In the Harry Potter Without Harry Potter

Chapter 32: ‘Dear’?

Filch soon brought Flitwick to the great hall.

The spells on the doors were all placed by him, and if someone had opened them, then naturally he could look for traces of spell on that intruder who had entered.

But even though he checked every single student present, he found nothing.

All the students of Hogwarts were here, all 56 of them, without any absence.

This made Professor McGonagall's face turn grim, there can only be three possibilities for such a situation.

A student did break into a room that was out of bounds, but it was not unintentional or just some curious and mischievous student, rather it was a premeditated act, after which he removed the traces of the spell from his body.

Such a possibility is very low, even if it is only a minor magic spell, it is still a spell placed by Flitwick, and not just any student can dissolve it.

The second possibility would be that no student had trespassed the room, and the only people left on this wagon besides the students were the professors, so the current deed was actually committed by some professor.

This is the most unlikely guess, excluding Dumbledore and her, there are only three professors at Hogwarts, Lily, Slughorn, and Flitwick who were either taught by her personally, or colleagues who worked with her for many years, all of them were tested at critical moments, so none of them can be suspected.

That is why Professor McGonagall actually leans more towards the third guess.

Since it is not a student, nor a professor, then it means that there is someone in this wagon who is not supposed to be here!

When she thought of this Professor McGonagall's face became incredibly pale.

She did not like to think about this possibility, because no such thing had ever happened at Hogwarts during the seven years of exile, but she had no choice but to think about it.

If such a thing did happen, it would mean that all the students in this wagon are in an unbelievable state of danger!

"Everyone, stay in the great hall! Don't go anywhere!"

Her voice suddenly became sharp and frightened all the students present.

Professor McGonagall's face was frighteningly grim, and she entrusted this place to Flitwick, who also recognized the seriousness of the situation, and then she hurriedly walked out of the great hall and walked quickly in the direction of Dumbledore's office.

The panic in her heart made her even forget to knock on the door, and simply pushed the door open and walked in.

"Albus! You have to be aware of this! Albus!"

Dumbledore was quietly writing a letter with a quill, and in the face of McGonagall's sudden intrusion, his face did not show the slightest surprise.

He put down the quill in his hand, but his eyes were still on the letter that he had just finished writing.

"Don't worry, Minerva, the wagon is still running, and I'm still here, so there is no need to be so flustered."

Dumbledore's calmness seemed to calm McGonagall's nerves as well, and she breathed steadily, nevertheless, she said impatiently.

"Someone trespassed the restricted rooms on the wagon, all the rooms were previously subjected to Filius's spell, which can leave traces on the person who opened the door, but when we checked all the students on the wagon, none of them had the trace. Somebody should have intruded! Most likely it was during the last Auror attack, that incident was too strange, if their intention was to distract us with the attack and then let someone sneak in, that would make sense!"

She quickly finished her speculation, but the expression on Dumbledore's face did not change a bit, he was still looking at the letter in his hand as if he was checking the wording on it.

"Well~"

When Professor McGonagall looked at his attitude, she could not help but frown again, and she shouted Dumbledore's name.

"Albus!"

Dumbledore then seemed to be pulled back into focus by her voice, and he looked up at McGonagall with a blink.

"What's wrong?"

"Did you even hear what I just said!"

Dumbledore sighed and placed the letter to the side as he crossed his fingers in front of him.

"Of course, of course, I was listening to you, you speculated that the last attack was actually a conspiracy by the Ministry of Magic and that they deliberately tried to sneak someone into the wagon. But I don't think you have to worry at all if that's the case, Minerva."

He said softly, his voice sounded faint like he really didn't care much about this matter that McGonagall was so nervous about.

"Why we shouldn't worry! No one has ever been able to intrude into this wagon for seven years, and now if someone did sneak in, especially if that someone was from the Dark Lord's side, how could we keep the students safe?"

In regard to her concern, Dumbledore simply replied calmly.

"First of all, someone intruded on the wagon is just a guess of yours, although we left at that time, Horace was left to guard the wagon, I trust his ability more than anyone else, if someone really intruded, then he wouldn't have failed to notice it. Besides, if someone did sneak in and had the ability to remain dormant on the wagon for three months without harming the students or being discovered by us, then we would have even less to worry about. If he was really targeting students, he would have acted long ago and would not have waited until now, which means he has other intentions, we just have to wait for him to reveal his traces. On the bright side, it's better to have an enemy infiltrated from the outside than to have a traitor within ourselves, isn't it?"

His words were reasonable and justified, such a reply managed to stabilize Professor McGonagall's mood a bit, after all, as long as there is Dumbledore on board, it is unlikely that there will be any major incidents.

"So what are we supposed to do now?"

After dispelling Professor McGonagall's nervousness, Dumbledore focused his attention on the letter again, as if he could see flowers on it.

"Nothing, have Hagrid found a place where we can celebrate the holiday, it is time for us to prepare to take the children for Christmas this year."

"That's it?" Even if her mood has calmed down, McGonagall still felt a little incredulous about Dumbledore's way of handling the situation.

Dumbledore nodded.

"That's it, please help me call Horace to come here later, I have some things I would like his help with."

After seeing that Dumbledore was not really all that unresponsive, McGonagall was then slightly relieved, but as she was about to leave the Headmaster's office, Dumbledore suddenly called out to her again.

"Perhaps you can give me a little advice, after all, you wrote all the Hogwarts admissions letters in the castle, you should know more than me when it comes to wording and grammar."

McGonagall turned her head again in doubt, she was actually also very curious about the letter in Dumbledore's hand too.

"What kind of wording is it?"

"'Honourable Mr Grindelwald', do you think such wording is too formal? Although we haven't seen each other for four or five years, after all, we are old friends, so would it be better to use 'Dear'?"

McGonagall: "..."

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