Growth Spurt

On Christmas Day, Harry found something waiting for him that he wasn't sure he could class as a present.

There were multiple people downstairs that he didn't expect to see. One was Percy Weasley, the estranged Weasley child who'd fallen out with his family after aligning himself with Cornelius Fudge. Percy had been all but in hiding after it came out what a buffoon Fudge was, and that his family was right all along. Percy didn't look like he wanted to be here now, either, yet there he was skulking in the corner of the room while his family glared at him.

All the Weasleys barring Charlie were home for the holiday, with Charlie still overseas and unable to visit. Pansy was there, skulking in the opposite corner to Percy Weasley in a very similar way, while Molly Weasley bounced between the two of them, trying to rekindle a motherly relationship with her estranged son and to give Pansy an authentic warm christmas experience at the same time.

But Harry was focusing on the other stranger arrivals in addition to Percy Weasley. There was a blond girl who was dressed in sleek robes who smiled brightly at Harry. She looked a little older and more mature, but it was Alicia Spinnett, his old Quidditch teammate, who had arrived with a notebook in her hand. The other one was already sitting down in an old reclining chair while Arthur Weasley sat opposite him.

"You're sure that you're comfortable, Minister?" Mr. Weasley said.

"Yes, quite," said the man.

He had a severe face, and he looked on the older side, but he still seemed rather fierce. He was completely different to his predecessor, Harry decided. This had to be Rufus Scrimgeour; Harry had seen his name and photograph while visiting Diagon Alley for his school supplies.

Harry had entered alongside Hermione, who kept him company the night before. As soon as he stepped off the stairs, Scrimgeour was looking at him.

"Ah," said the Minister. "Would you look who's arrived. Please, sit."

Harry did so slowly, casting glances at the older man. Arthur Weasley stood, giving up the seat opposite the minister for Harry to take.

"Have a good vacation?" Scrimgeour asked.

"It's been a nice change of pace," Harry said guardedly.

Scrimgeour nodded. "Good. I'm glad to hear it. You know, I heard that my aide here hadn't visited his family for a while, so we decided it would be a good time to drop in."

Harry glanced at Percy Weasley. The boy looked like he wanted to wrap himself in an invisibility cloak and disappear forever. He'd clearly been forced to come. The minister must've been using him as a pretext, making his true goal something else entirely.

"What do you want with me, Minister?" Harry asked.

Mrs. Weasley looked like she wanted to scold him, but Scrimgeour laughed before she could. He kept laughing as he stood up.

"Would you take a walk with me, Harry?" he asked.

"I guess I could, on account of it being Christmas," Harry said. "I should be charitable."

Even Mr. Weasley looked worried that he was being too rude now, but Scrimgeour didn't mind.

"Good," he said. "Let's see the garden."

Alicia followed them to the door, but stopped just inside, giving Harry and Scrimgeour privacy. Harry couldn't figure out why she was here, but he was sure he'd have time to answer that later.

Good to his word, Scrimgeour led Harry out to the Weasleys' vegetable garden. They walked the edge, coming close to the woods that surrounded the Burrow. It was the same route Harry ran while he was there over summer as a way of keeping in shape.

"We're at war," were Scrimgeour's first words.

"I've noticed, Sir," Harry said.

"Yes. I'm sure you have." Scrimgeour shook his head. "He Who Must Not Be Named was inside the Ministry, and if it weren't for you and your friends stalling him, he would've escaped while still being on the loose."

"It was Dumbledore who really stalled him," Harry said. "I wouldn't have stood a chance once the Dark Lord arrived."

Scrimgeour's face went sour, like he'd licked a lime. "I'm aware. Doesn't it make your blood boil?"

That wasn't what Harry expected to hear.

"Pardon?" Harry asked.

"The powerlessness of it. It's like we're helpless. There's a lot that we can handle, but as soon as the Dark Lord comes to fight, none of us could stand up to him. None of us but Dumbledore… But that man is playing his own games, hidden high up in his tower."

"The Headmaster has his reasons," Harry said, but his voice lacked convention.

"Everyone knows he does," Scrimgeour said. "The problem is that he won't tell anyone what those reasons are. So the rest of us are left guessing… and that isn't good enough. People are dying. Out here, and even inside his school."

Harry stopped walking. He felt a desperate urge telling him to go for his wand, but the rational parts of his brain were strong enough to tell him what a bad idea that would be.

"Are you threatening me?" Harry asked softly.

"Merlin no." Scrimgeour looked tall and weathered as he stood there. "I think you behaved commendably, Harry. That Malfoy boy was marked. We've seen it all. He cast Unforgivables. Even attempting to cast one is enough to earn Azkaban time, let alone successfully casting it on the heir of another house. You did what you had to in order to stop him."

"I don't think it's that simple," Harry said. "I didn't mean to actually kill him. It was an overreaction."

"I used to be an Auror," Scrimgeour said. "I did it for decades. Do you want to know what we call an overreaction in a duel? We call it winning. When there's a dark wizard in front of you, their life is secondary. Your health comes first, so that you can stop them and others like them in the future. What matters is that the Death Eater was stopped. I don't care if he ends up in Azkaban or the ground, do you understand?"

It was the complete opposite of Dumbledore's views, despite both of them being opposed to Voldemort. Dumbledore's softer ideals made sense, considering he himself was reformed after a radical youth, even if he'd never been so vile as a Death Eater. There was a reason his brother still held a grudge and kept him at a distance. Harry couldn't deny, though, that the new minister's style seemed like a much better fit for the midst of a war.

Harry began walking again, so Scrimgeour did the same, resuming the lap they had started.

"What do you want, if you're not here to threaten me?" Harry asked.

He'd been worried the Minister was going to extort him with Draco's fate in order to get Harry to do things. At least that worst case scenario had proven to be paranoia.

"I want to be your friend, Harry," Scrimgeour said. "In the political sense of the word."

"Which means?" Harry asked.

"That to the public, we look like two peas in a pod. I don't give a damn what you're like behind closed doors. You can throw manners to the wind as you see fit. But I want you to go out there and align yourself with the ministry." Scrimgeour sighed. "I hate to say it, but the ministry is in the mud as far as people's opinions go. They either consider us as bad as the Death Eaters, or they think we're so weak that we'll just get run over by those evil fucks. But they adore you!"

"They loathe me, too," Harry said. "It goes back and forth."

Scrimgeour laughed. "Welcome to politics! But right now, your stocks are high, because they're utterly desperate. If you put those stocks behind us, we can fight this war to a completely different standard."

"You want me to become a poster boy," Harry said.

"Yes," Scrimgeour said. "Because I think that will save our country."

"What would this look like?" Harry asked. "Sending Aurors to snatch me out of class so I can smile at your press conferences?"

"It could look like that, if you want," Scrimgeour said. "From your tone, it certainly sounds like you don't. Let me propose a different option. The Ministry can get the best tutors this country has. You can do individual study, learning much faster, and you won't be at risk of any kind of retaliation from allies of the Malfoys."

He must've heard about Snape, then. To tell the truth, this offer would change things so much that it still hadn't fully sunk in what Harry was hearing.

"You're offering to take me out of Hogwarts before my seventh year," he said.

"I'm offering to give you what no Hogwarts student could receive," Scrimgeour said. "I'll be frank, the worst thing that could happen for our cause is losing YOU. If that day comes, even more than Dumbledore, even more than me… That's the day that we lose."

Harry took a deep breath.

"I don't have the best history with the ministry," he said. "You people haven't left the best impression."

There was a swish of cloth. Harry was forced to stop as Scrimgeour bent down, bowing to him.

"I apologize." He raised his head. "I'm sorry for all that you were put through. But now, we need each other. I believe that with all my heart."

At some point, Harry's heart had started to hammer. He never would've guessed the answer would've come in the form of the ministry, but he remembered his reflections coming home on the Hogwarts Express. He had scrounged for what scraps of power he could, but it wasn't enough. Being a student was no longer good enough. Right now, he needed to prepare.

"I don't just want to become as good as a Hogwarts graduate," he said. "I want to be better than that. Strong enough to fight back for real."

"That can be arranged." Scrimgeour stood, straightening his coat. For the first time, he smiled. "My sources have told me you have other interests, too. Ones we'd very easily be able to fill."

They had come back around to the Burrow. Alicia was waiting outside the front door, her short blond hair blowing slightly in the wind. She was certainly a hot witch, something Harry was sure to notice after sharing a locker room for years as he went through puberty.

"She got a job as an assistant at the ministry after graduation," Scrimgeour said. "If you take our offer, she'll be reassigned to you. She was extremely excited at the prospect. When she saw a photo of you, I believe she immediately thought of extracurricular relations."

The man nudged Harry's shoulder, who could only nod. It was surprisingly mortifying talking about this with the most politically powerful man in Britain.

"Are you on board?" he asked.

"I'm tempted," Harry admitted. "Extremely tempted. But… I need time to think about this."

"I'd expect as much. I'm sorry to intrude on such a special day," Scrimgeour said. "If you don't mind, Alicia will stay for the day. If you have any questions, feel free to ask her."

He stopped, straightening his coat and checking his watch again.

"I must be going," Scrimgeour said. "Evil takes no holidays, I'm afraid. The office won't run without me. I'll visit again in a week's time. I'd like your answer then."

He gave Harry a manly, stoic nod, the Disapparated.

"Whew!" Alicia, who'd been standing at perfect attention, slouched suddenly. "He's gone, is he? Merlin, it's so tiring being around him. So intimidating."

She shivered as she approached Harry. She'd gotten even better looking after leaving Hogwarts, clearly putting more attention into her appearance. She'd gone from a slight tomboy to a stunning secretary.

"So… the Ministry, huh?" Harry asked.

Alicia nodded. "That's right. So can you accept his offer? I'm sick of dealing with high ranking stuffy old officials. My cute underclassman sounds like a much better assignment."

"Your underclassman is taller than you now," Harry said. "And I reckon he rides a broom better, too."

Alicia looked him from head to toe. "I guess he has grown up, hasn't he…" she chewed on her lip. "He's always been a better flyer, though. I'm not like Angelina or Oliver. I know how to admit when someone has me beat. There's a reason I didn't try to go to the league after graduating."

"Couldn't have hurt to try," Harry said. "It would probably beat having to serve old farts coffee every morning."

Alicia groaned. "That's why I'm asking you to take his offer! I wouldn't mind, if it was you I was helping out. It would even be kind of fun. So come on, isn't there anything I can do to convince you?"

Harry couldn't help but laugh.

"That sounds like the start of a story in Playwitch!" he said.

He didn't expect Alicia to lean toward him without hesitation, batting her eyes.

"It could be something like that, if you wanted," she said.

She hastily looked around. Seeing everyone else was still inside, she grabbed Harry's hand with both of hers.

"What do you say we take a second to ourselves?" she said cheekily.

Harry wondered if Scrimgeour had threatened her to make her do this. But Alicia just looked excited, so he didn't think so. Blackmailing one of his school friends wasn't a good way to get Harry on his side, and the new minister seemed like he was nothing if not pragmatic.

Alicia dragged Harry around the side of the Burrow to a spot with no walls. She pushed him against the wall, but instead of kissing him, immediately sank onto her knees.

She had his pants open remarkably fast. She did it so quickly that Harry wasn't hard yet. Alicia used her hand, rubbing his length to make it stiffen.

"You're suspiciously good at that," Harry said. "Did those old farts have more work for you than bringing them coffee?"

"Gross." Alicia wrinkled her nose. "I'll have you know that I never sleep with my boss unless he's a hung young stud."

Harry was sufficiently hard by now, so Alicia leaned in and opened up her mouth. She slipped her lips around his head and sank down, taking three quarters of him inside her mouth and using her hand to squeeze the rest.

Harry felt her tongue slip along the underside of his shaft. Alicia held him in her mouth, looking up with both eyes while her tongue did the work, stroking him relentlessly. Alicia used the hand that wasn't on his cock to grab Harry's wrist, planting his hands on her head one at a time.

When she finally moved, it was to slide her head back until she could plant a kiss on the tip of Harry's cock. Alicia giggled, her hand sliding up to jerk him off again, now using the spit she'd left behind.

"You've got some tricks," Harry said.

"I live to serve," Alicia said with a sultry smile.

She promptly opened her lips, inviting him in. This was clearly what she put his hands on her head for. Without hesitation, Harry pushed her down.

He shut his eyes, listening to her gag. Alicia had always been older than him at Hogwarts, and a mentor on the Quidditch pitch. Now, she was letting him use her body as he pleased as she kneeled there, taking it obediently. He decided to give Alicia her very first assignment as his secretary.

"Don't waste a drop," he commanded.

Harry bucked his hips forward, grinding Alicia's face against him. Her eyes had begun to water. He held her there until he felt the last spurt of semen leave his stiff length, then finally let go of her.

Alicia slid back so fast that a small drop of cum slipped from between her pouty lips. However, a good secretary can always think outside of the box. Her hand shot out. catching it before it could touch the ground. Looking up at Harry with tears still on her cheeks, Alicia stuck out her tongue, licking the palm clean.

"Like that, right boss?" Alicia asked with a giggle.

The Ministry drove a VERY hard bargain.

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