The metal plate Harry was pressed against was very cold, and the bare skin of his wrist felt as if it were freezing. But with his son Albus watching from the sidelines, he feigned complete calmness and waited for the machine to begin working. Soon, the steel structure surrounding the central section of the machine began to rotate slowly. A thin metallic membrane, reminiscent of an umbrella, stretched out from the structure and covered Albus's face, which looked like it was about to burst into tears. Trapped in complete darkness, Harry wished he could have given his son one last warm smile.

He tried to reassure himself that this wasn't a permanent separation, that he would soon be a wizard and see his son again, and that there was no point in regretting it. All the while, the structure that cocooned him spun faster and faster, and the heat emanating from the working parts of the machine washed over him. But the warmth was short-lived as a cold female voice suddenly spoke into his ear, sending a shiver down his spine.

"The Machine of Reality is about to activate. You are now asked to look straight ahead."

The voice seemed to be artificially created by a spell, like the ones in the lifts at the Ministry of Magic. Harry did as the voice said and fixed his eyes on the darkness in front of him. He didn't know if his eyes were getting used to the darkness or if there was a very faint light coming from somewhere, but gradually he could vaguely make out the metal plates in front of him and the seams between them. Then, just as quickly, the boundaries between the plates blurred and the surface became smooth and faintly shimmering, as if melting. At first, Harry thought the metal plates were turning into clear glass. After a moment, it was indeed turning into glass, but not the clear kind. Harry thought the faint figure, almost shrouded in darkness, was Albus looking at him from outside, but he soon realized that there was a mirror in front of him and he was looking at his own reflection.

"Searching for coordinates: now please think about what you really wish to be."

Coordinates? And what did he wish to be? Harry's mind was spinning from the two unrelated things he'd just heard, and then a memory from when he was very young took shape and flashed before his eyes. A beautiful mirror, high enough to reach the ceiling, surrounded by an elaborate gold rim, with an inscription around the top that read: Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi. Harry's eyes widened again and he stared at the mirror in front of him, wondering if this was the same Mirror of Erised he had encountered in his first year, the one that had shown him what he wished for instead of what he actually was?

"The coordinates have not been assigned yet, please think about what you want to be," urged the cold female voice.

Harry quickly pulled himself together and looked at the mirror, which still showed him as he was, and tried to think of what he wished he could change. It was not an easy task, given the lack of oxygen in the cramped, stuffy cabin. Harry closed his eyes and thought about how he had ended up in this place. Yes, he had been a wizard once, and it had made him happy. And it had gotten him out of the cramped cupboard under the stairs at number four, Privet Drive, and into a much bigger place, Hogwarts, where he truly belonged.

"I want to be a wizard again," Harry murmured, checking the mirror out of the corner of his eye, afraid to interrupt his train of thought. His reflection was slightly different from his current self. Harry's face looked younger and less tired, and he was dressed in handsome crimson robes and a similarly colored pointy wizard's hat. In his hand he held a wand, not a crude plastic imitation, but a wand made of holly and phoenix feather, his lifelong companion.

"But is that all?" said the cold voice. It sounded surprisingly clear over the hum of the machines, as if it came from inside Harry's head rather than outside. "Do you think being a wizard again will ever make you truly happy?"

"Yes. I think I could," said Harry firmly.

"But will it really?" the woman's voice said softly. "You want more than that, don't you?"

Harry tried to deny it, but his mouth wouldn't move. Flashes of his past moved dizzily before his slightly lifted eyelids. . . . The two flashes of green light that had killed his parents, Cedric Diggory sprawled on the floor, dead, Sirius Black gone forever behind the veil, Dumbledore's corpse with his limbs snapped randomly like a broken doll. . . . He had not been happy, despite being a wizard. In fact, because of that, the shadow of unhappiness that had fallen upon him at the age of one never left him. . . .

"I must save the loved ones," muttered Harry. "I have to become a wizard and save my family and friends. It's the only way I'll ever be happy."

But what if I lose? A dark voice whispered inside him. What if I lose the final confrontation with Eisenbein and lose everything, just like I lost Hagrid in the Forbidden Forest? What if this is all a losing battle?

"It's not!" Harry shouted sharply. His voice boomed, amplified in the cramped confines of the machine. "I can save everyone. Everyone . . . "

Harry tried to see himself in the mirror, wide-eyed and ready to fight, the great wizard he had become, but he couldn't, as if something heavy was pressing down on his eyelids. Through his squinted eyes, something strange was happening in the mirror. The image of him as a wizard was getting smaller and smaller, and other black figures appeared behind him, filling the mirror. It was as if he was being defeated by the shadows, sealing his fate. . . . Focusing all his strength on his eyes, Harry finally managed to lift his eyelids completely, but the Mirror of Erised was no longer in front of him. There was only blackness, just like the first time.

"Coordinate measurement completed. Have a nice trip."

The woman's voice said and then cut off. But no matter how long he waited, nothing happened. At least that's what Harry thought, until he noticed that the darkness in front of him was getting thicker by the second. . . . At the same time, the steel structure surrounding him was spinning faster and faster, and the rumbling was getting louder and louder. What's more, the sound didn't just get louder, it seemed to mutate into something else. It was as if someone was faintly whispering and muttering unintelligible words. . . .

Harry, who had been listening in silence, took a breath as he realized where he had heard the same sound before; from beyond the archway of the Ministry of Magic that had swallowed Sirius came the exact same sound. Suddenly aware that he was facing the same gate of death as the one in the Department of Mysteries, Harry struggled to free himself. But the machine that enveloped him didn't budge, and the darkness before him grew thicker and thicker until it finally engulfed him. . . . It was all black now, not just in front of him, but all around him, and he felt an intense chill run through his body like icy water.

Had Sirius been this cold when he went through the archway? Giving up on everything, Harry asked himself this question at the last moment. It didn't matter anyway, he would see him again soon, on the other side of the veil. . . . A faint horn sounded, similar to that of a train, as if the machine had sensed the death of its occupant and ceased to function. Death had finally found him, and there was nowhere to hide. Perhaps it had been planned from the moment the Cloak of Invisibility had been taken from him, but the image of Eisenbein wearing the Cloak as if it were his own made his heart beat faster again as anger and hatred took over. He couldn't die like this, he had to get back to his family.

"Ginny!" Harry called out harshly. "James! Albus! Lily!" He shouted their names over and over again. They were the only ones he had left, the ones that death could not take away. "Ginny! James! Albus! Lily!"

His desperate cries must have worked, because his blackened vision gradually brightened, revealing the dark room he was trapped in. Strangely, the room felt larger than before. There were no more places to swing his arms and bump into. Harry floundered in the darkness, trying to free himself from the flat slab he was lying on. His surroundings were no longer barricaded. With a thud, he fell to the hard floor in excruciating pain. His knees burned like they were on fire from the impact, and his vision blurred. Then, in the distance, a red shape emerged from the darkness. The first thing that came to mind was his daughter Lily, with the red hair she'd inherited from her grandmother and mother.

"Lily, is that you?" whispered Harry. "Lily, Daddy's here, help!"

His cries were cut short by a blur of red hair, and then it was gone. As Harry collapsed in despair, he heard footsteps approaching and someone gently scooping him up and laying him on a fluffy spot. A warm hand pressed against his burning forehead, taking in the warmth.

"Shh, everything's going to be okay, just drink this," a woman's soft voice said. With that, a spoon of warm, sweet liquid was pushed into Harry's mouth and he gulped it down without a second thought. As drowsiness soon overcame him and everything became a blank, he forced his eyes open with the last of his strength to see who had helped him. The red-haired woman was back. That was enough, he thought, letting go and sinking comfortably into the dreamless world of sleep.

It was the sound of children giggling that woke Harry from his deep sleep. It was very faint, but he could still make out the innocent joy in it. Harry opened his eyes and lay there in a daze for a moment. It was dizzyingly bright around him, and the machine that had trapped him in that small, cramped space was gone. It took him a moment to remember why he had been trapped there in the first place. As his confused mind finally recalled the shape of the Machine of Reality and the metallic covering that had surrounded the slab on which he had been placed, he scrambled to his feet and sat up.

The scene around him was very different from the one he'd left: a bedroom, the walls covered in a warm beige wallpaper. On one side of the wall was the bed he was sitting on, with bright sunlight streaming in from a large window on the opposite wall, and next to it was a bookshelf filled with books, a wooden chair that looked too small for him, and a desk. The comfort of the fluffy bed gave way to a feeling of grimness as he realized that he must have failed to successfully activate Ekrizdis's mysterious machine; far from turning him into a wizard, the scrap metal device had apparently knocked him unconscious, and if that were the case, he would be lying in a hospital wing for treatment.

Harry slid off the bed and stood up straight, then staggered in shock and nearly fell over. He was so small. . . . The bottom of the windowsill, which he had thought was waist-high, was right in front of his face, and the desk and chair, which he had just thought were too small, seemed just right for him. He brought a hand up to his face to rub his eyes and was in for an even bigger shock. The scar on the back of his hand from Umbridge's pointed black quill was gone, and the smooth, furry, pink-skinned hand was tiny, almost childlike.

Harry scrambled to his feet and ran to the window, pressing his face against the glass. The bright morning light was blinding, but he forced his eyes open and stared at his completely changed face. The green eyes, round glasses, and untidy black hair were similar to what he remembered, but the face was that of a child, at least thirty years younger. The short stubble around his mouth had been replaced by a fluffy fuzz, and there was no sign of the scar on his cheek from the curse he'd received as an Auror.

Had the Machine of Reality had a side effect and made him younger? It was better than dying, but it was a very disturbing prospect for a man who had an immediate war to fight. He suddenly remembered the case of Crabbe senior, whose face had turned into that of a baby in the Time Room during the battle at the Ministry, and who had spent the next few years babbling in St. Mungo's. . . .

Harry then raised a hand to push his bangs away, exposing his forehead, and was shocked, more so than the fact that he was back to his childhood self. The lightning scar that was supposed to be there was gone. With the scar on his forehead that had been there for as long as he could remember nowhere to be seen, Harry suddenly realized something: He hadn't just gotten younger. It was as if his entire life had been erased and his soul put into a body that didn't quite fit.

He opened the window and stuck his head out, still stinging from the shock of it all, to take in the scene outside. He was on the second floor of a small building that faced the street, a narrow path lined with two-story houses that were probably similar to where he was now. He could hear the laughter of small children running around somewhere in the open space between the street and the buildings. Then the sound of a door opening behind him made him jump and turn to see someone's thick, dark red hair moving in a flurry.

"You're up, Harry. Have some breakfast!"

A soft female voice called from the hallway, clearly his wife, Ginny. Apparently, they had been forced to stay together in this unknown place to care for him after his near-fatal accident. . . . Harry looked out of the window once more before leaving the room and remembered seeing a small town that looked similar to this one a long time ago. He couldn't remember exactly where it was, but it was probably Hogsmeade.

Harry pushed the door open slowly, as if he were in a haunted house, and made his way down the stairs. When he reached the narrow hallway, his already foggy mind became even more complicated. What the hell was he supposed to do with Ginny? With his height reduced by less than half and his physical age by a quarter, it would be ridiculous to treat her as his wife. But that didn't change the fact that he was Harry Potter, and yes, perhaps Hermione would find a way to make him grow back into his adult body. . . . He was sorry that the scar on his forehead that had become his trademark was gone, but it wasn't like he couldn't live without it.

A short distance down the hallway he came to a small living room with a long couch, and through the slightly open door beyond it he could hear the humming of a woman busily preparing a meal. Harry took a deep breath as he passed the couch, which seemed large and intimidating in his shrunken form, and pushed open the door.

The red-haired woman had just finished scooping fried eggs and sausage from a frying pan onto a plate, and with a flick of her wand, the greasy pan came to life and began to clean itself in the sink. The smell of food filled his nostrils, and it was only then that Harry realized he was incredibly hungry. He stumbled over to the table where the plates were set and almost screamed in surprise when he came face to face with the woman who had just turned around. She wasn't Ginny, although she had similar red hair. She was a woman Harry had never met in person, but even so, he couldn't miss the bright green eyes beneath the dark red hair, eyes that looked just like his own.

"Mum?" murmured Harry.

"Did you sleep well, Harry?" Lily smiled brightly, came over and placed a hand on his forehead. "The fever's gone, dear. You had some wild dreams last night, screaming and fussing, didn't you?"

"I thought we were on a first-name basis now, son?" came a man's voice, and a new face appeared as the newspaper on one side of the table was lowered. Harry stared at James Potter, his heart pounding. With his messy jet-black hair, thin face and round glasses, he looked like a twin of his older self, except that his nose was slightly longer than Harry's and his eyes were hazel. James grinned mischievously and said, "James! Lily! I can't count how many times you've said our names in your sleep. . . . That wasn't all, he called other names too —"

"Oh yeah, he called Genie too," Lily said, bursting into laughter. She pulled out a chair for Harry and he hesitantly sat down at the head of the table. "Maybe he had a dream about Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, I remember telling him that story a while ago . . . "

"And he called Albus too," James said, picking up a large sausage on his plate with his fork and taking a bite. "I don't know anyone with that name except Albus Dumbledore, and frankly, I felt sorry for you, Harry. I mean, I know you're going to be starting school soon, but you're already screaming the headmaster's name at the top of your lungs. . . . I suppose you can't wait to get out of our house?"

Hearing that, Harry looked down at the copy of the Daily Prophet that James had folded on the table. At the top of the front page was the date 24 July 1991. . . . Exactly one week before his fateful eleventh birthday, the day he had found out he was a wizard. Harry looked over at his parents at breakfast and poked at the food on his plate with his fork. He was starving, but an old superstition from his time in the Muggle world echoed in his mind. Muggles believed that once they put food from the world beyond the veil into their mouths, they could never get out. . . . And his parents must have died.

"Er, am I dead?" said Harry. At the words, James and Lily looked back at Harry, their eyes wide.

"What do you mean, dead?"

"I-I mean — if I'm here — Mum and Dad, you were — a long time ago —" Harry stuttered, then shut up. No matter how he looked at it, his parents were as much alive as he was, and moreover, they didn't seem to be aware that they were dead. Finally, Harry swallowed what he was about to say and said, "It's nothing, I just had the worst nightmare last night. . . . I guess I'm still trying to shake it off."

"Really? What was the dream about?" said Lily, her eyes narrowing.

"Well, it was . . . about us being in a car crash," Harry rambled on, and James, who had been listening seriously, chuckled.

"I guess I've been showing you too many motorcycle magazines lately! Huh, a car crash? I've never heard of a wizard dying in a car."

"Oh, have you not?" said Harry, grinning awkwardly.

"I think we should eat and go for a walk, James," Lily said worriedly. "Our dear son must be having these nightmares from the lack of sunlight . . . "

Harry, who had been nibbling at the food on his plate, heard his mother's soothing voice and finally picked up the bacon with his fork and shoved it into his mouth. If this was the afterlife, he thought, it would be a good place to be. Once Harry, who was starving, had cleared his plate as ravenously as his cousin Dudley (which took quite a while as James had made him four more fried eggs when he saw his son doing so), the three of them went for a walk at Lily's suggestion.

James had insisted on going out in his scarlet Gryffindor Quidditch robes, but at Lily's insistence he'd settled for a plain Muggle shirt and trousers, while Lily, true to her Muggle roots, wore a light yellow floral dress that seemed appropriate for the midsummer weather. In the hall leading from the living room to the front door, an old orange cat curled up in front of the fireplace mewed goodbye.

Outside the door was a small garden surrounded by a neat hedge. As soon as Harry stepped onto the manicured lawn, the memory of his first visit to this house came back to him. Yes, he had come to Godric's Hollow with Hermione to find the sword of Gryffindor. . . . In the yard of the Potter family home, which had been abandoned for sixteen years and by then almost in ruins, bushes had grown waist-high and dark ivy had covered the entire house. One side of the roof had had a hole in it, the result of Voldemort's Killing Curse, and there had even been a sign in the garden commemorating the Potters' deaths. But now the house looked just as intact and well-kept as the other houses on either side of it. It was as if Voldemort had never been in this neighborhood at all. . . .

"What are you looking at so intently, boy? Everything looks so new today, huh?" James grinned and ruffled his son's hair.

Harry nervously took both of his parents' hands and stood in the middle of Lily and James as they walked out of the front gate. Their house was at the edge of the village, at the end of the street. Beyond the low stone wall that bordered the village were green fields, crisscrossed by a small stream, and beyond that a forest full of old trees. Similar two-story houses lined both sides of the narrow but beautiful cobbled street. Harry concentrated on the warmth of the parents' hands in his own, glancing up at their relaxed, happy faces every chance he got. They looked too natural to be dead, and this place too real to be the afterlife.

Was this a dream then? The last dream of his life, as he lay unconscious and dying in the Machine of Reality. . . . He shuddered to remember the dark, cold underground of Azkaban he had left behind. Yes, this must be a dream; there could be no other explanation. Harry kept walking down the street with James and Lily, determined to make the time in this dream count before his consciousness was trapped in complete darkness. From his short height, the rows of houses seemed as imposing and grand as the skyscrapers of the Muggle world. Turning a corner, he heard the sound of loud voices and saw a pub bustling with the early morning crowd.

"Son, would you like to join me for a beer?" said James, winking at hm.

"James, you say that to a child?" said Lily, slapping her husband's shoulder.

"Well, I drank beer like it was water when I was Harry's age . . . "

"That's why you ended up like this!" snapped Lily, bursting into laughter. Harry smiled with them, realizing all over again how young James and Lily had died; now that he was almost eleven, they must have just entered their thirties. . . . It was a very strange feeling to realize that he was actually older than his parents now.

"I'll let you try the butterbeer later," said James quietly. "If you're going to Hogsmeade, you'll have to get it first, because there's nothing like sneaking it into your dormitory and drinking it."

"You're being a really good parent," sighed Lily, glaring at her husband, and Harry smiled in spite of himself. It was comforting to think that this was all a dream. After a moment of discomfort and awkwardness at being back in a child's body, now that he was between his mother and father, a sense of security and belonging that he hadn't felt in a long time filled his little body with warm happiness.

Not long after passing the local tavern, they came to a small square in the center of town. In the middle of the white-tiled square stood a stone obelisk covered with the names of those who had lost their lives in the war. As they passed the war memorial, Harry stared at it intently. The last time he'd been here, another memorial had stood in the same place, consisting of the hidden statues of James, Lily and Harry himself as a baby, protected from the eyes of Muggles. But the war memorial did not disappear, it was still there. . . . Of course it was, because the three people it was meant to commemorate were still walking around, alive and well. Everything felt so vivid, considering it was all a dream.

"Bathilda! What are you doing here?" Lily said cheerfully when she saw an old woman coming toward them.

Harry looked that way, then noticed that the old woman had just stepped out of the church that bordered the square. Bathilda Bagshot was small, not much taller than young Harry, perhaps stooped with age. Her eyes were clouded with cataracts that gave them a slight creamy tint, and she hadn't heard Lily's call for some time before she finally spotted her and approached. She was limping slightly and her face was wrinkled and covered in age spots, but she certainly looked better than the last time Harry had seen her. Of course, back then he'd been dealing with a dead Bathilda, controlled by an evil snake. . . .

"Oh, Lily, I've got some work to do at the church. Them Muggles will never guess how this old lady can move all those chairs faster than a young man." With a mischievous grin, Bathilda pointed to her own wand, protruding from her pocket. "I'm becoming more and more intrigued by religion as I near the end of my life. . . . Of course, that's a long way off for you at your age."

"Not at all, you're still in your prime!" said Lily affectionately, and Bathilda giggled like a little girl. Harry felt a strange sensation as he remembered that in the original world he had come from, Lily and James had died at a much younger age than Bathilda.

"If you're not in a hurry, why don't you come to my house for a cup of tea?" said Bathilda kindly. "All my friends are dead, and it's so boring to live alone. . . . At least now I have you Potters to talk to."

"Of course, Bathilda. It just so happens that our son is also looking for a change of scenery," James said, putting a hand on Harry's shoulder. "He said he had a nightmare last night, and I'm sure a hot cup of tea will help him have a better dream."

Harry thought he was already having the best dream ever, but he didn't say it out loud. An excited Bathilda walked down the street as fast as her limp would allow, chattering to them that Hannah, the daughter of the Abbott family who had once lived in the village, was now old enough to attend Hogwarts with Harry. They left the square and turned into the small street where the Potter family home was, and after passing a few houses, opened the gate and entered. Bathilda paused at the front door and fumbled in her pockets for her keys, then gave up and exclaimed, "Accio Key!"

A tiny key popped out of her coat pocket and slid into the front door, unlocking it. Bathilda followed it across the threshold into a darkened living room, where repeated flicks of her wand, one by one, dimly lit the candlesticks on the tables and cupboards scattered about the room. With trembling hands, Bathilda tried to light the cold fireplace, but with little success; the faint flame died each time on the damp logs.

"I'll do it." Lily stepped forward and brought the flames to life, instantly brightening the room.

"Ah, thank you, Lily. I'm getting old, even basic magic like this is difficult. . . ." Bathilda smiled and led the Potters to two couches in the living room, facing each other, with a table in the middle. "Please sit here for a moment. I'll have tea brewed in a moment . . . "

"She seems to be getting less mobile by the day," said Lily sadly, watching her with concern as she limped into the kitchen. "I wonder if we should take her to St. Mungo's or something . . . "

"Don't worry, dear. Bathilda's been a crooked old lady since I was a little boy, she's no different now," said James cheerfully. He looked around the living room with a curious gleam in his eye that reminded him of a mischievous boy, until he spotted a bow-fronted chest of drawers and walked over to it. He looked at the numerous photographs on it, then beckoned to Harry.

"Harry, come here. Your grandparents are here."

Harry rose to his feet and examined a photograph of an old man with knobbly knees, similar to his and his father's, and a gentle-looking old woman. Seeing their grandson, Fleamont and Euphemia Potter smiled broadly and waved.

"I guess you never met them, Harry. They were so sweet and kind," Lily said as she walked over to her husband and son and looked at the picture. "They would have loved you so much if they hadn't gotten dragon pox and died so young."

"Just like you love me so much now?" Harry said, deeply touched; James started to chuckle.

"Ha ha, it seems you've grown up all of a sudden after that nightmare!"

"Harry was already more mature than you before that, James," said Lily. James just grinned, then picked up the other pictures and examined them one by one, his attention drawn to a picture of two teenage boys standing shoulder to shoulder. "Wow, look at this. That's a young Dumbledore! And who's that next to him?"

"I wonder if that's Elphias Doge, they were very close as children," said Lily thoughtfully.

"There's no way Doge could have been such a handsome man, and this one doesn't have any pockmarks on his face."

Harry knew full well that Dumbledore's friend in the picture was none other than Gellert Grindelwald, one of the worst Dark wizards of all time, but he didn't dare bring it up. They stopped arguing, put the silver frame back in its place, and returned to the couch to sit down when they heard a rustling in the hallway. Harry was exchanging furtive glances with Lily and James when Batilda came in carrying a silver tray with a teapot and a cake. She was trembling and looked like she was going to drop the tray at any moment, so James quickly flicked his wand — the tray slipped out of her hands and floated gently to land on the table.

"Thank you, James. The older I get, the more I forget spells and it's hard to do the simplest magic. . . . Oh, right, now I'll get the teacups."

Batilda flicked her wand in the direction of the hallway, but nothing came except the repeated sound of something breaking.

"I'll go see," Lily said, watching her nervously.

"Wait a minute, Mum. Let me try," said Harry. He took the wand from his father's hand and wielded it skillfully, worried that the effects of the Fourth Curse would leave him unable to use magic even in his dreams, but fortunately this wasn't the case: Soon shards of broken pottery were flying through the hallway. Excited to use his magic for the first time in a long time, Harry flicked his wand again and the flying shards rearranged themselves into a set of four sleek, stunning teacups on the dining room table. It wasn't until the kettle moved of its own accord, pouring hot tea into each of the four cups, that Harry looked up to find the three adults staring at him with utterly bemused expressions. He felt a pang of regret for using magic too advanced for his age, but it was too late.

"Lily, I think we . . . " James, who had been watching his son for what seemed like an eternity, finally turned to his wife and spoke. "I think we . . . have given birth to a Dumbledore."

"Indeed! I've lived a long life, and I've only known two boys to show such talent at such a young age, and one of them was Dumbledore," said Bathilda admiringly. "And his best friend, another."

"You mean Grindelwald," Harry blurted out. Lily, who had still been staring blankly into her teacup in shock, shot up at him.

"Grindelwald? Harry, it's rude to say that! I'm sorry, Bathilda — I've been reading him a history book lately and —"

"How did you know it was Gellert?" said Bathilda in surprise, looking around at the chest of drawers with its many framed photographs. "You must have seen the picture, didn't you?"

"Oh, no, ma'am . . . " Harry raced to think of something to say. "It just popped into my head, you know, Grindelwald was the most notorious Dark wizard next to Voldemort, and he was quite powerful."

"Voldemort? Who is that?" James asked, raising an eyebrow. "I've never heard that name before . . . Is he a French?"

"You don't know Voldemort?" said Harry in shock. But the confused looks on the faces of the three adults told him it wasn't a joke. "Oh, I just — I guess he's from my nightmares then."

"Well, if that's the case, he might as well be in your dreams a lot," said Bathilda, gesturing to the teapot and cups in front of her. "Maybe he's the one who taught you all that wonderful magic. . . . Anyway, Dumbledore and Grindelwald were —"

From then on, as if she had been waiting for it, Bathilda excitedly told the story of how Grindelwald, who had been invited to stay at her house, had struck up a friendship with Dumbledore. While Lily and James listened with interest and disbelief, Harry wondered why the adults hadn't recognized the name Voldemort. Not only had Voldemort never come to town to harm the Potters in this dream world, it was as if he had never existed. Now that Harry thought about it, Voldemort was the one who had robbed him of the life he could have had, a happy life like the one he had in this dream. . . . As soon as he got rid of the villain, Lily and James appeared before him, alive and well, as if nothing had happened.

They had finally finished their tea, and the Potters were escorted out into the street by Bathilda. As they made their way to a house not many doors away, James looked back to see if she was there and said, "Bathilda really needs to go to St. Mungo's."

"She really does! I can't believe Dumbledore was that close to Grindelwald. . . . I mean, she seemed serious, but still."

"What do you think, Harry? You brought it up first," said James, looking back at his son.

"Well, sometimes facts can be more amazing than outrageous myths and legends," said Harry with a shrug. James chuckled and ran his hand through his son's hair.

"Ha, you sound like a politician! But you'll regret that soon enough. Especially after one of Professor Binns's History of Magic classes, where the word 'fact' makes you doze off as soon as you hear it." Harry burst out laughing with Lily as James tilted his head back and snored plausibly, pretending to be asleep. James opened one eye and laughed with them. "I was trying to imitate your mother. You wouldn't believe how she snored so loudly in History of Magic that no one could hear the lesson. Well, her snoring was still funnier than Binns's droning, so I couldn't complain."

"What are you talking about? I never slept in class!"

"You did! I was watching you the whole time."

"What? How devious!"

"Ha ha, was I?"

After a good round of laughter, the Potters returned home and had a hearty lunch. In the afternoon, James left to run some errands in Diagon Alley, leaving Harry at home with his mother. Lily sat Harry down on the living room couch for a while, then returned with a large black box on the dining room table, which she lifted into the air.

"Mummy's got something for you," Lily exclaimed happily as she entered the room. She opened the box to reveal a small caludron, a pestle, scales, flasks, tongs, and other small tools. "This is a children's potions making kit. I thought it would be good for you to learn the basics before you start school."

Lily taught Harry how to make the potion she'd given him last night, the one that would allow him to sleep soundly and dreamlessly. Harry hadn't always been good at making potions; he made some mistakes like adding the wrong ingredients and heating the caludron too hot. He looked into Lily's green eyes every chance he got and could see why those who had known her always said he had his mother's eyes; she seemed to have a knack for making everyone around her feel light and happy. Even when he accidentally added too much snail powder to the potion, causing it to emit dark green smoke, Lily's laughter brought a smile to Harry's face.

They spent the rest of the day enjoying dinner with James after he returned, and finally Harry dragged his tired body back to the bedroom. Before turning out the lights, Lily placed a small glass jar of the potion that would keep him from dreaming on his bedside table.

"Here, this is the potion we made together. If you feel like you're going to have any more wild dreams tonight, take a sip and go to sleep."

"I will, Mum," said Harry. But he knew very well that he wouldn't drink the potion, no matter what. If only he could keep having these happy dreams. . . .

He desperately hoped that this dream would never end, no matter what. But the cold voice in his head told him that it was all over now, that if he fell asleep, the last dream of his life would end and death would come for him. But just as death could never be stopped, an irresistible wave of sleep soon washed over him, and gradually everything turned black. Thinking that it wouldn't be so bad if he died after such a good dream, Harry finally fell asleep.