Disclaimer: It's not mine! I wish it was, but its not.

Summary: What do you get when you cross a couple of Aurors and their wives; the DA; Neville Longbottom, working for a secret organisation; an ancient school of Dark Magic and Someone with a grudge?

The answer? Harry Potter and the Durmstrang Deception

Nine years after the Battle of Hogwarts and all Harry and Ron want is to settle down with their wives, Ginny and Hermione. But as Harry is chief Auror and Ron as his deputy, will they ever get what they want? No.

When Harry gets a call to investigate a disturbance at a long-closed school, things get out of hand.

With Voldemort gone, what is this new threat which Harry and his friends, and half of the DA have to contend with?

The Durmstrang Deception.

Chapter 1

The School

High in the mountains of Bulgaria, just to the West of Sandanski, stands a school of magic. A school imbued with an ancient evil so strong, that Voldemort himself cowered away from its strong stone walls, and many turrets. The school has many names, many of which are forgotten, few of which are spoken, and all of which translate to mean "Fear".

Picture the worst castle fortification imaginable; this school is ten times worse. The stones from which it is made seem to attract the darkness. Protected by only the most malicious of Anti-Muggle curses, the sight of it makes most mad. At night, the echoes of long dead screams reverberate around its halls; for that is part of the magic.

Once upon a time, in the Middle Ages, the school had a reputation for mindless, needless violence. Practices of Kill or be Killed: students killed teachers and in turn, became teachers, only to be killed by students.

As time wore on, those practices died, leaving a place seeped in evil. Students were taught there, until recently. But not anymore- the murder of the headmaster saw to that. At one time in history, it was a great triumph to kill a teacher, but gradually, the school had become weaker, kinder. Then the school closed.

Many myths still surround the school, and few dare to speak its name. "Durmstrang" strikes fear into the bravest of hearts-

If the school was closed, what were those flashes of wand-light, screams of pain and bursts of melodic laughter doing, issuing from within the castle walls?

x x x x x x

A blustery Monday morning found Harry Potter and Ron Weasley in the Auror Headquarters headed for a meeting. As a general rule in the office, meetings were kept to a minimum, but this one was important.

Harry Potter scowled as he entered the building, which had been aged by winds and graffiti of many centuries. The gold statue of the Artemisia Lufkin, the first Minister of Magic, however, stayed as untouched and clean as ever. The inside was just as badly kept, with piles of paper littering every desktop, carpets covered in Droobles Best Blowing Gum, and dustbins belching up pencil shavings. The once worshipped prospect of working here had lost all its glamour.

"Good Morning, Harry," a man called out, as Harry strode down the corridor between the desks.

"Hey, Mark! You finished that report on the Chrysler murders yet?"

"Working on it!"

"Well get a move on, then. Sometimes I think Scotland Yard could do a better job." The gentle rebuke from the highest ranking Magical Law Enforcement official was all that was needed to drive everyone into work-mode.

Smiling to himself, Harry collected some papers off his desk. He had been working on the case that the meeting concerned for many months now, and was pretty confident that he would completely nail the Aurors with his inside scoop.

The meeting was to be held in one of the bigger meeting rooms, in the main ministry buildings. Kingsley had insisted that the Aurors would get their own special building in a more central part of London, which made getting to meetings held in the actual ministry rather difficult, especially with the new anti-Apparation wards that had been put around the place as a safety measure.

Fashionably late to the meeting, Harry strode in flustered.

"Right, sorry, everyone," he muttered, before announcing more loudly, "This meeting is called to order!"

A communal groan ran through the group, as they put down their doughnuts and eager gossips, and turned to face Harry.

"Does anyone have any leads on this whole Durmstrang business?"

"I dunno what it is," said a young Auror-in-training, "but something's not right in that place. It gives me the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it." He shuddered.

Harry rolled his eyes. "Any real leads? No? Nothing?"

Norman Spavin, a balding Auror pushed forward a sheaf of paper.

Harry picked it up. "What have we here, Spavin?"

"Well, a few fishermen were fishing in the lake just off the Milliken Cliff at daybreak. They saw a man in blue robes come out of the Rangdek woods," said Spavin, as if it made everything quite clear.

"And... what's that's supposed to mean?"

Spavin looked apalled. "The fishermen saw a man coming out of the woods," he stated again.

"So? I bet he was a Muggle woodcutter. They often chop woods from that forest."

"Yes, but... Well, I think it's a very important lead on the investigation," he said decidedly.

Harry didn't even want to argue his point. He dejectedly asked, "Anyone else?"

The Aurors shook their heads. "Terrible. Well, luckily for you, I have been collecting information for months now."

A murmur of approval, and awed hush greeted this announcement. Very rarely did any Auror do successful research projects on their own investigation.

"So what's going on, Harry?" asked Ron perplexedly. "We've been working on this case night and day, and nothing! How did you find anything?"

"That's for me to know, and you to find out," Harry responded childishly. "Okay, here's what I know: Someone is recruiting an army. I reckon they're using Durmstrang as some kind of…well, to be honest, I don't know. But it's something to do with this guy."

"Great research," said an old looking Auror from the corner. Harry ignored the obvious sarcasm. He was suddenly feeling a little red in the cheeks for being rude with Spavin- his own research, which had seemed so obviously brilliant even an hour ago, sounded incredibly patchy now.

"Well, of course we need more information, but we know what to dig into. We have to search the villages around Durmstrang to see if anyone has come to recruit."

Ron eyed him testily. "Are you sure you have foolproof information. I mean, someone can hire an army for an army of reasons. We don't want to get tangled in another case."

"Well, if you are so sure, why don't you have a report?" snapped Harry.

Ron raised his hands up, palm outward in surrender. "Just saying, mate. You said we could use some insights, didn't you?"

"I don't need insights; I need on-field investigation."

"Alright, we'll send out some of the Aurors."

The meeting concluded and several squads of Aurors were immediately dispatched to Durmstrang Institute of Magic.

Harry scribbled through the reports of some street muggings and such trivialties, when a blast of smoke erupted from the fireplace. Oh, dang! Who was using so much Floo?

He stood up coughing, and tried to bat and blow away some smoke from his eyes, when he tripped on something. He staggered to his knees and crouched down.

Harry felt his stomach do a nasty flip, and the meatloaf he had eaten threaten to spill out of his mouth. It was Cranley, the young understudy who had begged to be on the team to Durmstrang.

He lay in the pool of his own blood, his face scarred almost beyong recognition. Harry pressed his lips together as his eyes found the deep gash in Cranley's left leg, where very little flesh was clinging to his bone.

"Wh- What happened?"

"They're- not coming," choked Cranley, and Harry could see even the effort of talking was a monumentous task for Cranley. Harry tried to hoist Cranley to the couch, but it only caused more pain. Harry sent a Patronus to the emergency medical department, as he held the shaking man.

But even before the silver stag swooshed out of sight, Cranley went still, his hand slid from Harry's grip. Harry sat hunched beside him- he couldn't believe the young, happy face of Cranley would never light up with excitement the moment someone mentioned a new mission.

x x x x x x

Bedaube Slumlord, Bulgarian Minister for Magic, couldn't sleep.

It wasn't the scratchy sheets of the rundown inn in the mountains of Sandanski that were keeping him awake. Or the rowdy crowd downstairs at the bar; he'd sorted that issue by silencing the room. It wasn't even the lonely night he was about to face without his wife.

No. It was something else.

As Slumlord drifted into an uneasy slumber, something dark and flowing slipped beneath the door. It crawled up the bed and slowly swallowed the minister.

The Lethifold exited the room as silently as it had entered. It left not a trace of its being there, the old minister might have just upped and left.

Its work done, and its hunger satisfied, the Lethifold returned to its master.

Authors notes:

This is my first attempt at a story and its not even mine! I'm co-writing it with greencyanide, so a big shout out for Sanjana.

Please review, flames welcome. And 10 points to the first reviewer to work out the anagram in the ministers name.

Thanks