A/N) I feel that I should explain why I am including the memory chapters in a lot of detail. There is a reason for it, at least in my view, which will become clear in Chapter 64, which I finished writing yesterday. Obviously I can't say what it is, but I'm sure you'll be able to guess why it is important. I could gloss over them, but I personally don't think that is right to do so, considering I do know what is coming up... I hope people can understand that and bare with me for these type of chapters. :)
Chapter Fifty-Six: The Secret Riddle
Saturday 17th October 1995
The week passed quickly: Harry and Ron fervently trained for the upcoming Quidditch match, while attempting to stay on top of their homework; Hermione was discharged from the Hospital Wing on the Friday and was due to return to lessons the following Monday; the Grangers had since left the school, however as a special arrangement, they were allowed fortnightly visits to their daughter. Sirius, on the other-hand, had been knee deep in paperwork for the Auror department for the majority of the week. He hadn't want to sit still and do nothing so he had begged Kingsley to give him something, and the crafty Auror had decided to give Sirius a back log of paperwork for him to sort through: he had not been pleased.
Still, when he hadn't been working – often muttering under his breath about how unfair the paperwork was – Sirius was seen down on the Quidditch Pitch watching the Gryffindor team practice. He had even taken the place of Fred Weasley for one training session when he had managed to get a detention, just so that the team could train.
However as Saturday evening drew closer, Harry gathered Sirius, Ron and Hermione together in an empty classroom to bring them up to speed on the lessons he had been receiving with Dumbledore. Sirius had known about the Gaunts but not the fact that Voldemort was related to them. Clearly, the fact that Marvolo Gaunt's daughter had run off with a Muggle, had not been something he had been proud of, or something he had wanted to broadcast around. Sirius had believed that line to have died out. Still, at least they knew where Voldemort came from – and considering that particular part of his ancestry had been mad raving lunatics due to all the inbreeding, Sirius could certainly understand why he was as insane as he was.
"Are you ready?" asked Harry, nervously.
Sirius nodded. "Sure." He raised his fist to knock on the Headmaster's door. "Let's see what he's got to show us tonight."
"Are you caught up to speed, Sirius," asked Dumbledore, his voice quite quaint, "regarding the Gaunts and that we had a brief glimpse of Lord Voldemort's father?"
Sirius glanced at Harry. "He didn't mention that part..."
"Sorry..." Harry blushed. "As we left we saw a man in a carriage, who was the man Merope had fallen in love with and then bewitched to fall in love with her."
Sirius nodded. "Right, what happened then after Tom Riddle Senior returned home, leaving Merope expecting?"
"Merope was left alone in London, abandoned by the man she had loved, who did not love her in return... I know she was in London due to the evidence of one Caractacus Burke, the then owner of Borgin and Burkes." Dumbledore reached forward and swirled the contents of the Pensieve that sat beside his desk with his wand.
Out of the swirling, silvery mass raised a little old man revolving slowly in the Pensieve, silver as a ghost but much more solid, with a thatch of hair that completely covered his eyes. His voice was eager with anticipation. "Yes, we acquired it in curious circumstances. It was brought in by a young witch just before Christmas, oh, many years ago now. She said she needed the gold badly, well, that much was obvious. Covered in rags and pretty far along... Going to have a baby, see. She said the lockets had been Slytherin's. Well, we hear that sort of story all the time, but when I looked at it, it had his mark all right, and a few simple spells were enough to tell me the truth. Of course, that made it near enough priceless. She didn't seem to have any idea how much it was worth. Happy to get ten Galleons for it, she was! Best bargain we ever made!" The old man descended back into the swirling mass of memory.
"He only gave her ten Galleons?" Harry was flabbergasted.
Sirius snorted. "A lot of pure-bloods, Harry, are egotistical gits who think they can take advantage of the easy and then swindle them for their own gain. Your father, thankfully, was not one of those. Back in the time that Merope lived, it was common... even my forefathers made scrupulous deals like that, just to increase our family's wealth. If easy prey came along you were taught to take it. Pure-blood society is not a nice place to grow up in."
"Sirius is right; the Burkes, especially Caractacus was not famed for his generosity," said Dumbledore evenly. "So, we know that neat the end of her pregnancy, Merope was along in London and in desperate need of gold, desperate enough to sell her one and only valuable possession, the locket that was one of Marvolo's treasured family heirlooms."
"But she could do magic!" said Harry impatiently. "She could have got food and everything for herself by magic, couldn't she?"
"Unrequited love can do a lot of damage to a person," said Sirius quietly. "Sometimes, when you are heartbroken, witches and wizards can lose their powers or just stop using magic as they think that is the reason why their spouses' leave them. It happened to one of my ancestors."
"Exactly, but in any case, as you are about to see, Merope refused to raise her wand even to save her own life."
"She wouldn't even stay alive for her son?"
Dumbledore raised his eyebrows. "Could you possibly be feeling sorry for Lord Voldemort?"
"No!" said Harry quickly, "but she had a choice to live or die, didn't she, not like my mother –"
"Ah, that is where you are wrong, Harry. Your mother had a choice too: to live or die, she chose death to protect you," explained Dumbledore, clasping his hands together. "Merope Riddle chose death in spite of a son who needed her, but do not judge her harshly. She was greatly weakened by long suffering and she never had your mother's courage. And now, if you will both stand..."
Sirius and Harry both did, exchanging looks but both knowing that the Headmaster would explain in his own time.
"Unlike last time where Harry and I entered the memory of Ogden, we will be visiting my memory. I think you find it both rich in detail and satisfyingly accurate. After you, Harry..."
Harry bent over the Pensieve; his face broke the cool surface of the memory and then he was falling down... Seconds later, his feet hit firm ground. He opened his eyes and found that he was standing in a bustling, old-fashioned London street. Sirius landed beside him, shaking his head.
"That was an odd sensation. I've never been in anyone's memory before," he said, as he studied his surroundings. His eyes focused upon a tall figure crossing the road in front of a horse-drawn milk cart. "I think that might be Dumbledore..."
"Where?" asked Harry.
Sirius pointed towards where he was looking. The younger Albus Dumbledore's long hair and beard were auburn. Having reached their side of the street, he strode off along the pavement, drawing many curious glances due to the flamboyantly cut suit of plum velvet that he was wearing.
"Nice suit," said Harry, before he could stop himself; Sirius suppressed a snicker.
"Why thank you, Harry." The real Albus Dumbledore had now joined them in the Pensieve memory. "If you'll just follow my younger self..."
They followed the younger Dumbledore a short distance before they passed through a set of iron gates into a bare courtyard that fronted a rather grim, square building surrounded by high railings. They stood behind the younger Dumbledore waiting for the front door to open, for he had knocked upon it. A moment passed before it was opened and a scruffy girl wearing an apron opened the door.
They listened as the younger Dumbledore explained that he had an appointment with a Mrs Cole to the girl, who then promptly bellowed over her shoulder and then indicated for Dumbledore to step through. They found themselves in a hallway tiled in black and white; the whole place was shabby but spotlessly clean. A skinny, harassed-looking woman came scurrying toward them. She had a sharp-featured face that appeared more anxious than unkind, and she was talking over her shoulder to another helper as she walked briskly towards Dumbledore. She stopped dead in her tracks as her eyes fell upon the wizard. Her eyes widened in astonishment.
"Not your best clothing choice for this particular meeting was it?" said Sirius, albeit a bit cheekily.
Dumbledore merely chuckled.
"Do you know what's going on?" asked Harry.
"I have a fair idea," responded Sirius, placing his hands behind his back as they followed Mrs Cole to her office.
Harry was intrigued but didn't ask further questions. He was sure he would find out soon enough.
"I am here, as I told you in my letter, to discuss Tom Riddle and arrangements for his future," said the younger Dumbledore.
"Knew it," smiled Sirius.
And Harry understood. Lord Voldemort had been orphaned, brought up in an orphanage: this was the place his mother had left him. "I guess this must be where Tom Riddle discovers he's a wizard."
They listened as the younger Dumbledore explained to Mrs Cole that he had come to offer Tom a place at his school, trying to tell her that Tom had the qualities they were looking for. Mrs Cole continued to question why one of her orphans had a place at a school that she had never heard of; Dumbledore counteracted that with saying that his name had been down since he had been born.
"Who registered him? His parents?" Mrs Cole's voice was sharp.
Harry noticed Dumbledore pull out his wand from the pocket of his velvet suit, at the same time as picking up a piece of blank paper from Mrs Cole's desktop. A wave of his wand and he passed her the piece of paper. "I think this will explain everything."
Mrs Cole's eyes slid out of focus and back again as she gazed intently at the blank paper for a moment. "That seems perfectly in order," she said placidly, handing it back.
"You confounded her, didn't you?" accused Sirius.
"To avoid unnecessary questions, yes," the older man replied.
"That was rather Slytherin of you," Sirius replied, winking at Harry. By the time Sirius returned his attention back to the memory Mrs Cole was drinking a glass of gin, draining it in one gulp, while Dumbledore asked whether she could tell him of anything regarding the history of Tom Riddle, noting that he thought he had been born here in the orphanage.
"That's right!" confirmed Mrs Cole. "I remember it clear as anything, because I'd just started here myself. New Year's Eve and bitter cold, snowing, you know. Nasty night. And this girl, not much older that I was myself at the time, came staggering up the front steps. Well, she wasn't the first. We took her in, and she had the baby within the hour and she was dead in another."
"Did she say anything before she died?" asked the younger Dumbledore. "Anything about the boy's father, for instance?"
"Now, as it happens, she did," said Mrs Cole, who had poured herself another glass of gin and swigging it down freely. "I remember she said to me, 'I hope he looks like his papa,' and I won't lie, she was right to hope it, because she was no beauty – and then she told me he was to be named Tom, for his father, and Marvolo, for her father – yes, I know, funny name, isn't it? We wondered whether she came from a circus – and she said the boy's surname was to be Riddle. And she died soon after that without another word. Well, we named him just as she'd said, it seemed so important to the poor girl, but no Tom nor Marvolo nor any kind of Riddle ever came looking for him, nor any family at all, so he stayed in the orphanage and he's been here ever since." Two pink spots had appeared high on her cheekbones. "He's funny boy."
"Yes," said the younger Dumbledore, "I thought he might be."
"Why do I have a feeling that Tom Riddle is not your average young wizard?" said Sirius. "And I mean not accidental magic which I'm sure you did plenty of when you were younger, Harry."
Harry nodded. "Yeah, I did."
"You'll find out," smiled the older Dumbledore, "if you listen."
They heard how, as a baby, the young Lord Voldemort had hardly cried and that when he had got a little older, he had been odd. This had prompted the younger Dumbledore to ask how he was odd, which had raised Mrs Cole's suspicions, and wonder whether the young orphan really did have a place at Dumbledore's school and that no matter what she said, he would still go, regardless. Once Dumbledore had assured her of that, she answered in quite a sudden rush:
"He scares the other children."
"A bully then," said Sirius, just as the younger Dumbledore asked, "You mean he is a bully?"
"I think he must be," said Mrs Cole, frowning slightly, "but it's very hard to catch him at it. There have been incidents... Nasty things..."
"Slytherin tactics, showing that he was capable of slipping out of trouble..." whispered Sirius to Harry.
They heard as Mrs Cole explained about how Billy Stubb's rabbit had been hung from the rafters, but they couldn't see how Tom Riddle could get up there, but they knew he and Billy had argued the day before... On a summer outing to the countryside, two children had never been the same again after they had gone into a cave with Tom Riddle, but he had sworn all they had done was go exploring, but they were sure something had happened in that cave... "I don't think many people will be sorry to see the back of him," she finished with a hic-cup.
The younger Dumbledore then went onto explain that they would not be keeping Tom Riddle permanently, and that he would have to return, at least, every summer. Mrs Cole then suggested that Dumbledore would like to meet him, in which the Professor rose from his chair and followed the now tipsy woman out of her office, up some stone stairs until they turned off at the second floor landing and stopped outside the first door in the long corridor. She raised a pudgy hand and knocked twice before entering.
Harry, the older Dumbledore and Sirius followed the younger Professor and the Matron into the room. It was a small bare room with nothing in it except an old wardrobe and an iron bedstead. A boy was sitting on the top of the gray blankets; his legs stretched out in front him, holding a book.
"Merope got her dying wish then," mused Sirius. "No sign of the Gaunts at all... unless you count the psychopathic tendencies to harm others..."
The young Tom Riddle was his handsome father in miniature: tall for eleven years old, dark-haired and pale.
"How do you do, Tom?" said Dumbledore, walking forward and holding out his hand.
For a second Sirius thought the young Voldemort was not going to take the offered hand, but after a slight hesitation he took it.
"I am Professor Dumbledore."
"Professor?" Riddle's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "Is that like 'doctor'? What are you here for? Did she get you in to have a look at me?" He was very demanding, authority already filling his voice, pointing towards the door where Mrs Cole had just left through.
"No, no," said Dumbledore, smiling.
"I don't believe you," hissed Riddle. "She wants me looked at, doesn't she? Tell the truth!"
Sirius was shocked by the tone of the young boy. It reminded him rather eerily of his mother. "That wasn't a question... that was a command... as if he's used to getting his own way and in an orphanage that shouldn't be happening."
"Why not?" asked Harry.
"Because orphans don't get their own way, Harry, you of all people should know that."
Harry realised his godfather was right. Until Sirius had come along, nothing had gone right in his life, and though he had grown up in a family, he hadn't been loved, he hadn't been able to do what he wanted: Tom Riddle, on the other hand oozed authority, as if he was used to being in control and getting his own way in life without anyone standing up to him.
He was pulled out of his thoughts by Tom Riddle's outburst.
"You can't kid me! The asylum, that's where you're from, isn't it?" 'Professor,' yes, of course – well, I'm not going, see? That old cat's the one who should be in the asylum! I never did anything to little Amy Benson or Dennis Bishop, and you can ask them, they'll tell you!"
"Demanding little bastard," whispered Sirius, out of hearing of Dumbledore. He wasn't liking the child one bit, but then considering the boy grew up to be the man who murdered his best friends, how could he sympathise with him?
"Hogwarts," the younger Dumbledore continued, "is a school for people with special abilities –"
"I'm not mad!" Riddle shouted.
"I know that you are not mad. Hogwarts is not a school for mad people. It is a school of magic."
"So that's how you introduce magic to Muggle-borns?" asked Sirius, curiously. "You try to explain and if they do a 'Riddle' you spring it on them?"
The older Dumbledore turned to acknowledge Sirius. "Usually, yes. There are always some people who react the way Riddle does, some worse than him, in fact. Sometimes it is best to spring it on them, rather than to let them get even angrier if they think they are going to the wrong type of special school."
"In the Muggle world," explained Harry, "special schools are for people with learning difficulties or physical difficulties. If you've grown up in the Muggle world, it's easy to assume you mean that type of school."
"Oh," said Sirius, "in our world, usually those with difficulties don't end up attending magical education, as far as I am aware..."
"They don't," confirmed Dumbledore. "They are usually left at home and looked after by their mother or other members of their family. Magic can be dangerous to those who would be unable to control it, so the magical community shelter them, to keep everyone else around them safe."
There seemed to be a sad, reminiscent glint in Dumbledore's eyes as he spoke of that, as if he had some personal experience, but Sirius couldn't place his finger on it and instead returned his attention to the scene playing out in front of him.
The older Dumbledore was asking the young Riddle what he could do; clearly during their discussion, Riddle had come to except that whatever he could do, could be the influence of his magical abilities coming to the fore.
A flush of excitement was rising up the young boy's neck and into his hollow cheeks; he looked fevered, as if he was hardly daring to believe. "I can make things move without touching them. I can make animals do what I want them to do, without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who annoy me. I can make them hurt if I want to." He leaned forward, legs trembling, staring into his hands, his head bowed as though in prayer. "I knew I was different, always knew I was special. Always, I knew there was something."
Sirius clamped his mouth shut, resisting the urge to comment knowing that if he did, Dumbledore would probably be angry with him.
The younger Dumbledore agreed with the young Riddle's assessment that he was special and went onto explain that he was a wizard, which then caused Riddle to ask whether Dumbledore himself was a wizard and when the then Transfiguration teacher answered, Riddle used the same commanding tone he had used before to get Dumbledore to prove it. Dumbledore did not oblige straight away, which Sirius was glad about, but only because he didn't want the Headmaster obeying the future Voldemort. Instead Dumbledore took that command as a sigh that Riddle was accepting his place at Hogwarts and went onto admonish him for his rudeness and to address him as 'Professor' or 'sir', causing Riddle's face to harden for only the fleetingness of moments before he said in a rather unrecognisably polite voice: "I'm sorry, sir. I meant – please, Professor, could you show me - ?"
They watched as Dumbledore drew his wand and pointed it towards the shabby wardrobe in the corner, and gave his wand a casual flick. Immediately, the wardrobe burst into flames.
Riddle jumped to his feet, howling in shock and rage, but even as the eleven year old boy rounded on Dumbledore, the flames vanished, leaving the wardrobe completely undamaged. Riddle stared from the wardrobe to Dumbledore; then, his expression greedy, he pointed at the wand. "Where can I get one of them?"
"All in good time," said Dumbledore. "I think there is something trying to get out of your wardrobe."
And sure enough, a faint rattling could be heard from inside it. For the first time, Riddle looked frightened.
"He's a thief," said Sirius.
Harry glanced at his godfather quizzically. "There is a spell one can use to detect whether people have something they shouldn't have... I guess Professor Dumbledore used that spell within the fire one he conjured."
Riddle opened his wardrobe and lifted down a small cardboard box that was shaking and rattling.
"What's in there?" breathed Harry. What could possibly be inside the box that was making the young boy look unnerved?
Riddle admitted that there were things in the box that he should have had, though he said it rather reluctantly. At Dumbledore's instruction Riddle opened it and tipped the contents onto his bed. There was a mess of small, everyday objects: a yo-yo, a silver thimble, and a tarnished mouth organ among them. Once free of the box, they stopped quivering and lay quite still upon the thin blankets.
Dumbledore told him to return the objects to their owners with apologies and that he would know if Riddle had not done as asked. He warned that thieving was not tolerated at Hogwarts. He continued to explain that Hogwarts taught not only how to use magic, but how to control it. It was clear that Riddle had been using his powers in a way that is neither taught nor tolerated at Hogwarts, and that Tom was not the first, nor the last, to allow his magic to run away with him. He warned the boy that Hogwarts can expel students, and that the Ministry of Magic would punish lawbreakers still more severely, and that by entering their world, all new wizards and witches agreed to abide by their laws.
After his reprimand, Riddle placed the objects back in the cardboard box before explaining that he hadn't got any money. Dumbledore produced a leather money-pouch from his pocket. "There is a fund at Hogwarts for those who require assistance to buy books and robes. You might have to buy some of your spell books and robes from second hand, but –"
"Where do you buy spell books?" interrupted Riddle, who had taken the heavy money bag without thanking Dumbledore, and was now examining a fat gold Galleon.
"In Diagon Alley. I have your list of books and school equipment with me. I can help you find everything –"
"He's not going to like that..." mused Sirius and was proven right when Riddle said he didn't need 'you'.
"I'm used to doing things for myself, I go round London on my own all the time. How do you get to this Diagon Alley – sir?" he added quickly, catching Dumbledore's eye.
Dumbledore handed the young boy the envelope containing his list of equipment, and after telling Riddle exactly how to get to the Leaky Cauldron from the orphanage, he said, "You will be able to see it, although Muggles around you – non-magical people that is – will not. Ask for Tom the barman – easy enough to remember, as he shares your name –"
Riddle gave a twitch.
"Doesn't like his name... Considering he is descended from Slytherin it doesn't surprise me, though he doesn't know it yet..." said Sirius.
"How can you tell that he hates his name?" asked Harry.
"Simple. It is a rare phenomenon but if a witch or wizard is brought up in conditions unfamiliar to their ancestors and bought up among people they despised, sometimes that can be transferred within your own blood, and become a part of you." He pointed to the boy. "He has a clear hatred of his name, whether that is down to an irrational hatred of Muggles or the circumstances of his upbringing, I do not know. And the fact that he shed the name to become Lord Voldemort tells me a lot," explained Sirius, just as Riddle claimed that there were a lot of Toms and asked whether his father was a wizard.
"I'm afraid I don't know," said Dumbledore, his voice gentle in response.
"My mother can't have been magic, or she wouldn't have died," said Riddle, more to himself. "It must've been him."
Sirius scoffed. "How little he knows."
The older Dumbledore shot him a warning look.
The scene continued, with the younger Dumbledore explaining that Tom would leave for Hogwarts on the first of September from King's Cross Station and that there was a train ticket within the envelope too. Dumbledore stood up and held out his hand again; Tom Riddle taking it, said, "I can speak to snakes. I found out when we've been to the country on trips – they find me, they whisper to me. Is that normal for a wizard?"
"It is unusual," said Dumbledore, after a moment's hesitation, "but not unheard of." His tone was casual but his eyes moved curiously over Riddle's face. They stood for a moment, man and boy, staring at each other. Then the handshake was broken, and Dumbledore was at the door to the boy's room. "Good-bye, Tom. I shall see you at Hogwarts."
"I think that will do," said the white-haired Dumbledore and within seconds they were soaring weightlessly through darkness once more, before landing squarely in the present-day office.
Both Harry and Sirius sat down, while Dumbledore sat behind his desk.
"He believed it much quicker than I did – I mean, when you told him he was a wizard," said Harry. "I didn't believe Hagrid at first, when he told me."
"Yes, Riddle, was perfectly read to believe that he was – to use his word – 'special'," said Dumbledore.
"Yet he was special, in the conventional sense," said Sirius. "He could do thinks no other witch or wizard could do. Speaking to snakes was a Salazar Slytherin ability which was only passed down through the direct line... well, that's what I was taught. He was right about that, but to normal witches and wizards, he wasn't special as he thought he was."
"Did you know then, Professor?" asked Harry.
"That I had just met the most dangerous Dark wizard of all time?" finished Dumbledore. "No, I had no idea that he was going to grow up to be what he is. However, I was certainly intrigued by him. I returned to Hogwarts intending to keep an eye upon him, something I should have done in any case, given that he was alone and friendless, but which, already, I felt I ought to do for others' sake as much as his. His powers, as you heard, were surprisingly well-developed for such a young wizard – most interestingly and ominously of all – he had already discovered that he had some measure of control over them, and begun to use them consciously -"
"Which he never stopped doing," interjected Sirius. He knew that certain members of his own family had attended Hogwarts at the same time as the young Tom Riddle, and when he had rose to power they used to talk about what he was like. The majority of them didn't seem to know his ancestry though. "What he did were not the random experiments typical of young wizards. Youngsters don't go around using magic against other people, to frighten, to punish or control."
"The little stories of the strangled rabbit and the young boy and girl he lured into a cave were most suggestive," conceded Dumbledore.
"And he was a Parselmouth, like me," interjected Harry.
"Yes, indeed; a rare ability, and one supposedly connected with the Dark Arts, although as we know, there are Parselmouths among the great and the good too. In fact, his ability to speak to serpents did not make me nearly as uneasy as his obvious instincts for cruelty, secrecy, and domination."
"All notable aspects that were associated at some point or another with Salazar Slytherin over the course of his own life," noted Sirius. "One of the things I hate about being a Black is that I was forced to learn this stuff. It's difficult to not make comparisons between the two."
Dumbledore nodded, taking a brief glance out of the windows at the darkening sky. It was getting late. "Before we part, I want to draw your attention to certain features of the scene we have just witnessed for they have a great bearing on the matters we shall be discussing in future meetings. You noticed Riddle's reaction when I mentioned that another shared his first name, 'Tom'. There he showed contempt for anything that tied him to other people, anything that made him ordinary. Even then, he wished to be different, separate, notorious. He shed his name within a few short years of that conversation and created the mask of 'Lord Voldemort' behind which he has been hidden for so long. I trust that you both noticed that Tom Riddle was already highly self-sufficient, secretive and apparently, friendless? He not want help or companionship on his trip to Diagon Alley. He preferred to operate alone. The adult Voldemort is the same. You will hear many of his Death Eaters claiming that they are in his confidence, that they alone are close to him, even understand hi. They are deluded. Lord Voldemort has never had a friend, nor do I believe that he has ever wanted one."
Sirius smirked. "Poor Bella. She always came home boasting about how she was his most trusted servant. Oh, if she could hear you say that now..."
"She'd probably strike me down with the killing curse," finished Dumbledore, smiling lightly. "Your cousin was never the sanest Black."
"You can say that again," muttered Sirius, enjoying the fact that the Dark Lord to Bella, was not what she wanted to be to him.
"And lastly, the young Tom Riddle liked to collect trophies. You saw the box of stolen articles he had hidden in his room. These were taken from victims of his bullying behaviour, souvenirs, if you will, of particularly unpleasant bits of magic. Bear in mind this magpie-like tendency, for this, particularly, will be important later." Dumbledore leant back in his chair, smiling wearily. "And now, for Harry, at least, it is time for bed."
Harry nodded and he and Sirius got to their feet; as they crossed the room, his eyes fell upon the little table on which Marvolo Gaunt's ring had rested, but the ring was no longer there. "The ring's gone," said Harry, looking around. "But I thought you might have the mouth organ or something."
Dumbledore beamed at him, peering over the top of his half moon spectacles. "Very astute, Harry, but the mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ."
Harry peered curiously at the Headmaster before shrugging his shoulders and leaving the office with his godfather. Once they had descended the stairs, Harry turned to Sirius and asked: "What did he mean by that the mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ?"
Sirius bit his lip, running a hand through his dark hair. "I have a hunch and I do not like it one bit, especially if it's going to have to be something you'll have to do."
Harry swallowed; fear settling in his stomach. "What do you mean?"
"I don't want to say, not until we have more proof. I need to check on something in the Black family home, but if I'm right I think the Headmaster might have figured out the real reason why Voldemort survived that night he attempted to kill you. In theory, he should have died himself, but he didn't, which backs up my own thought." He placed his hands on his godson's shoulders. "I'm sorry I can't tell you anymore at the moment, but I need to do some research first."
Harry nodded. "I understand. But you'll tell me when you're sure, right? Even if Professor Dumbledore doesn't?"
"I promise," said Sirius. "Now, I'll escort you back to the Tower, its past curfew, and I don't want you getting into trouble. You've still got that week's worth of detention with Professor Snape still to do and we don't want that added on top of what you've already got."
"I'd completely forgotten about that..." whispered Harry, wondering exactly how he was supposed to survive the year with so much work and lessons to do.
"You'd best start hoping he has forgotten," mused Sirius.
"He'll set them the week of the Quidditch match, I know he will," replied Harry.
Sirius laughed. "It wouldn't surprise me; anything to give Slytherin the chance of winning the cup once more."
To be continued...
Please let me know what you think!
I thought it was important to include Sirius in these memories as he does have a very important role to play and Dumbledore does know that he won't let Harry out of his sight and wouldn't approve of him teaching what he is to Harry without him there.
Next chapter: Andromeda Black - Sirius visits his favourite cousin and a traitor is discovered... There are hints below...
The spell hit Sirius in the chest and he went flying, his back impacting hard against the wall. He slid to the floor, but he was already moving, rolling to the side and then coming up into a duelling crouch, his wand pointing directly at Harry.
They were passing the stone circle when Remus grabbed Sirius by the back of his robes and hauled him behind the nearest stone, pressing his friend's back against it, hand on his mouth. Sirius raised his eyebrows but didn't struggle, realising that there probably was a very good reason for Remus to have done that. A frown was across his friend's face, and out of the corner of his eye he noticed a figure walking briskly past the stone circle, bypassing the path, but attempting to blend in with the surroundings. The figure was heading towards Hagrid's Hut, but Sirius was certain their true destination was the main gates of Hogwarts.
"This is just a hunch, but I think we might have just found our traitor," whispered Remus into Sirius' ear, removing his hand from his friend's mouth.
So, what is going on in the first hint? And who exactly is the traitor? Can anyone guess? All will be revealed in the next chapter... To be posted on Monday.
Until then,
the-writer1988