1.
Disaster
Harry's stay at the Dursley's is an undisputed disaster. What with House-elves and accidental magic and the sudden absence of the left front flowerbed, Albus reconsiders.
"Harry, how would you feel about spend the rest of the summer at Hogwarts?"
Harry nodded enthusiastically and dashed upstairs to get his trunk. Albus is disappointed to find that it is still packed.
Is this how badly you treat him? His trunk in still packed after a weeks in your house. He loves his school better than here. You know so little about him, after spending almost eleven year together. How could you, Petunia?
"Harry, please wait outside. I want to have a… word with you aunt and uncle."
His green eyes widen.
"Don't hurt them," he whispered coldly. He brushed past and walked out the door.
His plea startled Albus. How had he known?
In the end, what he does to Mr. and Mrs. Dursley is rather illegal and obscure and will not be tracked back to him …but he doesn't hurt them… much.
Because Harry asked.
Albus tells them this, but they aren't grateful.
2.
Again
It haunts him. The Chamber of Secrets has been opened. Enemies of the Heir… Beware.
Will there be more attacks? More deaths?
Then Harry's eyes. They look like they've seen this before, but where? When?
3.
Flowers
Harry was horrified by Ms. Granger's petrifaction. It surprises Albus how deeply he is effected by it. As far as he knew, Harry and the girl were only acquaintances.
Harry always keeps fresh flowers on her bedside table, sometimes picked by the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest, sometimes Transfigured.
It's an impressive bit of magic for a second year.
Albus wondered -not for the first time- if Harry was really the age he appeared to be. He was far too mature. Too sad. Too... broken. No, Harry was not broken. He was too strong for that.
"But he still holds himself like a soldier," muttered a traitorous voice from the back of his mind. "He knows too much. He might not be the real Harry Potter at all. He can do magic most children his age can only dream of."
Most sixth years couldn't do half the things Harry did, half as as nicely. He supposed Harry had enough practice making flowers. He makes up colourful crowns of pretty flowers for the first year girls.
When Ms. Lovegood passes him in the Great Hall with Harry's blue and yellow flowers in her hair, Albus felt like he had seen Ariana's ghost.
Only, he hadn't made his sister flowers half as often as Harry does.
4.
Requirement
Harry, Neville and his new friend Luna often vanish for hours on the seventh floor. The portraits tried everything to find where they were hiding, but uncovered little.
Harry's two friends seem to love him. Harry doesn't notice. Albus wondered if he should have been harder on the Dursley's.
When Albus finally asked the House-elves about a place to hide on the seventh floor, he can't help, but feel outdone by a resourceful twelve year old.
But it is okay, because Harry is always the exception of the rule.
One day, Albus ran into Harry in front of the room.
"What do you need, Professor?" Harry asked in an almost mocking tone.
His voice held a note of familiarity and warmth that wasn't there before the summer. Almost like Harry likes him. Albus quickly warms to the idea.
"Nothing, anymore," he smiles. "What about you?"
"I don't suppose you can get a new Defense teacher on short notice?"
"What did Professor Lockhart do, Harry?"
"It's mostly what he didn't do that bothers me," Harry said blithely, leaning against the wall. "Teach and all of the stuff in his books. Turns out he's rather gifted in Memory Charms. I just avoided one, you see…"
Albus was not happy that evening. Dealing with fire-happy Aurors, an attack on a (famous) minor and the need to find a new Defense is tiring. At least he managed to keep Harry's famous name out of the papers.
5.
Smile
Albus is glad Sirius is a free man. All those years he had mistakenly believed him guilty…
From Harry he had learned that the rat nearly had come to Hogwarts with young Ronald. He shuddered to think of Pettigrew hidden and dangerous in the castle.
He simply beamed when Harry had met his godfather for the first time in his office, one spring evening.
However he could help but feel inexplicably… jealous –replaced, even- when Harry gave the man a shy, rather tentative, smile.
It was ludicrous. Silly and petty. Of course Harry would be excited to meet his godfather! It wasn't like Harry had ignored Albus on purpose.
Knowing that, Albus realized, didn't make him feel any better.
6.
Trust
Harry had appeared one night with a sobbing Ginny Weasley, an uncertain Neville Longbottom and a pale Luna Lovegood who was sporting an unpleasant scratch along her cheek. Harry held a small damaged black book in his right hand (which appeared to have been chewed on by a large… something). Albus was quite certain he didn't want to know what it was. He would ask regardless.
It was probably of some terribly dangerous and frightening variety. The type of monster that features heavily in nightmares and is not normally seen by twelve year old boys.
In Harry left hand he supported the blood stained Sword of Gryffindor. On his shoulder perched a Fawks who sported a smug smile. "I know something you don't know!" the phoenix
seemed to say in a sing-song voice.
It was after curfew, but Harry was covered slime and blood. Explanations could wait.
"You've long a lot of blood, my boy," he explained, noticing the child's confused glance.
"You'll be needing a few potions."
"A Blood Replenishing Potion," Poppy barked disapprovingly, but concerned at the same time.
She waved her wand in a complex pattern Albus recognized as a diagnostic pursed her lips at the results. "And a standard Toxin Remover."
Harry paled. "I think I'll need something more powerful than that."
"What on earth attacked you?! A standard Remover could clean out a acromantula bite," she snapped. "I doubt anything a second year could find would be more venomous than that!"
"I was attacked by a Ho- a memory," Harry muttered, stuttering a bit. "And I was bitten and thrown around by a giant snake."
"How big?" Poppy asked impatiently and she fumbled with vials of miscellaneous medical potions.
"Very," Harry said simply.
"Here, drink this." She handed him several goblets full of liquid before bustling off to tend to Ms. Lovegood. Harry swallowed them with visible wariness and alertness.
Albus found child's distrust worrisome, but he pushed that away for the moment to focus on the children's story.
"I see you had something of an adventure tonight," he began. A note of disbelief sounded from Harry's direction. Albus could not guess why. "Care to share?"
Young Neville spoke up first, "Luna found the Chamber of Secrets."
His heart skipped a beat. Excitement, surprise and horror. "Where?"
"The girl's bathroom on the first floor," Harry said, not meeting his eyes.
Ah, so Salazar had a sense of humor after all. "I see. And you decided to investigate?" He phrased it like a guess, but the answer was rather obvious.
Ms. Weasley was about to speak, but Harry spoke interjected swiftly.
"Yes. The Chamber itself in miles beneath the school. We followed the Chamber to another room where I found this-" he held up the book, which Albus noticed the name emblazoned upon it TM Riddle. Oh no…
"And this… this boy was there. He was an older student in Slytherin robes and he had a prefect badge. He tried to lie his way out and claimed he hadn't opened the Chamber and that he was investigating as well," Harry explained.
"We didn't believe him so he attacked us and stunned Ginny and Neville in a duel. He said he had… convinced… someone to open the Chamber and it was better work for him than against him. He made some pretty egotistical claims."
"He was a great murdering prat, you mean," Neville put in.
"Yes, that. He sounded like a psychopath, honestly," Harry continued. "Then Luna and I told him to shut it."
"I remember you telling him that Albus Dumbledore was the greatest wizard in the world and that Riddle would never know true power," Ms. Lovegood corrected absently.
Harry blushed and most definitely did not meet his eyes. He hurried on before Albus could speak, though.
"It's true. Real power comes from striving to gain something with everything you have without giving up. …And the only thing that is worth the effort is friendship," Harry gave his friends a shy smile before moving on. "I made Riddle quite angry, I think, so he called his snake to attack me. That was Slytherin monster. The giant snake. Anyways, it's tail came out of nowhere and hit Luna and I."
He nodded to the girl's face. "She was unconscious, after that."
"How did you fight the snake?"
"That's when… that's about when this bird showed up," Harry said uncertainly, as though he didn't think Albus would believe him, giving the bird a measuring look.
"Ah, I wondered when Fawkes showed up," Albus smiled.
"Fawkes?" Harry repeated.
"Yes, Harry. Fawkes, you see, is a phoenix, He has been my friend for many years now."
"Fawkes?" Harry repeated, sounding incredulous. "As in Guy Fawkes? Bonfires and fireworks?
Going up in flames?"
"Ah, yes. Exactly, Harry. I think you are the first person in about… ten years to pick up on that."
"Phoenix burst into flames when it is time for them to die then they are reborn from the ashes," he added, noting the other children's puzzled expressions.
Harry opened his mouth to respond. He closed it and shook his head before moving on. "So Mr. Phoenix here gave me the Sorting Hat. Not having much else to work with, I asked it for help."
He gave the Sword of Gryffindor a significant glance.
"The hat gave me the sword, over there. I was knocked around by the snake for a while before it decided to make me dinner. I got a lucky shot under the chin."
"It is dead?"
"Er, yes."
"What did Riddle do?"
Harry sighed. "Riddle had a pity party and wanted to duel me himself. I stab this book with a fang. He vanished."
So the "giant snake" was a basilisk. And… he held the battered diary in his hands… the book was a Horcrux. What other abominations had Tom made? Why hadn't Harry told him which of his friends Tom had possessed? Ms. Lovegood, Ms. Weasley or Mr. Longbottom? Did think they would get in trouble? Expelled? It was obvious that Tom had used someone.
…Should he tell Harry? Of Horcruxes? Of the Prophecy? One glance at the boy's determined face answered that question. Who else could he trust? Who was better?
Someone not so young, without a life ahead of them. Someone more experienced in magic to better face the challenges. Someone he didn't love quite so much because he didn't want to lose him.
Whatever his misgivings Albus couldn't think of anyone else he would rather trust.
7.
Hourglass
Harry was sleeping in Hospital Wing with the covers barely touching the child's chest. The boy shifted and his hands clenched into fists reflexively. Something on the boy's right palm caught Albus' eye.
Gently, he reached out and pulled the hand forward for inspection. Even in sleep, the boy flinched away, trying to tug away his captured hand.
Albus held tight and, after moment, Harry settled back into unsteady sleep. With care, he coaxed the fingers out of the fist and held the boy's palm out for examination.
A strange twisted line wound it's way all over the surface of the hand. The line seemed to have been caused by a small chain of some sort and stood out, almost red, against pale skin. To the side of his thumb were two tiny triangles pressed together in a crude imitation of two faded triangles connected by the points. The hourglass shape was surrounded by a faint outline of a circle.
What on earth? Magic had caused this injury, of that he was certain. He could feel it writhing and pulsing beneath the surface.
Albus was rather proud of his memory. It was almost photographic and it helped him remember names and Houses of long past students and remember insignificant things, some of which later became important.
He remembered to things he was almost certain connected to this puzzle. The first was that Harry's wand arm was his left. The second was that Harry despised physical contact, even handshakes. The third and last was a faint recollection of the bandages that had wrapped Harry's hand during the Welcoming Feast last year.
What had made this scar? It looked like a burn of some kind. When had Harry burned his hand and with what? He supposed he could just ask, but right now…
Right now, Harry was sleeping. It could wait until morning.
Or until Harry wanted to tell him.