"Thank you," said Bones. "And do let me know, toute suite, if any of your students, bar the three Slytherins I mentioned, turn up missing."
"Of course," replied Marchbanks.
When Marchbanks headed off, Bones walked back over to a clearly irritated Lord Potter.
"Harry," she quietly said.
When he just gave a nod back, she knew he was still upset.
She sighed and explained to him what had happened at Saint Mungo's not that long ago.
"He had help," said Harry. "No idea who that help was?"
"None," she replied.
_‗_
―==(oIo)==―
ˇ
After wishing Madam Bones well in her hunt for Albus Dumbledore, Harry and Neville left to head for the Infirmary. He thought it only right to tell the others what Madam Bones had told him.
If he had hung about the entrance hall a little longer, he'd have seen a sullen Draco Malfoy enter with Parkinson and his two bookends. And Marchbanks berate all four for 'avoiding' the aurors before assigning all four with further points losses and detentions.
When Harry walked in to the Infirmary it was to see Hermione sitting beside a bed with Daphne in it. Hermione was still wearing her 'witches casual' attire Harry kept insisting - as did Daphne, now - she wear when she didn't have to wear her Hogwarts uniform, with her sleeve still missing. And now Daphne was wearing a hospital robe.
Neville's two, plus Tracey, were also there. All five were chatting and laughing happily.
Walking in the door, Harry stopped and reached out to also stop Neville, as all five pairs of eyes were smiling back at them.
"Nev!" he mock whispered. "I think they're making dastardly plans about us. We should run!"
Neville gave a snort of amusement, as all five girls laughed. He pushed Harry's arm out of the way and walked over to the them.
"Oh, well!" Harry mock wailed. "Where a Longbottom goes, a Potter is sure to be there to drag his mate out of danger!"
With Neville a little ahead, the other boy walked over and kissed both his girls on the cheek, before looking around for another chair.
Harry gave a shrug, walked over and kissed Hermione on the cheek, then leaned over the edge of the bed and kissed a very surprised Daphne on the cheek, too.
As the girl blushed he pulled back and asked, "Skele-Gro?"
Daphne looked a little annoyed, which caused the blush to immediately recede, before she nodded. "According to medi-wizard Robinson, I'm here for the night."
"Hmm..." he said. "Mind if I put monitoring wards up on your bed?"
Curious, she asked, "No, why?"
He firmly replied, "Just in case someone uses the opportunity of knowing you're in here, alone, to try to attack you."
That had her worried a little. "Go ahead," she nodded.
Harry stepped back and cast the simple alert ward he wanted. It was keyed to her heart rate.
"Done," he smiled.
Hermione, ever curious, asked, "What sort of alert ward did you use?"
"A heartbeat one," he smiled back. "If Daphne's heartbeat goes above ten beats per minute more than what it is now, I'll know. If anyone enters and threatens to attack, her heartbeat will go up, which will trigger the alert."
Hermione looked back in surprise, as did the others. She said, "That's actually quite clever."
"Thank you," he smiled.
"I mean, the threat doesn't even need to approach her bed," she continued. "Just being in the room is enough, if that person proves themselves to be a threat. And it'll be Daphne's autonomic reflexes that'll trigger it, not something she consciously has to do."
Still smiling he replied, "I'm aware. That's why I picked it."
Cutting in before Hermione could go on one of her thought-made-verbal excursions, Daphne asked, "Do you know why they evacuated Hogsmeade?"
"Oh; yes," he replied. "Madam Marchbanks is going to announce to the wider school at lunch that a dangerous criminal has escaped lawful custody and was thought to be heading for Hogsmeade. They didn't want any students in the village in case the foul fiend took a student or two as a hostage."
A little quieter, he continued, "However, what she will not be announcing is that the escaped criminal is Albus Dumbledore. Madam Bones wanted us to know because she's absolutely positive that, first chance he gets, Dumbledore's going to try and grab me. And, if he can't do that, he'll try and grab one of you; so as to bargain with me to volunteer to swap."
"Dumbledore was in custody?" asked Tracey. "I didn't know that."
Harry nodded and said, "Remember us telling you about how he tried to analyse the wards at the Grangers' in order to find a way through them?"
She nodded.
"Well, they arrested him that night," he replied. "When they then tried to interrogate him under Veritaserum, he had a heart attack. Since then, he was in Saint Mungo's, recovering.
"This morning, after being informed yesterday evening he'd effectively recovered from it, Madam Bones believed he was well enough to be moved back to the DMLE holding cells before they recommenced interrogating him under Veritaserum. Some mongrel helped him escape from right outside the doors of the DMLE secure ward at Saint Mungo's, while they were moving him from the ward to the nearest floo point.
"All that occurred just as we were leaving the school for the village. Then it took them a short while to figure out there was a Hogsmeade day here today and Madam Bones ordered a full turn out of Aurors and an emergency attendance at the village to chase all the students back to the school. Just in case."
"Wow!" said Hannah. "It's been a busy morning for Aunt Ami."
"Yup," nodded Harry. "And her day is not done; not by a long cast. She needs to organise teams to go and search Dumbledore's old haunts, such as his own place in Godric's Hollow and his parent's old place in Mold on the Wold."
"Think they'll catch him?" asked Daphne.
Harry thought about it before he sighed and replied, "No. We're talking about a man who is more than capable of casting a Fidelius, remember? If he gets a wand anywhere near suitable for him in his hand, he'll have the charm up fast and hide under it until the heat dies down. It's what I'd do.
"Once he has the charm up, he'd have all the time in the world to work out what he was going to do from there. And that includes coming up with a plan to get his hands on me."
_‗_
―==(oIo)==―
ˇ
A while later and after being kicked out of the Infirmary by the new medi-wizard, ordered by him to go and have lunch, the Heirs bar Daphne headed for the Great Hall just as the weekend lunch period began.
It was while sitting there and thinking about how he thought Dumbledore would hide himself, at least for a while, under a Fidelius charm, Harry called Dobby to bring him his school satchel with ink, quills and parchment. Then began to write.
He wrote Madam Bones a note explaining why he thought Dumbledore would move to hide himself under a Fidelius. Then suggested she make the manhunt only continue for no more than two/three days.
'After that, I think you'll be wasting your time,' he wrote. 'He'd definitely have the Fidelius up by then. And no amount of searching for him is going to find him. Best not to exhaust your aurors for what would be a fool's quest.'
As there was no hurry for the note, he would send it off using Hedwig; who would be, of course, happy to take it.
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