The office was silent for all of five seconds after Gabriel left.
Then Dumbledore rose from his chair. A sudden pressure filled the room; the lamps flickered, and the many magical instruments lining the walls began to whirr and spark in protest. Fawkes let out a piercing cry and swept from his perch in a blaze of red and gold, landing on Dumbledore's shoulder.
Eloá looked supremely unimpressed by the display.
"Why are you here, Saint Germain?" Dumbledore demanded.
Eloá's lips curled into a mocking smile. "My, have you gone senile, Albus? You've already asked me that - and I've already told you." Her smile sharpened into a snarl. "I'm here because of my son."
"You are one of the Immortals. You cannot have children," Dumbledore said evenly.
"And yet - here he is."
They stared at one another for a long, charged moment before Dumbledore's sharp eyes caught a detail he had previously dismissed.
"Your eyes are brown."
"So they are," she agreed with a smirk.
"Not violet."
"How perceptive of you."
Silence fell again. Dumbledore studied the woman before him, weighing the implications of what he saw, while Eloá drummed her fingers on the armrest, her expression one of growing exasperation.
At last Dumbledore sighed, and the pressure in the room lifted. Fawkes trilled brightly, nipped his ear, and fluttered back to his perch - though not before flapping a wing directly into Eloá's face.
"Blasted bird," she grumbled, brushing her cheek.
Dumbledore sank back into his chair and removed his half-moon spectacles, polishing them with slow deliberation.
"When were you going to tell him?" he asked quietly.
"Ideally, when I couldn't put it off any longer," she replied. "But someone-" her eyes flashed at him, "-forced my hand."
"You were always a lazy man," Dumbledore mused, quite unmoved by her glare. "Or a woman now, I suppose. Alive since before the time of Merlin, and yet never accomplishing much. The great Saint Germain."
Rather than take offense, Eloá smiled. "That's where you're wrong. I have made life, Albus Dumbledore - from nothing. What have you ever achieved? A lifetime of regrets and graves."
"And a rather fetching collection of socks," he added mildly.
Eloá snorted despite herself. She picked up the Diary of Tom Riddle from the table between them and flipped through its blank pages with open disdain, feeling the artifact's futile attempts to worm its way into her soul, to create a bridge.
"I will help you deal with your little Dark Lord problem," she said suddenly. "In exchange, you will teach my son as if he were your apprentice - and you will name him so before the world. The name of 'Dumbledore' carries more weight with this generation than Ragoczy or Cagliostro does. You will give him every opportunity to grow and be challenged, and your unconditional support in any project or venture he pursues."
"Are you telling me you lack the skill to train your son yourself?" Dumbledore asked, his tone mocking.
"I lack the time!" she shouted, slamming her hand on the table. It shattered under her touch, and for a moment, her power flooded the room. Where Dumbledore's presence had been warm and blinding, hers was cold and crystalline - like shards of glass pressed against the skin.
She drew a slow, steadying breath, and the pressure receded. The table repaired itself with a low creak as she sank back into her ornate chair.
"There's too much I must do before the degradation reaches a critical stage," she said at last. Then she smiled, sharp and knowing. "And besides-"
Her eyes gleamed. "It's not as if you have much of a choice. With the main shade gone, the fragments will soon start clamouring to take its place. It won't be long until instead of one Voldemort, you have an entire collection of them to contend with. Is that what you want, Dumbledore?"
The look Dumbledore gave her was heavy, his voice grave and laced with bitterness when he finally spoke.
"You could have avoided this. Riddle. Grindelwald. The separation of the Muggle and Magical worlds. The Witch Hunts. With your knowledge, with the time you had… you could have prevented it all. A thousand bloodbaths, a hundred genocides, dozens of wars. If only any of you had cared enough-"
Eloá snorted, closing her eyes and lifting her chin and arms dramatically, like a Shakespearean actress about to deliver a monologue.
"'In place of the Dark Lord you will set up a Queen! And I shall not be dark, but beautiful and terrible as the Morning and the Night! Fair as the Sea and the Sun and the Snow upon the Mountain! Dreadful as the Storm and the Lightning! Stronger than the foundations of the earth! All shall love me and despair!'"
As she recited, the room darkened, shadows curling along the walls while a radiant light gathered around her. Fawkes gave a sharp, indignant cry from his perch. Eloá cracked one eye open to see Dumbledore's exasperated expression - and immediately broke into a full-bellied laugh.
"Oh, Dumbledore," she chuckled. "Have you still not abandoned those boyhood ideas of yours? How uncouth, for a man your age, to dream of domination."
"Cooperation, not conquest," Dumbledore corrected firmly.
She smiled sardonically. "To die in one's sleep or to die in flames - death is death all the same. What you speak of has been attempted a thousand and one times… and a thousand and two times more. It doesn't work. It can't work. Not because of the supposed evil in mankind's heart, nor because those with lofty ambitions were poor rulers or fools. Or even because no Immortal has tried it before - we have. It fails for one simple reason-"
She tapped her fingernail against the table with each word, the sound sharp as glass. Then she gestured in a slow, circling motion, encompassing everything around them.
"Because this world will not allow it. This rotten, theatrical world thrives on stories and tragedies. It won't let conflict die. It refuses permanent peace. It cannot abide something incorruptible - whether that be a person or an idea. The world is not malicious, no… but it is cruel. It demands upheaval, reversal, the endless turning of the board. The greater the attempt, the greater the ruin that follows."
Her tone softened slightly, but her eyes gleamed with cold certainty. "I have seen it myself - with my two eyes, and with the third as well. Nostradamus and Tycho Dodonus saw it too. You would do well to heed their words."
The fire seemed to drain out of the old man. Dumbledore sagged in his chair, the light of defiance fading into resignation.
"Fate," he murmured.
"Fate," Eloá agreed.
Then Dumbledore straightened, his eyes sharpening.
"But that isn't true anymore, is it? The Prophecy Orbs in the Department of Mysteries - my sources tell me there's been a disturbance. Some have gone inert, while others have outright exploded. And the same is happening across the world, without discernible cause or connection. That is, I believe, the entire reason you were granted access to do your research - to determine the source of this phenomenon while being allowed to study the Veil of Death."
Eloá inclined her head in quiet acknowledgment, a faintly unsettling smile curling her lips.
"But you do know what's causing it, don't you?" Dumbledore pressed, watching her smile deepen. "An unnatural birth, from one who should be unable to bring forth life. A soul that does not belong to this world. One whose creation escaped its gaze."
"An outside-of-context problem," she said, almost giddy.
"How did you do it?" he asked softly.
"I have no bloody idea." Her grin teetered on the edge of madness. Then she blew a raspberry, as if dismissing her own outburst. "Not that it's a long-term solution. The prophecies already destroyed will remain so, but those not wholly undone are adapting - to him. It won't be long before fate rewrites its plans to account for the new player on the board."
She sighed, bitterness flickering across her face. "He's fortunate to have inherited the Sight from me. Rarely does a Seer become the target of a prophecy - but, as your old flame can attest, it's no absolute protection." Her tone hardened again. "That's why my work needs to be completed. He is proof that it's possible - and I no longer have the time I once believed I did to guide him."
Dumbledore considered her words in silence, tugging absently at his beard. At last, his eyes drifted toward the diary in her hands.
"I suppose we should destroy this, then," he said quietly, "and begin tracing wherever else Riddle may have hidden the remaining fragments of his soul."
Eloá's smile turned victorious at his unspoken agreement to their bargain, then shifted into smug amusement.
"For someone who recognized me on sight by my magic alone, you seem to have forgotten who you're speaking to, Dumbledore. Have you truly gone senile?"
She laughed and pressed a single finger into the diary. The surface yielded like flesh, and a piercing, inhuman shriek echoed through the room as black smoke poured from the wound.
"I am Apollonius of Tyana," she intoned, voice reverberating with power. "I am Zosimos of Panopolis. I am Saint Germain. I am Cagliostro. I am the Count Bellamarre, the Knight Schoening. I am Manuel Doria, Graf Tzarogy, and Prince Ragoczy."
Her eyes gleamed as she pulled her hand free. "I am Eloá dos Santos Moretti."
Clutched between her fingers was something foul - a writhing shape like a malformed, embryonic creature of smoke and tar, tearing at itself, trying to flee in five directions at once.
"There have been alchemists more talented than I," she said, almost reverently. "Duelists, magicians, inventors… but none who have known the soul as I have. I have forgotten more about it than any living being has ever learned."
Dumbledore watched the creature twist and scream, disgust flickering across his face - tempered, for a moment, by pity. Both emotions gave way to alarm as two of the fragments began to react violently, pulsing in tandem.
"Hoh? It seems you were closer to your little nightmares than you believed, Dumbledore."
With a sharp motion, she crushed the writhing mass and poured what remained into a clear, crystalline vessel shaped like an icosahedron. The black vapour swirled and hissed within.
Eloá rose to her feet, turned toward the door, then glanced back over her shoulder.
"Well? What are you waiting for?" she said, her tone light but her eyes glinting with purpose. "We have work to do."