Author note: There are many excellent 'Harry goes back in time to try again' stories, and so many of them are fantastic. Well, Harry isn't the only powerful wizard with that option…and I don't think this has been done.

Chapter 35 – One More Dance

Albus Dumbledore stood in the formal parlor of number 4, Privet Drive, glaring at the three Dursleys petrified on sofa. Petrified, except for the fear and loathing radiating from their eyes. The headmaster of Hogwarts was stiff as a board, glowing an aura of angry gold so powerful even the muggles could see it. He wanted to kill them after looking through their memories. Then he wanted to end his own pathetic, worthless life.

Mrs. Figg had told him for years. Harry had hinted at it. Minerva made her opinion clearly heard. The Weasley family went on and on about it. But still, the great Albus Dumbledore knew better. He always had the answers – wasn't he the strongest, wisest and oldest of the wizards of the light? Well, he hadn't known this time.

With a primal snarl he snapped at the terrified trio, "be thankful I don't kill you for what you did to that poor boy – your own flesh and blood! I should never have trusted you. I should have watched you, instead of that foolish vow to give you privacy." The wizard paused a moment to catch his breath and rein in his temper just enough to keep from going down the long, dark one-way path to evil. "As it is, you have doomed us all. When Voldemort rescued Harry from your cruelty, he found the support and guidance you never gave him. The two of them will now destroy not only my world, but yours. And I'm sure you are on the top of his list."

Dumbledore was grateful to see the fear deepen in their unmoving eyes. Fear and understanding. He spat furiously, "you had better move, and quickly. You might have minutes before he arrives. I don't know, and I don't care. You are on your own, like you deserve." With a flick of his wand he released the Dursleys from the spell that held them in place, then apparated away, silent as a ghost.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Great heaving sobs shook his body as he collapsed in his favorite chair and laid his head in his hands on his heavy desk. He had blamed the Dursleys to their faces for Harry Potter turning dark, but he knew who was really to blame. It was him. Nobody else but himself. Fawkes flapped a couple of wing beats and landed gently on his heaving back, trilling gently.

"Thank you, old friend," Dumbledore whispered, "but even your music can not heal this wound. I did it to him, just like I did it to Tom. Why can't I ever take advice from others? What made me so convinced everything would work out on its own?" The tears started in fresh again, as his phoenix companion looked around the room helplessly.

Inspiration hit his familiar, and the creature flashed away in colorful flames, returning in a moment with one shocked and sputtering Minerva McGonnagal. She stood from where she had landed clumsily on the ground, getting ready to launch into a spirited verbal attack on the bird, but stopped in a moment, seeing the wreck of a man weeping piteously on his desk. "Albus?" she asked softly, in disbelief. In all her years around the man she had witnessed many occasions when a theatrical tear would escape from the man's eye, but this? This was a man who was broken.

He looked up in embarrassment and tried to still his crying, slamming occlumency shields into place to keep his grief to himself. But it was no use – the guilt was too strong, the remorse too powerful. His sorrow, for once in his life, was too sincere.

The professor gaped for a moment, shook to the core, but made her way around the desk and placed a tentative hand on his back. "Albus? What is the matter? I have never seen you like this!"

Swiveling in his chair, he wrapped his arms unashamedly around her slender waste wetting her robes with his tears. Hiccupping like a child he slowly stilled his crying and called her name, like the lifeline it was. He had to tell her – she would hear soon enough, and despise him. Almost as much as he despised himself.

"Harry turned to Voldemort," he spoke so quietly she had to strain to understand. "I did it to him. I just returned from the Dursleys. You were right, Minerva. I read all their thoughts – the things they have done to him all these years would melt the heart of a basilisk. They beat him, hated him, never hugged him or said nice things. He never had clothes or toys of his own, never had friends. They barely fed him enough to stay alive. They tried to kill him many, many times – only his magic kept him alive. And I refused to listen. I, the 'great' leader of the light, have doomed us all."

She trembled as he spoke. Quietly she took his withered hands and guided him to the sofa in the office, sat down by his side and held him as she would a child. She started to speak several times, but each time stilled her tongue, knowing the words would not help anyone at this moment. Dear Lily's son, the apple of James' eye, gone dark. She should have seen it coming – ever since Harry's fifth year the teen had grown more morose, volatile, and uncontrollable. Teachers and students were encouraged to 'give him space to grieve', but nobody was allowed to help. It seemed to her it was just as much her fault as any.

"How can you comfort me, knowing what I did!" he finally asked, sitting up and wearily leaning his elbows on his frail knees, rubbing his forehead. "Do you not understand? We know the levels of Harry's raw power – and he hasn't even reached his majority! He showed me the markings of the first ritual of immortality before he apparated away. He used Hagrid as his sacrifice! There is no turning back – I know that now."

A lone tear crept down the woman's cheek. "Albus, we are all to blame. I knew what the Dursleys were like, yet I never checked up on them in all those years. I saw his clothing, how thin and starved he was at the start of each school year. It's my fault just as much as yours."

He shook his head sorrowfully. "Thank you, Minerva, but I had forbidden you or anyone else to 'interfere'. And as old as I am, I know how to make people do my wishes. It rests on me and me alone."

"Albus Dumbledore!" the animagus snapped, shaking a finger in his face. "That is enough of that! Perhaps you did tell us what you wished us to do, but we are still beings of free will. We could have chosen to disobey, but decided not to! And you did not make the Dursleys mistreat him! Didn't you give them an unbreakable vow to leave them alone until he started Hogwarts?"

"Y-y-y-yes," the man quavered like a child. "But when he showed up, looking so lost, clueless, and starved – why didn't I do something?"

"Because you always choose to believe the best in people," the professor snapped back. She paused a moment to call an elf for tea and some of the headmaster's favorite lemon tarts, before continuing in her no-nonsense tone of voice. "I, by the way, agree. Once a wizard had chosen to do that ritual, he's gone. Now we have two very powerful and twisted wizards to take down. Where do we start?"

"I destroyed his childhood, his youth, every chance at happiness. I treated him like some weapon or trophy, never a child with needs. Now I must take his life as well?" He looked at her in desperation. "I don't know if I can do that, Minerva" he whispered frailly. "I would do anything, give anything to repair this. But kill him too?"

"Ahem," a sneering voice called from one of the portraits. Minerva glared at Phineas Nigellus and shook her head in a 'not now' gesture. The former headmaster ignored her and mockingly called to Dumbledore. "Anything, Albus? Just how far is anything? I might have a solution – a desperate one, but a solution none the less."

Albus scrutinized the painting. Phineas was one of the most despised headmasters in Hogwart's history. Whispered to be a wizard of the darkest sort, Dumbledore knew he had a barbed tongue that gained him a nasty reputation, and was extremely strict with the children under his charge. But he wasn't an evil man like most people thought. "What do you mean? I would do anything to right all the wrongs I did to Harry. And why would you go against a Black? After all, Sirius did make him the head of your house…"

The former Lord of the House of Black shrugged. He casually reached down into drawer in a cupboard in his portrait, removed a glittering object and tossed it casually at the broken wizard and startled witch. It flew out of the painting and landed in Albus' lap. "I've been saving it for a special occasion. I just returned from watching young Mr. Potter at Grimmauld Place from my hidden portrait. You are correct – he is volatile, powerful, and bitter beyond all repairs. He is, I'm afraid, quite beyond redemption. That device in your lap is the only solution I know of. As to why – I am helping the current Lord of the House of Black, though he might not agree at the moment."

Dumbledore picked up the small gold and glass creation from its landing place. He held it gently so the witch could see it too. "A time turner?" she shook her head sadly. "What will a few hours buy us, Phineas?"

But the mugwhump was less fatalistic, and hope bloomed in his eyes. "But this goes back more than a few hours, if I am I correct, Mr. Nigellus?"

The painting's smirk grew wider. "Indeed. It will work once, and once only, and send you back 15 years, to be precise. Mr. Potter will be 4 years old. Still with those damnable muggles, but not so damaged as of yet." He gave a smug nod, and returned to his formal pose, bored with the conversation.

The wizard smiled a huge, sincere smile of hope. But Minerva was not so convinced. "Oh no you don't, Albus Dumbledore! How can you trust this man? It could be a trap – a trap sent by Harry himself! He just said he came from Grimmauld Place! Don't you dare just jump blindly into this!"

Humming contently to himself, Albus ignored his friend as he gently placed the long golden chain around his neck. "One turn then, Phineas?" he asked the portrait politely. The painting nodded his head and remained silent.

Glaring with impotent fury, Minerva grabbed the chain with one hand and looped it over her neck too, holding Dumbledore closely with her other. "Well if you are going to do something this reckless and foolish than I will join you! You will need a woman to keep you grounded and your brain on the earth!!!"

Albus gave her a beatific smile and planted a chaste kiss on her forehead, which was red with anger. "Are you sure, dear? This is a one-way trip, and you are correct, as always. It could end badly."

"Headmaster – it's better than doing nothing!" she snarled. "And you need me. You always have, but were too stubborn to realize it!"

Fawkes too flew across the room, landed on Dumbledore's shoulder and placed the chain around his own neck with his sharp beak. He knew you can't trust wizards to keep themselves out of trouble.

"Yes, dear," he solemnly agreed, with no trace of teasing. "I do need you to keep me from making mistakes." Planting a gentle kiss on the surprised witch's lips, and with a flip of the tiny hourglass, they were gone.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

Author Note: I'm attempting here to write a good Dumbledore. I hate the character, so this is a real stretch for me…