Harry Potter: The Witty Wizard

"You have a responsibility to the people of wizarding Britain?" he sneered. "Puh-lease... you know damned well I know that's a cauldron full of shit. Your responsibility is to the shareholders; no one else. You know I know that.

"As for your first point, your rock solid information? Your own... sorry... my client's own newspaper, which you're the editor for... for the moment... reported in-depth the crap, lies and manipulations Dumbledore was doing. How you could sit there and tell me you're information is 'rock solid', as you put it, when you know the man is a lying, manipulative old toss-pot, is beyond me."

When Cuffe appeared he didn't know what to say next, Ted sneered, "Well?"

Cuffe was frantically trying to come up with something that would get him out of what was now clearly a mess and couldn't think of anything.

When he saw Cuffe sigh and deflate, Ted knew he had him.

Cuffe quietly said, "What do I need to do?"

Ted smirked and said, "Pull out a quill and parchment and takes notes of what I'm about to tell you. Those notes will then form the basis of how you're going to handle this to the satisfaction of your shareholders.

"If you do not do exactly what I'm about to tell you to do, I'm going to go through every back copy of the Prophet until I find at least one hundred people who would have the legal right to sue you and your journalists for slander and libel. I'm sure it will not take me long to find one hundred witches and wizards who could not afford to go after you and would now relish the opportunity to do so.

"I will then represent them in a class action suit against you and each individual journalist who was involved in writing those slanderous and libellous remarks about them. You'll also notice I did not mention they would be going after the Daily Prophet media organisation; just you and your journalists.

"If I make that public, then Lord Potter will own the Daily Prophet media organisation almost outright within hours," he all but snarled. "I cannot see your other stockholders tolerating that. They will either dump the stock in fear of the value dropping, fire your bum, or both.

"Lord Potter will then buy up all the shares, thereby gaining majority shareholder-ship on his own, then he will fire your arse if it hasn't already been fired. Then he will print the retraction.

"Either way, that retraction is going to be printed."

Cuffe stared back in not a little fear.

"The question you need to decide for yourself is... do you want to remain Editor or not? And the only way for that to occur is for you to print the retraction first."

"Now, are you ready to take notes?"

Shaking and trying hard not to, lest he cause his quill to leak ink all over the parchment before him, Cuffe replied, "Y-yes."

"Good. First, you are going to print the retraction about your story that slandered Lord Potter in this morning's paper. As part of that retraction you are going to write you made assumptions based on the information provided you from a manipulative, lying old man. You will not specifically name him. After all, we don't want to see you sued for slander by him, do we?"

"Second, you are..."

When Ted walked out twenty minutes later, he was internally smirking. He never actually said he had the authorisation of the majority of shareholders, just that the Houses were 'friends', which was true enough.

He also knew Harry and Sirius both would not hesitate to make a swift move on purchasing any shares that hit the market because of the information the Editor and journalists were going to be sued, got out. He would even be the one getting it out.

'Oh, it's good to be me,' he thought. 'Hot and successful in her own right wife, successful and powerful daughter already making her rise in the auror corps, a successful business of my own that now has two of the Seven as House clients with two more Noble and Ancient Houses as clients as well. It's all good.'

_‗_

―==(oIo)==―

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Still not having been informed of the password to his old office, Dumbledore was forced to wait for over ten minutes after he arrived at the gargoyle before Marchbanks turned up, slowly hobbling along the passageway towards him.

As soon as she was close enough, he asked, "Really, Griselda. Was it absolutely necessary to force me to wait for quite so long?"

"Unless you have a cure for old age, Albus; yes," she snapped back. "I'm not as spry as I used to be, you know."

Of course, Dumbledore knew that, no matter what he said in response to that, he'd be on defence; so he wisely kept silent.

As the Headmistress, Marchbanks did not need to use the password to gain entrance. She just looked at the gargoyle and it hopped aside for her.

When Dumbledore looked like he was going to stride forward and onto the stairs, Marchbanks whacked him on the closest shin with her cane.

As Dumbledore reactively gave a yelp and jumped back, she firmly said, "Ladies first, Albus."

Now wanting to hop on one foot and massage his shin where she'd struck him, he suppressed that desire and scowled at her back as she began to ascend. He followed her a few seconds later.

Once inside and behind her desk, she made Dumbledore stand before it like a naughty school child while she settled herself.

Once ready she turned her attention to him and said, "I'm adding yet another black mark to your record, Albus. Did you think me that stupid I would not work out it was you who gave that report about Lord Potter not choosing to attend the Yule Ball to the Prophet?"

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean," he indignantly shot back.

"Really," she drawled. "So you deny you both knew it was going to be Lord Potter's intent not to attend, or that you are the so-called staff member of Hogwarts who informed the Daily Prophet of this?"

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