Draco Malfoy stepped through first, back straight, fists clenched at his sides. Millicent Bulstrode followed. Then Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Theodore Nott. All in their school uniforms. All silent.
Cassian froze the moment the doors opened. His eyes snapped to Dumbledore.
"What the hell are they doing here?" he barked.
He swung over the railing and floated down as if flying, landing softly on the stone banister. A few straightened in the seats, murmuring what was happening now.
Cassian didn't care.
He crossed the floor fast and stopped dead in front of the students.
"Why are you here?" he demanded.
Draco met his eyes but didn't answer. There was a hitch in his breath. He looked like someone expecting to be stopped. By bloodline, oath, the ghost of his father's voice. But it never came.
Crabbe stepped forward behind him. "I don't want to be a Death Eater."
Millicent followed. "Neither do I."
Goyle looked at the floor. "No."
Nott lifted his head. "Never."
Draco was the last. "I won't follow them."
Cassian stared down at them, jaw tight.
"Go back," He said. "You don't need to do this. You don't need to testify against your own families."
Draco didn't blink. "We want to."
The others stood firm. No one moved.
Cassian turned sharply, eyes locking on Dumbledore. The realisation hit fast and ugly.
"You brought them," he hissed.
The box of defendants went still. Lucius saw his son out of the corner of his eye.
Shock flickered over their faces. Only for a moment. Selwyn's eyes scanned the group. Then he snorted in disgust. Bulstrode's matriarch whispered something sharp. Goyle senior turned his head toward his son but didn't speak.
They were angry. But not worried at all.
Because they knew. Family couldn't testify against House heads. It was a rule older than half the walls in this chamber. Occlumency blocks were taught young, stitched into the mind like a second heartbeat. Every proper family had them. Fail-safes, seals... hardwired instinct, shut down if questioned about blood.
Dumbledore turned slightly. "Draco L. Malfoy. Step forward."
Draco stepped around Cassian walking to the centre.
His hands were shaking.
He cleared his throat. "Last year," he started, "I asked Professor Rosier to help me with a memory problem."
Lucius's gaze flicked to him.
"I'd been taught Occlumency at home. It was... faulty. Every time I tried to shield properly, things bent wrong. Like the memories wouldn't hold. He told me the problem was in the way the safeguards were built."
He hesitated.
"When he patched it, I stopped blacking out when people pressed. But it also broke the failsafe. The one that stops me from... talking about my family."
Selwyn shifted. Many in the room gasped. One of the Aurors near the wall moved a little closer.
Draco breathed through his teeth. "After that, I shared a memory with him. Something I saw my father do. Multiple times. It happened at our house."
He didn't look at Lucius. "Malfoy Manor. The drawing room. The same night every week. My father met with the Selwyn patriarch. Barty Crouch Junior. And the Dark Lord this year."
The court went silent. All looking at something unthinkable happening right in front of their eyes. The seal had cracked wide enough to let a boy speak against his house since last year. Every magical family in the room felt it too. Fear bloomed in their hearts. That this was a start... A precedent.
Magnus and Regulus looked at Cassian. Both normally so dead-eyed, like a dragon could land on their desks and they'd ask it to keep it down, now they looked actually rattled. Cassian had helped the boy patch his family Occlumency? That meant he could do the same to himself.
Which meant...
Rosier secrets weren't safe anymore. Not even inside the wards.
The room wasn't just watching the Malfoys fall apart. It was watching something older come undone, a method that had kept bloodlines safe for centuries, picked open by someone who clearly knew where to pull.
And if Cassian could do it once, he could do it again. To anyone.
Lucius's face hadn't changed. He wasn't looking at Draco anymore.
"They talked about how to move inside the Ministry. What departments they needed emptied. Who they'd use. Names were listed. Some were taken out within weeks of that meeting."
Draco didn't shake anymore but the words were coming out fast. Like he'd said them in his head a hundred times.
"They had a list of students, too. Who'd be easy to control. Who'd be groomed for support. Which families were reliable. Who needed pressuring."
He swallowed. "They talked about how Hogwarts had to fall in line. Or fall apart."
Selwyn opened his mouth. Dumbledore raised a hand, silencing everyone.
Draco stepped back.
"I shared the fix with my friends," he said. "This year. I taught them how to patch around the failsafe. Because we didn't want to be part of it. We didn't want to be chosen."
He looked toward Theodore Nott.
"He got the worst of it."
Theodore stepped forward. Taking deep breaths.
"My father used the Cruciatus on me," he said. "Twice a day. Said it was for my own good."
A shudder went through the gallery.
Theodore's voice didn't crack. He stood tall staring right into Lucius's eyes.
"He told me I had no choice. That our House stood with the Dark Lord, and I would too. Or I wouldn't stand at all."
One of the court scribes set his quill down. Like copying that last line would've cursed the parchment. In the gallery above, a woman gasped. Someone else whispered a curse too quiet to catch. Even the ones in the black and gold robes who'd smirked through until now looked listless.
Lucius's jaw clenched. Those behind him also looked paler.
Millicent Bulstrode stepped up next. Just looked directly at her grandmother. "I was told I don't have a choice but to become a Death Eater. I refuse to kneel at that man."
Vincent and Gregory echoed her, louder, "We refuse to kneel!"
Dumbledore turned back to the front bench.
"No further witnesses are needed," he said, voice cold.
Lucius didn't move. His mouth had thinned to a single line. Selwyn stared ahead, sweats balling on his forehead.
Cassian strode past the benches, jaw tight, fingers digging into his palm. He didn't look at Lucius or Selwyn or any of the others standing boxed in like bad theatre villains waiting for their cue. He didn't slow until he reached Dumbledore.
"I got my magic back," he said flatly. "I could share the memories of what happened in the cemetery last year. The whole thing. That alone would be enough to convince the Wizengamot to authorise Veritaserum."
His eyes stayed on Dumbledore's face.
"So why did you summon them?"
Dumbledore sighed slowly, like he'd been carrying the weight of that answer for years. His gaze dropped, only briefly, before lifting again. "Veritaserum isn't foolproof," he said. "Anyone who's mastered Occlumency can shield against it. And most of the people standing in that box have spent a lifetime learning how."
Cassian's molars clenched so hard.
"I've got a way around Occlumency," he shot back. "Draco helped me spot the pattern. Their family defences aren't as clever as they think."
Dumbledore met his gaze at last. Saying, 'I am not happy about this either, but I had to.'
"I know," he said quietly.
"Then why?" Cassian asked. "Why put them on that floor? Why drag kids into this when you could've kept it clean?"
Dumbledore didn't answer straight away. His eyes flicked toward Draco and the others standing together at the edge of the chamber.
"Because Veritaserum forces truth," Dumbledore said. "But it also gives them room to claim coercion. Manipulation. Memory tampering. It turns the trial into a debate about methods."
He looked back at Cassian. "They chose to speak. In front of everyone. Without charms. Without compulsion. They broke their own safeguards and stood here anyway."
Cassian shook his head. "You still used them."
"I gave them the option," Dumbledore said. "They took it."
Cassian's jaw locked so hard it ached. The veins at his temples stood out, like they were about to pop.
"The difference between giving a child a sword and teaching them how to use one is a lesson," he said. "Giving them a sword, then opening the gate and pointing at the enemy is war."
Bathsheda stepped in close and caught his arm before he could say something that would burn the room down. Her fingers dug in through his sleeve.
"Cass," she said quietly. "Calm down."
He dragged in a breath through his nose. Held it. Let it out slow. His eyes never left Dumbledore.
"Do you know what the Erinyes are," he asked, "O Supreme Mugwump?"
A ripple went through the chamber. Dumbledore squinted at him.
"Is that related to the case?"
Cassian let out a snort.
"Ancient Greek belief," he said. "They were goddesses of vengeance. They hunted people who murdered parents, killed siblings, betrayed their own blood, broke sacred family oaths."
He took a step forward despite Bathsheda's grip. She didn't let go.
"I have stood between parents and children," Cassian went on. "I have stepped into homes where blood was treated like property. I took that role gladly. I took it with every scrap of fury I had, because children don't deserve to be crushed by the people meant to protect them."
His gaze flicked to Draco. To the others standing stiff and pale behind him.
"And now," he said, "you put those same children on a floor like this. You ask them to stand up and break the oldest bonds they have. You dress it up as a choice, but you know exactly what it costs."
Dumbledore opened his mouth.
Cassian cut across him. "Whether they love their families or hate them is beside the point. Family oaths are not social clubs you leave when they become uncomfortable. They are magic. They are old. They cut deep."
He turned his head slightly, staring down everyone, including the Wizengamot benches.
"I would die to keep them from that fate," he said. "I would stand in front of every curse meant for them. But I will not watch adults use them as tools and call it justice."
Bathsheda's hand tightened on his arm.
A murmur moved through the benches. Someone shifted. Someone else swallowed.
Cassian straightened, finally pulling his arm free from Bathsheda's grasp.
He turned away from Dumbledore and looked at the students again, his expression changing, softer but no less pissed.
"You've done enough," he said to them. "More than anyone should have asked of you."
Theodore's shoulders finally dropped. Just a bit. Crabbe blinked like he hadn't expected to survive this part. And Millicent gave a nod.
Then he looked back over his shoulder at Dumbledore, eyes sharp.
"And if the Erinyes are watching," Cassian added, fury still hot in his heart, "they won't come for the children."
---
Hello all!
We're very close to the end of the fifth book, and I just want to clarify something: I'm not making Dumbledore a Dark Lord or a villain. He's doing what he's always done for the Greater Good, acting according to what he believes is best, even when those choices are complicated or imperfect.
The discussion around the Prophecy is coming soon, and I'll go into it properly over the next couple of chapters. This summer arc will also include a small adventure, just a few chapters and I promise not to drag it out.
One small note: Cassian's reference to the Erinyes is metaphorical, he's talking about an ancient idea of moral consequence and judgment, not expecting literal goddesses of vengeance to show up.
As always, thank you so much for all the support. I truly love reading your comments, and please don't ever hesitate to give feedback. 🫀🫀🫀
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Hear ye! Hear ye! A tale most wondrous has been told!
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Very well, carry on then.
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