Chapter Text
Aragog’s Funeral was over but the Felix Felicis still lingered in Harry’s system as he crept back into the castle. The potion seemed to carve his path through the dark school grounds, guiding him confidently back the way he came and instilling the sense in him that there was a direction he was still meant to be going.
The front door remained unlocked when he reached it and he managed to avoid Peeves successfully on the third floor. But by the time he got up to the portrait of the Fat Lady and pulled off his Invisibility Cloak, he was somewhat surprised to find her in a most unhelpful mood.
“What sort of time do you call this?”
“I’m really sorry — I had to go out for something important —“
“Well the password changed at midnight, so you’ll just have to sleep in the corridor, won’t you?”
“You’re joking!” said Harry, wondering if the potion might be wearing off early. Wasn’t it supposed to last for twelve hours? “Why did it have to change at midnight?”
“That’s the way it is,” said the Fat Lady. “If you’re angry, go and take it up with the headmaster, he’s the one who’s tightened security.”
“Fantastic,” said Harry bitterly, looking around at the hard floor. “Really brilliant. Yeah, I would go and take it up with Dumbledore if he was here, because he’s the one who’s wanted me to —“
“He is here,” said a voice behind Harry. “Professor Dumbledore returned to the school an hour ago.”
Nearly Headless Nick was gliding toward Harry, his head wobbling as usual upon his ruff.
“I had it from the Bloody Baron, who saw him arrive,” said Nick. “He appeared, according to the Baron, to be in good spirits, though a little tired, of course.”
“Where is he?” Said Harry, his heart leaping. The Felix Felicis nudged him gently toward the corridor to his left and suddenly Harry was sure that his good fortune hadn’t quite run out.
“Oh, groaning and clanking up on the Astronomy Tower, it’s a favourite pastime of his —“
“Not the Bloody Baron — Dumbledore!”
“Oh — in his office,” said Nick. “I believe, from what the Baron said, that he had business to attend to before turning in —“
“Yeah, he has,” said Harry, excitement blazing in his chest at the prospect of telling Dumbledore he had secured the memory. He knew, with intense certainty, that he needed to speak with the headmaster as soon as he could. He wheeled about and sprinted off again, ignoring the Fat Lady who was calling after him.
“Come back! All right, I lied! I was annoyed you woke me up! The password’s still ‘tapeworm’!”
But Harry was already hurtling back along the corridor and within minutes he was saying “toffee eclairs” to Dumbledore’s gargoyle, which leapt aside, permitting Harry entrance onto the spiral staircase.
“Enter,” said Dumbledore when Harry knocked. He sounded exhausted.
Harry pushed open the door. There was Dumbledore’s office, looking the same as ever, but with black, star-strewn skies beyond the windows.
“Good gracious, Harry,” said Dumbledore in surprise. “To what do I owe this very late pleasure?”
“Sir — I’ve got it. I’ve got the memory from Slughorn.”
Harry pulled out the tiny glass bottle and showed it to Dumbledore. For a moment or two, the headmaster looked stunned. Then his face split into a wide smile.
“Harry this is spectacular news! Very well done indeed! I knew you could do it!”
All thought of the lateness of the hour apperarently forgotten, he hurried around his desk, took the bottle with Slughorn’s memory in his hand, and strode over to the cabinet where he kept the Pensieve.
“And now,” said Dumbledore, placing the stone basin upon his desk and emptying the contents of the bottle into it. “Now, at last, we shall see. Harry, quickly…”
Harry bowed obediently over the Pensieve, golden anticipation thrumming in his veins, and felt his feet leave the office floor… once again he fell through darkness and landed in Horace Slughorn’s office many years before.
There was the much younger Slughorn, with his thick, straw-coloured hair and his gingery-blond moustache, sitting again in the comfortable winged armchair in his office, his feet resting upon a velvet pouffe, a small glass of wine in one hand, the other rummaging in a box of crystallized pineapple. And there were the half-dozen teenage boys sitting around Slughorn with Tom Riddle in the midst of them, Marvolo’s gold-and-black ring gleaming on his finger.
Dumbledore landed beside Harry just as Riddle asked, “Sir, is it true that Professor Merrythought is retiring?”
“Tom, Tom, if I knew I couldn’t tell you,” said Slughorn, wagging his finger reprovingly at Riddle, though winking at the same time. “I must say, I’d like to know where you get your information, boy, more knowledgeable than half the staff, you are.”
Riddle smiled; the other boys laughed and cast him admiring looks.
“What with your uncanny ability to know things you shouldn’t, and your careful flattery of the people who matter — thank you for the pineapple, by the way, you’re quite right, it is my favourite —“
Several of the boys tittered again.
“— I confidently expect you to rise to Minister of Magic within twenty years. Fifteen, if you keep sending me pineapple, I have excellent contacts at the Ministry.”
Tom Riddle merely smiled as the others laughed again. Harry noticed that he was by no means the eldest of the group of boys, but they all seemed to look to him as their leader.
“I don’t know that politics would suit me, sir,” he said when the laughter had died away. “I don’t have the right kind of background, for one thing.”
A couple of the boys around him smirked at each other. Harry was sure that they were enjoying a private joke, undoubtedly about what they knew, or suspected, regarding their gang leader’s famous ancestor.
“Nonsense,” said Slughorn briskly, “couldn’t be plainer you come from decent Wizarding stock, abilities like yours. No, you’ll go far, Tom, I’ve never been wrong about a student yet.”
The small golden clock standing upon Slughorn’s desk chimed eleven o’clock behind him and he looked around.
“Good gracious, is it that time already? You’d better get going, boys, or we’ll all be in trouble. Lestrange, I want your essay by tomorrow or it’s detention. Same goes for you, Avery.”
One by one, the boys filed out of the room. Slughorn heaved himself out of his armchair and carried his empty glass over to his desk. A movement behind him made him look around; Riddle was still standing there.
“Look sharp, Tom, you don’t want to be caught out of bed after hours, and you’re a prefect…”
“Sir, I wanted to ask you something.”
“Ask away, then, m’boy, ask away…”
“Sir, I wondered what you know about… about Horcurxes?”
Harry’s heart picked up speed and an unusual instinct told him to pay close attention, to not let a single detail of the memory slip him by.
Slughorn stared at Riddle, his thick fingers absentmindedly caressing the stem of his wine glass.
“Project for Defence Against the Dark Arts, is it?”
But Harry could tell that Slughorn knew perfectly well that this was not schoolwork.
“Not exactly, sir,” said Riddle. “I came across the term while reading and didn’t fully understand it.”
“No…well… you’d be hard-pushed to find a book at Hogwarts that’ll give you details on Horcruxes, Tom, that’s very Dark stuff, very Dark indeed,” said Slughorn.
“But obviously you know all about them, sir? I mean, a wizard like you — sorry, I mean, if you can’t tell me, obviously — I just knew if anyone could tell me, you could — so I just thought I’d ask —“
It was very well done, thought Harry, the hesitancy, the casual tone, the careful flattery, none of it overdone. He, Harry, had had too much experience of trying to wheedle information out of reluctant people not to recognize a master at work. He could tell that Riddle wanted the information very, very much; perhaps had been working toward this moment for weeks.
“Well,” said Slughorn, not looking at Riddle, but fiddling with the ribbon on top of his box of crystallized pineapple, “well, it can’t hurt to give you an overview, of course. Just so that you understand the term. A Horcrux is the word used for an object in which a person has concealed part of their soul.”
“I don’t quite understand how that works, though, sir,” said Riddle.
His voice was carefully controlled, but Harry could sense his excitement.
“Well, you split your soul, you see,” said Slughorn, “and hide part of it in an object outside the body. Then, even if one’s body is attacked or destroyed, one cannot die, for part of the soul remains earthbound and undamaged. But of course, existence in such a form…”
Slughorn’s face crumpled and Harry found himself remembering words he had heard nearly two years before: “I was ripped from my body, I was less than spirit, less than the meanest ghost…but still, I was alive.” The Felix Felicis almost seemed to glow warmly his chest then, as if to emphasize something about those words.
“…few would want it, Tom, very few. Death would be preferable.”
But Riddle’s hunger was now apparent; his expression was greedy, he could no longer hide his longing.
“How do you split your soul?”
“Well, said Slughorn uncomfortably, “you must understand that the soul is supposed to remain intact and whole. Splitting it is an act of violation, it is against nature, and it comes at a cost.”
“But how do you do it?”
“By an act of evil — the supreme act of evil. By committing murder. Killing rips the soul apart. The wizard intent upon creating a Horcrux would use the damage to his advantage: He would encase the torn portion —“
“Encase? But how —?”
“There is a spell, do not ask me, I don’t know!” Said Slughorn, shaking his head like an old elephant bothered by mosquitoes. “Do I look as though I’ve tried it — do I look like a killer?”
“No, sir, of course not,” said Riddle quickly. “I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to offend…”
“Not at all, not at all, not offended,” said Slughorn gruffly. “It’s natural to feel some curiosity about these things… Wizards of a certain calibre have always been drawn to that aspect of magic…”
“Yes, sir,” said Riddle. “What I don’t understand, though — just out of curiosity — I mean, would one Horcrux be much use? Can you only split your soul once? Wouldn’t it be better, make you stronger, to have your soul in more pieces, I mean, for instance, isn’t seven the most powerfully magical number, wouldn’t seven —?”
“Merlin’s beard, Tom!” Yelped Slughorn. “Seven! Isn’t it bad enough to think of killing one person? And in any case… damaging enough to divide the soul… but to rip it into seven pieces…”
Slughorn looked deeply troubled now: He was gazing at Riddle as though he had never seen him before, and Harry could tell he was regretting entering into this conversation at all.
“Of course,” he muttered, “this is all hypothetical, what we’re discussing, isn’t it? All academic…”
“Yes, sir, of course,” said Riddle quickly.
“But all the same, Tom… keep it quiet, what I’ve told — that’s to say, what we’ve discussed. People wouldn’t like to think we’ve been chatting about Horcruxes. It’s a banned subject at Hogwarts, you know…Dumbledore’s particularly fierce about it…”
“I won’t say a word, sir,” said Riddle, and he left, but not before Harry had glimpsed his face, which was full of that same wild happiness it had worn when he had first found out he was a wizard, the sort of happiness that did not enhance his handsome features ,as most of his smiles did, but made them somehow, sharper…feral.
More real.
“Thank you, Harry,” said Dumbledore quietly. “Let us go…”
When Harry landed back on the office floor Dumbledore was already sitting down behind his desk. Harry sat too and waited for Dumbledore to speak. It was late and the school’s inhabitants were sleeping, but Harry didn’t feel the slightest bit tired. He knew that he was exactly where he needed to be right now.
“I have been hoping for this piece of evidence for a very long time,” said Dumbledore at last. “It confirms the theory on which I have been working, it tells me that I am right, and also how very far there is still to go…”
Harry suddenly noticed that every single one of the old headmasters and headmistresses in the portraits around the walls was awake and listening in on their conversation. It seemed, that they, too, knew that an important discussion was about to be had. A corpulent, red-nosed wizards had actually taken out an ear trumpet.
“Well, Harry,” said Dumbledore, “I am sure you understood the significance of what we just heard. At the same age as you are now, give or take a few months, Tom Riddle was doing all he could to find out how to make himself immortal.”
Part of Harry wondered what could possibly drive a teenager to want immortality so badly. Especially after witnessing Slughorn’s reaction to the cost of it. But another — more vulnerable part — of him remembered the look on eleven-year-old Tom Riddle’s face when he declared that his father must have been a wizard, because if his mother had magic she wouldn’t have died.
“You think he succeeded then, sir?” asked Harry. “He made a Horcrux? And that’s why he didn’t die when he attacked me? He had a Horcrux hidden somewhere? A bit of his soul was safe?”
The magic of the Felix Felicis —which until now had been fairly subtle in its influence — suddenly became quite potent. It buzzed restlessly under his skin and flexed itself encouragingly as he spoke to Dumbledore.
For the life of him, Harry couldn’t figure out how a potion designed to bring him good luck somehow managed to drag him into this unsettling conversation.
“A bit…or more,” said Dumbledore. “You heard Voldemort: What he particularly wanted from Horace was an opinion on what would happen to the wizard who created more than one Horcrux, what would happen to the wizard so determined to evade death that he would be prepared to murder many times, rip out his soul repeatedly, so as to store it in many, separately concealed Horcruxes. No book would have given him that information. As far as I know — as far, I am sure, as Voldemort knew — no wizard had ever done more than tear his soul in two.”
Dumbledore paused for a moment, marshalling his thoughts, and then said, “Four years ago, I received what I considered certain proof that Voldemort had split his soul.”
“Where?” asked Harry. “How?”
“You handed it to me, Harry,” said Dumbledore. “The diary, Riddle’s diary, the one giving instructions on how to reopen the Chamber of Secrets.”
Harry’s stomach dropped and wisps of an angry, headache inducing, dream from many months ago floated through the back of his mind. Voldemort’s ire had spread so far that night, that it forced its way into Harry’s nightmares. He could still recall Narcissa Malfoy shakily promising the Dark Lord that she’d never seen the diary before, swearing that she didn’t know how it became damaged in her husband’s care.
At the time, Harry wasn’t too bothered by it. As far as dreams from the Dark Lord went, it was fairly tame. He just popped a couple of paracetamols for his headache when he woke up and brushed the dream aside as unimportant. After all, the diary had been destroyed years ago at that point and Harry was still preoccupied with his grief over Sirius — who’d only died a few days prior.
“I don’t understand, sir,” said Harry, although he was a little afraid that he actually did understand.
“Well, although I did not see the Riddle who came out of the diary, what you described to me was a phenomenon I had never witnessed. A mere memory starting to act and think for itself? A mere memory, sapping the life out of the girl into whose hands it had fallen? No, something much more sinister had lived inside that book… a fragment of soul, I was almost sure of it. The diary had been a Horcrux. But this raised as many questions as it answered.
“What intrigued and alarmed me most was that the diary had been intended as a weapon as much as a safeguard.”
“I still don’t understand,” Harry repeated.
“Well, it worked as a Horcrux is supposed to work — in other words, the fragment of soul concealed inside it was kept safe and had undoubtedly played its part in preventing the death of its owner. But there could be no doubt that Riddle really wanted that diary read, wanted the piece of his soul to inhabit or possess somebody else, so that Slytherin’s monster would be unleashed again.”
“Don’t you see, Harry,” Dumbledore continued, “that he intended the diary to be passed to, or planted on, some future Hogwarts student. He was being remarkably blasé about that precious fragment of his soul concealed within it. The point of a Horcrux is, as Professor Slughorn explained, to keep part of the self hidden and safe, not to fling it into somebody else’s path and run the risk that they might destroy it — as indeed happened: that particular fragment of soul is no more; you saw to that.”
Harry frowned. But Voldemort didn’t want the diary passed around, he thought to himself, he left it with Lucius Malfoy to be protected. Harry had seen Voldemorts fury when he discovered that the book had been destroyed. The Dark Lord never wanted his Horcrux to be given away, of that, the Gryffindor was sure.
“The careless way in which Voldemort regarded this Horcrux seemed most ominous to me.” The headmaster stroked his long, white beard as he gave Harry his explanation. “It suggested that he must have made — or been planning to make — more Horcruxes, so that the loss of his first would not be so detrimental. I did not wish to believe it, but nothing else seemed to make sense.”
To Harry, the only thing that didn’t actually seem to make sense was Dumbledore’s own supposition that the book was meant as a weapon. Because… well, because the diary only took Ginny down into the Chamber as a last resort.
Unlike the headmaster, Harry actually did meet the version of Tom Riddle that came out of the diary for himself. He spoke to the other Parselmouth while Ginny lay unconscious on the cold, wet ground — her life force slowly being drained out of her. He was a first-hand witness to the way Riddle grew stronger as Ginny’s life left her body.
It seemed to Harry that the diary wasn’t designed as a weapon, but rather, as a tool for ressurection. That was what it was trying to do — resurrect the soul within it using the life force of another person. First it tried to make a kill with the Basilisk, and when that proved to be unreliable, and whispers about the school shutting down began, the diary decided to attack the only person it was able to reliably reach — Ginny.
The diary probably only reached out to Ginny in the first place to use her as a way to enact its purpose.
In fact, it was only when Harry tried to stop Riddle from killing Ginny that the Horcrux began attacking him — as an act of self preservation.
Horcruxes were meant to preserve life, weren’t they?
He thought the logic of it was completely sound. Surely, Voldemort didn’t rip his soul into pieces and then deliberately plan to lose one of those pieces, right? The look on Riddle’s face when he spoke of immortality was determined and hauntingly keen. Why would he simply throw away one of the few objects ensuring his immortality? What did he have to gain by wreaking havoc on a school he hadn’t attended in decades?
It wasn’t that Harry disagreed with Dumbledore’s theory that Voldemort made multiple Horcruxes. Harry was actually certain that he did create more than one.
But Dumbledore’s explanation felt… off.
Something about it didn’t sit right. It was all so convoluted and Harry struggled to see any direct connection at all between the possible existence of multiple Horcruxes and the Chamber of Secrets debacle.
So why was that event the one that managed to convince the headmaster of his theory? Did he already have some other information that pointed him toward that conclusion? Even back in Harry’s second year?
The Felix Felicis seemed to rush, like molten gold, through his veins in that moment. It tugged at his magic, and some deeply imbedded awareness within him whispered that there was something important, just beyond his reach. But this time, the potion didn’t guide him in a physical direction, this time, it honed in on Dumbledore.
Harry opened his mouth to offer his perspective to the headmaster, but Dumbledore, who was focused on a far off point over Harry’s shoulder, didn’t notice. He continued speaking.
Harry closed his mouth and decided to wait patiently for his chance to talk. He could feel that now wasn’t the time to interrupt.
“Then you told me,” Dumbledore said, “two years later, that on the night that Voldemort returned to his body, he made a most illuminating and alarming statement to his Death Eaters. ‘I, who have gone further than anybody along the path that leads to immortality.’ That was what you told me he said. ‘Further than anybody.’ And I thought I knew what that meant, though the Death Eaters did not. He was referring to his Horcruxes, Horcruxes in the plural, Harry, which I do not believe any other wizard has ever had. Yet it fitted: Lord Voldemort has seemed to grow less human with the passing years, and the transformation he has undergone seemed to me to be only explicable if his soul was mutilated to the extent that only a fraction of it still exists within his body….”
“So he’s made himself impossible to kill by murdering other people?” said Harry.“Why couldn’t he make a Philosopher’s Stone, or steal one, if he was so interested in immortality?”
“Well, we know that he tried to do that, just five years ago,” said Dumbledore. “But there are several reasons why, I think, a Philosopher’s Stone would appeal less than Horcruxes to Lord Voldemort.
“While the Elixir of Life does indeed extend life, it must be drunk regularly, for all eternity, if the drinker is to maintain their immortality. Therefore, Voldemort would be entirely dependent on the Elixir, and if it ran out or was contaminated, or if the stone was stolen, he would die just like any other man. Of course he was prepared to drink it if it would take him out of the horrible part-life to which he was condemned after attacking you, but only to regain a body. Thereafter, I am convinced, he intended to continue to rely on his Horcruxes: he would need nothing more, if only he could regain a human form. He was already immortal, you see…or as close to immortal as any man can be.
“But now, Harry, armed with this information, the crucial memory you have succeeded in procuring for us, we are closer to the secret of finishing Lord Voldemort than anyone has ever been before. You heard him, Harry: ‘Wouldn’t it be better, make you stronger, to have your soul in more pieces… isn’t seven the most powerfully magical number…’ isn’t seven the most magically powerful number. Yes, I think the idea of a seven-part soul would greatly appeal to Lord Voldemort.”
“He made seven Horcruxes?” Said Harry, horror-struck, while several of the portraits on the walls made similar noises of shock and outrage. “But they could be anywhere in the world — hidden — buried or invisible —“
“I am glad to see you appreciate the magnitude of the problem,” said Dumbledore calmly. “But firstly, no, Harry, not seven Horcruxes: six. The seventh part of his soul, however maimed and small, resides inside his regenerated body. That was the part of him that lived a spectral existence for so many years during exile; without that, he has no self at all. That seventh piece of soul will be the last that anybody wishing to kill Voldemort must attack — the piece that lives in his body.”
The golden, potion-induced instinct within him flared again.
“But the six Horcruxes then,” said Harry, a little desperately, “how are we supposed to find them?”
“You are forgetting… you have already destroyed one of them. And I am currently tracking down another.”
“You are?” said Harry eagerly.
“Yes, indeed,” said Dumbledore, and turned his eyes towards the Pensieve, Harry followed his gaze. “I have been investigating some of its possible locations over the last few years. At one point this past summer, I came across a location in which, I am certain, it was previously held. Evidently, it was moved.”
“But how did you know where to look?”
“Well as you now know, for many years I have made it my business to discover as much as I can about Voldemort’s past life. I have travelled widely, visiting places he once knew. I stumbled upon signs of a Horcrux hidden in the ruin of the Gaunt’s house. I believe that whatever was there had been protected by powerful enchantments, in the shack where Voldemort’s ancestors once lived. He likely never suspected that I might one day take the trouble to visit the ruin, or that I might be keeping an eye open for traces of magical concealment.
“However, we should not congratulate ourselves too heartily. You have destroyed the diary and I am on the heels of a second Horcrux, but even then, there are still five Horcruxes remaining.”
“Four, you mean,” Harry corrected the headmaster with a frown. “The diary, plus the one you’re looking for, are two. Another five Horcruxes would make seven in total, not six.”
Dumbledore paused and blinked at Harry before averting his eyes and nodding as he stared out the dark window.
“Quite right, Harry,” He said, somewhat absently. “My apologies, the late hour has affected my arithmetic it seems. But you’re absolutely correct: Four Horcruxes, not five.”
The headmaster gazed out the window for a moment while Harry’s stomach swooped nervously.
“And they could be anything?” asked Harry, breaking the silence. “They could be old tin cans, or I dunno, empty potion bottles…”
“You are thinking of Portkeys, Harry, which must be ordinary objects, easy to overlook. But would Lord Voldemort use tin cans or old potion bottles to guard his own precious soul? You are forgetting what I have showed you. Lord Voldemort liked to collect trophies, and he preferred objects with a powerful magical history. His pride, his belief in his own superiority, his determination to carve for himself a startling place in magical history; these things suggest to me that Voldemort would have chosen his Horcruxes with some care, favouring objects worthy of the honor.”
“The diary wasn’t that special.”
“The diary was proof that he was the Heir of Slytherin; I am sure that Voldemort considered it of stupendous importance.”
“So the other Horcruxes?” said Harry, feeling suddenly that it was a very important question to ask. “Do you think you know what they are, sir?”
“I can only guess,” said Dumbledore. “For reasons I have already given, I believe that Lord Voldemort would prefer objects that, in themselves, have a certain grandeur. I have therefore trawled back through Voldemort’s past to see if I can find evidence that such artifacts have disappeared around him.”
“The locket!” said Harry loudly. “Hufflepuff’s cup! The Gaunt Ring!”
“Yes,” said Dumbledore, smiling, though his eyes did not exactly twinkle as they usually did. “I would be prepared to bet my wand, that they became three of the Horcruxes. The remaining two, assuming again that he created a total of six, are more of a problem, but I will hazard a guess that, having secured objects from Hufflepuff and Slytherin, he set out to track down objects owned by Gryffindor or Ravenclaw. Four objects from the four founders would, I am sure, have exerted a powerful pull over Voldemort’s imagination. I cannot answer for whether he ever managed to find anything of Ravenclaw’s. I am confident, however, that the only known relic of Gryffindor remains safe.”
Dumbledore pointed to the wall behind him, where a ruby-encrusted sword reposed within a glass case.
“Do you think that’s why he really wanted to come back to Hogwarts, sir?” said Harry. “To try and find something from one of the other founders?”
“My thoughts precisely,” said Dumbledore. “But unfortunately, that does not advance us much further, for he was turned away, or so I believe, without the chance to search the school. I am forced to conclude that he never fulfilled his ambition of collecting four founder’s objects. He definitely had two — he may have found three — that is the best we can do for now.”
“Even if he got something of Ravenclaw’s or of Gryffindor’s, that leaves a sixth Horcrux,” said Harry, counting on his fingers. “Unless he got both?”
“I don’t think so,” said Dumbledore. “I think I know what the sixth Horcrux is. I wonder what you will say when I confess that I have been curious for a while about the behaviour of the snake, Nagini?”
“The snake?” asked Harry, startled. “You can use animals as Horcruxes?” A persistent itch in his mind made him frown again. It was as if there was a word on the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t quite remember it. Or like an idea was just about to form in his brain, but was struggling to come together properly.
“Well, it is inadvisable to do so,” said Dumbledore, “because to confide a part of your soul to something that can think and move for itself is obviously a very risky business. However if my calculations are correct, Voldemort was still at least one Horcrux short of his goal of six when he entered your parent’s house with the intention of killing you.”
The itching feeling spread from his mind to the rest of him, wriggling pointedly under his skin. It was an irritating sensation, and Harry struggled not to squirm in his seat.
“He seems to have reserved the process of making Horcruxes for particularly significant deaths,” Dumbledore continued. “You would have certainly been that. He believed that in killing you, he was destroying the danger the prophecy had outlined. He believed he was making himself invincible. I am sure that he was intending to make his final Horcrux with your death.”
Dumbledore’s pronouncement reached Harry’s ears in a way that was not dissimilar to the foreboding toll of a bell, and he couldn’t make sense of why.
His experience of the whole night was a bit like being adrift at sea. The liquid he’d put himself at the mercy of was dragging him this way and that, with no rhyme or reason that he could discern. Initially, when he’d floated to Slughorn for the memory, everything had made sense. But at some point, his instincts started circling ominously around something he didn’t understand and whatever it was, Harry couldn’t help but notice that the water was rough and dangerous out this way.
“As we know, Voldemort failed to make a Horcrux that night,” the headmaster said, almost dismissively, his eyes darting up to Harry’s forehead and back to the dark window again. He fingered at the hem of his sleeve.
Lie.
The word whispered itself in Harry’s mind, inarguable and hauntingly clear.
Dumbledore just lied.
The dishonesty was so obvious that, for half a moment, it felt to Harry like the wind had been knocked clean out of him.
If there was one thing that Harry Potter knew how to do, it was lie.
‘Yes, everything’s well at home.’ ‘No, I got this bruise from roughhousing with the other boys.’ ‘My Aunt and Uncle always take good care of me.’
After all these years, he was practically an expert.
‘Really, Hermione, I’m not having any strange nightmares.’ ‘My scar feels fine.’ ‘I can only talk to snakes. That’s all that being a parselmouth means, I promise.’
It wasn’t an ability he was proud of, but it was one that he’d managed to masterfully hone out of necessity. And — despite not being the most attentive observer — every so often, he was able to recognize his own methods in other people.
Yet, even if he hadn’t been able to read Dumbledore’s dishonesty like an open book, the Manufactured Luck currently coursing through his veins would have made it obvious to Harry in a heartbeat.
Dumbledore lied.
And yet, without more than a short pause, the old man carried on speaking.
“After an interval of some years, however, Voldemort used Nagini to kill an old Muggle man,” he said, seemingly oblivious to Harry’s realization, “and it might then have occurred to him to turn her into one of his Horcruxes.”
The lie was a short one — it placed itself neatly between remarks without bleeding into them at all.
‘As we know, Voldemort failed.’ That was it. As far as Harry could tell, there was no trace of falsehood in any of the commentary on Nagini that followed.
It was just that one sentence.
But how could it be a lie?
Wasn’t it the truth? Voldemort did fail that night in Godric’s Hollow. Harry lived while the Dark Lord’s body was destroyed.
“Nagini underlines the Slytherin connection, which enhances Lord Voldemort’s mystique; I think he is perhaps as fond of her as he can be of anything; he certainly likes to keep her close, and he seems to have an unusual amount of control over her, even for a Parselmouth.”
Harry struggled to keep up with the information that Dumbledore was dispensing, and simultaneously decipher the meaning of his lie.
The headmaster kept talking, and the words he’d spoken, just moments ago, got further and further away as he moved on to other topics. But Harry held tight to the comment, it meant something important. He knew it in his bones.
Harry processed what was being said as efficiently as possible. Nagini was a Horcrux. Voldemort liked snakes. That much he was able to understand.
But, the rest…?
Voldemort didn’t use Harry’s death to create a Horcrux. Obviously.
He was still alive.
So why was every ounce of intuition within him screaming out that it was a lie?
He shook his head and furrowed his brow at Dumbledore. He was missing something. He needed to back up for a minute.
“So,” Harry said, trailing off while he rearranged his thoughts, “…the diary’s gone. The ring, the cup, the locket, and the snake are still intact,” he counted off Horcruxes on his fingers, “and you think there might be a Horcrux that was once Ravenclaw’s or Gryffindor’s?”
Dumbledore bowed his head, “An admirably succinct and accurate summary, yes.”
That accounted for six Horcruxes.
Except… Harry recounted in his head.
The diary.
The ring.
The cup.
The locket.
The snake.
The unknown Horcrux.
…
He paused again for a long stretch, trying to figure out what was bothering him about the list. Dumbledore sat patiently, giving him time to adjust to everything he’d learned tonight.
“So…” Harry began again, “If all of his Horcruxes are destroyed, Voldemort could be killed?”
“Yes, I think so,” said Dumbledore. “Without his Horcruxes, Voldemort will be a mortal man with a maimed and diminished soul. Never forget, though, that while his soul may be in tatters, his magical powers remain intact. It will take uncommon skill and power to kill a wizard like Voldemort even without his Horcruxes.”
“But I haven’t got uncommon skill and power,” said Harry, before he could stop himself.
But he had to point it out. Someone had to address it.
How was he supposed to kill Voldemort? The best he could do was deal with the man’s Horcruxes, but after that was done, Harry couldn’t see how he fit into the equation. It wasn’t like Dumbledore was training him to duel or something.
“Yes, you have,” said Dumbledore firmly. “You have a power that Voldemort has never had. You can —“
“I know!” said Harry in a burst of impatience, as he realized exactly what Dumbledore was about to say. “I can love!” It was only with difficulty that he stopped himself from adding, “Big deal!” He didn’t want the platitudes one would give to a child — he wanted real bloody answers!
Something wasn’t adding up and it was frustrating Harry that he couldn’t understand what that ‘something’ was. If only Dumbledore would give him more information, he might be able to figure it out.
“Yes, Harry, you can love,” said Dumbledore, who looked as though he knew perfectly well what Harry had just refrained from saying. “Which, given everything that has happened to you, is a great and remarkable thing. You are still too young to understand how unusual you are, Harry.”
As it so often did since his last encounter with Voldemort, the prophecy swam through Harry’s mind, displacing the thoughts left in its wake as it made its way to the forefront of his consciousness.
If he could just press for a little more information… he felt like he was close, like he was very near to the answer. Perhaps Dumbledore just needed a little prompting in the right direction.
“Then, when the prophecy says that I’ll have ‘power the Dark Lord knows not,’ it just means — love?” He asked slowly, watching Dumbledore’s face closely.
“Yes — just love,” said Dumbledore, rubbing the fabric of his sleeve between two fingers distractedly. His moustache twitched downwards at the corners.
Lie.
Another lie.
But unlike the last, Harry was able to make sense of this one. It was clear as day.
The ‘power the Dark Lord knows not,’ wasn’t love.
It was something else.
And Dumbledore was lying to him about it.
Why?
“But Harry,” the headmaster continued before Harry could dispute his claim aloud, “never forget that what the prophecy says is only significant because Voldemort made it so. I told you this at the end of last year. Voldemort singled you out as the person who would be most dangerous to him — and in doing so, he made you the person who would be most dangerous to him!”
“But the prophecy —“ Harry began, pressing at the topic like a tender bruise.
“Is only words!” Dumbledore interrupted, sounding impatient now. Pointing at Harry, he said, “You are setting too much store by the prophecy!”
“But,” spluttered Harry, “but you said the prophecy means —“
“If Voldemort had never heard of the prophecy, would it have been fulfilled? Would it have meant anything? Of course not! Do you think every prophecy in the Hall of Prophecy has been fulfilled?”
“But,” said Harry, more bewildered than ever, “but last year, you said one of us would have to kill the other —“
“Harry, Harry, only because Voldemort made a grave error, and acted on Professor Trelawney’s words! If Voldemort had never murdered your father, would he have imparted in you a furious desire for revenge? Of course not! If he had not forced your mother to die for you, would he have given you a magical protection he could not penetrate? Of course not, Harry! Don’t you see? Voldemort himself created his worst enemy, just as tyrants everywhere do! Have you any idea how much tyrants fear the people they oppress? All of them realize that, one day, amongst their many victims, there is sure to be one who rises against them and strikes back! Voldemort is no different! Always he was on the lookout for one who would challenge him. He heard the prophecy and he leapt into action, with the result that he not only handpicked the man most likely to finish him, he handed him a uniquely deadly weapon!”
Harry jolted and abruptly leaned forward in his seat, as something started to piece itself slowly together in his mind. A uniquely deadly weapon. How could any weapon be deadly to an immortal man?
“But —“
“It’s essential that you understand this!” Dumbledore said vehemently, standing up and striding about the room, his glittering robes swooshing behind him; Harry had never seen him so agitated. There was a glint of desperation in his usually twinkling eyes. Was he aware that Harry was on the verge of a revelation? Was he trying to prevent it? Or was he simply determined to make Harry take his words to heart?
“By attempting to kill you, Voldemort himself singled out the remarkable person who sits here in front of me, and gave him the tools for the job! It is Voldemort’s fault that you were able to see into his thoughts, his ambitions, that you even understand the snakelike language in which he gives orders, and yet, Harry, despite your privileged insight into Voldemort’s world (which, incidentally, is a gift any death eater would kill to have), you have never been seduced by the Dark Arts, never, even for a second, shown the slightest desire to become one of Voldemort’s followers!”
Harry’s eyes darted away from Dumbledore, coming to rest, instead, on the corner of the worn rug beneath the headmaster’s desk.
Parsletongue.
Their shared thoughts.
Godric’s Hollow, 1981.
He was stretching out mentally, reaching for something, and it was just barely close enough to touch now.
“You are protected by your ability to love!” said Dumbledore loudly, forcing Harry’s eyes back to him. “The only protection that can possibly work against the lure of power like Voldemort’s! In spite of all the temptation you have endured, all the suffering, you remain pure of heart, just as pure as you were at the age of eleven, when you stared into a mirror that reflected your heart’s desire, and it showed you only the way to thwart Lord Voldemort, and not immortality or riches. Harry, have you any idea how few wizards could have seen what you saw in that mirror? Voldemort should have known then what he was dealing with, but he did not!”
Harry stared at Dumbledore — who gesticulated with choppy motions — as he explained to Harry why he was so different from Lord Voldemort, against all the odds. And in that moment, a memory came back to him.
A memory of another visit to this very office, where they had a similar sort of discussion.
It was a so many years ago, but every detail was still so clear: from the tired-ache in his bones, to the glint of the sword on the desk when the sunlight hit it’s bloodied steel.
At twelve-years-old, Harry Potter had stood before the headmaster, covered in black ink and Basilisk venom, and asked the man why he was so similar to Tom Riddle.
While the Dumbledore-of-the-present expounded on the topic of pure hearts and powerful love, Harry ignored him. Instead, he recalled the man’s words from the end of second year.
“…He transferred some of his own powers to you the night he gave you that scar. Not something he intended to do. I’m sure.” Dumbledore had said gravely.
“Voldemort put a bit of himself in me?” Harry asked him, eyes wide with fearful bewilderment.
“It certainly seems so,” the headmaster responded, looking down at the damaged diary on the desk before him.
Time refused to stop for Harry as understanding finally, cruelly, dawned upon him.
Dumbledore was still pacing.
“But, sir,” Harry said, cutting across the man’s pressured dialogue. His own voice, sounded to him like something foreign, he was hardly aware of what he was saying. His mind reeled as he began slotting the pieces of the puzzle together. “Sir, you said I’ve got to kill him, or —“
“Got to?” said Dumbledore. “Of course you’ve got to! But not because of the prophecy! Because you, yourself, will never rest until you’ve tried! We both know it! Imagine, please, just for a moment, that you had never heard that prophecy! How would you feel about Voldemort now? Think!”
Harry watched Dumbledore striding up and down in front of him. His blue eyes ablaze with what Harry could only describe as single-minded purpose when he glanced at Harry.
It was like Dumbledore was trying to convince him that he should hate Voldemort.
It was like Dumbledore needed him to hate Voldemort.
“You’d want him Vanquished! Of course you would!” Dumbledore announced, “And you’d want to do it yourself! You see, the prophecy does not mean you have to do anything! But the prophecy caused Lord Voldemort to mark you as his equal… in other words, you are free to choose your own way, quite free to turn your back on the prophecy! But Voldemort continues to set store by the prophecy. He will continue to hunt you…which makes it certain, really, that —“
“That one of us is going to end up killing the other,” Harry whispered.
Dumbledore’s pacing came to a halt and he turned a sad expression on the young man sitting before his desk.
Harry stayed silent. His heart was a cold stone in his chest.
Only a short while ago, Dumbledore told him that Voldemort failed to create a Horcrux with Harry’s death. And that had been a lie.
Because Voldemort didn’t fail to make a Horcrux on October 31st, 1981. He might not have been able to murder Harry, but there were two people he did murder that night.
Futile desperation made Harry recount the Horcruxes. Though he hoped that he was wrong, he knew, deep inside, that he wasn’t.
The diary.
The ring.
The cup.
The locket.
The snake.
The unknown Horcrux.
And now he knew why the list felt incomplete.
“…to confide a part of your soul to something that can think and move for itself is obviously a risky business…”
Inadvisable, Dumbledore had said about creating Horcruxes from living beings.
But possible.
He didn’t get the math wrong when he was counting the Horcruxes earlier. No. He’d slipped up.
There weren’t six horcruxes.
There were seven.
Perhaps it was a side effect of the Felix Felicis he consumed earlier, or perhaps it was shock, but Harry remained calm as his world flipped on its axis.
A distant part of him knew he should be panicking, but there was still more he needed to know.
“So…have you been looking for the Horcruxes, sir?” He asked in a voice that sounded eerily distant to his own ears. “Is that where you’ve been going when you leave the school?”
“Correct,” said Dumbledore, coming to sit down at the desk once more. “I have been working for a very long time. I think …perhaps… I may be close to finding the one I’ve been chasing. There are hopeful signs.”
‘A very long time.’
How long, he wondered. How long have you known? Since second year, like you said? Or since the very beginning?
It was a hollow feeling, and he knew that it would hurt later, but in the moment he was just…empty.
Harry’s gut told him to ask one last question.
“What are you planning to do with them when you find them?” (What’s your plan for me?)
Dumbledore looked away from Harry again — a behaviour that was becoming sickeningly familiar. There was nothing that he could be seeing out the window at this hour. The sky was pitch dark.
The wrinkle between Dumbledore’s brows deepened.
“They must all be destroyed,” he said.
And at last, Harry understood what Dumbledore was keeping from him. The secret he concealed was the difference between Harry walking proudly into the arena for a battle to the death, or being dragged forcefully into the arena and tied to the altar as a sacrifice.
And wasn’t it just that much easier if your sacrifice thought they were a soldier? Dying for a good cause?
Wasn’t it less painful for all involved if the Sacrifice thought he was the Chosen One? If he thought he had a chance of survival?
There was no Chosen One. Only a lamb to be slaughtered.
The Prophecy wasn’t a hopeful encouragement. It was a pre-signed death certificate.
…Either must die at the hand of the other…neither can live while the other survives….
It all had new meaning now.
But Dumbledore himself was the one who said that Harry was free to turn his back on the prophecy.
There had to be another way. There had to be a version of events where Harry didn’t end up in the arena at all.
If there was, he was going to find it.
Dumbledore might not believe that Voldemort would walk away from the prophecy, but when the Dark Lord marked Harry as his equal, he gave away the key to immortality.
And that made all the difference in the world.