Chapter 14
Thankfully for Dumbledore's burgeoning blood pressure, Harry soon tired of playing with the man. Quite frankly, it felt way too much like bullying a helpless infant for him to be comfortable with it. There was also the fact that he was; after all, intensely curious to find out exactly why Dumbledore had come looking for him after all these years. Luna couldn't possibly be right. Well, she usually was, but this time he hoped that she had caught a hold of the wrong end of the stick.
Still, he wasn't just about to come out and let Dumbledore know who he was. No, this had to be handled most carefully.
"Well, Professor," he started saying, "when you arrived you told me that you had some information for the Boy-Who-Lived. Why don't you tell me what it is and I will make sure that he gets it."
Dumbledore shook his head in exasperation. "No, no," he cried. "That would not be at all possible. While it is vital that I speak to him, I must be made privy to the secret of his identity first. Unless, I am able to remember who he is, how will I be able to give him all the details?"
"And why should I do that?" asked Harry. "How do I know that this information you're hinting at will have any meaning whatsoever? For all I know you could be lying about that. Perhaps you are working with his enemies. Perhaps this is all a ploy to draw him out. Hmmm?"
Dumbledore glared at the young man. While he had lost a lot of respect over the last decade, it had still been years since anyone had dared to question him in this manner. He did not like it, no he did not.
"The information I have for him," he said slowly as he pondered if he was doing the right thing, "it has to do with the events leading up to the attack on him as a child. The reason behind why he became the Boy-Who-Lived. Some of this information is being obscured by the Fidelius Charm. I know that I possess this information but unless I am made privy to the secret I cannot remember all of it, much less tell it to you."
Harry stared at his former Headmaster. He had no doubt that Dumbledore would know why Voldemort had originally targeted his family. However, he asked himself whether that information could possibly have any relevance to him now. Yes, he was still intensely curious and desperately wanted that information but… was it worth letting Dumbledore into the secret of his identity? Perhaps he should just stun and obliviate the old man. It would be ridiculously easy to do despite the man's reputation of being a ridiculously powerful wizard. The man was still under his wards after all and with the way Harry had them set up Dumbledore would be absolutely unable to defend himself or even attack Harry in any way.
Still...Why had Voldemort attacked Harry when he was a baby? That was a question he had pondered ever since Hagrid had told him about the events of that long ago Halloween night. He stared into Dumbledore's eyes and attempted to enter his mind with legilimency. Unfortunately, he drew an absolute blank. Dumbledore's occlumency skills were far too good to be defeated by him. Perhaps he could just stun or incarcerate the old man and then interrogate him under veritaserum. Yeah right, he snorted to himself. Like he had any veritaserum. Unfortunately, he could not buy any, as the sale of it was currently illegal in the states. He could probably brew some, his potions skills had improved dramatically once he had found a teacher other than Snape, but the damn potion took a full lunar phase to mature. There was also the chance that Dumbledore would be able to resist it using occlumency.
"All right," he suddenly barked. He was feeling not a little bit angry at himself for biting at Dumbledore's bait. "I can let you in on the secret..."
"Excellent," exclaimed Dumbledore, losing the glare that he had wearing ever since Harry's failed legilimency attack. He started beaming away with his trademarked eye twinkle back in full force.
"But first," continued Harry, "we're going to write up a little contract. Magically enforced of course. I'm sure you're familiar with them."
"A contract..." questioned Dumbledore. "Why would we need a contract?"
"The Fidelius Charm only hides the identity of the Boy-Who-Lived. It's not going to be very helpful if you decide to let slip his location to someone. Why, the next thing you know is that Death Eaters will be attacking this street and killing everybody on it. They don't need to know which person living on that street is the Boy-Who-Lived if everyone is dead. Right?"
"I assure you that is highly unlikely to happen," said Dumbledore.
"And your assurances mean what to me exactly?" asked Harry. "As far as I'm concerned your assurances are worth less than a bucket of warm piss."
"Very well," stated Dumbledore stiffly. He was quite angry at the boy's crude vulgarity but unfortunately he could do nothing about it at the time. "Write your contract."
~oo00oo~
Luna was busy digging through boxes when Harry stormed into their bedroom. She had been watching Harry's conversation with Dumbledore but just like Harry, she too had found the entertainment factor of seeing Dumbledore brought down a few pegs swiftly decline after a few minutes. Now she was happily digging through the multitude of boxes that her father had left with her. After Luna had moved in with Harry, Xenophilius Lovegood had embraced a rather nomadic lifestyle. He'd sold his house, contracted out his printing needs and seemed happy never spending more than a few days in any one location. Which meant that Luna had ended up saddled with all of the years of research materials, books and esoteric tchotchkes that Xeno had collected. This of course came in handy when she needed to look up something that he had told her about years ago. Information that was bound to be somewhere in his files. Now if only she could find it.
She looked up as Harry entered the room — "Wasn't the quote 'a bucket of warm spit'?" she asked.
"Nah," he said. "John Nance Garner said piss. That was just the euphemism that people used to make it a bit more polite. It was either that or telling him that I trusted him as far as I could push him with the force of one of my farts." He sat down heavily on the bed. "What do you think?" he asked her.
"You could have been more polite. Not that it wasn't entertaining. I don't think Dumbledore is used to anyone being quite so rude to him," she said.
"Yes well, I wanted to see just how badly he wanted to find me and... it was kind of cathartic as well," said Harry.
"Cathartic? Why?" asked Luna.
Harry sighed deeply. "That would be a very long conversation, mostly dealing with my years at Hogwarts. Right now, I need to write up a quick contract and came up to find the contract paper."
He looked around the room, which looked remarkable messy. He and Dobby had unpacked nearly the entire contents of his old trusty backpack in their quest to find the books detailing the Fidelius Charm and they had not had the time to pack everything away yet. There were stacks of books, papers, miscellaneous pieces of equipment and clothes dispersed randomly amongst the piles and piles of loose golden galleons lying around haphazardly. He really should do something about that. Why hadn't he converted all those galleons to American dollars? Well, it wasn't as if he needed it and there was something to be said about keeping a large store of gold coins as part of his emergency escape kit.
He had to kick aside several stack of papers before he could open his chest of drawers. The contract paper, which he rarely used, was lying on the bottom of the lowest drawer. Hardly anybody used magically reinforcing contracts anymore but a while back, he had come across a client who insisted on one being drawn up before he would give Harry the job of warding his house. He wouldn't have bothered but this was one of the few clients who wanted to go all out on his wards. Jobs like that were quite rare and besides the contract had only covered stuff that he would have done anyway. Luckily, he still had some of the magically enchanted paper lying around. All he had to do was write out the terms, lay in the sealing enchantments and have Dumbledore sign it.
"Do you need help drafting the contract?" asked Luna.
"Don't think so," answered Harry. "It should be reasonably straightforward. My identity is covered by the Fidelius, so all it needs to cover is...He can't tell or give anyone any information about me or my location. If he has to come here again for any reason then he has to make absolutely certain that no one ever finds out about his visit and that he is not followed by anyone. He can't talk about me with anyone. Can't hmmm...What else does it need? Perhaps a line about him never lying to me. Never attempting to learn who my secret keeper is and if he does manage to find out, by accident or whatever then to never ever attempt to persuade or manipulate my secret keeper into telling the secret to anybody else." He stared at Luna for a moment, thinking hard. "And supposing something happens to me, then he has to make sure that my secret keeper is safe."
Luna frowned, "Cancel that last one," she ordered.
"Why?" asked Harry.
"In case something does happen to you...I really don't want Dumbledore trying to protect me. I'd rather he just keep as far away from me as possible."
"Yes, of course, you're absolutely right," said Harry, thinking of how Dumbledore had arranged to keep him safe after his parents were killed.
"Anyway, that should probably do it, I think. I'll just write it up and have Dumbles sign it," he said.
~oo00oo~
Harry walked back into the room where Dumbledore was waiting patiently and handed him the contract which he had hastily written up.
"Read that, after you sign it I can let you know where you can find your Boy-Who-Lived," he stated.
Dumbledore peered at the contract rapidly scanning it. "Most of this seems quite reasonable. However, I must be allowed to discuss the fact that I have found him with my allies. Finding the Boy-Who-Lived will provide an incredible boost of morale to those opposing Voldemort. I must be free to at least do that."
"No, I'm afraid it's an all or nothing situation. Either you sign that, or I shall obliviate you of the details of this meeting and send you on your way."
Dumbledore looked like he was about to argue but a single look at Harry's face was all it took to convince him that he was wasting his time.
"Very well," he stated as he pulled out a quill to sign the contract.
"Just a second," said Harry. "I still need to lay in the usual contract enchantments that will make it magically enforceable."
Harry started tapping the contract with the pencil that he had been holding the entire time and mumbling under his breath.
After a few minutes, he handed the contract over to Dumbledore and said — "There you go, you can sign it now."
Dumbledore stared at the young man. "How — How did you do that without a wand?" he asked. Contract enchantments were quite complex and even he, with all of his years of experience, would never attempt to perform them without a wand.
Harry looked surprised as if he had no idea what the man was talking about. Then he looked at the pencil he was holding and started to laugh.
"Oh man, you really don't get out much. Do you? My dear Professor, this IS a wand," he stated as he held his pencil in front of him. It looked like a perfectly ordinary muggle pencil, black with gold lettering on the side that marked it as an HB pencil. Obviously one that hadn't been used much as its tip was perfectly sharp and the length showed that it had never been sharpened. "The wizards over here in the States have always believed in blending in with the non-magical population. As such...well, why would you ever want to carry a wand that looks like a wand. Everyone here uses wands made to look like a pencil or a pen. Oh, you should have seen how much I was teased the first time I pulled out my old Ollivander wand at summer camp. All the other kids were asking me why I was carrying my grandfather's wand. Hell, for weeks that's what they called me — Grandad!"
With a start, Dumbledore realised that the young man had been holding the pencil the entire time they had been talking. He had been held at wandpoint and he had not even realised it.
"I don't like the ones that look like pens though. They coat those in something that makes them look and feel like a metal or plastic pen. The pencil ones feel much more natural, just like the wooden wands you're used to. This one is even made of holly, just like my old wand. You can even write with it in a pinch, but that's not really a good idea. Replacing the leads can be a bit of a pain."
Dumbledore sighed, perhaps he was getting too old. He rubbed his tired eyes and signed the contract.
"Excellent," said Harry as he put away the contract carefully. "Now, then I guess I have to do my part."
He pulled out a slip of paper and paused. He seemed incredibly reluctant for a moment then he handed the paper over to Dumbledore with a sigh.
Dumbledore looked at the paper and the biggest smile suddenly blossomed on his face.
"Harry, my dear boy. You have no idea how good it is to see you after all these years."
Harry plucked the paper out of Dumbledore's hand, carried it to his kitchen sink and set it on fire. He waited for the paper to completely burn then he picked up the remnants and crushed the black fragments between his fingers before turning on the water and washing the lot away.
"You had something to tell me I believe," he stated.
"Aah yes, of course I do," said Dumbledore a bit taken aback. He suddenly seemed a lot older and tired than he had looked just a moment ago.
Dumbledore closed his eyes and buried his face in his long-fingered hands. Harry watched him, but this uncharacteristic sign of exhaustion, or sadness, or whatever it was from Dumbledore, did not soften him.
Dumbledore lowered his hands and surveyed Harry through his half-moon glasses.
"It is time," he said, "for me to tell you what I should have told you years ago, Harry. Please sit down. I am going to tell you everything. You may get angry after hearing some of the things that I tell you but… I ask only a little patience. You will have your chance to rage at me — to do whatever you like — when I have finished. I will not stop you."
Harry stared at him for a moment, then flung himself back into the chair opposite Dumbledore and waited.
Dumbledore stared for a moment into the distance, then looked back at Harry and said, "Fifteen years ago you arrived at Hogwarts, Harry, safe and whole, as I had planned and intended. Well — not quite whole. You had suffered. I knew you would when I left you on your aunt and uncle's doorstep. I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years."
He paused. Harry said nothing although his mind was whirling. Ten dark and... Dumbledore had known, he had bloody well known...
"You might ask — and with good reason — why it had to be so. Why could some wizarding family not have taken you in? Many would have done so more than gladly, would have been honoured and delighted to raise you as a son.
"My answer is that my priority was to keep you alive. You were in more danger than perhaps anyone but I realised. Voldemort had been vanquished hours before, but his supporters — and many of them are almost as terrible as he — were still at large, angry, desperate and violent. And I had to make my decision, too, with regard to the years ahead. Did I believe that Voldemort was gone for ever? No. I knew not whether it would be ten, twenty or fifty years before he returned, but I was sure he would do so, and I was sure, too, knowing him as I have done, that he would not rest until he killed you.
"I knew that Voldemort's knowledge of magic is perhaps more extensive than any wizard alive. I knew that even my most complex and powerful protective spells and charms were unlikely to be invincible if he ever returned to full power.
"But I knew, too, where Voldemort was weak. And so I made my decision. You would be protected by an ancient magic of which he knows, which he despises, and which he has always, therefore, underestimated — to his cost. I am speaking, of course, of the fact that your mother died to save you. She gave you a lingering protection he never expected, a protection that might still flow in your veins to this day. I put my trust, therefore, in your mother's blood. I delivered you to her sister, her only remaining relative."
"She never loved me," said Harry at once. "She never gave a damn —"
"But she took you," Dumbledore cut across him. "She may have taken you grudgingly, furiously, unwillingly, bitterly, yet still she took you, and in doing so, she sealed the charm I placed upon you. Your mother's sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you."
"I still don't —"
"While you could still call home the place where your mother's blood dwells, there you could not be touched or harmed by Voldemort. He shed her blood, but it lived on in you and her sister. Her blood became your refuge. You needed to return there only once a year, but as long as you called it home, whilst you were there he could not hurt you. Your aunt knew this. I explained what I had done in the letter I left, with you, on her doorstep. She knew that allowing you houseroom may well have kept you alive for all those years."
"Fifteen years ago, then," continued Dumbledore, "you arrived at Hogwarts, neither as happy nor as well-nourished as I would have liked, perhaps, yet alive and healthy. You were not a pampered little prince, but as normal a boy as I could have hoped under the circumstances. Thus far, my plan was working well.
"And then . . . well, you will remember the events of your first year at Hogwarts quite as clearly as I do. You rose magnificently to the challenge that faced you and sooner — much sooner — than I had anticipated, you found yourself face to face with Voldemort. You survived again. You did more. You delayed his return to full power and strength. You fought a man's fight. I was . . . prouder of you than I can say.
"Yet there was a flaw in this wonderful plan of mine," said Dumbledore. "An obvious flaw that I knew, even then, might be the undoing of it all. And yet, knowing how important it was that my plan should succeed, I told myself that I would not permit this flaw to ruin it. I alone could prevent this, so I alone must be strong. And here was my first test, as you lay in the hospital wing, weak from your struggle with Voldemort."
"I don't understand what you're saying," said Harry.
"Don't you remember asking me, as you lay in the hospital wing, why Voldemort had tried to kill you when you were a baby?"
Harry nodded.
"Ought I to have told you then?"
Harry stared into the blue eyes and said nothing.
"You do not see the flaw in the plan yet? No . . . perhaps not. Well, as you know, I decided not to answer you. Eleven, I told myself, was much too young to know. I had never intended to tell you when you were eleven. The knowledge would be too much at such a young age.
"I should have recognised the danger signs then. I should have asked myself why I did not feel more disturbed that you had already asked me the question to which I knew, one day, I must give a terrible answer. I should have recognised that I was too happy to think that I did not have to do it on that particular day . . . you were too young, much too young.
"And so we entered your second year at Hogwarts. And once again you met challenges even grown wizards have never faced; once again you acquitted yourself beyond my wildest dreams. You did not ask me again, however, why Voldemort had left that mark on you. We discussed your scar, oh yes . . . we came very, very close to the subject. Why did I not tell you everything?
"Well, it seemed to me that twelve was, after all, hardly better than eleven to receive such information. I allowed you to leave my presence, bloodstained, exhausted but exhilarated, and if I felt a twinge of unease that I ought, perhaps, to have told you then, it was swiftly silenced. You were still so young, you see, and I could not find it in myself to spoil that night of triumph . . .
"Do you see, Harry? Do you see the flaw in my brilliant plan now? I had fallen into the trap I had foreseen, that I had told myself I could avoid, that I must avoid."
"I don't —"
"I cared about you too much," said Dumbledore simply. "I cared more for your happiness than your knowing the truth, more for your peace of mind than my plan, more for your life than the lives that might be lost if the plan failed. In other words, I acted exactly as Voldemort expects we fools who love to act.
"Is there a defence? I defy anyone who has watched you as I have — and I have watched you more closely than you can have imagined — not to want to save you more pain than you had already suffered. What did I care if numbers of nameless and faceless people and creatures were slaughtered in the vague future, if in the here and now you were alive, and well, and happy? I never dreamed that I would have such a person on my hands.
"We entered your third year. I watched from afar as you struggled to repel Dementors, as you found Sirius, learned what he was and rescued him. Was I to tell you then, at the moment when you had triumphantly snatched your godfather from the jaws of the Ministry? But now, at the age of thirteen, my excuses were running out. Young you might be, but you had proved you were exceptional. My conscience was uneasy, Harry. I knew the time must come soon . . .
"But you came out of the maze in your fourth, having watched Cedric Diggory die, having escaped death so narrowly yourself . . . and I did not tell you, though I knew, now Voldemort had returned, I must do it soon. Then you disappeared and I had lost my chance. I have looked for you for many years and... And now, tonight, I know you have long been ready for the knowledge I have kept from you for so long, because you have proved that I should have placed the burden upon you before this. My only defence is this: I had watched you struggling under more burdens than any student who has ever passed through this school and I could not bring myself to add another — the greatest one of all."
Harry waited, but Dumbledore did not speak.
"I still don't understand."
"Voldemort tried to kill you when you were a child because of a prophecy made shortly before your birth. He knew the prophecy had been made, though he did not know its full contents. He set out to kill you when you were still a baby, believing he was fulfilling the terms of the prophecy. He discovered, to his cost, that he was mistaken, when the curse intended to kill you backfired. And so, since his return to his body, and particularly since your extraordinary escape from him in the cemetery, he has been determined to hear that prophecy in its entirety. This is the weapon he had been seeking so assiduously since his return: the knowledge of how to destroy you."
"In fact, a short time after your disappearance, he broke into the Department of Mysteries. He was seeking the prophecy, labelled with his and your name, but ran afoul of the defences which reacted rather...vigorously. Surprisingly so. The prophecy was smashed during the chaos but what was smashed was merely the record of the prophecy kept by the Department of Mysteries. But the prophecy was made to somebody, and that person has the means of recalling it perfectly."
"Who heard it?" asked Harry, though he thought he knew the answer already.
"I did," said Dumbledore. "On a cold, wet night twenty-six years ago, in a room above the bar at the Hog's Head inn. I had gone there to see an applicant for the post of Divination teacher, though it was against my inclination to allow the subject of Divination to continue at all. The applicant, however, was the great-great-granddaughter of a very famous, very gifted Seer and I thought it common politeness to meet her. I was disappointed. It seemed to me that she had not a trace of the gift herself. I told her, courteously I hope, that I did not think she would be suitable for the post. I turned to leave."
Dumbledore got to his feet and fumbled in his pockets for a bit. He pulled out a small black box which he placed on the floor. "I almost forgot this in my haste to reach you. Luckily, I remembered in time to carry it with me. As I am still not allowed to do magic within your house would you kindly place your wand upon this and perform a standard shrinking reversal spell," he said.
Harry did so and the box expanded into a fine black trunk, Dumbledore bent down, opened the lid and took from inside it a shallow stone basin, carved with runes around the edges. Dumbledore walked back to the desk, placed the Pensieve upon it, and raised his wand to his own temple, he paused. "This is not really a form of active magic. Will it trigger your wards if I remove a memory?" he asked.
Harry waved his wand and cast a few spells. "Now it won't," he said. "I've set the wards to allow you to cast just one spell. You can go ahead and do it now"
Dumbledore placed his wand to his temple again. From it, he withdrew silvery, gossamer-fine strands of thought clinging to the wand and deposited them into the basin. He sat back down behind his desk and watched his thoughts swirl and drift inside the Pensieve for a moment. Then, with a sigh, he raised his wand and prodded the silvery substance with its tip.
A figure rose out of it, draped in shawls, her eyes magnified to enormous size behind her glasses, and she revolved slowly, her feet in the basin. But when Sybill Trelawney spoke, it was not in her usual ethereal, mystic voice, but in the harsh, hoarse tones Harry had heard her use once before:
"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches . . . born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies . . . and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not . . . and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives . . . the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies . . ."
The slowly revolving Professor Trelawney sank back into the silver mass below and vanished.
The silence was absolute. Neither Dumbledore nor Harry made a sound.
"Professor Dumbledore?" Harry said very quietly, for Dumbledore, still staring at the Pensieve, seemed completely lost in thought. "It . . . did that mean . . . what did that mean?"
"It meant," said Dumbledore, "that the person who has the only chance of conquering Lord Voldemort for good was born at the end of July, nearly twenty-six years ago. This boy would be born to parents who had already defied Voldemort three times."
"It means — me?" asked Harry.
Dumbledore surveyed him for a moment through his glasses.
"The odd thing, Harry," he said softly, "is that it may not have meant you at all. Sybill's prophecy could have applied to two wizard boys, both born at the end of July that year, both of whom had parents in the Order of the Phoenix, both sets of parents having narrowly escaped Voldemort three times. One, of course, was you. The other was Neville Longbottom."
"Then — it might not be me?" said Harry.
"I am afraid," said Dumbledore slowly, looking as though every word cost him a great effort, "that there is no doubt that it is you."
"But you said — Neville was born at the end of July, too — and his mum and dad —"
"You are forgetting the next part of the prophecy, the final identifying feature of the boy who could vanquish Voldemort . . . Voldemort himself would mark him as his equal. And so he did, Harry. He chose you, not Neville. He gave you the scar that has proved both blessing and curse."
"But he might have chosen wrong!" said Harry. "He might have marked the wrong person!"
"He chose the boy he thought most likely to be a danger to him," said Dumbledore. "And notice this, Harry: he chose, not the pure-blood (which, according to his creed, is the only kind of wizard worth being or knowing) but the half-blood, like himself. He saw himself in you before he had ever seen you, and in marking you with that scar, he did not kill you, as he intended, but gave you powers, and a future, which have fitted you to escape him not once, but multiple times so far — something that few other wizards have ever achieved."
"Why did he do it, then?" said Harry. "Why did he try and kill me as a baby? He should have waited to see whether Neville or I looked more dangerous when we were older and tried to kill whoever it was then — "
"That might, indeed, have been the more practical course," said Dumbledore, "except that Voldemort's information about the prophecy was incomplete. The Hog's Head inn, which Sybill chose for its cheapness, has long attracted, shall we say, a more interesting clientele than the Three Broomsticks. It is a place where it is never safe to assume you are not being overheard. Of course, I had not dreamed, when I set out to meet Sybill Trelawney, that I would hear anything worth overhearing. My — our — one stroke of good fortune was that the eavesdropper was detected only a short way into the prophecy and thrown from the building."
"So he only heard — ?"
"He heard only the beginning, the part foretelling the birth of a boy in July to parents who had thrice defied Voldemort. Consequently, he could not warn his master that to attack you would be to risk transferring power to you, and marking you as his equal. So Voldemort never knew that there might be danger in attacking you, that it might be wise to wait, to learn more. He did not know that you would have power the Dark Lord knows not — "
"But I don't!" said Harry, in a voice that was oddly calm. "I haven't any powers he hasn't got"
"There is a room in the Department of Mysteries," interrupted Dumbledore, "that is kept locked at all times. It contains a force that is at once more wonderful and more terrible than death, than human intelligence, than the forces of nature. It is also, perhaps, the most mysterious of the many subjects for study that reside there. It is the power held within that room that you possess in such quantities and which Voldemort has not at all. It was your heart. The love you held within it."
Harry closed his eyes. He asked, without caring much about the answer, "The end of the prophecy . . . it was something about . . . neither can live . . ."
"...while the other survives,"said Dumbledore.
"So," said Harry, "according to you, does that mean that . . . that one of us has got to kill the other one . . . in the end?"
"Yes," said Dumbledore.
For a long time, neither of them spoke, then Harry suddenly exploded.
Harry stared at Dumbledore in disbelief. "That's it?" he asked in tones of utter incredulity. "That's all you've got? The reason that Voldemort's been trying to kill me for all these years. A few lines of gibberish from a drunk fraud? Just the fact that she gave it during a bloody job interview -— That alone should have been a huge red flag for you."
"Harry, I assure you that the prophecy is a true prophecy. I scanned Professor Trelawney's mind right after she said it. She had absolutely no recollection of saying those words. That combined with the way she said it — It had all the hallmarks of a true prophecy. It would have been utterly impossible for anyone, let alone her, to fake it."
"Really?" asked Harry. "How much are you willing to bet on that? Because I'm willing to bet you any amount you care to wager that I can fake a prophecy just as well as that."
"My dear boy, I assure you that there is no way..."
"Oh stow it," snapped Harry as he whipped out his wand and hit Dumbledore with a charm.
A few minutes later, Dumbledore suddenly snapped to attention. He felt like he had just fallen asleep for a moment.
"What just happened?" he asked.
"Not much, just me proving a point. Now Professor, I'd appreciate it if you would kindly look at this device. It's called a camcorder, consider it the muggle version of a Pensieve, and if you would just look at the screen right there you might see something that would interest you."
Harry handed the camcorder to Dumbledore and pressed the play button. Dumbledore nearly dropped the tiny little device when it started playing. He was astonished to see himself on the tiny screen. It showed him sitting at the same table where he was currently still seated, speaking words which he had absolutely no recollection of saying. There he was saying something in exactly the same harsh tones that Trelawney's prophecy had been in.
"The Great Bumblebee shall discover"
"on the day that east meets west"
"and the sun cleaveth the moon"
"that he is not as smart as he thinks he is"
"How? How is this possible?" he sputtered.
"It's was ridiculously easy," said Harry. "All, I really needed was a compulsion charm to read out what I had written on this paper here, just a bit of rubbish that I wrote. Tack on a voice changing charm to give you that lovely harsh tone and top it off with a short term obliviate so that a Legilimens will see that you have no memory of saying it. Crudely done, but even with that, I think I've managed to recreate the effects of Trelawney's prophecy. Plus, you must know it's ridiculously easy to pre-cast a spell and add a trigger to it. All Trelawney had to do was get that cast on her anytime before her interview with you, set it to go off when she says a particular word and you know what she got?"
"What?" asked Dumbledore, despite himself.
"Employment! A wonderful sinecure. An instant job, probably for the rest of her life. One where she barely has to do any work. Just light the incense and scare a few teenagers with ridiculous prophecies of their death a few times a week. Rather brilliant of her, I must say."
"Harry, you're forgetting that part of the prophecy has already come true. You were clearly marked. The scar on your head was caused by Voldemort."
"Oh please. Don't tell me you've never heard about a self-fulfilling prophecy. Hell, take any murderous psychopath and tell him that there's only one person in the world that can defeat him and if he believes you, then sooner or later he's going to go and attack that person. At least one of them is guaranteed to die, the survivor is more than likely to have a few scars, and then you can happily claim that your prophecy was true. It's utter bullshit as far as I'm concerned," stated Harry.
"There was a time when I would have agreed with you Harry," said Dumbledore. "Unfortunately, over the years I have come to the inescapable conclusion that the prophecy holds true. Voldemort has never even come close to being defeated by anyone else. Only you have ever been able to defeat him."
Harry was about to interrupt when Dumbledore held up his hand. "Hear me out, please," he asked. "I'm not just talking about the night he killed your parents. Don't forget that you also managed to thwart his plans of stealing the Philosopher's stone. You were the one who defeated his shade and killed the basilisk that was terrorising Hogwarts. You were the one, Harry, that managed to escape him after he kidnapped you during the Triwizard Tournament. There you were, injured, bleeding, not an ally in sight. What did you do? Not only did you manage to duel him to a standstill, you also managed to escape. And if that wasn't enough you managed to retrieve poor Cedric's body as well. No other wizard in the world, not even me, can claim to have done as much against Voldemort as you. You are the one Harry. You are the only one who can defeat Lord Voldemort."
Harry just stared at Dumbledore for a long moment and then he did something that surprised Dumbledore. It was the very last thing that Dumbledore expected him to do.
Harry Potter began to laugh.
~oo00oo~
A/N: This chapter contained edited excerpts from JKR's Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix.
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