He gave a harrumph and muttered, "Cheap, worthless garbage."
"Of course," nodded Dumbledore. "I have little intention of wearing them anywhere, but in the classroom. The less I have to, the better. I much prefer your sartorial splendour, which is why I've come back.
"Now we can finally get on with the real reason I'm shopping."
It was while he and Twillfit were discussing what colour to pair with the chartreuse that Dumbledore felt the ward tap at Hogwarts he had his predecessor install suddenly release.
As Twillfit was recommending a dark forest green for trim, Dumbledore suddenly stiffened and cried, "Noooo!"
He quickly blurted out, "Terrence, my good man. I apologise. I must hurry back to the castle. I'll be back as soon as I can." He suddenly spun on his foot and raced out of the clothier. He needed to get back to find out what had happened to his ward tap.
In his haste to leave, he left his bundle of 'Malkin' robes on the counter.
As Dumbledore fled out the door, Twillfit took one look at the brown paper wrapped bundle, stared at it with distaste and gestured for his shop assistant to come over.
"Sir?" the young man asked.
"Send that to Marchbanks, would you, Peter?" asked Twillfit. "Add a note that Dumbledore left it here when he suddenly and rudely took off. There's a good chap."
With that, Twillfit left the young man to it. After all, little issues like that were the reason he and his partner hired the man. That, plus he looked delicious in robes that fit well at the hips, upper arms and shoulders, as a well-tailored robe should.
_‗_
―==(oIo)==―
ˇ
Sirius was telling Remus a few of the more public stuff Harry had been up to recently, his winning of the case for Sirius against the Ministry and the stripping away of the Statute of Misuse of Muggle Artefacts together with the sudden appearance of the Longbottoms right at the beginning of the Wizengamot General Meeting, when Remus spotted Dumbledore suddenly hurry into the Leaky.
"Hey, there's Dumbledore," said Remus, beginning to rise.
Sirius immediately hit Remus with an underpowered banishing charm, knocking him back into his seat as the old man raced for the fireplace just past them. And before Remus could snap at him for the banishing charm, he hit him with a silencing charm.
A few moments later, Dumbledore barked, "Transfiguration Office, Hogwarts!" He stepped in and was gone.
Sirius immediately lifted the silencing charm as Remus surged to his feet.
"What the hell, Pads?!"
With a sigh, Sirius said, "Sit down and calm down, Moony."
"Why?" the scarred man angrily asked.
Both knew what he meant.
"Because I cannot have Dumbledore use the excuse of bumping into me in the Alley to stick me with tracking, compulsion, loyalty charms and the like," he replied.
"Why would he do such a thing?" snapped Remus.
"Because he has this very unhealthy focus on Harry," he replied. "I know why, but I cannot tell you. I'm under oath. All I can tell you about it is that it makes perfect sense."
Moony scowled back and said, "I cannot believe Dumbledore would get up to all that sort of nonsense."
Starting to lose his temper back, Sirius said, "And I really couldn't care any less than I do right now that you don't!"
Surprised by the almost sudden vehemence in his friend's words, tone, posture and demeanour Remus sat back and stared back in not a little shock.
A few moments later, he'd calmed down enough to give a pointed look to his friend, who had also calmed back down. "What aren't you telling me, Padfoot?"
"It's what you haven't told me that's the issue, Moons," Sirius snapped back.
Leaning forward and staring intently at his last remaining school time friend, he asked, "During that near nine months you were at the school as a Professor, why didn't you ever tell Harry about his true heritage? You had plenty of time to do it; so, why didn't you?"
Shocked at the vehemence at the question, it was a few moments before Remus replied, "Errr... because Dumbledore asked me not to?"
Sirius sat back and stared back in fury. And it was obvious from his expression that the answer was nowhere near acceptable.
Remus's inner wolf was recoiling in fear.
It was a few long moments before Sirius quietly, angrily, vehemently stated, "We're going to get you checked out by a Healer. If there's no traces of compulsions, loyalty potions or the like in your system... then, we're done. Do you understand what I'm telling you?"
"Padfoot! What the Hell?"
"You don't know the full story of what that man did to our boy," said Sirius. "But, it's not for me to tell you. You clearly won't believe me."
He pulled a couple of galleons from his pocket and dumped them on the table. "Go to the Daily Prophet and ask for back-copies of the paper. The specific days you're looking for are the twenty fifth and twenty sixth of November; and the week starting Monday, the thirtieth of November. Hell, get the ones in between, too.
"You need to read them. You won't believe me, otherwise. Then, once you've done that, talk to a few people to get their views of what happened and contact me again. I expect to hear from you within the week.
"Then, when I do, I'm taking you to see my cousin, Andi. She's a Master Healer and very well trained in detecting lingering traces of potions within your system."
Then he rose and said, "Take care of yourself until then, Remus." And spun about and left.
Remus was left sitting there wondering what had just happened. The two galleons remained sitting on the table for almost a minute before he scooped them up as he rose. He made his way out to the Alley, heading towards the offices of the Daily Prophet.
_‗_
―==(oIo)==―
ˇ
By the time Dumbledore made it back to Hogwarts and hurried up to the Headmistress's office, the ward master team were just completing their work and the wards were coming back up. He hadn't even noticed the gargoyle had immediately stepped aside for him, or what it meant.
Almost bursting into the office he saw Marchbanks and 'ET', the Team Lead. He recognised the man, immediately.
"What the Hell have you done?" he demanded.
Marchbanks snapped right back, "Professor Dumbledore, mind your tone!"
ET smirked and replied, "The school's wards have been reconfigured. Your power tap has been removed."
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