HP • Legilimency | 𝐍. 𝐌𝐀𝐋𝐅𝐎𝐘

𝐒𝐍𝐄𝐀𝐊

Next comes the bomb

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Astria found it no easy feat to speak about the night when Voldemort had returned. Rita extracted every tiny detail from them, and she passed on everything she remembered, concealing what she wished.

She wondered how people would react. She imagined the story would confirm for many the view that she and Harry were children marked by trauma. But the only problem that concerned her was Narcissa and the inevitable question: "When did you give this interview?" At the moment, she didn't want to deal with the blonde's anger.

A few days later, as she entered the Great Hall for breakfast, just at the same moment, owls arrived with the mail on Monday morning. Astria wasn't the only person eagerly awaiting the Daily Prophet; almost everyone was eager to read more news about the escaped Death Eaters, who, despite being spotted several times, had not yet been recaptured.

She handed a small reward to the messenger owl and unfolded the newspaper quickly, while Draco served a glass of orange juice, and Medeea brought the daily sweets with her morning greeting.

The mysterious raven did not appear again, which disappointed her and resigned Narcissa. The latter now spent her mornings anxiously waiting for the mail, hoping to see it enter the hall.

Astria was reading the Daily Prophet, disappointed with the news when suddenly, three, four, five, six, seven owls landed next to Medeea, causing a small commotion. They jostled for space, stepped on the butter, and knocked over the salt shaker, all eager to deliver their letters ahead of the others.

Daphne, astonished, asked, "What's going on?" while the entire Slytherin table leaned in to see. Nine more additional owls landed among the first ones, and then another ten descended from the sky, this time heading for the Gryffindor table, creating a real chaos between the tables.

Harry stood up to peek at the Slytherin table, and she smiled as she saw numerous newspapers and magazines being waved in their direction. Astria looked back at the countless owls, and one of them caught her attention.

It carried a citrus-colored package that Astria automatically recognized as The Quibbler. She removed it from the owl's talons and opened the brown package.

From it, a tightly folded copy of the March issue of The Quibbler rolled out. Astria unrolled it and saw her own face next to Harry's on the magazine cover. They were smiling shyly at each other and then forward, facing the reader.

Large red letters across the photo announced:

𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐘 𝐏𝐎𝐓𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐀𝐒𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐀 𝐒𝐇𝐀𝐅𝐈𝐂 𝐅𝐈𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐘 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐀𝐋: 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐑𝐔𝐓𝐇 𝐀𝐁𝐎𝐔𝐓 𝐇𝐄-𝐖𝐇𝐎-𝐌𝐔𝐒𝐓-𝐍𝐎𝐓-𝐁𝐄-𝐍𝐀𝐌𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐍𝐄𝐒𝐒𝐄𝐃 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐑𝐄𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐍.

"I believe these are reader letters," Astria analyzed, observing the chaos among the owls. "I'm not sure if I want to read them; I'll collect them, but I won't look at the content."

"I think there are other copies as well, look," Draco pointed out, trying to help gather all the deliveries and briefly glancing at the newspaper with Rita Skeeter's face naming herself as the chief writer.

She just nodded in agreement. "Speak well or speak ill, but finally, let them talk about what's happening. I'm sure Voldemort and Fudge are seething with anger right now."