Chapitre 402: Deflect, Deflect, Deflect!
"Good Lord," Fudge exclaimed in shock. "What in the world happened here!?"
"It looks like the Undersecretary's been knocked out," said Dawlish most unhelpfully.
Mere moments after having sealed the entrance to the Room of Requirement, Oleandra and Harry had found themselves surrounded by Aurors. And since they'd been found standing next to the unconscious bodies of Cedric Diggory and Dolores Umbridge, they had immediately been held at wandpoint and had their wands confiscated.
Then, a few seconds later, the Minister for Magic himself had made an appearance, having huffed and puffed up the long flight of stairs to the seventh floor, before finally happening upon the scene described above. Having been called to Hogwarts by Umbridge, who'd promised him good news, he hadn't been expecting to see her sprawled on the floor, with her eyes rolled back in their sockets and her tongue lolling out of her mouth.
"I can see that, Dawlish," said Fudge witheringly. "I was asking Potter and Greengrass— Well, what do you have to say for yourselves, hmm?"
Oleandra took a step forward, ignoring the wands pointed threateningly at her chest.
"If I were you, Minister, I'd be more careful of who I'd hire," said Oleandra silkily. "Your Inquisitor tried to subject us to the Cruciatus Curse, so I'm afraid we had no choice but to incapacitate her."
"Preposterous!" blustered Fudge. "Why would Dolores do such a thing?"
The penalty for using any of the three Unforgivable Curses on another human being was life in Azkaban. Although, that might not be so bad, considering that the Dementors had deserted the island fortress. It was the last place in Britain you'd ever find them now!
"There's a spell that can make a wand spit out the last spells it cast, isn't there?" said Harry, who rapidly caught on to Oleandra's deflection strategy to get out of trouble. "See for yourself, if we're lying."
It didn't look as though the Minister had any interest in leading an investigation into his loyal subordinate, but luckily for Oleandra and Harry, one of the Aurors who had accompanied Fudge jumped to their rescue.
"There's no harm in verifying their words," said Kingsley Shacklebolt in his deep, booming voice. "With your permission, Minister?"
"Well… fine, then," said Fudge, shooting Kingsley a resentful look. "I suppose you might as well…"
Kingsley collected Umbridge's wand from the floor and placed the tip of his wand against hers.
"Prior Incantato!"
Crackling, ghostly grey lightning shot out of Umbridge's wand; there could be no mistaking the Cruciatus Curse.
Fudge shot an annoyed look at the unconscious Umbridge, as if the fact that she had caused him embarrassment bothered him more than her attempt to torture two teenagers.
"We'll have to interrogate the Undersecretary, of course," said Kingsley unctuously.
While it had been beyond doubt Umbridge's wand that had cast the Cruciatus Curse, the question of who had actually cast the Curse remained to be seen, and Fudge wasn't about to take Harry's word for it…
"Yes, yes," said Fudge impatiently. "Wake her up, Dawlish, so that we may be done with this."
One quick "Rennervate!" later, and Umbridge's eyelids flickered open. At first, her gaze was unfocused, the consequences of having had her memories roughly manipulated by a beginner. But after a few seconds, she was her old self once again— and not without some difficulty, she managed to push her rotund self from the floor and stand on her two legs… albeit slightly unsteadily.
"Ah, you're here, Minister!" said Umbridge triumphantly. "I have obtained proof that Harry Potter and Oleandra Greengrass have broken school rules!"
Oleandra could feel Harry's gaze on her; he doubtlessly wanted to know to what extent Umbridge remembered what had happened, but to be perfectly honest, Oleandra herself didn't have a single clue— she'd been forced to work faster than she'd have liked, so it was likely that Umbridge would still have some suspicious gaps in her memories...
"You have?" exclaimed Fudge giddily— but his ardour soon cooled, as he remembered her use of an Unforgivable Curse.
"Dolores Umbridge," said Kingsley very seriously. "Have you or have you not attempted to use an Unforgivable Curse on a student?"
Umbridge blanched; her memory was a little fuzzy, but she knew for a fact that she had in fact done so!
"It was an emergency!" she screeched. "I obtained information from a credible source that these two were recruiting students for an army for Dumbledore, on his behalf! I came here to verify that the information was indeed correct, as is my duty as High Inquisitor, but I was cowardly attacked while I was performing my duties, and I was forced to defend myself!"
Ordinarily, even in cases of self-defence, the use of an adult's Unforgivable Curse on an underage Wizard would have been considered overkill, and thus more than frowned upon. But since Oleandra was widely known to have brought down a Dragon on her own, Fudge was very generously prepared to grant her amnesty, if her actions had indeed proved to be necessary…
"Liar!" shouted Harry, full of white-hot rage. "You're the one who brought us here and threatened—"
"ENOUGH!" shouted Fudge. "We'll hear your account later, thank you very much— Dolores, can you elaborate on your credible source?"
"It's Edgecombe's daughter, Cornelius," said Umbridge eagerly. "She's been spying on Potter's subversive group, you see— she had been about to give me the names of their accomplices, but unfortunately, she was struck by some kind of foul Curse, and she ran off before she could tell me more. I sent the caretaker after her, but the lazy fool's obviously taking his time…"
Kingsley coughed loudly, drawing everyone's attention to him.
"Why don't I search for the girl, Minister?" Kingsley proposed. "I'll have her before you within ten minutes."
Fudge nodded appreciatively.
"Good idea, Kingsley— you do that," he said, patting him on the shoulder. "It's heartening to know I've still got some competent Aurors under my command."
Upon saying so, Fudge glared at Dawlish, who stared back unblinkingly; the insult having completely flown over his head.
"Well, I daresay we'll have this whole sordid affair sorted out—" Fudge began saying, but the rest of his sentence went unheard, due to the deafening explosion that had just rocked the castle to its foundations.
BOOM!
"What in the?" Umbridge yelped, before rounding on Oleandra and Harry. "This is your doing, somehow!"
"Duck!"
Oleandra threw herself to the floor, just barely escaping the fate of having every single hair on the top of her head singed off her scalp— a fiery projection of a Dragon had just burst into the corridor from the stairs and flew above all of their heads, roaring and spouting gouts of flame!
"It couldn't be…" Oleandra heard Harry mutter, as he cowered on the ground by her side, watching the Aurors throwing spells at the fireball in the shape of a Dragon in vain.
L’AVIS DES CRÉATEURS 
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État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
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Power Stone 
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