Filius never forgets his grandsire's words, for goblins are sparse in affection through words. Lessons are taught through blood and steel and gold. Bare your teeth and blade. Strike while the iron is hot. Lies are human and truth is gold. He may live with wizards, dine with wizards, teach with wizards, but he never forgets the goblin way of life. He has been born as one, raised as one, and he will die as one. Blood breeds true. Always has, always will. Albus has never understood that, and Filius will never apologize for it.

"Ah, Filius. Thank you for coming."

Artificially complaisant, and exactly the reason they will never see eye to eye. Sitting behind his desk, various knickknacks glinting smoky-silver and whirring softly, Albus beckons him to have a seat, as if this is a social visit.

"Did you expect otherwise?"

Filius bares his teeth as he hops onto the chair, and Albus flinches.

"Well, after our recent…altercation, I wasn't sure how receptive to a conversation you would be."

The tone of the conversation is set then, aligned with their vocal tone, doomed from the beginning. Albus will cajole. Filius will cut. Nothing will change.

"Spare me the wounded feelings act, Albus. I'm old enough to see through that, and you're old enough to know better than to even try. Save it for Severus. Merlin knows how that boy has the patience for it, but he does."

A grimace shadows Albus' face. "Yes, well… Tea?"

"Let us not dance around the subject, Albus." Shaking his head, Filius brings out his flask of scotch and pours a generous amount into the cup of bland tea. "You want to know all there is to know about Harry Potter. You always want to know everything, and even worse, you expect to be told everything, but rarely return the courtesy. I wonder if your grave will be deep enough for all your secrets."

"That was uncalled for, Filius." Albus' skin grows ashen, pale as his admonition.

"Was it?" Filius smiles, mirth beneath a gnashing of teeth. "Just ask your questions, Albus. I'm not here to entertain your penchant for emotional manipulation."

If he is insulted, Albus hides it well, but the truth remains plain to see. Blue eyes gleam behind the half-spectacles perched low on the crook of his nose as he dispenses with the fake pleasantries. Curiosity burns too hot inside him to keep playing a losing game. Albus wants to know more than he cares to control the pace for once.

"What happened, Filius? What happened to the sweet boy I remember? He was full of James' mischief, tugging at my beard every time I visited. And now…his smiles are sharp enough to draw blood."

His expression is solemn, gone dark with focus, an antithesis to the brightness of his robes. Filius feels no pity when he tells him.

"He grew up. What did you expect with where you left him, Albus? Don't even try to deny it. You knew very well what life he'd have in that house."

Albus nods, still solemn, still curious. "But that is not all, is it? It can't be."

No shame in that man. Disgusted, Filius barely restrains the growl building in his chest. "No. No, it isn't." The words are ground out jagged and feral. "But you never cared to find out before, did you? You only care when you are forced to face your mistakes."

A sigh deluges the space between them, as if Filius is being unnecessarily difficult, spiteful for the mere sake of it.

"Filius, please. I only want to understand."

Ha! If only. "And what will you do when you understand? Will you leave that boy be?" Nothing comes forward, and Filius scoffs. "I thought so." A harsh tsk grazes the flesh of his tongue. "I will tell you, Albus, but not because you asked. I will tell you because I owe it to Lily."

Albus startles at that, brows slightly knit. It baffles Filius, incenses him. Is he truly so ignorant as to have missed how deep the bond between master and apprentice runs? Minerva must have been terribly cheated with her choice in mentor. Lily…the light of his eyes. Filius gave her everything, everything and more. He would have taken care of the light of her life, too…if he could, if it wouldn't have incited another war. A goblin raising the wizarding hero. Psah! The earth would have cried blood. And he would have still done it, but no child should be raised in bloodshed.

"She didn't die for you to unmake her sacrifice in your self-righteous quest to erase all magic that doesn't cater to your sensibilities. Lily didn't think you'd understand, you know. That's why she never told you or James what she did." Wrath in his eyes, blood and fire on the altar of forgotten magic. "And she was right."

A gasp echoes, faint with dawning horror. "You can't mean she—she turned to the Dark Arts?"

Filius can see revulsion in the white of Albus' pallor, in the arctic blue of his eyes, frozen in the grip of that realization. That conniving hypocrite!

"Oh, for Merlin's sake. This isn't the political arena, Albus. Magic is magic. Don't bother to tell me otherwise. You know my views very well, even if you never agreed with them. They don't suit your political agenda, do they? They clash with your fanatic need for redemption. Why blame the people when you can blame the magic?" How many murderers have you pardoned, Albus? How many walk free to terrorize the innocent once more because of you? Throwing his head back, Filius downs his cup and lets the burn wash away the taste of his revulsion. "But enough. I'm not going to argue with a politician. I will talk to a wizard, if you can find it in yourself to be one for an hour. Will you?"

Warily, Albus stares at him, perhaps regretting he ever asked. "I'm sorry, Filius, but…the Lily I knew would never turn to such foul magic."

Foul, he says! And his grandsire's words roar in his ears. Beware the pride of humans. Beware their folly! Filius draws breath deep inside his lungs, then exhales, and again. "You didn't know Lily Evans, Albus. You knew Lily Potter, and that is how she liked it." Albus opens his mouth, but Filius' glare cuts him off before he can spew more nonsense. "Remember. Did you ever interact with Lily before her marriage to James?"

Humming, Albus pulls at the middle of his beard, skin creasing above his brows, filaments of memory resurfaced. "She was friends with Severus, even as a Gryffindor. It warmed my heart to see their friendship hold strong in the face of adversity. Until that day, of course."

The last sentence carries the gravity of some cataclysmic disaster.

Filius' stare turns droll. "And what did you think happened that day? Did you think Lily threw away years of friendship because of a common slur? That she didn't know why Severus turned on her? That she couldn't forgive an insult spoken in blind anger and humiliation?"

A slow blink. Albus' jaw slackens, mouth falling ajar, trying and failing to reconcile the past. "She knew? But then…why?"

"Because she had to." Firm, unchallenged, a statement. "Severus was well on his way down a road that would make her a target. Consorting with children of Death Eaters, some of them even marked while still in school. Muggleborns were hunted down and slaughtered like animals back then. Did you forget that? Or perhaps you don't want to remember what your redeemed boy has done in his youth?" One vicious curl of lips, thinly satisfied. "Lily did the smart thing and took the excuse when it fell into her lap. She did what she had to, and good on her."

All color flees Albus' face. He swallows once, twice, and when he speaks his voice has regressed to raw whispering. "Does Severus know that?"

Filius' smile becomes sardonic. "No." He can't help but laugh as Albus' body loosens in relief. "Don't worry, Albus. He's still leashed to her memory."

Disappointment stares back at Filius, so potent, so perfect. Merlin forbid Albus gives in to ugly emotions. Too dignified for anger, is he? Filius' laughter intensifies until he's wiping off tears.

"Must you make me the villain in everything, Filius? Can't I simply care for Severus' psyche?"

"You can." But you don't is loud and clear. Dragging his thumb under his eyes, shaking with light spasms, Filius sighs. "There are other things as well. I could speak about how brilliant, how shrewd that woman was for hours, but my point is made. You didn't know Lily."

Albus, too, sighs. "And I regret that I didn't."

"It is too late for regrets." Bitter, gaze narrowing, he snorts. "But if you truly mean it, then you will leave her boy alone after you know." Again, nothing comes forward, not that Filius expects otherwise. Goblins could tunnel that mountain forever without making headway. Even the truth might not move it. "She came to me after you served her that bogus prophecy."

"It wasn't—"

"Oh, it was." Filius quells him a look. "Until it wasn't. Self-fulfilling prophesies and all that rubbish. That's what happens when you meddle with the tongue of seers, but believe what you will. What is done is done." On that, they can both agree, maybe the only thing they ever will. "Lily asked for my help—and I helped her. Born as the seventh month dies, she said. On the eve of Lughnasadh. So I spoke to her about the old blood rituals on days of power."

Porcelain shatters and pierces weak flesh, blood welling, dripping sluggishly. Albus' fingers close around the pieces of his broken cup, opening the cuts wider, deeper. A soft trill blazes. Fawkes lands on the edge of the desk, fire-feathered head tilting over Albus' fingers, crystalline tears sealing the wounds. Albus smiles, strokes the Phoenix's plumage, his smile tremulous, showing his true age.

"Oh, Filius. How could you? She didn't—"

"She did." It is emphatic and beyond reproach. Filius has left his patience outside Albus' office—he's certainly not going to retrieve it now. Albus can go hang his disappointment next to his delusion. "Don't give me that look, Albus. Ritualistic birth is an ancient, sacred custom, and placental blood is one of the purest magical substances. It has become obsolete these days, rarely practiced even by the old pureblood families, but the hidden barrows still swell with magic. Witches have forgotten—but the magic remembers."

Another trill, softer, lugubrious. Albus weeps silent tears, as if mourning the loss of innocence. Despondent, overcome with grief. Filius wonders who will mourn Albus' loss if he were to accidentally meet his end at the edge of an axe. Probably too many sycophants to be worth the trouble of staging an accident. And that poor Phoenix… This is why creatures born with deep emotional resonance should never bond to wizards. To be enslaved to the whims of an overemotional schemer living in the past…

Gingerly, Albus dries his eyes, sighing even as he frowns. "I thought she gave birth at St. Mungo's. I remember that. There was an Order meeting that day, and James rushed out in a hurry when the floo call came. Frank had left before him, if I recall correctly."

"Alice Longbottom did give birth at St. Mungo's, but Lily was admitted after the birth. No one knows because Sirius memory charmed the hospital staff, and James arrived after it was over."

Shock jolts Albus out of his morose state. "Sirius Black?"

Filius smiles wryly. "Why did you think Lily named him godfather? For his stellar life choices and deep sense of responsibility?"

Albus' mouth imitates the result of a botched human-to-goldfish transfiguration. "Well…I did wonder."

"As most did, but no. Sirius was there during the birth. He was a Black, and Black blood breeds true." A stab of regret twists like a knife deep in his abdomen. That boy… Betrayed by his own blood, devoured by the sins of his forefathers. Filius curses the Black madness. Blood will always win in the end. "Although, I don't think he was ever the same after that day. Poor boy kept muttering about the Old Gods and calling Harry godling when only Lily was around."

Incredulity lines Albus' features, shaping them into something derisive. "The Old Gods, Filius? Surely you won't have me believe in such myths?"

"You believe in prophecies spoken by drunken seers, Albus." Taunt for taunt. "But no, I don't believe in ancient gods. I believe in sentient magic being tied to the mother's will and given pure purpose. Calling to the Mother Goddess and the Sun God is part of the ritual as it was done in the old days, but more symbolic than invocation. If you desire proof though, all you have to do is look at what remains of the ritual." Blank incomprehension is all he receives. Filius clicks his tongue, irritated, questioning if Albus is being deliberately obtuse. "The boy's scar, Albus."

Albus stills, motion and breath suspended, eyes too blue, too disbelieving, even when bludgeoned with clear-cut evidence. "Sæwelō…the rune of the Sun."

A sigh tumbles out of Filius' throat. "You thought the Killing Curse gave it form?"

Rigidly, he nods. "I…yes. What else could it have been?"

Unbelievable… "Runes are associated with rituals, Albus. Not Curses. A rune-scar on Samhain should have clued you in."

Contemplation creeps into that doubtful blue. "I had not taken Samhain into consideration."

"Obviously." Blunt, mordant, disguising nothing.

It falls on silk-clogged ears.

"I thought it was love—the love of a mother's sacrifice." Albus sighs heavily, wearily, trapped in his own web of fallacy, unwilling to escape.

"You haven't listened to a single word I've said, have you?" Filius shakes his head as he refills his cup with scotch, forgoing tea entirely. "It was love, Albus. Blood-bonded, yes, but a mother's love still. The ritual would not have taken if the intentions weren't pure."

"I see." Quiet, nearly inaudible, unseeing.

"Do you?" Filius takes one long draught of his drink, fire gliding down his throat to churn in a pit low in his stomach, and eyes him dubiously. "Because your expression tells me you'd rather forget you ever heard this."

Albus stares at the liquid amber in his cup as if it holds the answer to his prayers. "I can't change the past, but that doesn't mean I have to like it, Filius."

If this is Albus' reaction to an innocuous blood ritual, Filius doesn't have much hope for what will follow. Hope for Harry's sake. Albus deserves every single slash of agony, and Filius will relish being the hand of the Furies.

"Nobody asked you to like it, Albus. Just to accept what was done and leave it be."

"It still doesn't explain what has happened to the boy. Unless there is more to this…blood magic I'm not yet aware of?"

The small pause, how he stigmatizes that word, the way his eyes cloud with odium—Filius sees them all. And he remembers his grandsire's words. Let slip the dogs of war.

Their hands grip their weapons, fingernails black-smoked, metal blood-rusted. They smile and they die, and in their death-smiles, the immortalization of victory. Eagerness enough—enough to rename and reshape what is no glory.

Goblin rebellions are waged on blood.

Filius smiles, sharp as only goblin-wrought steel can be. "Of course there is. Blood magic alone would not have been enough. But if you add soul magic?"

Blood drains under his skin. Wide eyes bore into Filius', anguished, dreading. Pale hoarfrost, translucent fear. "Soul magic? Filius…you can't mean…"

"Oh, don't play the fool, Albus. I was there that night, you know."

Albus is choking on gelid air. Filius can feel nothing—but he can hear the frost filling Albus' mouth and rushing deep down his throat.

"Lily wrote in our linked journal when Voldemort came for them. Two sentences were all she managed: He's here. Please… And I knew."

Freezing deeper. He smiles and shivers with the satisfaction of that deeper.

"I arrived just in time to catch Hagrid leaving with the boy, so I put a tracking charm on the motorcycle. Once it stopped moving, I cloaked myself in silencing and disillusioning charms, and apparated. I came in time to see you leave him on that muggle doorstep like a bottle of milk—and I heard you, Albus."

Something cracks beneath the ice. Terrible and beautiful and hatched for bloodlust. It wraps around Filius' tongue with absolute precision. Delicately, viciously.

"Scars are useful things, aren't they? No need to heal them, now do we? Not that you could, mind you, but you didn't even try. Because you knew, didn't you?"

It seeps into the bloodless skin of Albus' face, glaciating the brittle framework of bone beneath. Cold heat and tissue being frostbitten, layer after layer after layer. He is numb through that biting. Slowly dying.

"How…?" A rough croak, voice gone. Phoenix song melts the chill clinging to the walls of Albus' throat, and his voice returns. "How did you know?"

"My grandsire is Agnar, Manager of the Egyptian branch of Gringotts. Soul magic is their bread and butter there. I knew what lay inside that scar before I even cast the detection spell. Soul magic leaves potent traces, and the boy was bathed in it."

Albus' silence is confirmation enough—but still not enough. Filius will have his pound of flesh on that boy's behalf come hell or high water.

"Nothing to say? Good. Because I have much to say to you." Growling, raw-throated fury. "You didn't even put one warming charm on the boy, Albus. Or an animal repelling ward. You irresponsible, self-serving bakraut."

The goblin curse goes deep—but not deep enough. Despite Albus' knowledge of the goblin language. It is given for blood-spillers, kin-slayers. What does he know of blood-bonds? He who reviles the blood-rites.

"I—I didn't think…" Albus rears back, pain-stricken, a scintilla of shame inside his eyes at long last. Not even Fawkes' melodic soothe-singing can chase the guilt away.

"No, you didn't. You didn't do a lot of things, Albus."

"What could have I done, Filius?" Blue flecked with opaline wet, beseeching dimly, desperately. "If you know, tell me."

"About the soul-shard? Nothing. Lily's magic had that well under control." Unmoved, Filius stares at him hard. "But about the boy? You could have done so much… I don't even know where to start. Leaving him on that muggle doorstep was your greatest mistake, and the one you have to blame for what happened."

Albus takes a fortifying breath. "What do you mean?" Cautious now, maybe finally aware of his ignorance.

"They abused him, Albus. That's what I mean." Matter-of-fact.

Whatever Albus expected to hear…this is not it.

"Surely not…they were his family." He mumbles the words, distraught, denying them when it is obvious he wants to believe them. Quietly, imploringly. "I admit I…suspected he might not have an easy life, but to say he was abused…"

"He was abused." Filius' stare hardens into titanium. Merciless, implacable. "He was treated so horribly that the blood magic chose to ally itself with the soul-shard and complete the half-formed bond. Do you understand, Albus? A piece of Voldemort's soul was preferable to the life he lived with those muggles."

It strikes him with the swiftness of a heart attack—cold sweat and spasms, breathing short and erratic, horror clotting inside blocked arteries, heart muscle deprived of oxygen-rich blood. A stuttering is all that comes forth. "What…? No. No, that…that can't be…"

Filius sits unmoved, calmly sipping his scotch. "It can, and it did."

And all the while Albus unravels. "How? That…shouldn't have been possible. I have been trying to find a way to separate them for years, Filius. Years…and nothing. I've found nothing."

"Because you know nothing. What do you know of soul magic, Albus? You can't bear to even speak about it without denouncing all that it is." Filius' lip curls, contempt enameled on gritted teeth. "The Killing Curse? The Horcrux? Tell me, what more do you know of soul magic?"

Flinching, Albus recoils in repugnance. "What more is there, Filius? It is a sickening branch of magic. One that should not exist."

"The Fidelius Charm is soul magic, Albus. The Animagus transformation is soul magic. The presence detection charm is soul magic."

With each piece of magic punctuated, Albus' denial is being chiseled away, little by little. Pity inundates Filius' soul. For the untaught children. Headmaster of Hogwarts and yet so unworldly. Rowena must be turning in her grave.

"You're a blind fool. You close your eyes to everything that contradicts your fallible perceptions of morality. That you even attach morals to magic is where your ignorance shows. But we'll never agree on that, so I'll tell you what I know of soul magic."

Albus leans forward, riveted as he is revolted.

"Harry is not the first living Horcrux. Not even the second, or the third. There have been numerous over the centuries." Filius barks out a laugh at the instant blanching of Albus' complexion, mirth guttural and long-lived. "Goblins keep records for inheritance disputes. Wizards and witches have been trying to cheat death for a long time, but they can never cheat goblins. You'd be surprised to know just how many have tried to claim their vaults after their supposed deaths."

Bewilderment avalanches across wan skin. Albus opens and closes his mouth, bereft of words. Seconds, maybe even minutes, pass. And then, "What? But...but that is absurd. It would be known were that the case."

Again, Filius laughs. "Goblins can keep secrets better than graves, Albus. Customer confidentiality and all that. But if you want known examples… The Greeks were very fond of soul magic, almost as much as the Egyptians. You should have heard of Orpheus and Eurydice."

Albus is staring at him with equal doses of dismay and skepticism, one small frown of brows and lips. "The muggle tale? Myths about gods again, Filius?"

Resisting every step of the way. Filius longs for his axe, the siren song of its steel calling for this fool's blood. Over and over.

"There is a grain of truth in every myth, Albus." Slow articulation, patronizing. "That couple was so…in love that they took their vows literally. Till death do us part gains another meaning when you exchange pieces of your soul. The issue was that when soul magic acquired vile connotations after Herpo's atrocities came to be worldwide known, the Greek Council of the time destroyed all accounts of soul magic and disguised most cases as muggle mythos. But records still exist deep in the magical Ancient Library of Alexandria, if you search through the right channels. Only the muggle part was lost, as you well know."

Dark, oppressive silence looms over Albus' bowed head, casting shadow and disquietude. An omen of grim tidings, ill-fated things to come. Albus ages ten thousand days in ten seconds.

He parts his mouth, stops to swallow, then begins again. "If you are right…if it is as you say, then Harry is lost as I feared."

Scowling, Filius surveys him heatedly. "Lost? What foolishness are you on about now, Albus?"

"His soul, Filius. His soul was…lost. That boy is not Harry Potter, but Voldemort reborn."

There is such absolutism in his tone, such soi-disant dogma, that Filius curses him to the ends of the netherworld.

"Sweet Circe's tits... Were you not listening again, Albus?" Will you ever listen? "Lily's magic would not have allowed Voldemort's soul to take over her son's body. It is exactly why I did nothing more than place some protective charms on the boy and let the matter be. I theorized that the blood magic would eventually reject the soul-shard, once it was running at full power again. Reflecting that Killing Curse had almost depleted it, but the magic was still active in the boy's blood. It should have vanished if its purpose had been fulfilled."

Filius spears him with his most savage glare when Albus makes to interrupt. "Listen, Albus, and listen well. In cases of living soul anchors, there have been four possibilities documented. The first is that the bond is too weak for the soul-shard and the vessel to ever have contact. The second is that the soul-shard takes over the vessel completely. The third is that the vessel rejects the soul-shard, but most cases don't survive the process. And the fourth is that the soul-shard and the vessel's soul merge. The last case is the rarest and most complicated."

Albus' mouth is locked in a soundless gasp, fist tight around his beard, when Filius pauses to hydrate his throat.

"I theorized on Harry's case because I had never heard of soul magic interacting with blood magic before. But I have read about cases of soul-merging. It is usually an even mix, unless one soul is infinitely more dominant than the other. A sixty-year-old wizard of prodigious intellect, with a fully developed, strong-willed personality, at the pinnacle of magical maturity would be considered exactly that. I'm not sure when the merge occurred, but it should have been during the boy's early years. Harry didn't have the time or the right influences to develop a solid personality yet. And so their soul-merging was unbalanced."

Albus does gasp then, full of breath and petrified. "So it is Voldemort."

"No, you—you—" A relentless stream of goblin curses hooks on the tip of his tongue. The few that escape color Albus' skin. A rainbow of colors. He changes from green to white to red, and back to green at the end. For a man of…colorful taste, he doesn't seem to appreciate it.

"What I meant is that what came out of the soul-merging was a person with the mentality of an adult but lacking the experience of being one. I can see Lily's fire in him, and Riddle's cunning, and some parts that are a mixture of both. What I don't see is Voldemort's madness, or his reckless power-lust, or his sadistic streak, and that is what matters. He's still in the process of absorbing parts that were dormant until now. Still merging. Right now, he appears more as a precocious child than the adult he mentally is. Hence, I treat him as the former. I'm guessing that the process will become complete in a year or so."

Filius' eyes connect with Albus', coal-black clashing with sky-blue, neither giving in, nor giving up. A battle of will and knowledge. Slowly, insidiously, Filius smiles.

"And when that happens, you can be sure that he will leave. Hogwarts loses its appeal after all its faults have been laid bare. Children can't see them, but Harry will. Indoctrination is hard to miss when you're not a malleable child."

In the quiet of the aftermath, Albus is rendered helpless, stripped of weapons and dignity, lying wounded on the battlefield. His sole avenue is to retreat for now and fight another day. Gathering the pieces of his shattered pride, he admits defeat—but the war still rages.

"Are you certain, Filius?"

Filius drains his cup, glutted with the euphoric burn of victory. "About what? That he is not Voldemort reincarnated, or that he will become disenchanted with Hogwarts' education?"

"Both." Grave as the funereal knell.

Only you, Albus… Filius stretches his neck and sighs. If he stays, he may answer the sweet call of his axe. Hopping down from his chair, he gives Albus the answer he deserves. "As certain as I am that you're a sanctimonious old meddler."

"Filius, please." Albus takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes as if asking for patience, and Filius scoffs.

"You can plead all you want, but the fact remains. You just can't leave things be. I told you what you wanted to know, but I still doubt you listened." You will never listen. "It doesn't matter. Do what you must, Albus, and we will do the same."

Albus gazes at him as he frowns, bemused. "We?"

"Minerva contacted Nicolas Flamel after your cavalier disregard of our concerns. He wrote back to say he will be coming to Hogwarts once his current project is stabilized. He also apologized for the delay, but the project is still quite delicate and volatile. Make of that what you will. Good day, Albus."

Once outside, Filius chortles. Minerva will be amused when she sees this in the pensieve. Albus' face… Nicolas Flamel must be something else indeed.