"Please try to calm yourself, Miss Skeeter," Dumbledore said gently.
His blue eyes swept over the corpse before he rose from his chair with a grave expression. He walked over to Adrian and asked, "Professor Westeros, could you tell me what happened?"
Adrian gave a concise recounting of the entire encounter, beginning with his pursuit of the smoke-transformed figure and ending with the manifestation of Voldemort through the Dark Mark.
When Adrian mentioned speaking Voldemort's birth name aloud "Tom", Dumbledore's expression shifted subtly. A flicker of something passed behind his half-moon spectacles, and his fingers unconsciously moved to stroke his beard.
"Interesting," Dumbledore said thoughtfully. "It would seem that Tom has developed quite a particular fascination with you."
He then turned his gaze toward Rita Skeeter, who had been watching this conversation with growing alarm as she realized the true severity of the situation she had stumbled into.
Her face had grown increasingly pale as Adrian described his encounter with genuine dark magic and Death Eater.
"Do you have anything you'd like to contribute to this discussion, Miss Skeeter?" Dumbledore inquired gently. "Professor Westeros has expressed his suspicion that you were responsible for bringing that dark wizard onto Hogwarts grounds."
Rita Skeeter's eyes widened to an almost comical degree as she began shaking her head with frantic desperation.
"I swear on my professional reputation that I know absolutely nothing about any of this!" She proclaimed with the over-the-top protestation that showed her guilt rather than innocence.
Her voice climbed several octaves as panic set in. "I came here today for one reason only: to conduct a simple interview with Mr. Potter. As for dark wizards and Death Eaters... how could I possibly have any dealings with such dangerous people, let alone bring one onto the grounds of Hogwarts!"
"Is that truly your final statement on this matter?" Dumbledore asked again, his voice remaining perfectly calm and reasonable despite the serious nature of his inquiry.
However, Rita could feel an unprecedented sense of psychological pressure radiating from him, as if his presence was somehow compelling her toward honesty.
"Yes, absolutely yes!" she replied at what was possibly the fastest speaking pace of her entire life.
Adrian sighed quietly to himself. Although he was almost entirely certain that the dark wizard had indeed been brought to Hogwarts by Rita Skeeter, the unfortunate fact remained that their primary source of evidence was now permanently silenced on the floor.
Without the dark wizard's testimony or some form of magical evidence linking him directly to Rita's presence, they were left with nothing more than reasonable suspicion and circumstantial connections.
Dumbledore naturally understood the principle at work here. Evidence, not suspicion, was what determined guilt or innocence in any formal trial.
"I cannot and will not jump to conclusions without proper evidence, Miss Skeeter," He said fairly.
Rita noticeably relaxed at these words, her stiff posture softening as relief flooded through her system. She placed one hand over her heart in a gesture of gratitude that seemed somewhat excessive given the circumstances.
"Thank you so much for your understanding and fairness, Headmaster Dumbledore!" She gushed with obviously forced enthusiasm. "I knew you were widely regarded as the most just and reasonable wizard in all of magical Britain, and now I can see why that reputation is so—"
"However," Dumbledore interjected, cutting through her gushing praise, "the fact remains that entering Hogwarts without proper authorization is indeed not appropriate behavior, regardless of your stated intentions."
Rita's bright smile froze on her face, and Adrian could practically see her mind racing as she tried to calculate exactly how much trouble she might still be facing despite Dumbledore's apparent willingness to give her the benefit of the doubt regarding the Death Eater connection.
"According to the security regulations that have been put in place for the duration of the Triwizard Tournament," Dumbledore continued in the same kindly tone that somehow managed to sound more ominous than any shouted threat, "all uninvited visitors to Hogwarts grounds must undergo certain necessary security inspections, conducted under the joint authority of the school administration and the Ministry of Magic."
"I've never heard of any such regulation," Rita protested with obvious displeasure, her voice taking on the sharp edge that she typically used when challenging powerful figures during her journalism work. "I demand to know exactly when these supposed rules were implemented and under whose authority."
"Ah yes, you raise an excellent point," Dumbledore replied with bland politeness. His eyes held just the faintest twinkle of what might have been amusement.
"These particular protocols were indeed newly added during the current tournament period, specifically in response to heightened security concerns. If you have any questions about their legitimacy or scope, I encourage you to direct your inquiries to Mr. Ludo Bagman or Mr. Bartemius Crouch, who serve as the Ministry's official representatives for tournament affairs."
Hearing Dumbledore's calm explanation and the specific mention of high-ranking Ministry officials who could theoretically verify these claims, Rita found herself in the uncomfortable position of having to accept what she strongly suspected was an improvised regulation designed specifically to inconvenience her.
"Well... I suppose that would be acceptable," She said through gritted teeth, forcing herself to maintain a facade of professional cooperation despite her reluctance. "I'm always willing to cooperate with legitimate security procedures."
'Just a little inspection,' she told herself with gritty optimism. 'How thorough could it possibly be?'
She had confidence in her abilities as an experienced investigative reporter. Evading official scrutiny and protecting her sources were vital skills that any competent journalist needed to master, and she had been practicing those arts for years.
Besides, she had been extremely careful to hide all the truly implicating evidence where no routine inspection would be likely to discover it.
They would find no evidence linking her to anything more serious than unauthorized trespassing.
But despite her outer confidence, Rita still felt a nagging sense of regret about how intensely the situation had escalated beyond her original intentions. The dark wizard had indeed been someone she had arranged to bring onto Hogwarts grounds, but her goal had never been to actually kill Adrian.
She had simply wanted to teach him a lesson, frighten him into being more cooperative, or at worst deliver a warning about the consequences of interfering with her activities.
A little intimidation, nothing more serious than that.
However, she had absolutely no idea that her contact would turn out to be connected to actual Death Eaters and the kind of dark magic that could summon manifestations of You-Know-Who himself.
'Wait a moment,' her journalist's instincts suddenly kicked into high gear as the full implications of what she had witnessed began to sink in. 'This could be the biggest news story of the decade!'
"Very good then," Dumbledore nodded with apparent satisfaction at her reluctant cooperation. "As it happens, Mr. Bagman is still currently at Hogwarts in his capacity as tournament coordinator. Professor McGonagall will escort you to the appropriate location for your security inspection shortly. I do hope you'll be prepared to answer all questions thoroughly and honestly."
Within minutes, Rita Skeeter had been hurriedly removed from the office by Professor McGonagall, who had arrived after receiving Dumbledore's message delivered via his silver phoenix Patronus.
The headmaster's office was left with only Adrian and Dumbledore, along with the unfortunate corpse that lay sprawling somewhat carelessly on the carpet.
Dumbledore returned to his chair behind the desk, his expression growing more serious as he focused his full attention on the implications of what had just occurred.
"When Tom's manifestation appeared before you in the forest," He asked with grave intensity, "what exactly did he say during your conversation?"
Adrian spent several moments organizing his thoughts.
"Let me think carefully," He replied thoughtfully. "Most of it consisted of fairly standard threatening language. However, he did make one specific claim that seemed worth noting—he said that the day of his resurrection was not far off."
"We all know that." Dumbledore frowned slightly. "Anything else?"
Adrian searched his memory thoroughly before shaking his head.
"And regarding this unfortunate individual," Dumbledore continued to ask, gesturing toward the corpse with obvious distaste, "were you able to determine his identity through any means?"
Adrian looked down at the pale body and shook his head once again.
"Wait," Adrian suddenly straightened as a possibility occurred to him. He reached into his robes and took out the two wands he had confiscated from the dark wizard during their confrontation. "Perhaps Mr. Ollivander might be able to provide some useful information. He can recognize the owners of all wands."
In the end, Ollivander didn't recognize the wand's owner either.
Of course, it wasn't that Ollivander couldn't recognize the owners of these two wands. It was that the owners of these two wands had been dead for who knows how many years.
It was actually quite impressive that Ollivander's memory could reach back far enough to recall the original purchasers of wands whose owners had been deceased for so long, but this remarkable feat of recollection did nothing to help them understand the current situation.
Afterwards, Adrian stopped concerning himself with the corpse's affairs, decisively chose to withdraw, and directly threw the matter to Dumbledore.
Let their headmaster solve such troublesome matters.
As for Rita Skeeter's final outcome after her security inspection—she received just a small fine for unauthorized entry onto school grounds, an amount that represented little more than pocket change for someone like her.
The entire dramatic episode was officially treated as nothing more than an unfortunate coincidence involving separate incidents of trespassing and dark wizard infiltration, with no proven connection between the two events.
It was as if everything that had happened that afternoon was just a minor episode in the ongoing story of Hogwarts' eventful academic year.
Honestly, this woman was even more foolish and reckless than Adrian had imagined.
The idea that she would actually dare to bring a dangerous dark wizard onto Hogwarts grounds in order to intimidate or threaten him showed her basic lack of understanding about both the magical protections surrounding the school and the potential consequences of involving herself with dangerous magical criminals.
Of course, there remained the possibility that she had been coerced or manipulated by forces beyond her control. However, based on her behavior and reactions during the interrogation, Adrian was more inclined toward the theory that she had acted mainly out of arrogance and personal vendetta.
He was considering whether it might be advantageous to reveal Rita Skeeter's secret identity as an unregistered Animagus, not out of any desire for revenge or punishment, but simply as a way to create ongoing complications that might prevent her from interfering with more important matters in the future.
A beetle Animagus form would certainly explain how she managed to gather so much private information for her sensationalized articles, and the Ministry took violations of Animagus registration laws quite seriously.
In the end, however, he abandoned this idea after more careful consideration. There was always the possibility that he might need to leverage Rita's journalistic platform for his own purposes at some point in the future.
After the lesson she had received today involving Death Eaters, manifestations of the Dark Lord, and one very permanent corpse, Adrian was confident that she would be considerably more willing to cooperate.
Time had its distinctive ability to accelerate when people weren't paying careful attention to its passage, and before anyone quite realized how quickly the weeks had flown by, it was already mid-December at Hogwarts.
As had become traditional during recent years, the castle had been experiencing steady snowfall for quite some time by this point in the winter term.
The walls and towers were covered with thick blankets of white snow that created a fairy-tale atmosphere of medieval winter glory. The tall corridor windows had become decorated with complex patterns of frost that sparkled like diamonds in the morning sunlight, while the distant Black Lake had frozen solid to create a vast mirror that reflected the gray winter sky.
The entire landscape surrounding Hogwarts had been transformed into a winter wonderland that seemed to have stepped directly out of the most romantic Christmas cards.
And along with the steadily falling snowflakes came the approaching celebration that every student looked forward to with eager anticipation: the Christmas holidays.
Ten days before Christmas morning, the students throughout Hogwarts received exciting and somewhat intimidating news during their breakfast in the Great Hall.
According to age-old Triwizard Tournament tradition, there would be a grand formal ball held on Christmas night.
However, this announcement came with a requirement that filled many students with considerably more anxiety than excitement: all fourth-year students and above would be expected to attend the ball, and they would need to find their own dance partners.
Later that afternoon, Harry was discussing this intimidating social challenge with his closest friends in the Gryffindor common room.
"Professor McGonagall informed me that as one of the tournament champions, I'm expected to participate in the traditional opening dance," Harry said with obvious irritation, running his hands through his messy black hair in a gesture of pure frustration.
"The problem is that I can't dance at all. I've never learned even the most basic steps, and the idea of performing in front of the entire school is absolutely terrifying."
"That makes two of us," Ron replied, though his tone showed that he was only half-listening to Harry's complaints. His attention seemed to be focused elsewhere.
"Actually, I do know a little bit about ballroom…..." Hermione began.
However, before she could complete her sentence, both Harry and Ron turned to stare at her with expressions of such obvious surprise and disbelief that she immediately fell silent, feeling somewhat defensive about their reaction.
"What exactly are you both looking at me like that for?" She asked with growing irritation, clearly not appreciating their assumption that she couldn't possibly know anything about such social activities.
"When did you learn to dance?" Harry inquired with genuine curiosity.
"My mother taught me," Hermione replied with simple honesty. "She believed that every well-educated young lady should possess basic social graces, including the ability to participate in formal dancing when the occasion required it."
"Oh, can't imagine you twirling around a ballroom," Ron muttered quietly from his position in the adjacent armchair.
However, this thoughtless remark had the instant effect of thoroughly annoying Hermione.
"Fine then, Ron," She said huffily. "Don't expect me to offer to teach you anything about dancing technique or proper ballroom etiquette."
After saying this, she immediately rose from her chair and walked out of the common room.
Seeing this, Harry asked cautiously, "Did you just manage to upset her again?"
"I don't think so," Ron replied with genuine confusion, scratching the back of his head. "What could she possibly be angry about this time?"
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