DISCLAIMER: Anything that you recognize and have read before belongs to our beloved JKR, and I do not intend to use it for my profit except for scores in QLFC.
Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition, as Beater 2 of Falmouth Falcons.
PROMPT: Write about a light character committing the sin of PRIDE or a dark character demonstrating the virtue of HUMILITY.
Chosen: 'Pride' for Albus Dumbledore, though the fic includes the 7 sins of the old wizard. Kudos to the ones who point all of them correctly.
Also, as sin and virtue are two sides of the same coin, the fic showcases 'Humility' on behalf of Gellert Grindelwald, too.
WORD COUNT: 2667
Also written for various prompts from the HPP forum.
Prompts:
# "The quieter you become the more you can hear." - Ram Dass
# "You can meet somebody tomorrow who has better intentions for you than someone you've known forever. Time means nothing, character does."
# "Time itself might not exist, it was humans who decided that it exists and believing is the thing that makes things real."
# "We try to hide our feelings but we forget that our eyes speak."
# "Loving you taught me what it is like to be dead while still breathing."
The Kingmaker
.oOo.
The difference between the king and kingmaker is this:
The king sits on throne, the kingmaker is the power behind the throne.
.oOo.
Albus shook his head for the umpteenth time in the last few minutes. Turning his back to where the sky was beginning to turn a soft purple as the first rays of sun graced the grounds, he said, "Gellert, I cannot go on a quest right now. We have forever to look for the Hallows, and I'm sure that no one will be able to find them before we do."
The older boy sighed. "You are a fool to think that we're the best. We may be brilliant, but there will always be someone out there in the world who could better us."
Albus rolled his eyes. Flopping down on the soft grass that covered the meadows behind his house, he said, "Don't tell me you really believe that; after all, we have all our lives in front of us. Why now? I am an orphan with two young ones to look after."
Albus picked at a the grass, wondering why on earth Gellert was discussing the Hallow quest at this ungodly hour when his mind was too numb to judge anything properly. He crushed a blade between his fingers, the green hue from the grass staining his fingertips. He chuckled, thinking of the mint humbugs he enjoyed so much.
"We can't leave everything to time," said Gellert as he, too, sat down.
"But time itself might not exist; it was humans who decided that it exists and believing is what makes things real."
As the older boy pinched the bridge of his nose and tried to calm himself, Albus smirked. Intelligent as he might be, Gellert would never win a word-battle with him—no one had to date, after all. Besides, the blond always had a hard time controlling his temper and Albus loved pushing it to the limits.
"Albus," Gellert began, "we can sit here as long as we want to and discuss the mysterious aspects of time and this world as a whole. Time might not exist, but as it is, the clock is ticking and people like us—who believe in The Tale of the Three Brothers—are in pursuit of uniting the Hallows right now. So, no, we cannot sit around and indulge in petty things like blood-relations when the greater good is awaiting us."
"Ah, but you are forgetting that the...blood-relative I have to look after is my sister, and she depends solely on me for her caretaking. Besides, do not underestimate the power you and I have when we are together." He watched as Gellert clenched his fists to the point where his veins must have started to throb angrily.
'Serves him right,' he thought. Gellert had no right to tell him what to do. They were equals; he wasn't inferior to the blond in any way. And this was his family they were talking about.
"Albus, if you keep this 'perfect-duo' belief for us, I'm afraid you will never be the king...just the kingmaker."
.oOo.
As Gellert Grindelwald fell to his knees, Albus Dumbledore let his focus shift over to their surroundings. They had drawn quite a crowd, though he was glad to see that the people were sensible enough to stand a good distance away.
Of course, Gellert was up again in no time and the duel resumed with the two sorcerers throwing spells at each other.
If someone would have observed closely, they would have noticed how all of the deadly spells thrown by both of the duelists were aimed just out of range of their opponent. The people, however, were too busy paying attention to the glittering show of fireworks the colliding spells provided.
A stinging hex hit Albus in the knee. Muttering a counter curse, he cast another shielding charm to deflect the barrage of spells Gellert was aiming his way.
By now, the two greatest wizards of the world had turned to the spells students learnt in their first and second years, not dark hexes and jinxes one would have expected. But that was the beauty of duelling—you could get away with simple hexes that the other person would not anticipate.
"Accio Gellert's Wand," Albus tried, picturing his opponent's wand in his head. Nothing happened, and Gellert smirked as the scowl added to the wrinkles that were set on Albus' senile face.
"I'm surprised that you haven't realised this isn't my old blackthorn wand, Albus," Gellert said, his voice loud enough for Albus to hear, but far too low for the growing audience. "At this moment, I am sporting the Wand of Death: the Elder Wand."
This did surprise Albus to a great extent and he tried hard to not let the shock show on his face. Yet, as he looked up, the smile that graced Gellert's face informed him that he had not fooled his old friend.
The duel continued for another couple of hours, draining the magic out of both men. They had nobody to reserve for them, and as the duel was taking its toll, both wizards were completely out of breath.
Albus tried to push his luck a bit. "Expelliarmus," he cried, and unexpectedly, the wand flew out of Gellert's hand, falling right in front of him.
Albus stood his ground—attacking a defenceless wizards in a duel was not style, yet Gellert made no movement to pick up his wand.
"It's yours, now," Gellert said, his voice betraying the slight annoyance he was feeling. "It's no use to me; I lost the duel to you. You are its new, true master."
With the speed of a bolt of lightning, Gellert drew out his old, blackthorn wand from the holster tied on his arm. The duel resumed, but of course, Albus had an upper hand now as Gellert had long ago lost the touch of his old wand. Within a matter of minutes, Gellert was disarmed again, and the wand landed in Albus' outstretched palm.
Gellert stood up and dusted his robes. "You win this time, old friend." Albus smiled.
"Your...wands." He pointed at the two wands, before the checkered pattern of the pavement drew his attention.
Gellert stepped forward, picked up the Elder wand, and tucked it into the waistband of Albus' robes. Slipping his own wand into the pocket of his robes, he leaned in and whispered, "I was just a pawn in the unison of the three Hallows, Albus—the duel today is proof—and I gave the quest up a long time ago. The near future promises the three gifts of Death to be brought together, old friend, but I stick to my words. You shall be the kingmaker, not the king."
Albus suppressed a shudder as Gellert placed a hand on his shoulder, "There was an uncertainty when I last spoke these words, but the death of Ariana rendered you incapable of being the Master of Death. The key is to treat all three as equal, and you and I both know that you have an infatuation for a certain black stone.
"The Elder Wand belongs to you, for now, but when time comes, let it fall into the right hands. It creates its own Fate and nothing we do would change the path it has decided for itself. I had thought I would win it back with my own wand, but clearly, I was wrong."
Gellert patted Albus on his shoulder, the latter too lost in his thoughts to even respond. Stepping back, he smiled a genuine smile. "Farewell, Kingmaker."
Albus could only stare at the retreating back of his old ally.
.oOo.
The fabric slipped through his fingers, the feeling unlike any other cloak he had seen or held. Albus thought of the day he had borrowed it from James; he had not opened the package then. In fact, this was the first time he was holding the second Hallow during the ten years of it being under his possession—the words of Gellert stopping him each time before.
The true owner of this cloak was somewhere in the castle, too—an eleven year old, unknown to the fact that he had inherited something else from his parents apart from the gold that lay buried in Gringotts. Albus was contemplating on whether or not he should return the cloak to Harry.
He could almost hear Gellert say, 'There are seven Deadly Sins in the world, Albus, and you're at guilty for all of them.' Then, shaking his head, his old friend would have tched, and said, 'Lust for an inanimate thing is bad, especially for someone as great as you, Albus.'
Albus Dumbledore shook his head.
"Headmaster, I think you should go with what your heart says."
He turned to the portrait of Dilys Derwent and stared.
The witch smiled. "We try to hide our feelings, but we forget that our eyes speak volumes."
Against his better judgement, Albus gritted his teeth. He had left Gellert for the greater good. Yet, he could sense Gellert's presence everywhere, in his mind and in everything around him, corrupting his thoughts.
As a last favour to Gellert, Albus decided to return the cloak to Harry when the right time approached.
.oOo.
Albus trotted along the long-forgotten path, humming a tune, a small smile playing on his lips. The smile fell, however, as he saw the thin backbone of what once would have been a small, brightly coloured garden snake pinned to an old door.
The cottage itself was almost in ruins; nature had clearly done its best to claim the spot back. Making his way through the vegetation with assistance from the Elder Wand, he pushed on the door, and was not surprised to see that it did not budge. He had expected this much from Tom Riddle.
After trying, and failing, to open the door with simple unlocking spells, he began to explore the spells placed on it using the ancient language of wizarding world. Finding the answer at last, he drew out the flask that held fresh Phoenix tears he had acquired from Fawkes. As he poured them on the doorknob, the venom coating it burned black.
With a wave of his wand, he muttered a final, simple unlocking charm and the door opened. Albus let another smile grace his lips. How ingenious. No one would have tried Alohomora after the complex protections that had been placed on the door.
He entered the shack, the magic causing a tingling sensation on the back of his neck. He wondered what horcrux lay therein: The ring? The locket? The cup?
Albus glanced around the hut before moving to a pile of debris where the magic was the strongest. Removing the top layers, he picked the casket up that lied beneath. He trailed his fingers on the intricately carved wooden box that held the answer to what he was seeking, a reward to all his efforts.
Repeating the process of spell-checking he had used on the door, Albus was astonished to find that none existed. He opened the lid.
What lay inside made him forget to be wary of the dangers of spells and enchantments that protected it. He extended his hand and pulled the ring out. Before he could bring his other hand up to stroke the black stone, the ring fell out of his fingers, and he writhed in pain.
Gellert had been right on both accounts—about his love for the stone and his ignorance to the humility Gellert had always held with pride.
Any moment now, Gellert would come out of the shadows that so woefully surrounded him and say what he had always tried to ignore: "You're the kingmaker, not the king."
Quickly undoing the protective enchantments, he picked up the ring. Slipped it on his, he disapparated away.
.oOo.
Albus took another sip of wine from the silver goblet he held. The afterlife offered better wine than the living world, though he did miss the Muggle sweets. He wondered again how he had managed to make it to heaven after all the darkness he had held in his life.
"Daydreaming again, are we?" he heard someone say. It was a voice he hadn't heard for a long time but could recognise better than the back of his blackened hand.
He looked around, then shook his head when he didn't spot anyone. "Ah, old age makes me hear things, even after death."
"No, Albus," the voice of Gellert spoke again. "This is simply the proof of the fact that the quieter you become, the more you can hear."
Before he could turn his head, the source of the sound jumped down from the tree Albus was sitting under.
"It has been a long time, Albus," Gellert Grindelwald said.
For the first time in many, many years, Albus was at a loss for words. Who could have killed Gellert? How did Gellert find his way to the light side? The thoughts swirled in his mind, question marks punctuating them and moving on to the next one before he could comprehend them.
"Gell—" he began, but stopped when his old friend tackled him to the ground with the spirit of a teenager.
"Bless my poor limbs," Albus said as Gellert stood up and offered him a hand.
"Well, if I remember correctly, I was older, and I died later." Gellert grinned at his friend. "An old student of yours came to me for the Elder Wand. I think he was a little behind the times."
"Tom Riddle?"
"The very same," said Gellert. Worry crept into Albus' mind before he remembered that the Wand of Destiny wrote its own Fate and his musings were redundant. So he focused on the next important question.
"How did he manage to defeat you?" Albus asked, and Gellert smiled.
"I always said there would be someone out there in the world who would better us. He caused your death too, didn't he?" Albus shook his head, and the two friends got into the task of catching up with each other's life-tales.
.oOo.
"Ah, here comes the kingmaker."
Albus let a small smile grace his lips. Life, or rather, afterlife, had definitely become better in Gellert's company. "You were right all along, Gellert. I was not the one Fate wanted to unite the Hallows."
"When have I ever been wrong?" Gellert asked.
"Is the preacher of humility falling to the sin of pride?" Albus questioned, raising a silvery-white brow.
"Never."
Albus' face grew somber as he began picking at his nails, an old habit that had followed him in his death. "I've still not quite got used to the fact that Harry did in just one year what I couldn't do in the whole of my life."
Gellert smiled. "Simply the game of intentions, old friend. You can meet somebody tomorrow who has better intentions for you than someone you've known forever. Time means nothing, character does. We wanted them for the Greater Good. You wanted them to unite a lost family. Harry brought them together by simply the lack of intentions; he did so just because he had to."
"When did you get so wise?" Albus asked.
"I think your company did me some good." Gellert turned his piercing blue eyes to meet Albus'. "We were the same, you and I. Your pride in 'us' taught me the beauty of being modest. Loving you taught me what it was like to be dead while still breathing." He paused. "I just understood this a bit too late, Albus."
Albus' breath hitched. "It is never too late for love, Gellert. And considering the fact that we both are dead and not breathing, there is no time like now to move past old differences and start writing a new beginning on a fresh piece of parchment."
"I think my company did you some good too, old love," and there, the moment of seriousness dissolved into the playful banter only friends could work out.
.oOo.