Chapter 20

The recording floor was pretty high, near the top floor for optimal reception, and it had numerous rooms of two kinds.

One kind were smaller rooms with long tables.

Moderately-sized mirrors were hanging behind those tables.

Opposite this arrangement hung, even bigger mirrors were hanging there, reflecting this whole set-up.

Here, shows with the format of muggle news shows could be recorded.

The bigger mirrors were for the final recording and the smaller mirrors were there to show clips during the recording.

The second kind of rooms were set up with couches or armchairs arranged in a half-circle, surrounded by a few moderately-sized mirrors attached onto floatable wooden disks, that functioned as stands.

They were for the talk-shows.

One was already fully decorated in a tasteful and rich style.

There were even small decorative pillows in the colours black, green and silver lying around, bearing images of several serpentine creatures, displaying the Malfoy Family crest, that had actually been designed as an homage to Slytherin's crest, when the Malfoy Family had arrived in Britain, after they had had to leave France.

There were also some white pillows with three purely black crows on them.

It looked like Narcissa had already completely settled here.

After Draco and Ted had killed enough time, they arrived back down only shortly before it was time to open the doors for the applicants.

The two wizards found Narcissa and Andromeda sitting at opposite ends of the interview table with their backs to each other, giving each other the silent treatment.

Their cheeks were still rosy, obviously from the blood that had shot into their heads during their heated quarrel.

„Mother, Aunt Andromeda, seeing you sitting here in such companionable silence warms my heart. Family reunions are great, right?" Draco really meant it, even if he exaggerated with ‚companionable' just a little.

Kreacher had been standing to the side, making himself as small as he could, wringing his hands, until he heard Draco's voice.

„Master Lord Black, you're back. Can Kreacher do anything for you?" Kreacher seemed really elated to see him, and escape the tense atmosphere between the volatile Black sisters.

Draco smiled, „Yes Kreacher. You can serve us some tea first."

Enthusiastic, Kreacher popped away.

After a minute, Kreacher returned with a steaming pot of tea and a big plate of biscuits.

Kreacher carefully placed everything on the table, and then he snapped his fingers, working his house elf magic.

Two teacups appeared out of thin air, one in front of Draco and one in front of Narcissa, sniding the Tonks couple.

Before Draco could reprimand Kreacher, Andromeda had already given Kreacher such a poisonous look.

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Whereupon Kreacher immediately flinched and snapped his fingers again, making two additional teacups appear.

„Kreacher, behave yourself. Go open the doors and let the first person in. And don't you dare drive away anyone you consider unworthy, I make the decisions here." Draco ordered.

„Yes, Master."

Kreacher went and let the first inside.

It was a young and pretty brown-haired woman.

Draco found her familiar.

No wonder, she looked like she hadn't been out of Hogwarts long, so she had to have still been there while he was in his early years, but he couldn't quite remember her name.

Draco searched his memory, wasn't she the girlfriend of that one Weasley brother, the stuck-up one?

The Ravenclaw prefect... Clearwater.

Yes Clearwater, Penelope Clearwater, Draco remembered now.

But that wasn't the only thing he remembered.

Draco also remembered what had become of her in the former timeline.

According to an intelligence report, that had landed on his desk at the end of the war with the muggles, Penelope Clearwater had been one of the higher ranking magicals, that had fought on the muggle's side.

Without traitors joining the muggle side, informing them about magical capabilities, and helping the muggle troops with scouting, warding, enhancing and even battling, the magical side wouldn't have lost so miserably.

And Clearwater had been one of more important ones, who had probably joined or even headed one of the muggles' many magical research facilities after the end of the war.

If Draco remembered it right, and with his occlumency mastery he knew he did, Penelope Clearwater had been approached by muggle forces years before the start of the war when she had searched for a job in the muggle world.

The intelligence report had suggested that the fact that she couldn't get a job in the magical world after graduating from Hogwarts had made her feel deceived and rejected, making her a prime target for recruitment by the muggles.

...

Penelope Clearwater had tried the whole summer, since her graduation from Hogwarts, to get an apprenticeship or a job in the wizarding world.

She had written every witch and wizard, that was known to take apprentices, who had a mastery in her N.E.W.T. subjects.

One half replied with a rejection, the other half didn't even send a reply.

Penelope knew there weren't many wizards with masteries in the British Isles, and they couldn't take every applicant every year, but with her test results, at least one of them should have taken her.

Especially since her good friend, class- and housemate got to study under a charms mistress in Scotland, and her test results had been much poorer than Penelope's.

It was really unfair, that her friend got the apprenticeship just because her father had a connection to that charm mistress from his own Hogwarts days.

Why was she disadvantaged only because her parents weren't magicals?

Disappointed, Penelope had applied to work at the ministry where her boyfriend Percy had gotten a job through his father, who had already been working there for years, since his own Hogwarts graduation.

To her discontent, the only job in the ministry available for her was as an unpaid job as a secretaries' assistent.

The disgusting woman that did the interview with her, an ugly toad directly from the office of the minister himself, had hinted to Penelope, that the only thing someone like her could be used for was crawling under the boss' table to work.

Revolted, she gave up on trying to get into the ministry.

When she went crying to her boyfriend about this, she got even more miserable, because he didn't get it and was surprised why she declined the opportunity.

With all his undeniable brilliance, Percy could be as dense as a wet brick sometimes.

Her hope of a beautiful magical future was considerably dampened, but not completely destroyed.

Lately, she tried to get a job with one of the shops in Diagon Alley.

It was a little below her educational standard to work at Madam Malkin's and learn magical tailoring, or sell books at Flourish and Blotts, but she could make her peace with that.

Sadly, they wouldn't be hiring for the next few years, unless special circumstances arose.

Penelope was finally at the point where she wanted to give up and return to her estranged parents in the muggle world, when she read Rebecca Abbot's article in the Daily Prophet.

She wasn't very optimistic about her chances of getting hired by that privileged, vulgar and obnoxious Malfoy boy, or whoever he paid to do the interviews for him, but when she read that the business was making and selling enchanted mirrors, functioning like a combination of a telephone and a television, she knew this would be great.

And it would be a dream come true if she could be a part of that.

That's why she gathered all of her remaining drive, and decided to give it one last try in the wizarding world.

Should she fail to get a job again, she would have to admit to herself that there was no place for her here.

And she would have to go back to the muggle world, that she had been out of touch with since she was eleven years old.

Not a promising prospect...