"He can choose. I'm willing to take him into the house of Black provided he's not been hopelessly spoiled by his father and his father's teachings."
"Will he become the Black heir?"
"No. No chance of that. Draco wouldn't even be considered."
"Who then your half blood godson? I can't believe you would do this, a half blood ahead of my son?"
"Oh it gets even worse Cissy, you see I married a squib and you will be respectful of her as Lady Black or you can kiss any hope of staying a Black goodbye."
"Aunt would be rolling in her grave."
"Yeah, her portrait gave me chapter and verse, right up until I silenced it and told her I would burn it out of the frame if she said one more word against Beth or our children.
"So what is it going to be Cissy?"
"Lucius became a death eater at sixteen because of Abraxas. Everything he's done as a death eater was to protect me and Draco."
"Not quite sure I buy that load of bovine excrement, but if so then I'll see to it he's protected. I want proof Cissy. Your husband was given a school journal by one Tom Marvolo Riddle the first part of your husband's proof comes when he hands that over, the rest will be in the form of a magical oath that he will never raise his wand to attack anyone except in defense. If he does both of those I will allow your marriage to stand, I will reinstate a quarter of your dowry, and I'll protect house of Malfoy."
Narcissa laughed sarcastically. "You, protect the House of Malfoy that is rich. Sirius, you're being tried as we speak."
"The case was a set up by Albus Dumbledore to get control of Harry. In three weeks, he'll be lucky to maintain his role of Headmaster. His power base has been being undercut for the last two and a half years. There are certain things that will come out during and after the trial. My power base is quite secure."
Narcissa Malfoy nee Black looked at her cousin. He seemed totally confident and there was a ring of truth in his words. "I'll speak to Lucius."
"Twenty four hours, Cissy no more."
Monday the trial commenced. The weight of proof fell to the British Ministry led by Albus Dumbledore. It only took Smith twenty minutes to make the prosecutions case look like swiss cheese. He then brought out the Potter wills, once they were read any question of Sirius being guilty in the matter of the Potters death was gone as was any question of him being guilty of the kidnapping charge.
The fact that the wills clearly stated who the secret keeper was, who their son's guardian was to be, and that Albus Dumbledore knew these details prior to the Potter's death left Albus with next to no credibility in the international community.
Sirius didn't even take the stand. All that remained was the question of what price was the British Ministry of Magic going to pay to re-establish itself in the International Arena. The rest of the week was spent deciding that.
One of the first things Sirius' legal team asked for was the resignation of Albus Dumbledore from all his Public Offices on the grounds the man had tried to railroad Sirius into Azkaban to get hold of his godson, disregarding what was morally right and wrong. Even disregarding the whole morality issue there was the whole issue of the legality of the situation.
One of Albus' cronies accused "Black you're trying to misrepresent the situation and to disgrace a national hero. It's obvious you don't care about the country because you took a national treasure and left."
Smith had called Amelia Bones to the stand. "Auror Bones would you tell us where your department gets it's funding?"
"Eighty-five percent of out budget comes from taxes, ten percent from fines, the remaining five comes from donations from private individuals."
"Who are some of the biggest contributors?"
"The Longbottom Family, the Potter Family, the Duc du Sable and the Foundation for Law and Order."
And approximately how much do each of those contributors donate?"
"The Longbottoms and the Potters both donate about a third of a percent of the total budget. The Duc donates a full percent and the rest comes from the consortium of the Foundation which is made up of witches and wizards all over Britain."
"Thank you, no further questions." Albus saw no reason to drag this out with more questions. But when Smith prepared to ask yet another group after asking similar questions of diverse groups such as St. Mungo's, an orphanage, and even Hogwarts. He objected. " I fail to see the relevance of these questions?"
"Well this new accusation is that my client deserted his country and disregarded its welfare. I was merely trying to bring out the fact that he did nothing of the kind. My Client did his duty by his godson by removing him to safe shores, and he continued to do his duty by his countrymen despite they were hunting him, through his donations to groups here in the UK."
"I failed to hear the name Black mentioned in any of those narratives. Mr. Smith."
Sirius spoke for the first time. "Didn't anyone inform you all, I inherited the DeSable Dukedom about six months after I left England. I've since made sure to help my fellow Brits where and when I could. Mostly anonymously of course."
Albus felt a wave of nausea. He knew to give up. Now the only question was would he be able to maintain his Headmaster position at Hogwarts.
...
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