad out of prison, he's probably already spread the word that his wife and son are what they call blood-traitors."
"Good idea. I'll ask Professor Mathews to stop in the Slytherin dormitory a few times a day."
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Draco Malfoy was silently sitting at a table in the Slytherin common room working on Transfiguration homework when Theodore Nott walked up to him, with Crabbe and Goyle beside him, and shouted for everyone to hear, "Malfoy! My father says you disgraced your family by becoming a blood-traitor."
Draco sneered at him, "You're the disgrace, Nott."
Nott ignored this and continued. "Your mummy also ran away from home."
Draco ignored this and made a show of picking up his quill to keep writing.
"She's probably shagging a muggle right now for money so she can live."
Draco drew his wand and shouted, "Stupify!" causing Nott to fall to the floor, but then several Slytherins, including Crabbe and Goyle, drew their wands and pointed them at Draco.
Blaise Zambini spoke. "Malfoy, you just attacked another Slytherin." He took a step forward. "You hexed one of your betters."
Draco looked around to see nearly half of the occupants of the room, many of them older than himself, coming at him, while the others clearly did not want to get involved. The blonde boy put up a protego shield like he'd learned in the dueling club that day as nearly a dozen spells were launched at him. The first few were blocked by his shield, but Draco saw that his shield was getting weaker and weaker. In desperation, he activated the portkey that was hanging around his neck. As he was feeling the familiar tug beneath his navel, one of the spells got through his shield, and he fell to the ground unconscious. He didn't see Professor Mathews enter the room to see Draco bombarded by spells as he disappeared
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"Enervate," said Narcissa Malfoy as she pointed her wand at her son.
He opened his eyes and remembered what had happened. He immediately realized that his left arm was in a lot of pain. He winced and looked at the offending limb, and winced again when he saw that it looked like it had been sliced up and mostly healed, leaving terrible scars. "Wh-What?"
"Your arm?" asked his mother as she seemed to be fighting tears. "That was hit with a spell that Severus Snape invented. It's called, 'Sectumsempra.' Apparently he's been teaching it to the older students. You're lucky it only hit your arm. The boys that did this to you are being slapped in the wrists. They lost a bunch of house points and got detention for their attempted murder." She chuckled. "If they'd been attacking anyone else, I'd probably have thought it was fine last summer. Your father was trying to get every mudblood at your school killed when he gave Ginny Weasley that diary." She sighed. "Are we really that heartless?"
Draco looked at his mother as he contemplated this. "I know that when father was arrested I'd have used that sectumsempra spell on Harry Potter without a second thought if I'd known it, and all he was doing is saving lives. Father really doesn't care about us at all, does he?"
Narcissa took a deep breath. "Your father never cared about anything except the pureness of his blood. Our marriage was arranged by our parents, and he viewed me as a tool to make an heir with. He didn't care who you really were inside. He just wanted you to be exactly like him. Once you proved that you're not him, he stopped pretending to care. I used to think that any pureblood who didn't follow the Dark Lord was a traitor, but the truth is that they never made any vows to follow him, so they're not betraying anybody. We're the ones who turned our backs on our humanity to the point that we try to kill our own families if they won't join us."
At that moment, the fireplace at the house they were staying at glowed with green flames. It was set to receive calls, but not allow anyone to enter that way. However, it would allow people to leave that way. Professor Dumbledore's face appeared in the emerald flames. "Oh good. You're awake, Mr. Malfoy. How are you feeling?"
"A bit sore, but I'll live."
"Splendid. I wanted to know if you are planning to return to Hogwarts."
"Mother told me that the students that attacked me haven't been expelled, so no."
"They have been punished," said Dumbledore.
"They got detention for trying to murder me. That's the same punishment you get for dropping a dungbomb in a classroom."
"They also lost all of Slytherin's house points."
"Those are my house points, too. Besides, do you think they give a damn about house points? The only reason we used to win the house cup was that Snape kept giving us points for harassing Gryffindors and taking away points from anyone who tried to do anything about it. Since he left you may have noticed that we're always last place in points, but still harass Gryffindors. The only reason we were happy we'd win the house cup was because we saw how disappointed everyone else was. We all thought that your house point system was a joke."
Dumbledore looked alarmed. "But surely you exaggerate. Severus may have been a bit biased but…"
"He was teaching dark magic to the older students!" said Draco, losing his patience as he showed his scarred arm to the headmaster. "He invented this spell! He started picking on Harry the moment he first stepped into his classroom! I thought it was funny at the time, but I certainly knew he wasn't being fair. The older students explained to me last year how Snape would make sure we automatically win the house cup no matter what we do. That's what happened every year he was at the school. We were totally surprised Gryffindor won last year, but the only reason was that you gave them all those points at the last minute. If Snape would've had one class with Gryffindor after that, all those points would've been gone."
"Surely not."
"You're a fool if you think otherwise, Professor," said Narcissa, who'd been silent during this conversation. "Snape would brag about it. Especially about the fact that you actually thought he wasn't cheating. You're supposed to be so clever, yet you didn't notice the way Slytherin started winning the house cup as soon as Snape started teaching there."
Dumbledore's ears went pink. "Anyway, I wanted to let Draco know that he can have private quarters if he returns."
"So I can be murdered in the halls? No thank you. Perhaps you can send my stuff here so I can study on my own. Maybe I'll be able to take my O.W.L.'s early."
"So that's it, then?" said Dumbledore, "You're just going to run away from your problems."
"Save that speech for a Gryffindor! Part of being a Slytherin is knowing when to leave."
"You heard my son! He doesn't want to go back to his death."
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