Time quickly arrived at the final few days of the Christmas holidays.
On this early morning, at the Black ancestral home located at No. 12 Grimmauld Place, Harry and Sirius headed out early.
Today was the day of the retrial for the case involving Sirius and Peter Pettigrew, which was why the two appeared so eager.
Because after this trial—whose outcome had already been decided internally and was akin to merely going through the motions—Sirius would be able to officially shed his identity as a criminal and live under the sun from then on.
When that time came, Harry would no longer have to live with the Dursley family every summer, but could instead move into the Black ancestral house and live happily with his godfather.
As Harry's godfather, Sirius could be said to be Harry's only living relative in this world who truly cared about him.
A three-story-tall, bright purple bus pulled up on a bleak little street in London.
Harry was not unfamiliar with the dilapidated red telephone booth by the side of the road.
Because he had just come here a few months ago, accompanied by the large Weasley family to attend the Order of Merlin award ceremony for George and Fred.
However, the telephone booth this time had undergone some changes compared to when he last visited.
Standing inside the telephone booth, the two found it extremely cramped; Harry was even squeezed right up against the telephone apparatus.
Whereas when they came before, an Undetectable Extension Charm had been placed on the telephone booth, making it appear quite spacious even with ten or twenty people standing inside.
But that had been a vanity project specifically crafted by the Ministry of Magic for the award ceremony.
Otherwise, with the telephone booth's transport capacity of only bringing two people into the Ministry of Magic at a time, the families of the medal recipients and those guests using the visitor entrance would have had to stand on the street outside under the scorching August sun, queuing for five or six minutes just to descend into the Ministry of Magic underground.
Is that how the British Ministry of Magic receives its guests?
It would be a miracle if they weren't cursed into oblivion.
Soon, the door of the telephone booth opened once more. Harry and Sirius were currently standing at one end of a long, splendid hall, with deep-colored wooden floors beneath their feet polished until they shone like mirrors.
The peacock-blue ceiling was embedded with gleaming golden symbols, resembling a massive high-altitude bulletin board.
The surrounding walls were all paneled with dark, glossy wood, with many gilded fireplaces embedded within the paneling.
After going through a series of security checks, Harry and Sirius were able to follow the crowded stream of people to an adjacent hall filled with lifts.
Accompanied by the rattling sound of chain drives, an elevator slowly descended before them.
The golden grilles slid open gently, and Harry and Sirius stepped into the lift.
Their current location was the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic, located on Level Eight underground.
Further down were only two more levels: Level Nine, where the Department of Mysteries was located, and Level Ten, where the courtrooms were.
Although there were many people coming and going inside the Ministry of Magic, very few were heading to these two levels, so Harry and Sirius were the only two inside the lift.
Just as the lift's golden grilles were about to close, a hurried figure squeezed into the elevator.
"Mr. Weasley." Upon seeing the red hair atop the man's head, Harry nodded toward him.
"Oh, Harry."
Hearing Harry's voice so suddenly, Arthur Weasley had a look of great surprise on his face.
"What are you doing here?"
It was only when he noticed Sirius beside Harry that Mr. Weasley slapped his forehead. "I completely forgot today is the day of the trial."
"Hello, Arthur."
Sirius took the initiative to extend a hand toward Mr. Weasley. "Thank you for taking care of Harry."
After exchanging pleasantries, Mr. Weasley finally noticed that the lift was heading downward rather than upward.
His office was on Level Two of the Ministry of Magic—that is, the second level underground—so he should have been going up.
The golden grilles of the lift had already closed, and Mr. Weasley, having boarded the wrong lift, obviously had no way to get off halfway.
As the lift slowly came to a halt, a woman's cold, indifferent voice echoed inside the elevator: "Level Nine, Department of Mysteries."
Level Ten of the Ministry of Magic could not be reached directly by the lift; one had to take the lift to Level Nine first, then walk down through a corridor turning off to the side.
The path was somewhat roundabout, and Harry and Sirius, being unfamiliar with the place, would likely have to search for quite a while to find where the courtroom was.
Mr. Weasley's work was not busy, so he simply led Harry and Sirius down to Level Ten himself.
After walking for a few minutes, the group appeared in a corridor.
The decor of this corridor was identical to those corridors leading to the old bat's dungeon classroom back at Hogwarts:
Rough stone walls, with torches inserted into brackets. The doors they passed here were all heavy wooden doors, embedded with iron hinges and keyholes.
The place where Sirius was about to stand trial was Courtroom One.
The lower the courtroom's number, the more heinous and dangerous the criminals tried within; Courtroom One was basically used to try those Death Eaters who had followed Lord Voldemort back in the day.
The decor of the courtroom was similar to the corridor outside, both constructed from dark, black stone.
Placed in the center of the room were two armchairs with iron chains attached to the armrests.
Both chairs were completely empty, with no one sitting in them.
In front of these two chairs designated for the accused criminals were rows of gradually ascending seats.
At this moment, quite a few people were already seated there.
The wizards sitting in the front row were all wearing plum-red robes, with a delicate silver letter "W" embroidered on the left side of their chests.
Behind them were some invited spectators; Harry would also join them shortly.
Facing the gaze of so many eyes, even though Harry was not the person about to stand trial, his palms sweated nervously.
Sensing the anxiety in his godson's heart, Sirius patted Harry's shoulder. "Don't worry, nothing will go wrong."
Saying this, he smiled and walked openly to the central chair for the accused, sitting down in a dignified manner.
Seeing that the chains did not bind Sirius, Harry finally felt at ease.
Once Harry took his seat in the back rows, two Aurors escorted a terrified-looking Peter Pettigrew inside.
Unlike the treatment Sirius received, as soon as Peter Pettigrew was pressed down onto the chair, the iron chains on both armrests automatically wrapped around his body, binding him tightly.
"The accused are present," Fudge said, his voice booming like a bell. "Let us begin."
At this moment, the whispers in the courtroom ceased.
"The trial on January 8th, a retrial of the case involving Sirius Black defecting to You-Know-Who, indirectly causing the deaths of the Potter couple, and breaching the Statute of Secrecy by casting a spell in a Muggle neighborhood that killed thirteen Muggles."
"Interrogators: Cornelius Oswald Fudge, Minister for Magic; Amelia Susan Bones, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement..."
After droning on through a long list of interrogators, Fudge then read out the names of the accused, as well as the crucial witness—Albus Dumbledore.
Upon hearing the witness's name, the slight bit of uneasiness remaining on Harry's face vanished without a trace.
To use a line Kyle had said before: The Chief Judge, the judges, the jury, the witnesses—every single unit is one of my people. How can you possibly beat me?
Just on the account that Dumbledore was attending as a witness, Sirius's case this time was as safe as houses.
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