Tonks sat in her chair. She stared at the window in thought for a long while. Her hair shifted from white, to yellow, to red, and back to pink again. "No, sir."
Dumbledore raised a single bushy eyebrow.
"Miss Tonks?"
"I don't accept that, sir. I suppose there might be situations where things go wrong, but I believe you should always fight to do the right thing for everyone equally."
Dumbledore regarded the stone faced young metamorph in front of him for a few long seconds before smiling widely and letting out a laugh belly laugh. "Well spoken, Miss Tonks."
Tonks' stern face became confused. "Sir?"
"That is exactly the attitude of a fine auror one that Magical Britain can be proud to have defending its citizens." He leaned over the table. "Remember that attitude, Miss Tonks. And never forget it. "
Tonks' confused look broke into a wide smile. "Ah, yes, Headmaster."
Dumbledore settled himself back in his chair. "Mmm… as it happens, a friend of mine is looking to get into auror prep after retiring from the department. If you feel ready, I could forward your name to him to work with you over the summer break to help prepare you. Auror training is not for the faint of heart and you will need every advantage you can get."
Tonks' eye's lit up. "Yes, I'd very much like that, thank you."
"Now, I'll let you get back to what you were doing. I'm sure you'll help bring Hufflepuff the duelling cup this year."
Tonks grinned. "I plan to!" She stood up, turned around, and exited, leaving the Headmaster alone in the room.
Dumbledore stared at the now closed door.
…Damn. It was during one of the mission preparation sessions that Harry and the girls now spent every free moment of their time in, that it happened.
Every single foot placement, every hand movement, every spell — Harry, Hermione, and Daphne had mapped out and written down every step needed to deactivate the fidelius once they'd tripped it.
On the outskirts of the forbidden forest, they'd set up fidelius charm after fidelius charm, always with Daphne as the secret keeper, continually experimenting with how Harry and Hermione reacted to different instructions, both inside and outside the charms.
Harry had spent days learning how to measure his footsteps and hand movements, all to a set of standard measurements, even while blindfolded.
Hermione had learned both how to overcome the weirdness of suddenly being faced by a list of instructions with no memory of how it came to be, and to quickly persuade a similarly confused Harry to follow her instructions.
But despite their best efforts, they still found guiding Harry, footstep by footstep, through a test maze they couldn't remember, and which Harry couldn't see, to be hard going.
That was when Daphne had the idea that since Harry could sense magic, he could follow a trail left behind by her invisible Eye of Kilrogg. That way Daphne could be the one to follow the pre-written instructions, and since moving the eye only required magical intent, rather than physical limb placement, it would be much easier to control to exact location of the eye.
Of course, this now meant that Daphne too had to learn to follow pre-written instruction under the influence of fidelius. So, she'd summoned her eye of Kilrogg, placed it in the middle of the area to be placed under fidelius, and waited for Harry to finish the charm and place the role of secret keeper with Hermione.
Harry did so.
And Daphne could still remember.
Hermione frowned as she turned to her.
"Hermione."
Hermione didn't say anything, just continued to observe her behaviour. "I remember."
"What?"
"I remember. The fidelius didn't work on me."
Hermione's eyes widened in shock.
Harry was still busy reading his parchment, looking confused and weary, just as he always did when the fidelius had just wiped his memory of where he was standing.
Hermione looked around frantically. Her voice dropped to a fierce whisper. "That's impossible!"
"It happened. I think it was my Eye of Kilrogg. It was in the area before the fidelius activated." Hermione quickly told Harry the fidelius secret and together she and Daphne told Harry what had happened.
Daphne thought Harry couldn't decide whether to be excited or alarmed. Eventually he drew his wand and pointed it at the sky. "This doesn't leave us," he firmly stated. "We have accidentally discovered a weakness in the fidelius charm. We use that charm for so many things. If anyone found out that it was possible to negate the charm if you can somehow get an Eye of Kilrogg into the charm space, we'd lose so much of our tactical advantage it isn't even funny. From this moment on, I declare this to be a Slytherin family secret."
Hermione and Daphne nodded, slightly wide eyed, feeling the compulsion magic slowly settle on them like a flurry of light snow. Harry lowered his wand. "Having said that, if Daphne can get into the charm space while the fidelius is active, and still keep her head, then the chances of this ridiculous plan actually working just shot up massively." Harry grinned.
Dumbledore sat, once more, behind his office desk. Getting the metamorph on his side would have been perfect for his plans, but it seemed it wasn't to be. No matter. He had a feeling his backup plan would be far more willing.
The door opened.
John walked into the Headmaster's office and sat down in the chair opposite the wise old man. "You asked for me, Headmaster?"
"Yes, John." Dumbledore sighed. "I feel I owe you an apology." An apology? John's eyebrows rose and clearly his surprise showed on his face.
"Yes, an apology — for not listening to your counsel at the start of the year. It would seem that in my old age, I've become far too sure of myself."
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