Dawn Rivera

Mayhem at the Ministry

Mr Weasley wakes us after only a few hours' sleep. He uses magic to pack up the tents, and we leave the campsite as quickly as possible, passing Mr Roberts at the door of his cottage. Mr Roberts has a strange, dazed look about him, and he waves us off with a vague, "Merry Christmas."

"He'll be all right," says Mr Weasley quietly, as we march off onto the moor. "Sometimes, when a person's memory's modified, it makes them a bit disorientated for a while...and that was a big thing they had to make him forget."

We hear urgent voices as we approach the spot where the Portkeys lie and, when we reach it, we find a great number of witches and wizards gathered around Basil, the keeper of the Portkeys, all clamouring to get away from the campsite as quickly possible. Mr Weasley has a hurried discussion with Basil; we join the queue, and are able to take an old rubber tyre back to Stoatshead Hill before the sun has really risen. We walk back through Ottery St. Catchpole towards The Burrow in the dawn light, talking very little because we are so exhausted, and thinking longingly of our breakfast. As we round the corner in the lane, and The Burrow comes into view, a cry echoes along the damp lane.

"Oh, thank goodness, thank goodness!"

Mrs Weasley, who has evidently been waiting for us in the front yard, comes running towards us, still wearing her bedroom slippers, her face pale and strained, a screwed-up copy of the Daily Prophet clutched in her hand. "Arthur - I've been so worried - so worried -"

She flings her arms around Mr Weasley's neck, and the Daily Prophet falls out of her limp hand to the ground. Looking down, I see the headlines: SCENES OF TERROR AT THE QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP, complete with a twinkling, black-and-white photograph of the Dark Mark over the tree-tops.

"You're all right," Mrs Weasley mutters distractedly, releasing Mr Weasley and staring around at us all with red eyes, "you're alive...oh, boys..."

And to everybody's surprise, she seizes Fred and George and pulls them both into such a tight hug that their heads bang together.

"Ouch! Mum - you're strangling us -"

"I shouted at you before you left!" Mrs Weasley says, starting to sob. "It's all I've been thinking about! What if You-Know-Who had got you, and the last thing I ever said to you was that you didn't get enough O.W.Ls? Oh, Fred...George..."

"Come on, now, Molly, we're all perfectly OK," says Mr Weasley soothingly, prising her off the twins and leading her back towards the house. "Bill," he adds in an undertone, "pick up that paper, I want to see what it says..."

When we are all crammed into the tiny kitchen, and Hermione and me have made Mrs Weasley a cup of very strong tea, into which Mr Weasley insists on pouring a shot of Ogdens Old Firewhiskey, Bill hands his father the newspaper. Mr Weasley scans the front page while Percy looks over his shoulder.

"I knew it," says Mr Weasley heavily. "Ministry blunders...culprits not apprehended...lax security...Dark wizards running unchecked...national disgrace...Who wrote this? Ah...of course...Rita Skeeter."

"That woman's got it in for the Ministry of Magic!" says Percy furiously. "Last week she was saying we're wasting our time quibbling about cauldron thickness, when we should be stamping out vampires! As if it wasn't specifically stated in paragraph twelve of the Guidelines for the Treatment of Non-Wizard Part-Humans -"

"Do us a favour, Perce," says Bill, yawning, "and shut up."

"I'm mentioned," says Mr Weasley, his eyes widening behind his glasses as he reaches the bottom of the Daily Prophet article.

"Where?" splutters Mrs Weasley, choking on her tea and whisky. "If I'd seen that, I'd have known you were alive!"

"Not by name," says Mr Weasley. "Listen to this: 'If the terrified witches and wizards who waited breathlessly for the news at the edge of the wood expected reassurance from the Ministry of Magic, they were sadly disappointed. A Ministry official emerged some time after the appearance of the Dark Mark, alleging that nobody had been hurt, but refusing to give any more information. Whether this statement will be enough to quash the rumours that several bodies were removed from the woods an hour later, remains to be seen.' Oh, really," says Mr Weasley in exasperation, handing the paper to Percy. "Nobody was hurt, what was I supposed to say? Rumours that several bodies were removed from the woods...well, there certainly will be rumours now she's printed that."