Chapter 6 - Good And Bad Are Opposites; The Greater Good Is Halfway Back To Bad
Harry felt as though he'd spent more time in the Headmaster's office in the last week alone than he had in the entirety of last year, which wasn't that much of an exaggeration, he thought. Hedwig was sitting beside Fawkes on the phoenix's perch, both birds looking very cramped but happily chirping in the silence as Harry himself stood beside Dumbledore as they both stared down at the gold ring in its box which lay on the desk.
"Is it cursed as well?" Harry asked.
"Yes," the man muttered, "Much like the box was," he said.
"Can't we just destroy it? Won't that break the curse?"
"It's probable, but I should think it safer if I break the curse before we destroy the Horcrux," Dumbledore said as he picked up the ring. "Yes," he breathed, "...A very powerful curse to ensure almost certain death to anyone who dares to wear this ring."
Harry watched closely, his eyes following Dumbledore's every move as the older wizard turned the ring about in his fingers, "After all these years," he said, too deep in thought to notice Harry's presence. "I'd long since abandoned any hope but...here it is...I can see them again...I can see her again...I can tell them...finally..." the older wizard continued to himself and, to Harry's horror, he went to put the ring on his index finger.
"Sir, don't!" Harry cried instantly, rushing forwards and grabbing Dumbledore's arm.
Dumbledore blinked and slowly glanced at Harry, his eyes focusing once more and he let out a deep breath, "Apologies, Harry," he said, "It seems I owe you a debt once again tonight." He relaxed his arm and deposited the ring back into its box and drew out his wand, whispering something that Harry didn't understand. The second the old wizard had spoken, small sparks of light burst from the ring as well as black shadows and the old ring started to jump about as though in protest of Dumbledore's curse breaking.
After a few minutes, each of which seemed to take hours to pass, Dumbledore lowered his wand with a heavy sigh. "That was a curse of prodigious skill," he remarked, "And now for the Horcrux itself," the man continued and took the sword from the surface of the desk.
Dumbledore placed the ring on the floor and moved to stand in front of it, "I suggest you stand back, Harry, I can't be entirely sure what will happen," he said, gripping the sword in one hand and his wand in the other.
"Maybe I should..." Harry began, glancing at the sword.
"I suspect it will sense me the moment I attempt to destroy it if it hasn't done so already, and should anything prevent me, you may have to," the older wizard said and Harry nodded.
Dumbledore raised the sword and brought it down towards the ring but before the silver blade could touch it, a black smoke seeped out and seemed to engulf the old wizard entirely. A strong force pushed Harry backwards and he landed hard on the ground, his very bones quivered from the impact. When he looked up he saw a strange sight indeed. Everything looked different, things were distorted like he was looking through water, and the air danced like on a hot summer day.
He had no idea what was happening to the Headmaster, he couldn't see a single trace of the man anymore, he'd simply vanished in the thick, black smoke in a split second. Harry couldn't even see Hedwig or Fawkes anymore either. When he stood and tried to move to where Dumbledore had been standing he was thrown backwards again and it took him a moment to be able to move his aching limbs. Clutching his wand he searched his mind for a spell that would help in any way, but he didn't know what it was he was fighting. How could he attack smoke? How could he defend himself against against something that had no form?
Just as he looked up a second time, he heard the sharp, echoing clatter of metal on stone and he could just about see the sword through the moving shadows. Instantly, he raised his wand and cried out, "Accio sword!" but the blade remained where it was. So, he pushed himself up and ran over to it through the black smoke but it felt like he was wading through deep water. His movements seemed slow and sluggish and he could hear a loud roaring in his ears, like the Horcrux was screaming out at him for daring to destroy it. Each step felt as though he was running a marathon and the closer he got to the sword the more he thought he could hear voices, some screaming and some shouting. As it got louder he recognised it as the same screaming he'd heard when under attack by Dementors. He heard the voice that snuffed out Cedric's life and another voice that shouted out the curse that killed Sirius every night when he slept.
The voices slowed Harry down and as the scenes of his nightmares replayed in his mind he lost focus on what he was actually doing. It took a loud, inexplicable cry from Fawkes, echoing in the room, to make him look around and see the sword once again. When he moved forwards he felt the strong pulse around him and knew he was going to be thrown back again but before it happened a golden light surrounded him and the shadows melted on contact. Deciding not to let an advantage go to waste, Harry rushed towards the sword and was able to pick it up, he clutched the hilt in his hands he looked down to see the gold of the ring just visible through the darkness emanating from it. Without another thought, Harry raised his arm and brought the sword down on the ring and the second afterward, all traces of the black smoke and thick atmosphere simply disappeared.
Harry fell to his knees, the sword falling loosely from his hands as he did so. He looked across the room to see Dumbledore lying on the ground, as though he'd been thrown back like Harry had, his wand was pointed at Harry himself and he pieced together that Dumbledore had been the reason he hadn't been thrown back a third time as he'd gone for the sword. The light now dimmed and faded as their eyes met in relief.
"Well done, Harry, well done indeed," Dumbledore said finally, his breathing just as heavy as Harry's.
The older wizard pushed himself up from the floor and Harry did the same before moving to retrieve the cracked ring. The stone had been severed from the gold ring by the sword and he picked up the black, cracked stone and then went to pick up the ring. But the second his fingers touched it he saw flashes of Voldemort at different stages in his life and he pulled his hand back as though he'd been burned. Dumbledore reached down and took the ring, then regarded him with an expression he couldn't quite place or describe. He held out his hand and Harry, slowly relinquished his hold on it to drop into the Headmaster's open palm.
"You're not injured, I hope?" he asked Harry.
"I'm fine," he answered, as Dumbledore's piercing blue stare studied him.
"If you were thrown as I was I'm afraid I must disagree with you; neither the cabinets nor the flooring were designed with such an act in mind," he said and several of the portraits snorted as the shock of what they'd witnessed, began to ware off.
Dumbledore, taking both ring and stone, walked over to his desk, sat down and put the objects in his drawer, taking the chance to rest his protesting muscles. "Sit down, Harry, I think you've earned a rest," he said when Harry lingered across the room.
Harry hesitated for a moment before picking up the sword and walking towards the desk. He lay the shining blade across the old surface of the familiar desk and leaned forwards in his chair. He still had questions, many questions about what had happened both in the destruction of the Horcrux and about what had happened in the Gaunts' shack but he didn't know whether or not the Headmaster would be forthcoming with answers on either subject.
"That symbol on the ring...you mentioned it like it was something important. What is it? What does it mean?" the young wizard asked, deciding to hope for the best.
"Ah, Harry..." Dumbledore sighed, "The stone...it means, that our friends, the Gaunts where mistaken in believing that the ring belonged to Slytherin..."
"And that made you..." the young wizard broke off with a helpless shrug, "...Attack me?"
"...Here I must beg your forgiveness for an old man's folly, but I'd long since abandoned any hope that the stone would ever be found. I didn't realise it's true significance until I saw the symbol and then of course, all of my old dreams, my old, foolish hopes...returned."
"What hopes? I don't understand, what is the stone?" Harry asked again, beginning to get frustrated by Dumbledore's evasive responses.
"It's possible that Voldemort didn't know, or simply didn't care about its power, but it is, and remains a Hallow, Harry, one of three legendary objects of great power."
"A...a Hallow?" the young wizard repeated, having never before heard the term.
"My mother," Dumbledore began , "Used to tell me and my siblings many stories as children but this one, even when I was young, this one was always my favourite..."
"...Sir..." Harry said, not sure what significance that children's tales held.
"I know you, Harry, I know you'll not leave this alone until you understand but please have patience," Dumbledore sighed. "The story then, the Hallows...the Hallows were, supposedly, given by Death to three brothers, one of these Hallows was a stone - a powerful stone of resurrection."
"...What?"
"Yes, I admit though, as a child, it was never the stone that interested me. It was not until I was a man that the mere concept of the stone became something capable of removing all rational thought from my mind."
"Can it really...bring people back?"
"Harry...despite my reactions...despite all my hopes, it cannot do so, not truly. If used, as the story says, what returns will be a tormented soul trapped in a world it does not belong to, bringing with it unbearable agony for the user."
"But you were..."
"I was, and still am a fool," Dumbledore shook his head and leaned over his desk. "I thought, just as I did as a young man, that I could bring back my parents...and tell them how deeply sorry I am," he added quietly, so quietly Harry wasn't sure he was meant to hear it.
He furrowed his brow in confusion listening to the defeated tone of the man's voice. Harry had no idea what had happened in his headmaster's past but he recognised the look on Dumbledore's face as the same one he had worn himself when he'd been told not to look for the Mirror of Erised anymore in his first year. It had been his only window into a family he could never have and when the image of that family was gone I longer there, it had been heartbreaking. Harry was used to people, sometimes complete strangers, giving him their sympathies for his loss but all it did each time was make him dwell on said losses. He didn't want to spend his time thinking about the family he lost, he liked to remember them by looking at the photographs in his album and remembering them by what he'd had for the first year of his life.
"So...erm...the symbol then..." he coughed, lightly. He was sure that Dumbledore didn't want people prying into his life and Harry wasn't going to.
"It is the mark of the three Hallows, yes."
"What are the other two, sir?"
"Here is the stone," Dumbledore said, raising his head and taking up his quill pen, he quickly drew the circle on a piece of parchment and continued. "It was given to the second brother who wanted to bring back his deceased love. A magical cloak able to prevent Death from following him, was given youngest, wisest brother. And a powerful wand made of elder wood went to the first brother who desired above all to be invincible," he said, drawing the triangle for the cloak and the single line for the wand.
Harry saw the simple symbol drawn in ink as had been carved in the stone as the older wizard put down his pen, "According to the tale, Death appeared to the brothers when they conjured a bridge over a ravine which had cost many a man his life. He was cheated out of his victims and so, very cleverly, he gave to each of them what they wanted most. The first brother used his powerful wand and killed a fellow wizard he'd once quarrelled with, he later boasted of its power but it was stolen from him when he slept, the thief slit his throat. The second brother brought back the woman he'd once loved but was driven to take his own life when he saw how lifeless and cold she was, and so, two of the brothers were very swiftly taken by Death. The third brother, hidden by his cloak, only emerged after many years and greeted Death as an old friend...Out of curiosity, Harry, tell me which Hallow is the most powerful, think carefully."
"Well," Harry began, "There's no such thing as an invincible wand, is there?" he asked, but Dumbledore didn't answer so he continued. "A wand can't make a person unbeatable and even if it could...it just got stolen from the first brother, so it'd be pointless anyway."
"Go on," the older wizard prompted, a smile on his face.
"And...you can't...bring the dead back," he sighed, "But...still..."
"But the mere thought of the possibility is enough to throw rational thought from your mind...just as it does, mine," Dumbledore nodded. "I never did find the cloak as tempting. At first I desired, like many before me, to possess the wand of ultimate power, but as I grew, after I'd made the worst mistakes of my life, the stone seemed to promise all that I desired. The most famous, or perhaps, infamous part of the legend, is that, together, the three Hallows are said to make a person the Master of Death - the Three Deathly Hallows. Many a life has been wasted in pursuit of them, believe me, Harry."
"Master of Death? Does that make a person...does that mean you could live forever?"
"No, no, the true Master of Death does not seek to run from Death. He accepts that he must die and understands that there are far worse things than dying," Dumbledore told Harry, "I only wish I could have learned this sooner."
"Sir...what..."
"Now, Harry, for a job well done, I'd very much appreciate it if you joined me at the Hog' Head for a drink," Dumbledore said, standing up before Harry could voice his question.
"Erm...sir...is that really a good idea?" Harry asked delicately, "What about the other Horcruxes?"
"I think you underestimate our victory here tonight; destroying a Horcrux is no simple feat."
"But there still more of them left, isn't there?"
"Yes, and we will find those too, but before our world becomes completely engulfed by war we should enjoy what time we have left."
"I thought we were in a state of open warfare," Harry frowned.
"Yes, but this is the calm before the storm, believe me when I say that once the storm hits you'll know it. I've seen enough wars to know that rushing in head first won't necessarily end well. Now, I'd prefer it if you wore your cloak once we leave my office," Dumbledore said, "Your trunk is just back there," he added, gesturing to the small alcove behind his desk.
Harry nodded and went to open his trunk and found his cloak folded neatly on the top. He took it, closed the trunk and went back to stand by Dumbledore.
"Couldn't we just apparate, sir?" Harry asked, curiously.
"Yes, but should wizards apparate whenever we wished to travel we would become very lazy indeed. The walk will do us both good and I was under the impression that you would appreciate travel by another means where possible," Dumbledore gave a small smile. Harry, appreciative of the break from apparition, held his cloak as they walked towards the door.
"Who else is still here?" Harry asked.
"A handful of trusted friends and colleges, but I'd rather the knowledge of your being here is limited where possible."
"But people will see me in the Hog's Head with you," Harry pointed out as he donned his cloak.
"You have visited the establishment before, haven't you?" Dumbledore asked shrewdly.
"Erm...yes," Harry said, deciding to be honest.
"Then you know it's much more secluded than The Three Broomsticks and I have it on good authority that it's been a quiet few days, added to the fact that it's nearing dawn I, don't think there'll be anything for you to worry about."
Not knowing what else to say, Harry fell silent as they walked through the castle and out into the early morning air.