The next morning, Harry awoke to see Dumbledore standing over him.

"There's something that you need to know about. You have the right to know why you are involved in this. The reason is because of your mother."

"My mother?"

"Lilly Potter. Or should I say Lilly RIDDLE Potter."

Harry was stunned. "What?"

"Yes, Harry. Your mother was Voldemort's cousin. To be exact, her father, your grandfather, was brothers with Voldemort's father. They were all Muggles, or, at least, that's what they thought. It did seem strange that two Muggle children were related but magical, but they grew used to the idea and eventually it was forgotten."

"Your grandfather, Gary was a twin. His brother, Saly, and he got along wonderfully. I see them sometimes in the Weasley twins-the same type of mischievousness. Lilly talked about them all the time, her father and her favorite uncle. She loved them a great deal. Gary married your Grandmother Floriane, and Saly married your great-aunt Harriet, who was a witch. It was a double-wedding, and soon afterwards, both had children-Petunia and Lilly, and Harriet and Saly had Harold and Tom. For the first ten years of their lives, the four of them were inseparable, until at the same time, Tom and Lilly were accepted to Hogwarts."

"Petunia and Harold were incredibly jealous. They knew that it all had something to do with Aunt Harriet and some special powers that she seemed to have to get herself out of a fix. Harriet hadn't talked much about it, but they all knew that there was something different about her and her strange friends."

"Tom and Lilly were nearly best friends until they started at Hogwarts, when the problems began. Lilly was Sorted into Gryffindor, and Tom into Slytherin. Lilly immediately began to become friends with James Potter, which infuriated Tom to no end. Their friendship and the competition between the two houses strained Tom and Lilly's friendship until they hardly associated themselves with each other."

"Suddenly, in their third year, Tom's mother Harriet fell ill and died, and there was a falling out between Gary and Saly. Gary and Floriane, who had always been proud of Lilly and Tom, tried to comfort Saly, but he renounced all ties to wizards or witches and nearly forbade Tom from magic. It was almost the same situation that you have with your aunt and uncle. Tom and Saly disappeared from Petunia, Gary, and Floriane's life, and grew further and further apart from Lilly except at Hogwarts-where they had become nearly enemies from their competition. Both were exceptional students."

"Lilly and James Potter, who was from a strong wizarding family, fell in love and married after leaving Hogwarts. At this time, Saly never saw Gary's family. Petunia had grown resentful because not only was she not accepted to Hogwarts, but she lost Tom and Harold because Saly refused to deal with magic after his wife died. Gary and Floriane remained loyal until their death just a few years before you were born."

"Lilly and James had kept in touch with Tom after school, although very distantly. Their friends were different, but they were on good terms. Suddenly, Lilly received an owl from Tom and immediately left James to go visit."

"What happened next is hard for me to tell you, Harry. I don't like to talk about it, and I daresay it will disturb you, but the truth is that Lilly became one of the original Death Eaters. She didn't do so willingly; she just came to help Tom in his upset state, and in her support of her cousin, didn't realize the change that was overcoming him. When he changed his name to Lord Voldemort, it was too late. She was already caught too deeply in Tom Riddle's trap."

"Your father kept on sending owls, but she kept on sending excuses, saying that her cousin was sick and then that he needed her help. It wasn't until she told him that she was pregnant that he searched high and low for her, trying to get her home to take care of herself."

"It was too late. She had pledged allegiance to her cousin and was bound to stay. One night, she witnessed one of the most horrible experiences of her life. She saw Voldemort murder his father, or her uncle, in cold blood. It shocked her, and she ran. Without telling James what happened, she came back home, renounced her old ways, and continued living wit h James, and eventually taking care of you. She loved you so much, Harry. But Voldemort's power was rising and our world was in shambles. He tried to forget about Lilly, to forget about her deserting him, but he could not, and blamed James. So, one night, almost two years after Lilly escaped, he came to your house to take revenge."

Harry was in tears. His mother, a Death Eater? Voldemort, his uncle? It was almost too much. But Dumbledore continued.

"There is something that I didn't tell you, Harry. Hundreds of years ago, there was one of the founders of Hogwarts-Salazar Slytherin. Until this point, you have thought that your mother was a Muggle. In fact, she may as well have been. What you don't know, and what Voldemort still doesn't know is that they weren't. Saly and Gary were not pure muggles. They were, in fact, direct descendants of Salazar Slytherin. One of his descendents married a Muggle and decided to live a normal Muggle life, and, eventually, all trace of magic was forgotten. Not gone, just forgotten. In that way, you are, in fact, a direct descendant of Slytherin and a blood relative of Voldemort."

"However, there is something else. I haven't spoken much of James, except to say that he came from a great wizarding family. To tell the truth, he is a direct descendant of Goderic Gryffindor. This, as you can probably tell, makes you both a descendant of Slytherin and Gryffindor. You have in you the power of goodness and the power of destruction."

"This is why you are involved, Harry. This is why no matter what happens, you are the one who must face Voldemort. You must face this part of yourself."