Chapter 108: The Banquet at Grimmauld Place

Dumbledore arrived at Grimmauld Place the morning after Edward returned. Amelia Bones came with him, accompanied by a curse specialist and a healer from St Mungo's. The locket and Basilisk fang remained inside separate cases.

They inspected the lower ward room before bringing either object across the threshold. The specialist rejected one ventilation charm because it might carry residue into the courtyard and replaced it with a sealed collection jar. Dumbledore added shields around the observation line. Bones recorded every change.

Kreacher watched in silence until the locket's case was placed on the stone table.

"Why not destroy it now?" he asked.

"Because we have not tested how its outer wards react to venom," the specialist said. "If the casing projects the attack outward, anyone holding the fang could receive it."

She used a minute sample taken from the dead Basilisk to touch a detached sliver from the locket's clasp. The metal blackened. A dark pulse moved through the sealed case and struck the innermost shield.

The test proved the venom could damage the enchantment. It also proved that direct contact would be unsafe.

They scheduled the full attempt for three days later, after the specialist prepared a fixed clamp and a remote striking arm. Kreacher disliked the delay but signed the room log with a shaking hand.

"Waiting is not failure," Edward told him after the adults left.

"Kreacher has waited thirteen years."

"Then three days will not be the part that defeats us."

The summer gathering fell on the intervening evening. Five guests arrived rather than eleven. Each brought the signed invitation and the consent page their guardian had reviewed.

Draco came first in ordinary black robes, carrying a box of sweets despite the instruction against gifts. Pansy arrived with three sharpened quills. Theodore brought a blank minute book. Daphne carried Hermione's written permission to use the mirror findings. Samuel Rosier came last, still wearing his prefect badge from habit.

Kreacher served tea in the front drawing room. The silver was old but the meal was simple, and no family portrait had been moved into a place of honour. Walburga Black remained behind a heavy curtain after shouting that half the guests were insufficiently deferential.

"Your house sounds disappointed in us," Pansy said.

"My house has been disappointed in everyone since 1885," Edward replied.

The answer loosened the room.

Before dinner, Edward gave them a short tour limited to occupied and safe areas. The family tapestry prompted the most questions. Names had been burned away whenever an ancestor chose a marriage, friendship, or political position the family disliked.

Daphne stopped before one blackened mark. "A record that removes inconvenient people is not much of a record."

"That is why the original remains visible," Edward said. "It shows the removal as well as the name."

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The library stayed closed. Guests saw the door and the access log attached beside it. No one entered without an adult custodian until the dangerous shelves were catalogued.

At dinner, Theodore opened the minute book. Pansy insisted they begin with the purpose of the meeting rather than the food.

Edward placed five packets on the table. Each contained the same approved extracts Dumbledore had released: maintenance history from the Chamber, nonlethal defensive theory, Riddle's recorded failures, and Hermione's analysis of indirect sight. Every page carried a mark showing its source and whether it was an original passage, later annotation, or staff summary.

"The original volumes are at Hogwarts," Edward said. "I did not inherit them, steal them, or receive permission to distribute them. These copies are what the review cleared."

Draco turned immediately to the section on unsupported flight. "This is mostly warnings."

"Because the successful method was not there. Riddle recorded three injuries and an incomplete hypothesis."

"Then why include it?"

"So the next person does not mistake confidence for a finished spell."

Samuel examined the source marks before reading the text. "Who decided what was dangerous?"

"Dumbledore, Snape, McGonagall, and a Ministry curse specialist. I argued for two additional defensive passages. They rejected one and summarised the other."

"And you accepted that?" Pansy asked.

"I accepted that I did not know enough to overrule four people who could explain the risk. We can challenge their reasoning if we find evidence, not remove the limits because they are inconvenient."

The discussion moved to the Chamber. Edward gave a factual account of the rescue, including his decision to enter the rubble channel and the limits imposed by McGonagall. He did not claim Harry's victory or hide that Fawkes had blinded the Basilisk.

Daphne read Hermione's page aloud. It demonstrated the kind of contribution the early alliance had ignored: careful observation by a Muggle-born student had identified the gaze mechanism before any inherited library did.

Draco shifted in his chair but raised no objection.

"Does Granger know we are discussing her?" Samuel asked.

Daphne held up the permission letter. "She added a correction to Edward's description of the hand mirror."

That detail mattered more than praise. Consent could be checked. Credit could be corrected.

Samuel asked whether the same standard applied to family material. His grandfather had lent a concealment charm to the Rosiers decades earlier; copies now circulated without the inventor's name.

"We cannot repair every missing attribution tonight," Edward said. "We can record what is known and stop creating new omissions."

Theodore opened a section in the minute book for disputed provenance. A source could be listed as uncertain without pretending it was anonymous. Daphne proposed that any member who recognised a family passage could challenge the label and request comparison under a neutral reader.

Draco objected that rivals might use the process to claim Malfoy work. Pansy answered that a claim was not a ruling. Evidence would include older copies, handwriting, dated correspondence, and testimony about custody.

"That sounds like a trial over every spell," Draco said.

"Only the ones someone disputes," Theodore replied. "Most people will prefer eating dinner."

Kreacher served the fruit tarts at that moment, proving the point.

They also agreed that sharing a defensive principle did not require surrendering every family secret. Owners could decline. What they could not do was offer a fragment, hide a lethal condition, and then blame the learner for trusting them. Safety warnings travelled with the spell or the spell did not travel at all.

Edward wrote that clause himself. The Chamber volumes had shown what happened when incomplete knowledge was mistaken for a gift.

After the plates were cleared, Edward placed the draft charter beside the packets. It required voluntary membership, evidence before accusation, recorded decisions, safe access to dangerous study, and protection without regard to house or blood status.

"This is not a secret army," he said. "If that is what you came for, leave before signing anything."

No one moved. They began asking questions instead.

Samuel reserved the final one. He pointed to a copied page of serpentine script from the oldest Chamber volume.

"You called this an authentic Slytherin text. What establishes that?"

Edward slid the provenance sheet across the table. "Nothing you must accept on my word. Examine the ink analysis, the layered handwriting, and the staff report. Then tell us what the claim is worth."

Samuel unfolded a clean square of silk and leaned over the copy.