Disclaimer: I'm not JKR. :sighs: ...God, that was painful...but necessary. I'd rather not have a lawsuit slapped on me as a present. Speaking of which, Merry Christmas!

All the Difference

Albus Dumbledore had known for years that Harry Potter would one day have to die fighting Voldemort. He knew that Voldemort would know this as well, especially after the boy had first survived the Killing Curse. Albus Dumbledore also knew, in his heart of hearts, despite his genuine fondness and love for Harry and the guilt burning at his insides, that he had no choice but to help this fact, this inevitable thing, twist and turn along the path to fulfillment. Harry had to defeat Voldemort, because once he was old enough to know the truth, he would never let his parents' murderer go free – and someone had to do it. And Dumbledore knew Voldemort knew all this as well.

But Dumbledore knew something else, something that Voldemort would never know until it was too late. The night he had taken Lily Potter's blood through her beloved son, it had bound Harry to life as long as Voldemort lived, and even when Voldemort died, Harry could have a chance to survive still. This eased Dumbledore's guilt considerably when he helped the seed of determination in Harry's head sprout into a vow to kill Voldemort, even if it cost him his own life.

Dumbledore knew one more thing that Voldemort did not know, and would also not find out before it was too late. He knew that Harry, once he knew that Dumbledore had been planning on him facing Voldemort and dying in the process, would not turn and run, or falter in the slightest in his task of finding the Horcruxes and killing the vilest wizard that ever lived. He knew that when the time came, when after Severus showed him, in one way or another, what he must do to rid the shard of Voldemort's soul within him, Harry would walk to his death with his back straight, his head lifted, his hands by his sides, and his eyes raised to meet Voldemort's – looking Death in the face, so to speak.

And that, hopefully, will make all the difference, Albus Dumbledore thought quietly, watching from his office as Harry sat beneath a beech tree's sweeping limbs, as so many Hogwarts students had done before, and, Dumbledore instinctively knew, as so many would do again.