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Power Plays Chapter 18
🕑 Added 2023-06-04 15:59:00 +0000 UTCThe arena-like theatre of the Wizengamot chambers was perfectly designed to intimidate anyone speaking on the floor. The tiered-seating system that ran all the way around the edges of the room were filled with witches and wizards dressed in their formal, plum-coloured robes, which, along with the silver ‘W’ embroidered on them, denoted their status as an official member of the Wizengamot. There was a small slice of the seating that was reserved for the press and visitors, though it rarely reached more than half capacity. The dark stone walls, dimly lit by torches, provided a foreboding feeling in the room, as though malevolent shadows lurked around the periphery.
The circular clearing in the centre of the room was noticeably lower than the tiered seating. It was a sunken pit, about four metres lower than the first row of seats. It forced anyone in the centre of the room to look up at the Wizengamot members to speak to them. There was a single, plain chair there that contrasted sharply with the finely-carved benches the Wizengamot members sat upon. There was one Auror stationed by the double doors leading into the Wizengamot, another by the stairs that led up into the seating section, and a final one by the private exit anyone could use once the session started so as to avoid walking through the centre of the room.
Harry had been on duty here only a handful of times. It was normally a dull job that was assigned to Aurors recovering from injuries or those who couldn’t be trusted to do anything else; still, the job had to be taken seriously otherwise the Wizengamot members would do what they do best: complain. All it took was the wrong person being upset with an Auror’s poor performance, and that Auror could swiftly find themselves out of work.
Given the turmoil at the Ministry over the past day, the Wizengamot chamber was packed. Every single member of the Wizengamot was in attendance, and the visitors' seating was filled too. Members of the British press had arrived hours in advance to secure front-row seats, and several members of foreign press outlets were there as well. There were several angry civilians in attendance as well; Harry recognised a few of them as Ministry workers, who were likely upset over the lack of a coordinated response in dealing with the Death Eater attack on the Ministry.
Harry was waiting with nervous energy in between Susan and Daphne. After spending the night at Susan’s, they had arrived at the Ministry together to find Daphne waiting for them. Since then, neither witch had left Harry’s side, and both had been trying to monopolise his attention.
Harry wasn’t ignorant to the fact that both witches were trying to outdo the other. After slaying Voldemort, Harry had quickly become used to the reality that many witches were suddenly very interested in him. In those early days after the war, there had been countless fights at pubs and clubs for his attention, some verbal and some physical. He’d gotten quite good at recognising when there might be an impending confrontation, and it had served him well in his career as an Auror. Well, all of his years of experience were telling him that something was bubbling up between these two witches.
Thankfully, both Susan and Daphne had enough tact to not bring their competition into the fore of the day’s events. They both recognised that the Wizengamot vote was more important than their burgeoning rivalry.
The Wizengamot session had been going on for nearly two hours now. The first part of each session was dedicated to handling unresolved issues brought up in the previous session or long-standing issues that required regular debate. Frankly, Harry found it all to be quite tedious, but he understood the necessity of it. Even simple matters, such as the negotiation of Lord Shingleton’s bill that reduced the Ministry’s restrictions on self-stirring cauldrons, could act as catalysts to further more important matters.
Despite the apparent success that came when Kingsley and Amelia supported Lord Shingleton’s bill and helped get it passed with a slim majority, Daphne didn’t seem at all relieved.
“There were fewer votes than I expected,” she told him quietly beneath the noise of the clapping throughout the chamber. “Lords Tremblay and Fawley and Lady Creaseworthy flipped on us.”
That nervous bubble in Harry’s stomach flipped. “Is it still enough to get your emergency measure passed?” He murmured.
Harry could see Daphne run the mental calculations through her mind. “Yes,” she eventually answered. She frowned in thought. “We’re still up by four votes on the two-thirds majority we need if everyone we confirmed in Lord Shingleton’s faction stays the course.”
That was a big if. From what Harry could see, Lord Shingleton looked quite pleased with the outcome of the vote on his bill. It seemed likely that he’d support Daphne’s motion in exchange. The real concern was that some of his friends and supporters might oppose anything that Kingsley supported out of principle due to the ineffectual response to the attack on the Ministry yesterday. It was too late to try to change things now; all Harry could do was hope that Daphne, Amelia, and Kingsley had pulled through with their last-minute politicking yesterday.
As the Wizengamot settled back down after the bill’s passage, the Chief Warlock, Elphias Doge, a former member of the Order of the Phoenix and former Special Advisor to the Wizengamot, banged his gavel and called the chamber to order. “With the last day’s business out of the way, it is time to begin the new day’s proceedings,” Doge announced loudly, his voice magically echoing throughout the chamber.
This was their moment. They had decided that Amelia was to be the one to introduce the emergency motion proposing that Daphne should become the new head of her family since a Wizengamot member was required to be the one to introduce new motions. Harry watched as she began to stand to make her announcement, but before she could get a word out, another voice called out.
“I demand that we discuss the failings of our Minister to keep us safe!”
Everyone’s heads turned to look over at the man who was standing. There were a few murmurs of people asking who that man was, but Harry recognised him instantly.
Rhys Orpington hadn’t changed in the slightest since Harry had arrested him for going muggle hunting and nearly killing Eloise’s brother, Mathis. He’d only been in Azkaban for two months and received a minor fine for his actions due to Kingsley’s weak sentencing guidelines he’d established as a way to help calm tensions after the war. The man’s gaunt face and shoulder-length black hair stuck out clearly amid the sea of plum-coloured robes. He was wearing those same robes too despite the fact that Harry knew that he wasn’t a member of the Wizengamot. His family’s seat belonged to his niece, Nerys Orpington, who was currently in Harry’s custody alongside Cyrus Greengrass.
Doge’s eyes narrowed as he glanced at Rhys’s face and then down to a scroll on his desk. “You are not a member of the Wizengamot, sir. I’ll have to ask you to leave at once. Aurors!”
When Rhys’s hand whipped into his robes, Harry thought the man was going for his wand. Harry’s wand was in his hand in an instant, ready to defend against whatever Rhys did, but the man instead pulled out a scroll of parchment. “My appointment is right here!” He announced to the room.
One of the Aurors who had approached him cautiously took the parchment out of Rhys’s hand and carried it over to Doge. As Doge read the parchment, Rhys announced its contents to the chamber himself.
“As my niece is currently detained in Auror custody, I have been appointed her representative on the Wizengamot!” He declared before turning his gaze over to Doge. “Everything is in order, is it not, Chief Warlock?”
By the grudging look on Doge’s face, Harry knew that it had to be genuine. “Yes,” Doge answered. “This chamber recognises you as a temporary member.”
Rhys grinned, his white teeth matching his pallid skin. “Then I put forward my vote of no confidence in the leadership of our Minister, Kingsley Shacklebolt.”
The chamber exploded in a flurry of activity. Voices were raised as members tried to shout over one another, members argued with their neighbours, and several others remained calm and seated, as though they had expected something like this to come. Through it all, Rhys just kept grinning as he sat back down and watched the chaos unfurl.
“He doesn’t have the votes,” Daphne told Harry and Susan with a frown on her face. It was very impressive how she could get a measure over how a vote would pass with just a moment’s glance through the chamber. Looking and listening closely, Harry could see several large groups that were clearly opposed to Rhys’s measure.
“If he doesn’t have the votes, then why is he doing this?” Susan asked with a frown.
“Because he doesn’t need this to pass,” Harry answered before Daphne could.
“Exactly,” Daphne nodded in agreement. “He’s trying to deepen the fractures that already exist in the Wizengamot. He’s trying to get people to argue and bicker over something contentious like this. If the Minister doesn’t respond well, it might make a few people break ranks with him.”
“Do you think he’ll handle himself alright?” Harry asked Daphne. He obviously had his own preconceived notions of the efficacy of the Minister, but he wasn’t as keyed into how the Wizengamot would respond to him. Harry’s speciality was in understanding the public’s opinion; Daphne was the one with the better political insight.
It took several seconds before Daphne responded. “I don’t think so,” she admitted glumly. “He’s exhausted and been cracking under the pressure of everything, and Amelia and I had to handle a lot of the more delicate negotiations for him yesterday. Maybe if he had a good night’s sleep to clear his head, he’ll do okay.”
“I don’t know if a good night’s sleep is enough to clear up weeks of stress,” Harry muttered in reply.
“I don’t know,” Susan winked at him, making sure Daphne saw her. “Last night’s sleep did wonders for me.”
Daphne’s frosty visage returned in full force then as she settled back into her seat and stared straight ahead at the chamber. Susan looked pleased with herself and chose to ignore Harry’s chiding glare.
There was nearly an hour of discussion over the Minister’s recent performance, and little of it was positive. The angry voices dominated the discussion, mostly coming from the darker families who undoubtedly wanted a new Minister who’d be even more lenient towards them, their beliefs, and the dark artefacts in their possession. They highlighted his recent failures to unify the Wizengamot and his less-than-impressive Auror Force being unable to stop the recent attack on the Ministry. Voices in support of Kingsley came in the form of rebuttals of many of these claims. Harry recognised several prominent families argue in favour of the Minister or, at least, suggest that his failings were not a symptom of a larger fault with his rule.
However, after the initial burst of anger washed through the Wizengamot chambers, all that was left was petty bickering over minute details. It frustrated Harry to see that there was so little discussion on the role that Dawlish played in the ineffectual response to the attack; everyone seemed much more keen on focusing on Kingsley specifically. Even though Kingsley wasn’t blameless, it seemed to Harry that their single-minded focus on him was more about political gain rather than a genuine attempt to rectify the issues present in the current system.
But that was politics after all. It was an imperfect system that governed the magical world, but it was necessary nonetheless.
Kingsley appeared silent through it all. Quite frankly, he looked a little surprised that a no-confidence motion was even brought up. Harry saw the man deep in thought as the argument raged on between Wizengamot members.
Daphne kept a close eye on the discussion, and she was even taking notes. She had smoothed out her dress robes and started scribbling away on a piece of parchment she laid on her thigh. Harry held the inkwell for her as she worked. Most of her notes were difficult to decipher; they were one or two-word phrases that noted various politician’s opinions towards Kingsley, the Ministry, or anything else that came up during the discussion.
As the hour drew to a close, the discussion was forcibly halted by the Chief Warlock.
“As the matter has yet to be rectified,” Doge noted, critically eyeing several of those who were still making passionate arguments on the subject. “We will hold this issue until tomorrow. Now—”
“If I may, Chief Warlock,” Kingsley suddenly interrupted as he got to his feet. “Before we table the matter, I believe it would only be appropriate if I had a chance to speak a few words.”
“Oh no,” Daphne murmured. “Don’t say anything.”
But as Kingsley cleared his throat and straightened his robes, Harry knew that the man was going to say too much.
“For as long as I’ve been your Minister for Magic, I’ve done my best to take care of the people of our great country,” Kingsley stated loudly, his voice booming through the Wizengamot chambers. “I was a part of the resistance fighting back against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and I helped to cleanse his stain from this great institution. It is unfair to suggest that I have done anything less than putting my life on the line to serve this country.”
Kingsley’s cheeks flushed lightly in anger as he focused in on Rhys Orpington. “Your niece is being held under suspicion of her involvement in serious criminal activity. I have been doing my due diligence to keep us all safe, but even I cannot predict when unexpected attacks from radical groups will occur.”
“Your Aurors didn’t stop the attack until it had gone on for—” Rhys shouted from his seat, but Kingsley shouted over him.
“They did their duty to the best of their ability,” Kingsley snapped back.
It was a bold-faced lie. By now, half of the people in the Ministry had heard of the chewing out Kingsley gave to Dawlish for the ineffectual response to the attack. Everyone knew that the Aurors did not respond well to the attack, but Kingsley was suggesting that this had been them at their best.
Harry wanted to grin. This was the exact type of situation he loved to see; anything that made Kingsley or Dawlish look foolish brought him one step closer to his goal of seeing real changes enacted in the Ministry. Ideally, Dawlish would lose his position and Harry would be perfectly poised to succeed him as Head Auror. Then, he’d have more power to go after those who still clung to Death Eaters and the Dark Arts.
However, as happy as Harry was with Kingsley’s words, he was also well aware of the damage they were doing to Daphne’s emergency motion. Kingsley was weakening his position, and that meant that it was more likely that some Wizengamot members would flip on him when it came time for the vote on the emergency motion that he supported.
“Did they?” Rhys asked, a smug smile playing on his lips.
“I have led this Ministry better than any Minister in the past few decades,” Kingsley argued. “And you would all do well to remember that.”
Kingsley sat back down in a huff. He looked exhausted as he sagged in his seat and rubbed at his forehead. It wasn’t the sign of strength that he needed to be presenting when the sharks were circling him in the water.
Hushed whispers rose as the discussion came to a close, but Doge quickly banged his gavel on the table in front of him and called things to order.
“This matter is officially tabled until tomorrow,” Doge declared with finality. “Now, for some housekeeping notes—”
“Excuse me,” Amelia interrupted loudly as she stood up from her seat.
Doge looked to her in, clearly annoyed at another interruption before the regularly-scheduled portion of the Wizengamot meeting. “Yes?”
“I am proposing an emergency motion to remove Cyrus Greengrass as the Head of the Greengrass family,” Amelia announced.
Predictably, there was an uproar from the dark-aligned faction of the Wizengamot. Removing someone from the position of the Head of their family was a serious and rarely done thing—none of the Death Eaters or those who supported the Death Eaters were removed from their positions except in circumstances where they ended up in Azkaban. However, the strong reaction was muted throughout the rest of the chamber who were already aware of the impending motion.
“Order!” Doge shouted towards the raucous faction before he returned his focus towards Amelia. “I certainly hope that you have a valid reason for suggesting such a thing.”
“I do,” Amelia replied. “If I may take the floor?”
Doge nodded his assent, and Amelia started down the stairs to take her place in the pit in the centre of the tiered seating. This was where most people spoke during extended cases such as this or where prisoners sat during hearings.
When she reached the clearing, Amelia looked carefully at the members of the crowd before beginning her speech. “Cyrus Greengrass was arrested two days ago on suspicion of aiding and abetting Death Eater activity.” Again, her words stirred up noise from families who were more than likely to still harbour love for the Death Eaters, but Amelia just continued on. “It is the belief of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement that there are pertinent documents in Greengrass Manor that will aid us in our investigation regarding yesterday’s attack on the Ministry.”
Over the shouts and heckling, a voice called out. “Why don’t you raid his manor?”
“The documents are secured in his office,” Amelia explained. “They can only be accessed by the Head of the family. While we could bring in warding specialists to break through the manor’s protections, it is likely that the information in the documents would be out of date by the time we’d manage to break through.”
“Won’t you still need the new Head of the family to get the documents?” Another voice shouted.
“We will,” Amelia confirmed. “And we have their confirmation that they will willingly hand over the pertinent documents.”
Harry felt the cold glares coming from the dark-aligned faction of the Wizengamot, but even with everyone staring at her, Daphne didn’t baulk in the slightest. She sat with her back straight and eyed the old men and women with an icy stare that told them that she would not be intimidated out of her decision. Her resolve impressed Harry quite a bit; she was willing to make enemies out of some of her family’s allies in order to help him. Well, technically she was also helping herself, but the depth of her cunning showed off just as much bravery.
His heart skipped a beat when her beautiful blue eyes met his gaze. He hadn’t even realised that he had been staring at her for so long.
Amelia responded professionally to the dozens of questions that followed. Every possible criticism was either countered or deflected by citing the secrecy of the investigation. After an exhaustive half hour, Doge finally banged his gavel to call the room to order.
“Unless there are any substantial challenges to this proposal,” he said, pausing for a moment to give anyone a chance to present a further challenge. When none came, he gave a slight nod of his head. “Then we will begin with the voting.”
With practised familiarity, the Wizengamot members drew their wands.
“All those in favour of the emergency motion,” Doge prompted.
A flurry of wands were raised, each with a glowing tip. Harry scanned the Wizengamot members, trying to manage a rough count.
Before the war, the Wizengamot had only been made up of around fifty members. One of the few positive things that Kingsley did as Minister was to expand the number of Wizengamot seats. Originally, he had attempted to double the number, but that had been expressly rejected by the Wizengamot members. Eventually, he managed a compromise that expanded the Wizengamot to seventy seats. For this motion to pass, they needed forty-seven members to agree to it, and then Kingsley would have to give his support as well.
Before Harry could finish his count, Daphne already had hers. “Forty nine,” she murmured, sounding a little concerned.
Harry grinned and poked her side with his elbow. “That’s great, isn’t it?” He asked. “The motion will pass.”
“It will,” Daphne replied, not sounding any happier than before. “But we’ve lost Lady Edgecombe and Lord Goldstein’s support along with the others from before. Edgecombe is fine to lose, but Goldstein has a lot of sway in the Wizengamot. He’s been a longtime supporter of the Minister, so it’s concerning that he switched sides.”
Harry could see what she was getting at. “So, the cracks in the Wizengamot are growing.”
Daphne nodded her head. “Exactly. If Lord Goldstein’s no longer going to support the Minister, it may be a sign of more turmoil to come. And now, everyone thinks that I’m in the Minister’s pocket. It’s going to be difficult for me to rebuild trust with a lot of these families.”
“The motion passes the Wizengamot!” Doge announced. He turned to look at Kingsley. “Minister, the emergency motion requires your assent to pass.”
Kingsley stood and gave a bright smile across the room to Daphne, Harry, and Susan. “It is my honour to welcome the newest member of the Wizengamot: Lady Daphne Greengrass!”
A thunderous applause rang out through the room as the Wizengamot welcomed their newest member, even if several individuals looked reluctant to do so. Harry saw the angry or cold looks on the faces of several members as they stared at Daphne as she got to her feet and gave a slight bow of her head, but one pair of eyes weren’t on her.
Rhys Orpington was watching Harry instead. His grey eyes were filled with fury as he stared at Harry, but there was still a smugness in them that had Harry on edge. It was like the man was taunting him, but Harry wasn’t quite sure what it was about. Did he know something that Harry didn’t? Did he have some plan in mind that would end badly for Harry or the Ministry?
“Please come find your seat, Lady Greengrass,” Doge announced loudly, gesturing to the vacant chair a row in front of Rhys.
Daphne walked confidently down into the pit and past Amelia before she ascended the stairs up to where the Wizengamot members sat. She held her chin high as she found her seat and sat down delicately. Then, a magical swirl of silver light appeared around her left hand. When it dissipated, an ornate ring with an embossed 'G' on the front of it appeared on her pinky.
As Doge began to move on to other matters, Harry watched as Rhys leaned down and whispered something in Daphne’s ear. Daphne’s expression hardened, but she didn’t say a word back to the man. Rhys leaned back in his seat and his gaze returned to Harry as a sly grin came over his face.
Something felt wrong, but Harry didn’t know what it was. He sat through the entire Wizengamot meeting with his eyes locked onto Daphne, making sure that she was safe. Rhys never spoke to her again, and he left the chambers promptly as soon as the session ended.
Just as Harry got to his feet with Susan, an Auror burst into the Wizengamot chambers. The doors slamming loudly against the walls was enough to garner the notice of nearly all of the members. The Auror rushed up to Amelia’s side at her seat in the stands and murmured something in her ear. As she dismissed the Auror, her eyes sought out Harry and Susan. She gestured down to the exit.
Out in the corridor, Amelia pulled the two of them aside from the streaming line of Wizengamot members. Her wand moved in a flurry as half a dozen privacy charms went up in seconds.
“What’s wrong?” Susan asked, clearly feeling the underlying tension.
Amelia eyed them both carefully and then glanced over at Daphne, who had just exited the Wizengamot chambers and was looking at them with undisguised anger in her expression. “Cyrus Greengrass and Nerys Orpington are missing from their cells.”
