I pushed open the door to the Headmaster's office.
Fawkes trilled a greeting, and the portraits pretended not to listen, though I could feel their curiosity buzzing like bees.
The fire crackled softly in the grate, but I didn't need the warmth. I was already humming with energy.
Sitting across from me, Dumbledore arranged a few objects on the desk with his usual deliberate calm. A quill. A goblet. A silver instrument shaped like an astrolabe.
Dumbledore's blue eyes twinkled, but there was something sharper beneath them—concern, suspicion, and maybe…hope.
"Today," he began, "I would like to test your foundations. Shall we?"
I grinned faintly. "Go ahead, Professor."
He gestured to the goblet. "Turn it into a predator. And then restrain it."
I pointed my wand almost lazily. The goblet rippled, lengthened, sprouted legs, and in a heartbeat, a wolf with gleaming silver fur stood snarling atop the desk.
Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Now defend yourself."
The wolf lunged. I didn't flinch. A flick wordless and the wolf froze mid air, rigid as ice.
Another twist, and it softened back into a goblet, landing soundlessly back on its base.
Dumbledore inclined his head. "Most impressive. Few can balance aggression and reversal without faltering."
"Feels natural," I said simply. "Like stretching."
Dumbledore unfurled a parchment covered in rune sequences. "Identify the spell family. And if possible… alter it."
I glanced over the tangled symbols. "Destruction family. Disintegration curse. But it can be softened, watch."
I traced in the air with a finger, lines of gold runes hanging above the parchment like a glowing diagram.
Two symbols shifted, the structure rebalanced, and the destructive charge unraveled into a harmless pushback force.
"More stable now," I said. "Less drain on the caster, too."
The Headmaster blinked slowly, hiding his astonishment. He hadn't even taught me half the runes yet.
He summoned a cube of stone, inscribed with layered protection runes. "Dismantle this without breaking it. Gently."
I placed my palm on the surface, closed my eyes, and listened.
Magic hummed in the stone like a living heartbeat. With a steady breath, I willed it to part.
The runes flickered, fell quiet, and one by one, the layers folded away until the cube sat bare and inert.
When I opened my eyes, Dumbledore's quill had stilled in mid air.
"…Effortless," he murmured.
Finally, he placed a lump of dull lead on the table. "Show me, then, what you know of alchemy. If you cannot manage, we will—"
I tapped it with a thought. The lead shimmered, fractured light spilling across it, and in a moment the lump gleamed as pure silver.
Not content, I pressed further. Silver melted, twisted, and in seconds, a thin chain of flawless mithril coiled across the desk, pulsing faintly with inner light.
I leaned back, smirking. "Was that part of the test?"
Dumbledore chuckled faintly, though his eyes never left me. "No, Harry. That was quite beyond it."
He leaned back in his chair at last, folding his hands. "You move through these lessons as though you had walked them for years. I must confess… you are far beyond what I expected. Tell me truthfully, what happened this summer?"
I didn't answer right away. Instead, I leaned forward, meeting his gaze. "Before I tell you that, Professor… I want the truth from you first."
His eyebrows rose. "The truth?"
"Yes. Why did Voldemort come after my family? Why me? Why did they have to die?"
-----------------------------------------
The warmth in the room dimmed. Even Fawkes stirred uneasily.
Lets see if you would reveal the prophesy to me or would hide it.
This will decide our trust now, Dumbledore. Whether you trust me or not.
He was silent for a long moment, and I thought he might deflect, as he so often did.
But then his shoulders sagged, and his voice dropped.
"You deserve to know everything, Harry. And I will hold nothing back."
He bowed his head. "Sixteen years ago, a prophecy was spoken. Sybill Trelawney, though her visions are rare and seldom coherent, entered a true trance in my presence. who would be born to parents who had "thrice defied him" and born "as the seventh month dies". That child would have the power to vanquish the Dark Lord… or perish by his hand."
I stayed silent.
I'd read the words before, but hearing them aloud was different.
"Severus Snape," Dumbledore continued, "was eavesdropping outside the door. He heard only the first half, the part about the child, and ran to his master."
Dumbledore's voice grew hollow. "Severus begged him, Harry. He begged Voldemort to spare Lily. Only Lily. Not James, not you. He thought to save the woman he loved, and damn the rest."
I felt my lip curl despite myself. "How noble."
A shadow crossed Dumbledore's face. "Yes. Selfish. Cruel. A coward's plea. But Voldemort… Voldemort promised nothing. He gave your father no chance, and when Lily refused to stand aside—"
He broke off, his hand trembling slightly on the desk. "She died protecting you. And Voldemort's curse rebounded."
The office was too quiet. The ticking of some strange silver contraption filled the space between us. Dumbledore's words about the prophecy and Snape still hung in the air like smoke.
I leaned forward, eyes narrowing.
"So let me get this straight… Snape overheard the prophecy, ran to Voldemort, and made my family a target. He begged only for Lily's life, not mine, not James's. Voldemort ignored him, killed them both, and then came for me."
"Yes," Dumbledore said quietly. His hands were folded, knuckles white.
"Then why," I asked, voice low but sharp, "is he still here? Why is he teaching in this castle, teaching me, when it's his fault they're dead?"
Dumbledore did not flinch, though his shoulders sagged under the question.
"Because that night broke him. Snape returned to me after Lily's death, shattered by what he had caused. He begged me to protect you, to keep you alive, at any cost. From that moment, he became my spy, turning his knowledge against Voldemort. For years he has walked a knife's edge, living a double life, risking discovery daily. It is his punishment, his penance, and his duty."
His gaze met mine, piercing blue and weary. "I do not forgive his past, Harry. But I believe in his remorse. I trust his service. And through his atonement, countless lives have been spared."
I sat back, silent for a long moment. On the inside, I already knew this. But I wanted to hear if the old man would gloss over it, lie, protect Snape. He hadn't.
Finally, I exhaled.
"So… the man who delivered my death sentence is now my bodyguard."
Dumbledore's lips pressed into a thin line. "In a sense, yes. A cruel irony, perhaps, but also… a strange form of justice."
I gave a humorless laugh. "Justice. That's a pretty word for letting him breathe while my parents don't."
Dumbledore's eyes dimmed, and for the first time that evening, he looked old.
"Yes," he whispered. "It is imperfect justice. But it is all we have."
I stared at him, unblinking. I already knew the truth, about Snape, about the prophecy, about that night, but I wanted to see if Dumbledore would hide anything.
He hadn't. Not this time. That's good.
It means he really is an old man with too much on his table to handle.
"Pathetic," I said softly. "All of it. My parents deserved better than to die over a half-sentence and someone else's weakness."
Dumbledore's eyes shone with something like grief. "Yes, Harry. They did."
-----------------------------------------
The silence lingered after Dumbledore's last words, heavy as stone. The old wizard did not reach for another excuse, nor soften his truth with half comforts.
He had said it plainly: Snape had been the cause, and Snape had been the penitent.
I gave him a curt nod. "Fine. At least you told me without sugarcoating."
Dumbledore studied me, the sadness in his eyes tinged with something else, curiosity, maybe even wariness.
He steepled his fingers, the candlelight catching the silver of his beard.
"There is another matter," he said at last. "You are not the boy who left Hogwarts in June. Your magic has grown sharper, your command of it… extraordinary. Even today, your Transfiguration and Arithmancy exceeded the work of seventh years. I must ask, Harry: what did you do this summer?"
I leaned back, folding my arms. This was the real test.
Should I tell him?
what if he achieve it like me? would that not put a potential danger on me?
An unrestricted, enlightened dumbledore?
But its not that easy.
Whatever happened to me was just not my realisation on the truth.
Its unlikely dumbledore would reach that level with how much guilt he carries in his life.
I'll gamble on it.
"I realised the truth," I said simply.
Dumbledore raised an eyebrow. "And that truth is?"
I looked at him in the eye and said the hymn :
[mano buddhi ahankara chittani naaham
na cha shrotravjihve na cha ghraana netre
na cha vyoma bhumir na tejo na vaayuhu
chidananda rupah shivo'ham shivo'ham
I am not any aspect of the mind like the intellect, the ego or the memory,
I am not the organs of hearing, tasting, smelling or seeing,
I am not the space, nor the earth, nor fire, nor air, I am the form of consciousness and bliss, I am Shiva (that which is not)...]
[na cha prana sangyo na vai pancha vayuhu
na va sapta dhatur na va pancha koshah
na vak pani-padam na chopastha payu
chidananda rupah shivo'ham shivo'ham
I am not the Vital Life Energy (Prana), nor the Five Vital Airs (manifestations of Prana),
I am not the seven essential ingredients nor the 5 sheaths of the body, I am not any of the body parts, like the mouth, the hands, the feet, etc.,
I am the form of consciousness and bliss, I am Shiva (that which is not)...]
The old man's gaze sharpened, as though weighing every syllable.
I continued. "I meditated, trained my body and mind until the line blurred. And then I stumbled onto something older than spells, older than Hogwarts itself. Adi Shankaracharya's words The philosophy of Advaita Vedanta. That I am not the body, nor the mind… that I am the self beyond all of it. Once I grasped that, magic stopped being a tool. It simply was. It moved because I willed it, the way my heart beats or my lungs breathe."
For the first time that evening, the great Albus Dumbledore looked unsettled.
His eyes flickered, his hands gripped the armrests of his chair.
"That… that is what you found?" His voice was hushed, almost reverent.
I nodded. "That's it."
He let out a long, trembling breath, leaning back in his chair. "Merlin's beard… All these years I have searched for meaning in prophecy, in rituals, in the very bones of old magic, and you tell me the answer was in philosophy? That this is the power Voldemort knows not?"
His gaze turned distant, as though seeing both too much and not enough. "To think that a truth so simple could unmake the terror of a Dark Lord…"
He finally blinked, returning to the present. "You give me much to ponder, Harry. Much indeed." His voice was quiet but tinged with awe. "But let us not abandon our structure. For next time: continue refining your battle transfiguration, review the rune sequences I gave you, and prepare to attempt spell creation exercises with Arithmancy. I shall expect you next Sunday."
I inclined my head, slipping my wand into my sleeve as I rose. "Understood."
As I left the office, the door clicking shut behind me, I could still see Dumbledore in my mind's eye, alone at his desk, fingers pressed to his temple, lost in thoughts that stretched far beyond stone walls and candlelight.
-----------------------------------------
Dumbledore POV*
The office felt cavernous once the boy departed, the click of the oak door echoing far too loud in the silence.
Fawkes stirred on his perch, the soft rustle of feathers filling the void as if the phoenix too sensed the storm in his master's thoughts.
Albus Dumbledore sat unmoving, hands folded before his mouth.
His eyes, so used to twinkling with half playful secrets, were grave now.
Advaita Vedanta, wisdom of Adi Shankaracharya.
The words tolled like bells in his mind, phrases dredged from memories of his youth, when he, a hungry scholar of the arcane, devoured Eastern philosophy in search of "truths" about magic.
He had admired them then, but dismissed them as abstract, too far removed from the practical realities of wandwork, battle, and blood.
And now Harry Potter, barely twelve, spoke them as if they were living truths.
He closed his eyes. He had expected many things: a ritual, a dangerous tome, perhaps some mad experiment with alchemy gone awry. But not this.
Not a child who had made himself one with the very fabric of magic.
Is this it, then? he thought, pressing his fingers harder into his lips. The power Voldemort knows not?
He thought of the prophecy, of Sybill's cracked voice all those years ago: The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… a power the Dark Lord knows not.
He had always believed it would be something tangible, a lost spell, some deep well of magical bloodline, perhaps a weapon buried in Hogwarts itself.
He even considered love.
But no. If Harry spoke true, the boy's greatest strength was not a weapon but a realisation.
A truth that Voldemort, with all his obsession for control and domination, would never grasp.
Dumbledore's chest ached, and his mind wandered unwillingly to Privet Drive.
The Dursleys' faces flashed before him: petty, cruel, narrow hearted people who had crushed Lily's son beneath their roof.
and the truth of Harry's quiet, needless death at their hands, still burned like acid.
And yet… through that suffering, through pain I could not prevent… Harry found this truth.
He wondered if it was fate or irony that the child who had been denied love so often had found his strength in a philosophy that declared the self as infinite, formless, unbound.
And a pang of grief pierced him. Because Albus could not follow. For all his wisdom, all his titles, all his search for power and redemption, he was still tethered to his regrets, Ariana, Gellert, the long shadow of mistakes that bound his heart.
He could never wholly step into the formless self Harry described. He envied him, and pitied him, all at once.
Fawkes trilled softly, a note of comfort. Dumbledore smiled faintly, shaking his head.
"Harry Potter," he murmured aloud, voice heavy with awe and fear alike, "you are more than even I imagined. And Merlin help us all if Voldemort ever realises what he faces."
He leaned back in his chair, staring into the flickering candles. Sleep would not come tonight.
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