Chapter 147: Chapter 147: Job Interview

Chapter 147: Job Interview

19^th August 1995, Hog’s Head (Earth 2)

(Albus Dumbledore POV)

Albus Dumbledore was getting tired. He really was too old to deal with this kind of stuff. Lord Voldemort’s revival had messed up a few of his plans. Well, not really, he had known about Moody’s impersonator, Barty Crouch Junior, and his plan to revive his master. He had chosen not to act on them, in hopes of creating another confrontation between young Harry and the dark lord.

He did that in a vain hope that whatever protection Lily had created would continue to protect Harry and would save him from harm. It was one of the main reasons Dumbledore didn’t interrupt Crouch’s plot. The prophecy would be fulfilled in Harry’s favor while he still carried his mother’s protection, which he would lose when he reaches his seventeenth birthday.

So, the headmaster of Hogwarts was strapped for time, and was starting to get desperate. The discovery of Tom’s method for immortality during the chamber of secrets fiasco, while disgusting, had deeply complicated matters. It would take him years to track down every single soul anchor and destroy them, time he did not have. He did start looking for them, but so far, the search seemed fruitless, outside of the one in the Gaunt shack.

Dumbledore had foolishly hoped that Harry’s protection would be able to counter Voldemort’s horcruxes somehow. Lily had always been ingenious like that, and that protection was a piece of art that Dumbledore, while having some idea of what it entails, knew that he didn’t even scratch the surface of what it was capable of.

Unfortunately, this point is moot at this point. Voldemort found a way around Lily’s protection by using Harry’s blood during his resurrection. If Albus knew that this would have happened, he would have stopped Crouch immediately. But this was not a time to wallow in past despairs. Albus needed to be decisive. He spent the first part of the summer making sure that Voldemort wouldn’t be able to steal Harry’s birth right using his blood. There was a reason that blood magic on this degree was very frowned upon, the possibility of line theft was a real one, and old families would do anything to avoid this.

It took some bargaining with the goblins, and usage of the fact that he is young Harry’s magical guardian, to add a few restrictions to inheriting the Potter family fortune, like possessing the invisibility cloak, for example or using the marauders’ password. It took a few weeks to finalize the paperwork but after a while, Harry’s birth right was secured.

With Voldemort having come back to life, Dumbledore quickly realized the nature of Harry’s scar, and was researching a way to remove the soul shard without killing the boy. He only hoped that he would find a way quickly, because if he didn’t, the boy would have to die, something he wanted to avoid at all costs.

It was mostly out of guilt; Dumbledore had knowingly made young Harry’s life miserable. Truthfully, he only wanted Harry to be humble and not end up as a spoilt brat which any child would have become when he was being worshipped by the masses. He didn’t expect the Dursleys to love him, but he expected them to act like human beings, not like the magic fearing savages they are. He had visited Petunia a few times while Harry was at Hogwarts, and Petunia did regret her actions towards her nephew, however, the main problem was her husband who had seen her fears of magic and decided to agree with her and started acting more violently towards young Harry. Dumbledore couldn’t enchant them or curse them, because they were under Harry’s blood protection and thus until Harry’s seventeenth birthday, they were safe. Albus needed that protection, after all, to defeat Voldemort.

Now, onto his latest issues, Dumbledore’s issues with the ministry were getting out of hand. Honestly, he didn’t care about being dismissed from his political positions; he was planning on retiring soon after dealing with the dark lord, and to focus solely on Hogwarts.

The smear campaign was very amusing and showed how desperate Fudge actually was and demonstrated how fragile his grip on the ministry is. Anyone with a brain could recognize the signs that he won’t be elected next term, especially after attacking a teenager of all things for saying things after suffering with what was sure to be a traumatizing event.

But Fudge had gone too far and had actually sent dementors to silence the boy. Well, Umbridge was the one to do it, but it was still his administration that did it. And then, he had the audacity to summon the entire Wizengamot for an underaged magic hearing, just to attack the boy for defending himself.

Adding in the pressure he was putting on them to find a new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, or they would send Umbridge as a professor, a woman who hadn’t even passed her OWLS in Defense. They had threatened every candidate to withdraw and had already assumed that Umbridge had the job. They had even added her chosen book into the booklist. This was an obvious plot to undermine his authority on Hogwarts, but there was nothing he could do without actively challenging the ministry, something that he needed to avoid with Voldemort still in hiding.

Dumbledore had almost given up hope and was resigned to give Umbridge the position, which would subject the students to a malicious, cruel and unknowledgeable Professor. He only hoped that Tom’s curse would work early on her.

Fortunately for him, he had received a letter from a most peculiar candidate, Jasmine Sayre. He had never heard of the woman, he had even thought that the family was extinct. He had tracked down the family tree all the way back to the founding of Ilvermorny, the most popular American school of magic, with Gellert during their foolish quest for the Hallows. Still, the girl was undoubtedly a Sayre, considering her recommendation from the head of the Charms guild and Runes guild. The two men had a reputation to maintain and wouldn’t tarnish it by sending in a fraud.

Apparently, the young woman was a prodigy in pretty much all magical fields and was looking to teach at Hogwarts to be able to use the library, especially the restricted section, for her research.

Dumbledore was doubtful, but anything would be better than Umbridge, even a virtual stranger with no motives. Right now, Dumbledore was waiting for her to arrive at his brother’s inn, for an interview, that both of them knew would be useless. But perhaps he would be able to convince her to join the Order of the Phoenix? He had to vet her and see her trustworthiness, but a witch of her caliber would be a very good addition to their side.

The woman entered the bar, she was under a powerful notice me not, but Dumbledore was able to see through it, using his charmed glasses. She was a beautiful young woman, in her twenties, with long black wavy hair, skin as pale as the moonlight, and emerald green eyes that reminded him deeply of young Harry’s eyes.

The woman looked around, found him and sat in front of him.

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Dumbledore spoke, “Miss Sayre, I presume.”

The woman smirked at him, “Headmaster Dumbledore, I presume.”

Dumbledore chuckled at that. Very few dared to act that sassy with him, probably afraid of the second coming of Merlin or something. It was refreshing to see someone this young be this unafraid of him. Was she that confident of her abilities? He tried to invade her mind using Legilimency, but was immediately stopped. The woman’s eyes focused on him, “That was very rude. Do you always do that when you meet another person?”

Huh, a powerful Occlumens as well, how fascinating, especially for someone her age. The headmaster hadn’t seen this kind of competency in the mind arts since Voldemort himself. Disappointed in himself for being caught off guard like that, Dumbledore sighed and chose to change the subject entirely, “I hope I don’t sound presumptuous, but last I heard, the Sayre family had died out centuries ago.”

The woman nodded, “Yes, but a few members survived the purge and took other names to protect themselves. We vowed not to take the name Sayre without being strong enough to protect ourselves. I am the last Sayre, I even graduated from Ilvermorny under a different name. I am powerful enough to protect myself, so I took back my family name.”

The headmaster nodded; it made sense. Many families had done the same during Grindelwald’s war. He actively hunted down old families to steal their books and plunder whatever knowledge they had to enrich himself. It was a common trend and so families had moved away and hidden under different names just to escape Gellert’s wrath.

“Now, Miss Sayre, why do you think that you’re qualified to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts?”

The young woman was looking at him incredulously, “You’re kidding, right? If you want proof of my knowledge, you should just read my references. I am the youngest person with a dual mastery in history, but if you want a practical demonstration, I’m more than happy to oblige, but I don’t think that this place would still stay standing.”

Dumbledore chuckled once more; he hadn’t been challenged to a duel in years. He was almost tempted to accept the offer, but she was right, it would probably create more problems for his already large pile of them, “You’re probably right, it would be unwise. But that wasn’t what I was asking. I wanted to know why you think you can TEACH Defense, not if you could practice it.”

The woman looked at him and he could see that her respect for him had risen slightly, “Well, considering that my apprentice didn’t complain when I taught her, my tutelage seemed to be good enough. Plus, I always wanted the world to see the true wonders of magic, people really take it for granted. And to do that, I need to start young, show them how magic actually is, show them the truth. There’s this satisfaction when you realize that children had grown into great men and women with your assistance. It’s very gratifying.”

This rang warning bells in Dumbledore head, was she a dark witch? Did she want to corrupt the students? “What magic are you talking about?”

“All magic, from Elementalism to Charms to Transfiguration to even Alchemy, people always follow the steps in the books without thinking, forgetting how this magic was discovered in the first place, ignoring what could be improved. As a society, Magical Britain has stagnated for centuries, and I wanted to help stop that.”

“And how are you planning on doing this?”

The woman grinned at him, “By making them actually think about magic, other than it being a convenient tool.”

This was a very dangerous line of thinking, that could destabilize the fragile peace that Albus had worked his entire life to create. It was a way to avoid another Grindelwald who could wield magic to his will like a master. Truthfully, Voldemort, outside of raw magical power, had nothing on Gellert, he had nothing on Albus. If he was at his prime, Albus would have easily wiped the floor with him. It was after Albus started restricting certain books and certain magics from Britain that the situation was starting to stabilize, and violent crimes had almost ceased. The Aurors could easily handle anything because, outside of family magic, there were very few spells that the Aurors didn’t recognize on sight and knew how to deal with them. Introducing Magical improvement was a sure way to destabilize this and create chaos and instability.

“You have to understand that some knowledge is dangerous for the general public. The consequences would be very grave. I cannot allow you to introduce such dangerous thoughts to my school.”

The woman snorted, “Look, let’s put our cards on the table here. We both know that you’re going to hire me, because if you don’t, what will happen to your students while under Umbridge’s thumb will be far worse than whatever ‘different knowledge’ I put in their heads. This would leave Hogwarts relatively safe from the Ministry until they decided to butt in as well. You’ll be free to deal with your little pissing context with Riddle. So, which one is it going to be? You can either choose the ministry that is proving to actively try to undermine anything you do on principle, or you can take a risk and choose me, an unknown piece on your little chess board, a piece that is neither white nor black, a piece that you have no control over and will never have any control over. It would be easier for you to keep an eye on me if I’m in the castle, after all. So, what is it going to be, me or the ministry?”

With that little speech, Dumbledore knew that Jasmine Sayre was far more dangerous than she appeared. The woman was cunning, very powerful, and with access to sensitive knowledge that no one knows about like Voldemort’s identity. But the woman had admitted that she was on neither side. Perhaps, having her at Hogwarts would be enough to persuade her to his side, to actively oppose Voldemort, to fight for the light.

It didn’t matter either way, he had no choice in the matter, after all. Dumbledore sighed and spoke to her, “Fine. You’re hired. I expect to see you on the first day of the semester. I will owl you the details tomorrow. I hope that we’ll have a wonderful year together.

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