With Voldemort out in the open, the second war begins

It’s a busy two weeks:

• When Minister for Magic Cornelius Fudge refuses to step aside for Voldemort, the Brockdale Bridge is destroyed, killing dozens of Muggles.
• Amelia Bones, Head of Magical Law Enforcement, and Emmeline Vance, a member of the Order of the Phoenix, are murdered – the former by Voldemort himself.
• Destruction in Somerset is reported; Muggles suspect a hurricane, but it was probably the work of giants working for Voldemort.
• Dementors are breeding, causing cool weather and persistent mist across Britain.
• Cornelius Fudge is sacked and Rufus Scrimgeour, Head of the Aurors, takes his place.
• A Junior Minister in the Muggle government, Herbert Chorley, has a bad reaction to an Imperius Curse and thinks he’s a duck. He is spirited away to St Mungo’s and Kingsley Shacklebolt takes a position as a secretary to the Muggle Prime Minister to guard him.
• Fudge visits the Muggle Prime Minister and introduces the him to Scrimgeour.
• Voldemort is furious with the failure of his Death Eaters to retrieve the prophecy. He assigns Draco Malfoy the task of killing Dumbledore, at least in part to punish Lucius’s failure, since Draco will almost certainly be killed.
• Narcissa Malfoy, followed by her sister Bellatrix, visits Severus Snape in his house on Spinner’s End and get him to take the Unbreakable Vow that he will protect and Draco and, if necessary, kill Dumbledore for him.
• Harry spends two weeks at number four, Privet Drive.

(HBP1, HBP2, HBP3)