London, Diagon Alley, September 30th, 1999, 15.30 hours

"Exiles out! Exiles out!"

Ron Weasley heard the shouts of the crowd from far away. And if he was guessing right, it was around where Diggle's house was located - Dumbledore's friend had just taken possession of his ancestral home yesterday.

"Who'd have thought they'd go that quickly from rumours to riots?" Tonks, wearing another disguise, muttered next to him.

"This seems to be happening a bit too quickly," Ron said. He had spent months in Britain, and he thought he understood the population quite well by now. And this was unusual.

"You think this is the Dark Lord's work?" Tonks almost stumbled as she asked that.

"I fear it is. First the rumours, now this." Ron cursed. "And merde alors! The Wands will play right into his hands!" He started running. He didn't know what he could do, but he had to do something.

"What do you mean?" Tonks fell in next to him.

"They will try to disperse the crowd, and..." Screams and explosions cut off his explanation.

The two were about to round the corner when they found themselves facing dozens of people running towards them, fleeing in panic. And behind them, in front of the Diggle House, he saw smoke rising from craters in the street, and bodies on the ground. And Wands exchanging spells with robed but not masked people.

He pulled Tonks to the side before they were trampled, ducking into the entrance to a shoes shop while the crowd rushed past them. "Too late!" he snarled.

"What?" Tonks asked, wand out, and apparently trying to get a clear line of fire to the battle.

"Rumours, a riot, and now a massacre." He shook his head. Ron would bet half his gold that whatever spell had blown up the street and many of the rioters hadn't been cast by the Wands. With those who were able to run gone, he could see the carnage. Screaming, bleeding people on the ground, some crawling over bodies, trying to get away while the Wands in front of Diggle's house finished off the attackers with their usual efficiency.

"Fiendfyre!" Tonks shouted next to him.

He whipped his head around and saw a giant snake made of flames pounce on the Wands. They raised a stone wall that deflected the cursed fire, but one of them was caught outside its protection, and vanished in the flames.

"Merlin!" Tonks muttered.

Ron was conjuring more walls, to shield the others in the area. If they were quick enough they could contain the fire that way...

He heard screams from behind him, and turned in time to see another fire-snake in the street - headed towards him and Tonks. Without thinking about it, he tackled her into the shop, hoping the owner had a fire ward.

They did. The flames clashed against the windows and he felt a heat wave strike them, but neither the front of the shop nor Tonks and himself were burning. The wards wouldn't hold for long though; not against Fiendfyre.

"We need to to flee!" he shouted, trying to apparate while he stood up. Apparition was blocked. He pulled Tonks up and started towards the back of the shop. The metamorphmagus stumbled over a display of waterproof sandals, but Ron caught her and dragged her with him.

They had just left the main show room when the fire ward broke down and the flames rushed in, turning shoes, sandals and even lavaproof boots to cinders. Tonks whipped her wand around and a stone wall shielded them for a bit longer. Long enough for Ron to blow the back door open with a Reductor Curse even though breathing became difficult as the flames consumed the air.

The two ran out. Tonks cast another wall behind them while Ron tried to apparate them again. This time it worked, and they found themselves back at the Leaky Cauldron. He spotted brown robes in the middle of the assembled crowd there, and pushed his way through the panicking wizards and witches. Behind him, Tonks crashed into a corpulent wizard, and both went down in a tangle of limbs.

"Death Eater attack on the Diggle House!" he shouted, once he was close enough to the Wands. "Imperiused people and Fiendfyre! Anti-Apparition Jinxes all over the area!"

The Wand-Leader at the front nodded towards him - the only acknowledgment Ron got - and led his team into the Alley. Ron heard the cry of 'Fiendfyre' spread, and the sounds of multiple Apparitions when fear won over curiosity among the people around him.

While Tonks managed to get up, cursing at the wizard, Ron watched another part of Diagon Alley burn.

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London, Diagon Alley, September 30th, 1999, 15.55 hours

Wand-Leader Hermione was torn between doing her duty, and checking if Ron was safe when she heard about the attack on Diagon Alley. Duty won. She told herself that she couldn't do anything anyway, if Ron wasn't safe. And that the best way to keep him safe was to do her job as a Wand. Which was currently to help stop the fires raging in Diagon Alley.

Fortunately, the Death Eaters who had started the fires had either fled or were dead, or so the first responders reported when her team arrived at the location, and efforts to contain the Fiendfyre were already underway.

Walls of stone - thick enough to resist the cursed flames long enough to be replaced and reinforced in time - had been erected in the side alleys separating the burning part from the rest of Wizarding Britain's merchant mile. Wands on brooms were floating above the burning houses, sending conjured streams of water into the burning ruins. And other Wands were pulling bodies from the site, sending both those who could be helped and those already dead to St. Mungo's.

She turned to Dean and Colin. "Alright. Bubble-Head Charms up, we'll push on to the site of the incident."

"Joy," Dean muttered. "On the frontlines again." Colin was already taking pictures.

Hermione snorted. "At least we're just fighting fire, not Death Eaters."

"Just," Dean said, sending a stream of water ahead and wincing when it turned to steam on the stones close to the burning shop at the corner.

Hermione winced as well. This wouldn't be easy.

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Hermione stared at the remains of the house one of Dumbledore's 'old friends', Dedalus Diggle, had reclaimed just a day ago. Nothing was left but rubble and a few stone pillars whose enchantments had stood up to Fiendfyre better than the rest of the house.

Then she looked at the crater in the street, noting how the cobblestones had been blown away by the spell that had caused it. They would have turned into deadly projectiles, smashing into, or even through, those wizards and witches the blast itself hadn't killed. Many of them would have been alive, but wounded. Unable to flee as the battle raged around them, as Wands exchanged curses with Death Eaters and rioters. And then the fires would have started, the heat quickly growing untenable. Bubble-Head Charms would only have prolonged the agony of those who'd managed to cast them.

She was now looking at the remains of the victims. They had been burned so badly, she couldn't tell Wands from Death Eaters or passers-by caught up in this catastrophe. Some she wouldn't even have recognised as bodies without her training. Colin was still taking pictures, despite having vomited earlier. Dean was not showing any emotion.

And she really needed to see Ron, hold him, know and feel that he was safe. But she had a job to do. He would understand. She hoped.

"Alright. Did anyone find spell residue?"

Dean shook his head.

"I didn't get any either." She hadn't expected to find any, not after Fiendfyre had swept over the area. "We'll need to depend on the memories of the survivors of this battle to analyse this."

"It's the same kind of attack we had before," Dean said. "Death Eaters."

"But this time they were hiding in the crowd," Hermione said.

"Traitors."

"Or victims of the Imperius," Hermione said. "At least some." Most of the rioters wouldn't have been under a spell. The Dark Lord didn't have enough followers to control so many. But as today had shown, he might not need that many to strike at the heart of Wizarding Britain.

"The ones who stayed and fought, maybe." Dean scoffed. "Don't know many purebloods who'd fight if they could run, unless they were under the Imperius."

Hermione glared at him. Such talk was dangerous, given the rumours going around. Even if it was mostly true. She looked around. No one but Wands were close enough to have heard that, even with some spells to help. She didn't call him out on his remark, even if she should have - she had talked like that too often herself to not feel like a hypocrite.

Kneeling down next to the charred remains of a rioter, probably, she checked the crater with a charmed measuring tape. After reading the results, she shook her head.

"Found something?" Dean stood next to her. Colin joined them as well, curious as usual.

She nodded. "The crater is smaller than those we found in the Nott and Malfoy Manors. So, it wasn't the Dark Lord himself. And based on the slight angle of the crater, the Blasting Curse was cast from the roof on the other side of the street." She pointed away from Diggle's house. "None of ours were there. Which means," she added with a grim expression, "That the Death Eaters didn't want to strike the house, or the Wands guarding it. They wanted to strike the rioters."

"But..." Colin blinked as he understood.

Hermione nodded. "The Death Eaters want the British purebloods to think we attacked them."

And they might have succeeded too.

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London, Diagon Alley, September 30th, 1999, 18.49 hours

"Hermione!" Ron Weasley called out when he saw his girlfriend enter the Leaky Cauldron, which had been turned into a makeshift information post it seemed, with lots of people coming and going and leaving notes with Tom the bartender. The witch turned her head, spotted him, and her tired, anxious face lit up with a smile. She almost knocked over a hag on her way towards him, and an instant later she was hugging him. Hard.

"I worried about you..." she whispered near his ear.

She smelled like smoke and burned flesh. For a moment, he feared she was hurt, then he realised what she would have been doing, and relaxed. "I didn't want to distract you, in the middle of this..." he whispered.

"Stupid."

He didn't know if she meant him, herself, or both. He saw Dean and Colin step closer. The older Wand was grinning, the younger was staring. Others were staring at well. And whispering. Dean stopped grinning and now was glaring around, and people refused to meet the wizard's gaze. Colin looked confused, then angry. They must have overheard the whispers.

"Let's sit down," Ron said, loudly enough so the two Wands in Hermione's team heard it as well, and would know they were included. A few minutes later, Tom had served them drinks and they had cast privacy spells.

"Rumours are going crazy. They claim that the Wands killed all the purebloods protesting the takeover of Britain by Dumbledore's exiles."

"Bloody purebloods," Dean muttered. "Stupid fools."

"It was a setup," Hermione said. "The rioting wizards were killed by Death Eaters, or people under their command, to make it look as if the Wands did it."

"I thought so when I saw the attack," Ron said.

"You saw it? I need your memory!" Hermione pulled out a vial and removed the stopper.

Ron nodded, pulling out the memory of the incident, and making a mental note to tell Tonks not to reuse that particular face. "Tonks and I had to run from the Fiendfyre." He didn't want Hermione to discover that in the pensieve without warning.

The witch tensed up. "How bad was it?"

He winced, then out his hand on hers, squeezing gently. "We made it, but we were lucky."

She closed her eyes and drew a deep breath. "You almost died then."

He nodded. He wouldn't lie to her.

She wiped her eyes with her hands, muttering curses under her breath.

"I'm sorry," Ron said. He was - for hurting her.

"It's how we met," Hermione said, smiling sadly.

He understood what she meant. She would have done the same. Had done the same in the past. And would be doing the same again. Even if it hurt them.

Dean cleared his throat, and Ron tore his attention away from Hermione. Colin was fidgeting with his camera. "What can we do about those rumours? I almost hexed that idiot insulting us."

"Who? What did he say?" Ron asked. He had a feeling that it had been mostly Hermione who had been insulted.

"That we were Dumbledore's tools. That we're oppressing the purebloods," Dean said while Colin nodded.

They probably used less neutral language too. Ron sighed. "What can we do about it? If people believe that..."

"We tell them the truth," Hermione said. "That the Dark Lord murdered people to frame us."

"People will claim that we're covering up our own crimes," Dean said.

She shrugged. "Some will, but some will believe us. We'll take pictures from all the memories we can gather. If The Quibbler publishes them then that should persuade at least some of the purebloods."

"Hopefully," Dean said.

"I'll do my best!" Colin piped up.

They'd all do their best, Ron knew. He just hoped it would be enough.

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London, Ministry of Magic, October 1st, 1999, 08.45 hours

"Hermione? Sarah wants to see you!" Sally-Anne said, peeking her head into the Investigative Branch's offices.

Wand-Leader Hermione put the reports from Diagon Alley down and stood up.

Dean frowned. "She should know we don't have anything yet. We haven't even started with the pensieve sessions."

"My pictures have been developed," Colin said, holding out a stack to Hermione.

"Thanks." She copied them and took the copies with her.

Sally-Anne was waiting for her. Hermione would have preferred to think about what she'd tell the Wand-Commander on the way to Sarah's office, but she knew that wouldn't work. Not unless she told Sally-Anne off, and she wasn't about to do that. The Corps needed to be united in this crisis. And Hermione couldn't afford to annoy Wands anyway. Not while she was in a relationship with Ron.

"So I heard your... lover was there when the attack started!" the other Wand said as soon as they started walking.

Hermione flinched. "Yes. It was a very close call," she said in a flat voice. He had come close to dying. His description had been clear about that, and she wasn't looking forward to see it in his memories.

"Oh. I'm sorry." Sally-Anne sounded sorry - for a few seconds. "But he's alright?"

Hermione nodded.

"Good! Have you heard the latest rumours? They claim Dumbledore is taking over Britain with us to oppress the purebloods!"

"I heard." Hermione had seen the glares and glances as well.

"That's so stupid! The purebloods called Dumbledore, after all."

"He expected them to call him though. And he did arrange things so they'd depend on him," Hermione said. That was known in the Corps, after all.

"I know. But still, they called him, and expected us to follow their orders. Now they claim he uses us to oppress them? That makes no sense."

"We could oppress them if we wanted," Hermione pointed out as they reached the hallway to Sarah's office.

"But we don't want to." Sally-Anne knocked on the door. "Hermione's here, Sarah!"

"Enter." Came the response.

Sarah was not behind her desk, but standing in front of the enchanted mirror showing Diagon Alley. The smoking ruins of the Diggle House, to be exact.

"Good morning," Hermione said while Sally-Anne closed the door behind her.

"Good morning." Sarah looked at her with an unreadable expression.

Hermione straightened up. "We haven't yet been able to study the memories of the witnesses, but we have taken their statements, and the initial conclusions indicate that the riot was orchestrated by the Dark Lord's followers in order to provoke a fight, use that to murder dozens, and frame us for it."

"Thank you. I didn't call you to talk about your investigation though. I'm aware that you only have preliminary results so far."

Hermione winced. She seemed to have spoken in haste. "Sorry, Sarah."

The Wand-Commander made a dismissive gesture with her hand. "I've called you because of your relationship with Ron Weasley."

Hermione raised her chin slightly and tried not to let her sudden nervousness show.

"According to the rumours, he fell in love with you while undercover, and revealed his identity to you."

"That's true." Hermione didn't know where Sarah was going with this.

"And then you verified his honest intentions with Veritaserum."

Her talk with Sally-Anne had been more successful than she had expected, Hermione realised. "He offered to let himself get dosed. I took that as sufficient proof, given how unlikely a deception was under the circumstances."

"I see." Sarah turned to look at the smoking ruins once more.

Hermione waited, not as patiently as usual. She still didn't know what Sarah wanted.

"Do you plan to marry him?" Sarah asked, without taking her eyes off the mirror.

"Yes," Hermione said.

"These rumours spread by the Dark Lord are hurting us," the Wand-Commander said after a pause. "They stir up the population, and weaken the country." She pointed at the crater. "That will do even more damage to the Ministry, and to us. Too many believe the lies, even though we've informed the Daily Prophet and The Quibbler about what really happened."

"We haven't finished the investigation yet," Hermione said.

"I know. But we cannot wait. Diagon Alley might see another riot if we let things go on."

Hermione couldn't argue with that - she had seen some wizards dismiss the newspaper in the Leaky Cauldron as lies. "Yes."

"And the last thing we need are rumours that lovestruck Wands are being manipulated by cunning exiles."

Hermione stiffened. Was Sarah about to tell her to break up with Ron?

"Even worse when it's the Commander."

Hermione blinked. Oh! Did that mean... Merlin!

Sarah turned back towards her. "What do you know about Sirius Black?"