Chapter 1
Compose
With natural light hazing alongside the mountains and glinting off the bronzed stars that speckled across the ceiling, the Ravenclaw common room was a lovely gathering place for all the members of the house. Nearly every night, while the students of all years would be doing their homework and assigned reading, the entire room would launch off long debates on a dozen different topics, usually starting because of the simplest off-hand comment.
Through the thousand years that the noble house of Ravenclaw had existed, the students had gathered together, like the old Roman assemblies, and discuss topics of both ancient history and current events.
In the more recent days, however, current events had been the topic of choice night after night. The change had not been out of anyone’s desire to lead a discussion; rather, a response to the chaos and horror that people living in the midsts of an upheaval of any kind would have felt.
“Now do you believe we are becoming a police state?”
For the whole school year, these topics had echoed through the Ravenclaw common room. They had ranged from the constant bickering within the Ministry, the gripping paranoia of those who were supposed to be making informed decisions for the school that was becoming harder and harder to ignore, and, what was quickly becoming the most personal for all the Hogwarts students, the new faculty member quickly rising through the ranks: Dolores Umbridge.
The woman had started out as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, the latest in a long line of many, and someone whom most of the Ravenclaws had hated from the very beginning. It did not take a very high intellect to see that the Hogwarts students were getting a subpar education (as much as that statement seemed to contradict itself). There were no practical applications of Defensive magic, and the so-called ‘theory-based’ classes had nothing to do with the subject they spoke of. Even the older students said so.
As though Umbridge weren’t horrid enough when she was just a lowly teacher, one morning the students awoke to learn the Ministry had named her the ‘Hogwarts High Inquisitor’. No one had any clue as to what it meant, until all the new rules began to be posted on the common room bulletins. Bit by bit, personal freedoms were chipped away and everyone began to feel as though they were being watched at all hours of the day. The students and the teachers both complained (in secret, of course), but there was nearly nothing they could do about it” not with the Ministry and all those who could buy their way into power pulling the strings and the Prophet praising their every action.
“The thing is such an idiotic rag,” one of the seven-year prefects complained. “Why would the Ministry even care what stories they were printing?”
She was talking, of course, about The Quibbler, the magazine Loony Lovegood’s father edited. And the prefect did nothing to quiet her comments for the straggly-haired blonde, who was laying upside down on one of the common room sofas.
Loony was extremely proud of her father and the work he did on The Quibber. Every time a new issue came out, she would slip a copy under each dormitory door and make sure there were at least three copies in the common room. The stories were always ridiculous (Wizardgamot Judge Replaced by Centaur During Sick Leave, Muggle Government Possesses Division Devoted to Watching Wizarding World), but everyone had read it at least once. It was great reading on those nights when a student couldn’t fall asleep, but didn’t want to open any of their textbooks for fear of stimulating their minds further, wind them up too much.
Just now, though, even The Quibber was starting to take an interest in current politics. Still stories too outlandish to be believed, but it was the only piece of media in wizarding Britain that didn’t just blindly praise the Ministry.
But then, one morning, a new notice appeared on the common room bulletin that both baffled and fascinated the Ravenclaw students at the same time.
BY ORDER OF
The High Inquisitor of Hogwarts
Any student found in possession of the magazine The Quibber will be expelled.
The above is in accordance with
Educational Decree Number Twenty-seven
Signed:
Dolores Jane Umbridge
High Inquisitor
“Up until now, any other new regulation could have been brushed off, but the foundation of a free society is a free press,” preached Mandy Brocklehurst. “The fact that we were barred from reading anything, even when Umbridge assigned that ridiculous lesson plan, should have been a warning sign!”
The other Ravenclaws regaled the fifth-year with a collective look of skepticism. Mandy liked to use big words and long-winded speeches to make herself sound more intelligent. It was an insecurity most Ravenclaws possessed, but it was especially prevalent in Mandy’s case.
What was most pestering, though, was that Mandy was right. Ever since Umbridge had shown up, the entire school had had an uneasy feeling to it. It had started with a class where they weren’t allowed to learn anything (a severe sin in the eyes of any member of Ravenclaw), but as more time passed, even though no one dared say anything against the system, people were beginning to notice that the school was becoming a Fascist state.
“It was easy to see this coming,” another seventh-year remarked in a relaxed sort of way. “We have one newspaper that is universally respected in the country, and they are completely in the Ministry’s pocket. It’s only natural that they would try to silence even the smallest media source that disagrees with them.”
“And it’s The Quibber for Merlin’s sake!” piped Lisa Turpin, suddenly glancing around the room as though looking for something. “Does anyone here still have a copy?”
Every set of eyes in the room raced around looking for anyone who might answer the question. There were always so many copies of the insane magazine floating around the Ravenclaw dormitories. It was hard to believe that they wouldn’t be able to find at least one copy of whatever issue it was that had set Umbridge off. A logical response would have been to go straight to Luna Lovegood, but most members were too intimidated by the strange girl to even say hello to her. No one was actually going to go up to her and ask her a favor.
Eventually, a little second-year boy, Stewart Ackerly, pushed himself up off the sofa and sprinted up one of the tower staircases. No one carried on with any type of debate and discussion while he was gone. Instead, the entire common room listened for every little bump and muttering that came from the upstairs.
The response was collective as soon as the little boy clabbered back down the stairway. “It was wedged part-way underneath a trunk,” he told her. “It has this month’s date on it. It has to be the one!”
Stewart took a new place of honor between Lisa Turpin and another fifth-year girl, Morag MacDogal. The girls peered over Stewart’s shoulders for a better look and all the other pieces of furniture were abandoned as the room of Ravenclaws gathered around the tattered magazine.
“Harry Potter Speaks Out at Last,” Stewart read aloud the featured story on the front cover. “The truth about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and the night I saw him return.”
“That’s not news!” piped a stiff-sitting fourth-year girl. “Potter’s been blathering on about that since last spring!”
Most of the students glared a stern look at the girl for her callous words, but none of them could very well say she was a liar. There was not a person in the school who had not heard Harry Potter’s ranting that You-Know-Who had killed Cedric Diggory, and that the Dark wizard had returned from the grave, and now he was going to kill them all. You had to be living even more so under a rock not to notice that the Ministry was doing everything possible to discredit Potter’s statements and keep everyone believing the party line: everything was fine, everything was perfect, and anyone who couldn’t see that was crazy and should not be believed.
“Well, Stewart, open it!” Morag prompted, shaking his left shoulder. “Read more to us!”
“We can’t do that!” a Chinese boy in his third-year stopped him. “You all read the notice that Umbridge posted. We’ll be expelled!”
“We’ll be expelled if she knows we keep any copies in our dormitory,” Lisa snapped back. "We will get in no less trouble if we say we didn’t read it. So c’mon, Stewart! Read us the story!”
The older girl was more insistent in her argument, so she was the one that Stewart eventually obeyed. Flipping into the middle of the magazine, Stewart found the story, complete with interviews, and he began reading the story to the rest of his housemates. Plenty of people objected and shifted nervously, but no one left the room or tried to stop the little boy.
Stewart read the article, paragraph after paragraph, and when he was finally done, no one in the house of Ravenclaw had anything to say. Not for ages and ages.
Finally, Lisa snatched the magazine from Stewart’s hands and held it up close to her face, as though she didn’t believe the words that had just been read to her. “That’s it?” she gaped. “This is the singular piece of media that could bring down the entire Ministry if it fell into student hands?”
Morag took the magazine from Lisa. “It’s just the same psychotic ramblings they publish in every issue.”
There was no doubt that Luna Lovegood could have heard Morag perfectly, but the words did not seem to affect her. She still lay relaxed on the sofa she had all to herself, chewing her way lazily through her bag of Licorice Wands. From the dreamy expression in the girl’s eyes, it wasn’t entirely clear if she even knew she was in the common room.
“Makes a person wonder why exactly they banned the thing from the school if they keep insisting it’s all such nonsense,” Morag finished.
“Don’t tell me that you’re beginning to believe Potter’s rambling,” the seventh-year boy said, raising an eyebrow and rolling his eyes.
“You don’t think we have the right to decide for ourselves if whether or not it is nonsense?” Lisa asked. “The Ministry is already so powerful, able to send their message any way they want. Do they really need to silence the one magazine that most people wouldn’t believe on general principle anyway?”
“It is odd, you know,” Mandy spoke up, twisting a strand of mousy-brown hair around her index finger. “It’s outright paranoia. They devote so much effort into discrediting Potter and Dumbledore. The Inquisitorial Squad, all these new rules that Umbridge has come up with”it’s suspicious. It makes them look like they have something to hide.”
A few in the circle of students rolled their eyes and snorted. Some of them whispered about how they should consider who was really paranoid in this discussion. But a good number of the Ravenclaws didn’t say anything, not even to themselves. Instead, they shifted their eyes down to the deep blue carpet, and their lips were twitching as though they couldn’t quite decide how to feel. At any rate, the discussion was dead and there was nothing that could be done to revive it.
Eventually, after spending far too much time in the uncomfortable silence, the students started to go up to their bedrooms, one by one. No one spoke or chatted with one another as they left, and the lack of movement and sound from within the tower was disturbing. It was unnatural for a place that was home to so many teenagers.
But thoughts are not silent. Even though no one spoke of the discussion that had shaken the Ravenclaw common room, it was certain that the discussion was being mulled over in the minds of every student in the dormitory until they finally lost consciousness. And it stayed with a number of them still while they were in the grips of sleep.
The Fourth Estate by OliveOil_Med
Story Notes:
This story was written for the organization Project Censored. Their goal is to provide education oppurtunities to journalism students and the public about they various forms of censorship that exist in the world. If you want more information about their mission or would like to, you can find a link to their website right here.
I actually got the idea for this story when I started thinking about a conversation I had with my two younger cousins, who are just as big of Harry Potter fans as I am. We all decided if we ever went to Hogwarts, we would all be Ravenclaws together. When OOTP came out, they were both upset that there was only one girl from Ravenclaw in Dumbledore's Army, so, of course, I had to say that was because the Ravenclaw girls were off doing something just as dangerous.
And this is what I believe they were doing during that time.
Chapter Notes: The Quibbler has just been banned from the grounds of Hogwarts, and now, the Ravenclaws cannot stop obsessing over the reason why.
Thank you to Colors for being such a wonderful beta!