Chapter 50.1- Doom Days
Added 2025-08-03 11:51:40 +0000 UTCDumbledore was a fool, I thought as I stared at the newspaper. It was happening even in this world. There was no dead Cedric, but a heavily injured Krum who had returned home the second he was declared stable enough to travel so there wasn’t as much reason to look into the aftermath of the Tri-Wizard as there must have been in canon Still, the old man had stood in front of the Wizengamot in full session and declared Voldemort’s return to the wizarding world. Maybe it was the right thing to do in the end— warn the public, have them watching for signs, for possibilities. Bu it was naive of him to think he’d be taken seriously.
The newspapers were already tearing into him— into the both of us in truth. I’d received their request for comments maybe they thought it was would tell them the o=ld man was insane, deny what he said, but why make an enemy of him? Why lie? For fickle public opinion? I said the truth and now they said I was insane, brainwashed by Dumbledore, driven mad by my obsession with the dark arts. So many things they said, and so much they did not say.
With Dumbledore, the problem was his age. With mine, the problem was my sanity. They attacked from every angle they could find— effects of the killing curse as a baby, my use of the killing curse during the first task, my alleged obsession with the dark arts, rituals everything they could throw at the wall, they did. Little stuck, but what stuck was probably going to stick hard— and for a while.
“You still reading that shite?” Sirius asked, stepping into the foyer.
“Like it or not, papers like this one tell the people what to think. It’s useful to know what they’re thinking” I retorted. While he trusted the old man, he’d found the smear campaign against him funny. The allegations that Dumbledore engaged in sexual affairs with goats jut like his brother, Aberforth, was one that had him laughing or days on end. Of course, that mirth had turned into rage when I was chosen as the next target of their attentions. He was less pleased by that. Less willing to see the comedy in their commentary.
