The Traverses were hosting dinner with the Shafiqs, among others, and Alduin was waiting for Abdullah to arrive quite impatiently. Unfortunately, Mrs. Longbottom came first and took most of his energy to contain until the Ollivanders arrived and the lady of that house took on her usual selfless task of entertaining the Longbottom matriarch. By that time, however, there were far too many guests for Alduin to be able to speak with Abdullah with any degree of privacy when he came shortly after, and so he resigned himself to polite welcomes and small talk.

Unwilling to wait until tomorrow, though, Alduin held his friend back over their dealcoholised port, letting the other men go join the ladies before he asked: „How much do you trust Philip Slughorn?"

Abdullah seemed surprised by the question. „I'd say pretty completely...I mean, he's probably my closest friend after you and Ginevra, and perhaps Mercurius...when you were in hospital, he..." Abdullah trailed off awkwardly, took a gulp of the port and asked: "Anyway, why?"

Alduin knew what it was that Abdullah wasn't saying: when he was in the coma, Philip was the closest thing Abdullah had had to a best friend. He chose not to comment on that. "I need his help," he said simply, quietly. "We need his help, really, with this stupid Horcrux business. He's close to his great-uncle, right?"

"Very close, yes."

Alduin gave one sharp nod. "Good. Horace Slughorn has a memory we need, a memory of Riddle's school years, and we need to get it. Dumbledore tried asking for it, and all he got was a farce that's been tampered with. We need the real deal."

"Hmm," Abdullah considered this, swirling the port in his glass. "How much can I tell Philip?"

Alduin had considered this at length. He was unwilling to part with any information, and yet...Philip was Abdullah's friend. That should be enough. He would have wanted Abdullah to trust Nathan on his word, would he not? He certainly would not let something as petty and childish as jealousy get in the way. "Well," he said, "he needs to know what to ask for, doesn't he? So you can tell him about Horcruxes, just keep the part with Harry quiet. But tell him it's the number we're after."

"The number?"

"Right, sorry, I'm not explaining it properly. It's probably the disgusting port."

Abdullah gave him a look, but Alduin just rolled his eyes. "I'm not going to become an enthusiastic abstinent, as I've told you many times, so stop trying. Your de-alcoholised drinks are disgusting. I agree with you that I need to stick to them for now, but it doesn't make me like them any better. Anyway, the memory is of Riddle asking Horace Slughorn about the horcruxes. We have some hope he might have mentioned the question of how many would, arithmetically speaking, be ideal. Philip knows best what method will work to convince old Sluggy, but I'm entirely willing to owe him a favour for this."

"You shouldn't have to," Abdullah muttered. "You're basically trying to save the world, for Merlin's sake."

"I shouldn't have to," Alduin agreed. "But I still might. Whatever works...and isn't entirely unethical."

Abdullah curtly nodded and they both rose and went to the drawing room, not wanting to have anyone wonder what was their talk about.

Mrs. Longbottom descended on Alduin then, and he was half afraid she was going to berate his for his unsociability in spending two minutes by talking to his friend. There was something else on her mind, though.

"I've just heard," she said, "that, apparently under your ward's influence, Neville started a Herbology club! I must say, I expected Harry Potter, of all people, would lead him in a different direction!"

Over her shoulder, Mercurius gave him an apologetic shrug. Alduin didn't blame him. Who could have known the esteemed Augusta would take issue with that, too? He swallowed a comment about how they were all out of Dark Lords to destroy for now, and instead said: "It's Neville's hobby. Ron Weasley has chess, so I think it's appropriate your grandson has something of his own, too. Don't you?"

Mrs. Longbottom sniffed. "As if I want Neville to turn out like the Weasley boy! What does your ward do in his free time, eh? Plays Quidditch, I know! That's proper amusement for a young boy. Gets him out of the castle, trains his strength..."

Alduin swallowed another comment, this time not pointing out that Herbology took Neville out of the caste as well. "I was under the impression that you didn't exactly encourage your grandson to fly when he was still at home?" He said instead.

"Because he's so clumsy it'd be a hazard to him and everyone around!" She replied.

Some people, Alduin concluded, just did not know what they wanted.

-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-

"I should go visit Hagrid again," Harry muttered one day in late February, casting a grim look to the not precisely encouraging weather outside.

"You don't sound very thrilled," Neville observed shrewdly.

Harry sighed. "I just feel like I'm neglecting him, but...the weather is ghastly, and there are enough people I want to talk to actually inside the castle. And I'm neglecting them, too! I don't even remember the last time I spoke to Kiara properly, and she's in the same House… But I just feel I owe it to Hagrid."

Neville frowned. "Well, he's not like...a family member or anything, right? So it's not like you have some special obligation...so why do you think you owe him?"

Harry thought about how to explain it. "Well, he seems to be really interested in me, you know? I mean, he insisted on visiting me even before I went to Hogwarts, from what Alduin told me...seems that as soon as he found out I was back in the wizarding world, he had to see me...that's just really nice of him, you know?"

"Harry...everyone wanted to see you once they found out you were back in the wizarding world," Neville pointed out.

Harry waved his hand. "Yeah, but it wasn't that with Hagrid. It wasn't because I was the famous Harry Potter, it was just because he knew my parents. He just wanted to make sure I was all right, you know? Seems real nice of him. Like, Alduin, he likes me fine I guess, but I know that for him it's...well, like you said, an obligation because he's family. Hagrid didn't have anything like that."

Neville was frowning.

"What is it?" Harry asked him when he stayed silent too long.

"Well, what you said about Hagrid wanting to make sure you were all right...it sort of rang a bell, and I'm thinking...It might not have been entirely his idea."

Harry stared. "What do you mean?"

"It's just something I overheard McGonnagal telling my Gran..." Neville began, sounding unsure.

"Yes?" Harry asked impatiently.

Neville spoke slowly, as he was pulling the story from his memory: "I think...I think someone else in the family was commenting how Dumbledore was strange, and McGonnagal had a sharp put-down for them-"

"I'm not surprised," Harry muttered, interrupting in spite of himself. "How anyone had the guts to insult him in front of her I don't know."

"Right?" Neville agreed. "I guess my Gran is right that are family is full of brave people. Anyway, then after the person slunk away with their tail between their legs my Gran said sort of privately that McGonnagal had to admit Dumbledore sometimes had ideas that were just a bit strange, and McGonnagal said that my Gran didn't know the half of it. So of course I did my best to listen after that."

Harry nodded in understanding. In spite of the harsh lesson he'd learned about listening at the door, he'd have wanted to hear that, too.

"Well, she kind of..." Here, Neville blushed. "I'm sorry to say this, really," he muttered, "but she kind of implied that Dumbledore hinted that you might not be, you know, all right with your cousin and that she should really go and check on you. This was some time last year, and I think McGonnagal was kind of trying to reprimand my Gran, you know? Because I guess she kinda thought so too, a bit. Anyway, it failed, because Gran just said it was good of Dumbledore, that he was just looking out for you and trying to give you some Gryffindor influence, and that she knew he contacted the Weasleys as well – only, of course, they told him that they were already asked to Travers Manor and knew you."

Harry scowled. "So, what, Dumbledore wouldn't come himself but kept trying to get people to check on me by...implicating," he was proud of himself for finding the word, "my cousin?"

Neville nodded. "That's how I understood it, anyway. So maybe Hagrid was part of the same attempt? I mean," he added quickly when he saw Harry's expression, "I'm sure he really wanted to see you anyway, but maybe Dumbledore just planted the idea? Let him know you were back in our world? Perhaps even told him where to find you? Hagrid was a Gryffindor, right?"

"I think so, yeah," Harry agreed, mulling over it in his head. "So you think Dumbledore is like your Gran? That he really wanted me to be a Gryffindor?"

"Hm, maybe. I mean, from what your cousin told you, what do you think?"

Harry thought back to his first year, to what Alduin had said about Dumbledore's weird behaviour and the Prophecy. "Maybe he thought that as a Gryffindor, there'd be a bigger chance I'd be willing to fight Riddle?" He suggested. "I mean...you know...the Prophecy and all that."

Neville flinched when he heard the word, but swallowed and asked: "How are you doing with that? I mean, how are the lessons with Snape going?"

"Better than I expected," said Harry honestly. "I mean, he's not pleasant or anything, but I can tell it's really...efficient, you know? Like, contrary to those classes with Maurice, as much as I hate to say it...he really makes me sweat it, but I can also feel the way I'm improving."

Neville grinned. "Does Snape see it, too?"

Harry laughed too, glad to have something else to think about apart from Dumbledore's weird manipulations. "I think so, actually. He never exactly praises me or anything, but he does say things like 'you are marginally less terrible at this than the last time', which from him is basically glowing praise."

"I'd say," Neville agreed. Then he shifted a little uncomfortably on the sofa and asked: "And what about your cousin, does he still train you, too?"

"Well, that's a little hard when we're at Hogwarts, isn't it?" Harry pointed out. "But we did some training over the break, yeah, and he recommended me some books about tactics and such. It's interesting, but at the same time I hope I'll never really have to use it. The things he said in those lessons really make it real, you know. That's one difference between Snape and him, because Snape never really talks more than he has to."

"Make it real? What do you mean?" Neville asked curiously.

"Well, he usually gives me some practical experience with every advice," Harry explained. "Like 'that really helped me in that fight' and 'Kingsley tells me this saved his life once' and so on. It's very...well, it just makes it obvious that it isn't a game. It's different from studying stuff at Hogwarts, that's for sure." Than Harry laughed again. "Especially compared to classes with Lockhart."

Neville grinned. "Did you read those interviews with him?"

Harry shook his head.

"He talks for ages about how he made a mistake with your arm because he was so shaken by your injury," Neville began enthusiastically, "and how he resigned because he realized he cannot cope with the emotional difficulty of children being in danger, that he is suited to being a hardened warrior with no need to regard anyone else's safety and so teaching isn't for him..."

Harry snorted. "Sounds hilarious."

"Pretty much. Gran showed me over the break. She thinks he just made all that stuff in his books up."

"Yeah," Harry said, "it's really the only logical explanation, isn't it?"

Colin Creevy passed them in this moment, and Harry reflexively groaned and turned his head to prevent the picture. "Enough, Colin," he muttered tiredly, and seeing that it stopped raining, added to Neville: "Let's go to Hagrid's."

"Are you gonna ask him about the Dumbledore thing?" Neville wondered, getting up.

Harry shook his head. He didn't think he wanted to know.

-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-hp-

Abdullah came to Travers Manor a week later, handing Alduin a vial with a memory. "Philip says not to ask how he got it," he said, "but I'm really curious now."

Alduin considered. "I can't really help you with your curiosity about that, but...come with me to view it, then," he said. "I owe you that much and more."

"You don't owe me anything, as I've told you many times – and Philip says the same, by the way – but I'll gladly go watch with you."

They went to Alduin's study, and Alduin took out his pensieve, holding it out. Abdullah hesitated for a moment, then poured the content of the vial in, and Alduin put the bowl on his desk.

"Ready?" He asked.

Abdullha nodded, and they both leaned over the surface slowly, stepping into the memory.

It was the same one, clearly. Watching young Horace Slughorn was no less entertaining the second time around, and Alduin and Abdullah exchanged amused smirks as they heard him list Riddle's excellent chances at becoming the Minister within fifteen years. "It could have worked, too," Abdullah mused. "While supported by Abraxas Malfoy, Riddle wasn't actually a Malfoy, so there'd have been less opposition..."

"And with his personal charm..." Alduin quite agreed, it would have worked.

Their conversation died out as soon as Riddle mentioned horcruxes, and they both concentrated carefully, trying not to miss a word. Alduin was becoming worried that it would all just be the basic theory, but then. Then Riddle asked his 'theoretical question.'

Seven. Of course it would bloody well be seven, because nothing could ever be easy, it could never be the less complicated way, oh no, he simply had to...Alduin supposed he should be grateful Riddle hadn't gone for twenty-one.

They emerged from the memory, Abdullah with a frown. "He really was daft in some ways, wasn't he?" He said. "Splitting your soul this much is idiocy."

"Well, I dunno, seems to have worked pretty well for him so far," Alduin said grimly. "He's not wholly dead and we have four pieces of his soul to look for, pieces we have no clue where to find."

Abdullah shook his head with emphasis. "No, it hasn't worked out pretty well, that's what I'm saying. Look, the Horcrux in Harry is accidental, right?"

"Yeah..." Alduin trailed off, unsure where his friend was headed with this.

"Now I did my reading, after you mentioned horcruxes for the first time. Normal people don't create accidental horcruxes when they kill someone. But once your soul is split six ways already...you wouldn't be able to fully control what happens to it."

Alduin blinked, stared, and blinked some more. "This is it," he said then, trying to hold his excitement on hold. "This is the thing we've been looking for all the time, Abdullah, all the transcendentals and historians. The biggest mystery of this century." At Abdullah's still confused look, he explained further: "This is why Harry survived, while so many other children died even after their mothers laid down their life for them. Lily Potter's sacrifice was crucial, yes, but only combined with Riddle's already split soul it could have led to this unique combination of circumstances."

Abdullah was still frowning. "How?" He asked.

Alduin couldn't stop himself, he began to pace as he elaborated: "Well, the point of murder for horcruxes is that it's the ultimate evil act. That's what splits your sole. Love holds it together, so it's the complete antithesis of love that splits it. So it needs to be truly murder, with full awareness of what is going on, not merely accidental killing or self-defence or a fight or something. No, only cold-blooded murder works, and the more innocent the victim, the better. The easier it makes the splitting. But, if I understand you right, the more splits your soul has, the easier it would be to continue further?"

"Well, that's what the books I've read for this suggest," Abdullah said carefully. "You know it's not my field."

"Right," Alduin nodded. "It's not exactly mine either, but close enough that I can at least tell it sounds plausible. So, Riddle wouldn't exactly need victims that are that innocent any more. Any old killing would probably do it for him. But Harry was a one-year-old baby, and protected by the purest form of maternal sacrifice. It was...an overload. A normal, whole soul could have dealt with it – it would have split for sure, but no more than that - but Riddle's just...exploded."

"What, you think it was destroyed? The fragment that was still in him, I mean?"

"No, I know it didn't," Alduin replied, thinking of the possessed Quirrel. "I think that it was more like...the soul, the bit of it that didn't split into Harry, just evacuated the body, to get away from the danger the murder presented for it. Because otherwise...otherwise it really might have exploded, been destroyed, by the overload, so...it was the only way to save itself."

Abdullah considered that for a good long while. "So what you're saying is that if a righteous man went to...I dunno, to kill a child because a prophecy said they would become a new dark lord, for example, mother's protection would not work, because he wasn't evil enough, just a little misguided?"

Alduin snorted at the euphemism, but then said: "Basically, but it's not only in extreme cases like this. If I understand this right – we'll have to consult with your father – even your regular evil person would be mostly immune. But Riddle's completely destroyed soul, combined with how perfect Lily's sacrifice was – she didn't defend herself in any way, she didn't have a wand – and how young Harry was...all these circumstances combined to activate the protection to levels unseen ever before in history, and it led to Riddle almost-dying and Harry surviving with just a Horcrux to remember him by..."

They stared at each other for a while, contemplating the implications of this answer to the biggest mystery in recent history.

"You realize how depressing it is," Abdullah said then, "then we can never, ever publish this?"