Chapter Seventy-Four: The Other Prophecy

Everything was chaos in the wake of Pettigrew's escape, both within, and without, the castle. Percy was so distraught and distracted by the news that he begged to have his N.E.W.T.s postponed for a second time. He seemed to be convinced that Pettigrew would come after him, particularly, and Harry had to wonder just what Percy had said in his testimony. He'd never been closer to feeling pity for what was usually the bossiest and most arrogant of the Weasleys.

Fred, George, and Ginny were nothing diminished, but they did seem to feel that Ron was in a certain amount of danger, which was utterly ridiculous. Neville was almost in hysterics at the realisation that the man who had only been arrested because Crookshanks had stolen the passwords Neville had written down (so that was how Sirius had gotten in) was now at liberty to take his revenge. Sirius and Professor Lupin spent a great deal of time in conference with Headmaster Dumbledore.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione couldn't catch a break. This, so soon after successfully rescuing Buckbeak, and the knowledge that Pettigrew's escape anticipated Riddle's return….

Harry continued his research into treating Sirius Black's trauma, but he thought he'd just about exhausted Hogwarts's knowledge, which was hardly extensive. For the most part, the information he was there for was in the Restricted Section, and it was all fragmentary references to reactions and attempted rescues from long-forbidden curses. He was only able to research these at all because Professor Lupin had written him a note, before he'd stopped being a member of Hogwarts's staff. Harry had sorted through these volumes, first.

For the most part, he sensed that he'd probably be creating his own cure, from scratch. It would take years, so he'd better start now. Even the pure energy of the other kind of magic would do little to cut down on the time that this would take. It was all a careful admixture process anyway, requiring a multi-faceted approach. If only there were someone with whom he could confer…. It was true that Mother was some help with his efforts, but it was also true that once a month was far from sufficient for planning. Still, with the threat of dementors gone, she'd resumed his lessons in healing, which was nothing if not directly relevant to his situation.

Ron had clearly managed to pass his final exams, with help from Hermione, but Harry thought he should have gotten a free pass—or at the very least an extension. Then again, cumulative exams were designed to show that students had been studying and practising what they'd learnt over the course of the semester. Harry hoped that Hermione hadn't forced him to review for Hagrid's class, which, with Hagrid moping about Buckbeak's impending execution, had been less than inspired.

Recent events had shoved Professor Dumbledore's promise to the side of Harry's mind. He was too busy with everything else, including the planning he'd picked back up on what might possibly be done to stop Thanos. The knowledge of a threat returning from beyond the grave had reminded him of the notes he still had in his trunk, which required some editing, but were still valid. For the most part.

Between his research, planning, hanging out with Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Ron, and Hermione, Harry was quite busy, anyway—and it was almost time to go back to the Dursleys (a truly appalling thought). The last thing he was expecting, although he should have been, was to be called to Dumbledore's office for a chat.

Well, no, not for a chat. He knocked, was bidden enter, and opened the door to see Dumbledore, pensieve out, sitting behind his desk, looking haggard and worn. The Ministry had kept calling him out to London to try to mop up some of the mess that had resulted from Pettigrew's escape. Fudge was not quite so confident and arrogant now, talking about more dementors being sent to Hogwarts the following year.

This time, Dumbledore put his foot down, and dementors were banned from the grounds. He was taking advantage of Fudge's current standing in public opinion, his more deferential air, the respect that the Wizarding World had in Dumbledore. Harry could respect that. Dumbledore was perhaps not showing the wear as much as most people his age would have under such pressure. Harry could respect that, as well.

"I was told that you wished to speak to me, sir," Harry prompted, as he entered. He paused, to turn to Fawkes. "Hello, Guy. Good to see that burning days aren't too common for you, eh?"

Fawkes gave a sleepy trill, and didn't lift his head out from under his wing. Harry supposed he understood the sentiment. He glanced at the Sorting Hat, again fighting the impulse to have a nice long chat with it. Although….

"Ah, yes," said Dumbledore. "Please sit. Lemon drop?"

There may have been a slight, absent smile on his face as he, with a murmured thanks, took one of the candies, and unwrapped it. So much changed since he had come for the first time! He waited. Dumbledore took a candy, himself, and then steepled his fingers, eyes narrowing.

"What I have to tell you is not easy for me to say," Dumbledore said, voice grave. A glance at his expression showed a troubled frown, and eyes devoid of any twinkle. "I wished to protect you from this knowledge for as long as possible," he admitted, and Harry tensed, fists clenching. Great. Just what he needed. More secrets. At least he'd been aware that this one existed; he still remembered asking Dumbledore about the reasons for Voldemort going after his family, his first year. He'd just forgotten that that was the particular secret Dumbledore had promised, at the end of last year, to share with him. Well, at least Dumbledore was coming clean without it being forced from him.

"'Knowledge is power'," Harry said. "If you share this knowledge with me, I will be better equipped to face what lies ahead."

Dumbledore cast a shrewd glance aside in his direction. "You are full of wisdom for one so young. Yes, you're right…this knowledge might empower you…but it carries a burden with it. I wanted to keep that burden from your shoulders for as long as possible.

"But I have heard that you are studying, teaching yourself occlumency. A useful skill to have, and it will help you to keep the knowledge I am about to impart from untrustworthy ears. And I must ask you not to share what I am about to tell you with anyone. I will inform your godfather, myself. Voldemort is a master legilimens, and this knowledge he would dearly like to have, for it concerns the nature of his defeat. Now that you know occlumency, you stand a chance of keeping the knowledge from him.

"More than that, when you first arrived here at Hogwarts, three years ago, you seemed so small, so fragile, that I could not bear the thought of laying such a burden on your shoulders. But, at the end of the year, I found that I had misjudged you, underestimated you. You had faced off against Voldemort, and lived. Clearly, you were stronger than you originally had seemed, both of mind, and of body. And then you asked me the question that I knew you someday must: Why had Voldemort attempted to kill you when you were a baby? Such a shrewd question for a child to ask, but it was so early, too early. You were still so young…I wanted to protect you for a bit longer.

"Perhaps you see where this is going. I made the mistake that many old men make—underestimating the young,—and the one which Voldemort particularly despises: I cared about you. I valued your happiness over the cause I sought to protect. I tried to protect you even from threats I knew you would someday have to face. What did I care if the rest of the world burnt, if you were safe and happy? …Such a foolish thought. I should have known better, that first year, after you saved the Philosopher's Stone from Quirrell. I should have told you, then. It took your reaction to Lockhart and the basilisk to see how hollow my attempts to protect you were. But for the sake of my conscience, I still waited for another year. I told myself that I could talk myself into the righteousness of this conversation, in only a year. But I hoped that you would forget to remind me. Selfish of me, not even to consider that you should be the one to choose. Foolish not to think that you knew your own limits better than I."

Harry had no idea what to say. It did sound rather as if Dumbledore were still dithering. He might have to say something, to bring the conversation on track.

"And then, you told me of the second of Professor Trelawney's predictions…I knew as soon as I heard the words that I could delay no longer. I had seen for myself your ability to rise to the occasion. What is love without trust? If I cared about you as much as I thought I did, then I would have to trust you with this knowledge, burden though it was. And that brings me to my point. For Professor Trelawney gave but one other prophecy than the one you witnessed in the Divination classroom. Ah, yes, and I should return that memory to you."

He held out a vial of what seemed to be silver glitter. "Poke your wand through the open bottle, until it touches the thought stored within. Then draw the thought back into your temple."

Harry opened the vial, and did as he was told, carefully extracting the thought, and placing it back into his own mind. Such a strange idea, that he could have given up a memory, only to recover it at a later date. Wizarding society was weird.

"Don't worry. The Department of Mysteries now has this prophecy on file. Only those about whom a prophecy is given can touch them, and only the actual prophecy is stored. It is labeled using a complicated system of initialing. I believe the label for that memory is… 'S. P. T. to H. J. P. concerning H. P. and L. V. II'—plenty abbreviated, and the Roman Numerals threw a few people off."

"Why is there that number II?" asked Harry. "Does that mean that it's the second prophecy concerning Voldemort and me? But it wasn't even really about Voldemort…."

Dumbledore sighed, and folded his arms loosely on his desk. He looked haggard and worn. "Indeed, it is considered to be the second prophecy your Professor Trelawney made concerning you and Lord Voldemort. They put it with the older prophecy because they are both prophecies in the greater scope of the blood wars waged by Voldemort. Peter Pettigrew is not an important enough figure, when the prophecy also mentions Voldemort."

Ah, yes. Well, that made sense, Harry supposed. And why did he think he knew whither this was headed?

"And the first prophecy?" he asked, gaze downcast.

Dumbledore sighed, yet again. "It was almost fifteen years ago that I heard that first prophecy—the only other prophecy Professor Trelawney has made, to my knowledge. I was considering cutting the course of Divination from the curriculum entirely, but Professor Trelawney had submitted her application, and her credentials were quite high—a descendant of a quite famous seer, named Cassandra (no, not that Cassandra), and I decided to give her a chance. I was less than impressed at our first meeting. I thought to myself 'Divination, then, is a waste of our resources, after all'. I turned to leave."

Harry tensed, anticipating what would come next. Dumbledore did not seem to notice, lost in his memories of that night. There was some part of his mind that told him that he should find a way to thank Trelawney—but for her sudden, and doubtless alarming, performance, the course of Divination would not exist at all, and that would have been quite the barrier to Harry's attempts to research the subject. If nothing else, that it was taught at Hogwarts ensured that Flourish and Blotts had textbooks and other reference materials on the subject. It kept the practice alive. But for the most part, his attention was directed to Dumbledore's story. The old man would get to his point…eventually. The background information was probably also quite important.

"I had reserved a room at the Hog's Head, a tavern in Hogsmeade owned by my estranged brother, Aberforth—I don't think I've mentioned him to you before. Hmm." There it was again: life laughing at him. Well, let this be a cautionary tale for him then. Dumbledore's deliberate levity suggested that he was not so indifferent to his estrangement as he wanted Harry to believe.

"The problem with the Hog's Head, as perhaps you are aware, is that it receives all manner of customers. On that night, unfortunately, the prophecy given by Professor Trelawney was overheard—at least in part. To protect her, and as a reminder that I, too, have my biases, and lessons left unlearnt, I offered her the position at Hogwarts for which she sought.

"Personal experience should tell you some of the shock I felt when her voice changed, and she stood there, so still…she seemed almost otherworldly. There was a definite difference to her presence. I knew what I was witnessing, as you did, and knew that I must pay attention. Perhaps that is why I did not notice the spy in time to prevent him from hearing as much as he did of the prophecy. That is my fault. He brought his knowledge of the incomplete prophecy to Voldemort, and because of that prophecy, Voldemort tried to kill you when you were a baby. To him, your parents were collateral damage—you were his true target. All because of that prophecy. I suspect, when he returns to full power, he will attempt to hear the full prophecy for himself—and as it is about him, he is one of only two people who could touch that prophecy without suffering grievous mental injury. You are the other, naturally."

Harry was running out of patience. He could see what Dumbledore was setting up, how important it was to set the stage, but curiosity was eating him up. Just what was this crucial prophecy? He realised that he'd crossed his arms at some point, which probably made him look a petulant two-year-old—or like Dudley (not that there was much difference). He made a concerted effort to relax.

"Then, this prophecy is the reason for everything that came after," he said. "Its mere existence a burden, but perhaps even more of a burden, the knowledge of the future it contains. And it has yet to be fulfilled."

Dumbledore looked incredibly grave, again. "Part of it has been fulfilled. Listen to it, and see what you make of it."

He prodded the silver liquid in the pensieve, which Harry had quite forgotten about, and a misty figure rose up, wrapt in her gauzy shawls and too-big spectacles, covered in bangles. She looked much the same, if slightly younger, than the professor who loved to predict his death. She spoke:

"The one with the power to defeat the Dark Lord approaches…. Born to those who have thrice defied him; born as the seventh month dies…. And the Dark Lord shall mark him as an equal, but he shall have power the Dark Lord knows not…. And either must die at the hands of the other, for neither can live, while the other survives…. The one with the power to defeat the Dark Lord shall be born as the seventh month dies…."

Harry was quite glad that the Hogwarts uniform covered his arms, hiding the goosebumps spreading up and down his arms at her pronouncements.

And it struck him, then, as unlikely that he'd chosen Divination as one of his two elective classes, and it turned out that he would not only witness a prophecy being uttered, but also, unwitting, be the subject of one. Mostly, however, he drank in the words of the prophecy, trying to set aside all the experiential excess that came of witnessing it secondhand. How many prophecies did the average prophet give in his lifetime, anyway? How many others might be? Did they, too, concern him? He understood Dumbledore's impulse to keep Trelawney close, that had paid off in the end.

He frowned, puzzling over the words of the prophecy. "Well," he began, "the prophecy refers to a child born at the end of the seventh month—that is to say, July. Thanks to English's grammatical structure, it doesn't tell if that child is a boy or a girl…but I suppose you have cause to believe that it refers to me."

Dumbledore's eyebrows rose, as if perhaps he hadn't taken grammar into account. But Harry was not an expert on prophecy, any more than Dumbledore was. They were both using a system of assumptions, their own different backgrounds, to assist them in interpreting. And, given his proclaimed derision for divination, he doubted that Dumbledore had taken the class, if indeed it had even been on offer a century ago, or whenever Dumbledore had been in school. Harry's limited experience in the subject did not give him an edge, so much as entangle him with minutiae.

"Perhaps it's that first part: 'born to those who have thrice defied him'. I would suppose, from my own experience, that not many survived to defy him thrice."

"And yet there were another set of parents, expecting a son at the end of July. I am speaking, of course, of Neville Longbottom, and of his parents, Frank and Alice Longbottom."

Harry blinked. Well, that was unexpected. Another candidate? Neville as the Boy-Who-Lived? What would have happened, then? Would he and his Mother have lived out their lives, never remembering the past—Lily Evans hadn't remembered until after she'd died, which meant that he would probably have been the same. Thor would have kept his secret—would Harry have ever learnt the truth? And did that—the fact that he remembered—mean that he'd in truth died, that Hallowe'en night? Didn't it have to?

He deliberately wrenched himself away from those thoughts, resolving to think on it more later, knowing full well that he'd go out of his way to avoid just that.

"Neville?" he asked. "He never speaks of his parents…I didn't even know that he was born at the end of July…."

Suddenly, he was stricken by the irrational thought that his roommates were all keeping big secrets from him. Had he given Neville so little notice that he didn't even know his birthday?

…Then again, when was Ron's? Sometime in March?

"Looking at Neville's burdens as they are, I think perhaps I'm better suited to being the Boy-Who-Lived. That grandmother of his…always pushing him so hard, but not giving him the means to fulfil her wishes. Did you know that he doesn't even use his own wand?"

He took the effort to return to the prophecy at hand. He'd given Dumbledore plenty of room in which to supply information, if he'd wanted to, concerning Neville's situation. Harry would have to seek out answers from Neville, himself. Which was probably best, anyway.

"…'The Dark Lord will mark him as his equal'—that would seem to suggest that Riddle thinks that I'm…well, like him, as he pointed out at the end of last year. Unless…." He lifted up his bangs, revealing the lightning-bolt scar. A mark. Shaped like a bolt of lightning, but that was a train of thought for pursuit another time (Ron's protection, from afar? A coincidence? Thor, the Protector of Man? Ron had, most likely quite deliberately, never spoken of it).

"Yes. Voldemort considers you a true threat, perhaps his equivalent amongst the light wizards, with your similar pasts and experiences. Accidentally, I increased your similarities. I understand that neither of you had the happiest childhoods."

That explained Riddle's reluctance towards returning to the orphanage.

"Then, he already has marked me as his equal—that is what you meant by part of the prophecy being fulfilled already. But the last line: Either must die at the hands of the other, for neither can live while the other survives….'. Hmm. I suppose that means that I'm now the only one who can defeat him…and it seems every near-death experience I've ever had has centred on him. I'm not too reassured by the hint towards certain immortality in that line. Does that mean that I can't die, except by his hand? And that he can't die, for some reason, except by mine? And that about… neither can live while the other survives'."

It was all quite distressing, and he was unable to stop himself from dragging gods into the mix. Did wizards have a means to make themselves immortal? But there was the Philosopher's Stone. If there were one way, there might well be another.

Why would he be the only one who could kill Riddle, anyway?

Dumbledore sighed, and looked his gravest. He seemed to have decided to take pity on Harry, helping his thoughts along. "Perhaps you have forgotten, last year, that we were discussing you and Lord Voldemort, and I told you that I believed that he had put a bit of himself in you, the night he gave you that scar."

It connected. The scar, the one that marked him as the Dark Lord's equal, the taint of the Dark Lord's soul, anchored to Harry by a rotten-looking, blackened plant in the forest outside of his mother's garden. He didn't know the relevance, but it was this fragment that marked him as different from everyone else…the reason that they were trapped in a nasty ouroboros—the symbol of infinity.

Right. Life was still laughing at him. Got it. Somehow, having a piece of Voldemort's soul in his head was enough to bind them in an endless circle. Unless one succeeded in killing the other. And Riddle couldn't have known about it, or he wouldn't have kept trying to kill Harry.

He reached up to touch the scar on his forehead. Not a sign of protection, then, but a curse—as he had been told. A curse that prevented Riddle from dying, but Harry doubted that he had that luxury. But perhaps, just perhaps, he was wrong. Perhaps that fragment of soul had kept him from dying, that Hallowe'en night—or had dragged his soul back from death. Maybe it wasn't Fawkes who had resurrected him last year. Sure, he'd died at least twice, but neither time had taken, for long.

What did he do with this information?

"In some sources, you will see that the Wizarding World has elected to call you 'the Chosen One', despite knowing nothing of this prophecy. They believe that you are the only one who can save them, and that in turn feeds the prophecy. It is the nature of hero worship, I'm afraid."

Hero worship. Ah, great. And speaking of….

"Just so you know, I'm going to tell Ron and Hermione all of this," he said. He hated when people kept big secrets about him from him, and these two were trustworthy, if anyone was. "Not necessarily immediately, mind you, but before the war begins again. I think they deserve to know, after all that we've been through. And, if you hadn't already said you'd tell him, I would have included Sirius."

Dumbledore was at his most inscrutable. His face appeared quite passive and blank, without his usual twinkle. "I prefer to involve as few underage wizards as I can in this war," he said at last, with a heavy sigh. "However, there is no denying that your friends have already been drawn into the thick of it. I will inform Sirius Black, as I have already said. As long as you ensure their silence, you may tell whomever you feel necessary. I trust your judgement, Harry."

He considered saying that no one in their right mind trusted him on anything. But he kept silent, still turning over the prophecy, and how neatly he'd avoided talking about "the power he knows not". He didn't want to think what that might mean.