And back to the Voldemort business after a Quidditch pause.

HARRY VIII

There was a point of light at the end of the tunnel. The point slowly expanded into a circle. Everything was fuzzy. He brought his hand to his eyes, rubbing them. He didn't have his glasses. He fumbled next to his bed until he found them and put them on his nose.

He was lying in a bed. His eyes fell upon a pile of wizardry sweets. Then he noticed a human shape sleeping in another bed to his left. His mother had her hands crossed on her tummy, her hair falling on the sheets, and she was fully dressed, like for a day of work.

"She's alright, Harry," a voice to his right said at the moment Harry was about to call his mother. Harry turned to the origin of the new voice. It was Albus Dumbledore.

"Professor? The Stone!" Harry moved to get out of bed.

"Calm yourself, dear boy. Quirrell doesn't have the Stone if that's what you're worried about."

"But... He had..." Harry hesitated to say the name.

"Voldemort." Harry was surprised that the headmaster would say his name. "Better call him by his name, Harry. Always use the proper name for things. Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself."

"Voldemort... He was there... He was sharing Quirrell's body..."

"Indeed, he was. It is one of my many failures this year. Probably the worst of them. My failure to see that Voldemort had gotten inside our walls."

"I thought... I thought..." It was difficult for Harry to express his thoughts. He thought that Voldemort might be... dead. He had vanished, disappeared. This is what his mother always told him.

"I suppose you have a lot of questions," Dumbledore said, understanding.

"Where's the Stone?"

"The Stone... was destroyed. We can thank your mother for this."

Harry looked at her. "Is she..."

"She is fine, Harry. She recovered from your encounter with Voldemort much quicker than you did. She then remained at your side the whole time. Madam Pomfrey gave her a soporific so that she would sleep a little. She should be awakened in two hours."

Harry's memories came back piece by piece. He remembered Quirrell taking the Stone from him, and he was about to drink it. Then his mother arrived, took the Stone away, and forced him to leave. He had then heard noises of battle and ran back. He had seen the ceiling crumble on his mother's head, and Quirrell about to finish her. He had not thought and ran straight to him, taking Quirrell's face into his hands and tackling it to the floor. Harry had felt an unbearable pain, worse than anything, but he kept his hands on Quirrell's face. He couldn't think of anything else to stop him from killing her. Perhaps his mother would have enough time to escape if he held long enough. As the face of the professor had burned and turned black, Harry had lost consciousness.

"How long have I been in here?" he asked, looking all around to the infirmary.

"Three days. Your mother will be most relieved you have come round, and so will be Mr Ronald Weasley and Miss Hermione Granger."

"Ron is fine? What about Hermione?"

Dumbledore raised his hand. "They are fine, Harry. They are perfectly fine. Mr Weasley was brought to the infirmary by Professor McGonagall as soon as your two friends got out of the trapdoor. I arrived not long after. It didn't take me long to understand where you had gone. But apparently," he said as he heavily sat in a chair, "my presence wasn't required. Your mother and you made much of the work. Voldemort had already flown away by the time I found you. Both of you were seriously injured though, especially you. So I brought you here."

"What happened? I remember touching Quirrell's face. He was about to kill my mother. I didn't know what else to do."

"What you did was very brave, Harry. You risked your life to save her."

"But... I don't understand. I... I touched his face, and it hurt so much, but he was being hurt as well. It was as if his face was... burning. Really burning."

"It did. Because Quirrell shared his body with Voldemort, and Voldemort cannot touch you, Harry. He cannot hurt you, to be quite simple."

"Why?"

"Because of her," he pointed his mother with his chin. "And because of your father. That night Voldemort tried to kill you, your father gave his life to save you, and your mother was ready to do the same, Harry. They made an ultimate sacrifice because they loved you so much. Lily barely managed to survive that night. This love left a mark." Harry touched his scar. "No, this is not a scar, Harry. It is not a visible sign. It is a love that lives within you and that prevents Voldemort from ever harming you. He cannot touch you as long as you live with that love. This is something he cannot understand... because Voldemort doesn't understand love."

Harry wasn't sure if he understood. "So, when I touched Quirrell, he was being burned... by love?"

"Yes."

Harry tried to assimilate it. He looked at his mother, who had come to save him. He shouldn't have written to her before he went down the trapdoor. He put her life into danger.

"Is she mad at me?" What a stupid question to ask.

"I think she is mostly relieved that you are alive, considering the situation in which you found yourself," Dumbledore replied. "You'll have a lot of things to tell each other when she wakes up."

"So... the Stone... It's really been destroyed?" Harry asked, trying to go back to the matter at hand.

"Yes. Your mother made sure of it."

"But that means Nicolas Flamel and his wife will die?"

Dumbledore seemed a little sad then. "They have enough Elixir to set their affairs in order. Then yes, they will die. To Nicolas and Perenelle, it is like going to bed after a very, very long day. When I told him what happened, he was relieved. Sad, too. The Stone was the great achievement of his life. But living forever can become heavy after some time."

Harry was surprised by what the professor was saying. "How did I get the Stone? I looked into that mirror and saw myself placing it in my pocket. The next moment, it was really inside my pocket."

Dumbledore smiled. "I'm glad you asked. This mirror is very special, Harry. This is the Mirror of Erised. It shows people what they desire the most in this world, their deepest wish. And for you, in that moment, it was to find the Stone. And only someone who wanted to find the Stone - find it, but not to use it - would be able to get it. A very good idea of mine, if you see what I mean."

Harry couldn't help but laugh with the Headmaster of Hogwarts. However, he stopped quickly. "That didn't stop Voldemort from getting the Stone. If it wasn't of..."

Dumbledore looked at his mother. Without her, Harry would have failed. Voldemort would be back. Dumbledore said nothing.

"Sir, if the Stone is destroyed, does that mean that Voldemort is gone, for good this time?" He feared the answer.

"I'm afraid he is still out somewhere. Perhaps looking for another body to share. He left Quirrell to die the moment he had no need of him. He's neither totally alive or totally dead, so he can't be killed. But if people stand against him like you did, maybe he will remain under that form forever."

"There are things he told me. He said... he said no one ever told me why he tried to kill me that night, ten years ago. Why?"

Dumbledore seemed embarrassed. "That... is an answer I cannot provide, Harry. I'm afraid the reasons why Voldemort wanted to kill you are very nebulous. Back then, we indeed received information that he was going after you and your parents, and it seemed like you were his target. But we don't know why he wanted to kill you, specifically."

"So... my father... and my mother... Everything that happened is because of me?" Harry asked, feeling horribly guilty.

"No, Harry. You were not the first person who Voldemort decided to kill. And every time he decided to kill someone, he was ready to do everything to reach that goal, including slaughtering and destroying everything in his way. You are not to blame, Harry. Voldemort is."

That didn't really reassure him.

"Voldemort said that he spared her because a friend of hers asked him to. What did he mean by that?"

Dumbledore sighed. "I'm sorry, Harry. This is really not my answer to provide. Ask your mother after she wakes up, if you want. But be kind and gentle with her. You caused her a lot of worries this year. You shouldn't be too hard on her for events that happened when she was your age."

This confused Harry, but Dumbledore didn't give him the chance to go further.

"I think it is time to leave you to your rest. Enjoy the gifts of your friends. And make sure to be in shape when your mother wakes up."

Harry smiled, but then he realized the pile was way too huge only for his friends to have brought these. "Who brought everything?"

"Your friends," Dumbledore repeated. "Though you may not know some of them. We may call them admirers instead. What happened down in the dungeons between you and Professor Quirrell is a complete secret, so, naturally, the whole school knows. I believe Mr George and Mr Fred Weasley tried to send you a lavatory seat, but Madam Pomfrey felt it might not be hygienic."

On that last joke that caused Harry to laugh, the Headmaster left. Harry then laid on his back, his head on the pillow. He turned his head to his left to look at his mother who was still sleeping peacefully, and he waited for her to wake up. He ate some of the sweets his friends brought him, thinking how funny it would have been if he actually received the lavatory seat. He remembered hearing the Weasley twins telling their little sister, Ginny, that they would send her one before they embarked on the Hogwarts Express. He wondered if they actually did send her one.

He hoped that his mother would wake up soon. On one side, he had many questions to ask her. There were these things Voldemort said. Do you know why I tried to kill you that night... When you were still a baby... Have you ever wondered why I spared your mother on that day... Why she is alive today... Why your father died and she is still breathing... Harry told himself that it was nothing. Voldemort had killed his father. He was just taunting his mother, trying to make her suffer. But there was also a part of him that had questions for her. And there was also what Dumbledore just told him. You shouldn't be too hard on her for events that happened when she was your age. What did it mean? He wanted to know, but at the same time, he looked at his mother, and he thought she must have been worried for him. She was always worried about him, but this time... He had gone through a dog with three heads, a Devil's Snare, giant chess pieces, poisons and even Voldemort himself, all that for a stone. He felt guilty for bringing her in all this, for endangering her life. Would it really be the time to ask her questions?

Ron and Hermione came to visit him later. Hermione looked about to throw herself into her arms. Luckily, she didn't. Harry was afraid that Madam Pomfrey would send them both out if she did.

"We were so worried about you," Hermione said very quickly. "Dumbledore told us you would be fine, but you were out for so long..."

"Well, glad to see you back, Harry," Ron interrupted her. "The whole school is talking about this. I think there are over a hundred different stories. Fred and George must be at the origin of half of them. What really happened?"

"Wait, first, I want to know what happened to you? How did you get out of the dungeons?" Harry asked.

"You should ask Hermione. I was unconscious most of the time."

"Well, we needed help," Hermione started to explain. "I carried Ronald up to the Devil's Snare, but I couldn't keep him on a broom to fly. That's when your mother arrived. Is she okay?" Hermione asked while looking at her.

"Just sleeping. Please continue, Hermione."

"Oh, yes. I helped her grab the right flying key, and then she arranged something for me to fly with Ronald on a stretcher behind. We got through the trapdoor, and then we left the forbidden corridor. We quickly found Professor McGonagall and brought Ron here. Dumbledore arrived not long after. He seemed to already know where you were."

"I only remember arriving at the infirmary," Ron said. "And I left the day after. Just in time, or I might have missed the Quidditch match."

"The Quidditch match?" Then Harry remembered. "What happened against Ravenclaw?"

"We lost," Ron said, obviously unhappy about it. "Really, it was unfair. Wood had to make Katie Bell the Seeker. She's not bad, but she's not you. That girl from Ravenclaw got the Snitch and we lost the championship."

"Do you have a problem with their Seeker being a girl?" Hermione asked, after rolling her eyes.

"No, but she was only a replacement. The girl was only a second-year, and you have no idea how small she was."

"Harry is small," Hermione pointed out. Harry was about to contest this assertion, but Ron spoke before he could.

"Hermione, she was very, very small. We should have won. The team was motivated to win like never. We arrived third, with only twenty points behind Slytherin. Fred and George were angry too, and they were right. And Ginny then spent the day asking to see you and how you were doing. I don't know how many times I had to tell her you were okay, but that she couldn't enter the school."

"What was the worst for you? Losing a Quidditch game or enduring your little sister?"

"Hey, you weren't there at the game. You spent it with Harry and his mother here. We were so close to winning this year, and Slytherins get their sixth Quidditch Cup in a row! If I had been that Seeker, I would have let Katie Bell catch the Snitch."

They continued quarrelling, and Harry couldn't help but find it funny. He got the impression that Ron and Hermione somehow kind of enjoyed it as well, and kept arguing only for the sake of it. His mother stirred at this moment, but Hermione and Ron continued to argue.

"James," she mumbled as she rubbed her eyes and yawned, sitting in her bed. "How many times did I tell you? No wandering with your cloak at night."

Harry didn't know how to react to this, and Hermione and Ron didn't seem to either, as they both stopped arguing and looked at Harry's mother. She looked only half-awaken, but sat on her bed with her feet in Harry's direction, and as soon as she saw him, she rushed to him and pulled him into a tight embrace.

"Harry! I was so afraid for you!"

Harry supported the hug. He looked at Ron and Hermione who waved their hands to tell him goodbye, obviously not wanting to stay there. Harry tried to nod his head to mean he understood and to thank them.

"Please, never make me afraid like this again, my dear."

Harry nodded. His mother might be overprotective, but he loved her, and she loved him. The fact he felt tears falling on the top of his head was proof enough of that. He had questions for her, but in this very moment, he decided to leave them unanswered. After all, didn't Dumbledore tell him to not be too hard on her for events that happened when she was his age? And considering what Harry just did, he guessed he should just let it go.

Not much new in this chapter, when compared to canon. Let's just say that for now, Harry remains in the dark on many things, including why Voldemort wanted to kill him, and also about his mother's and Snape's common past.

Please review.

Next chapter: Lily