Chapter 13: 13: Dumbledore's plans
For Albus, there were too many names to write, even if I wanted to reach two thousand words Dumbledore, his plans were not going well at all. He didn't know when, maybe when he realized that Lily hadn't died with James that night, not that he wanted her to, but from then on, a lot of his plans went down the drain.
He wanted to give young Hadrian a proper upbringing, his mother would not allow him to call him Harry, and the woman took it upon herself not to allow her son to get to know him, and even in the few times he visited the Potters, he only got to see the boy once from a distance, playing with other children.
He wanted to be there to watch the boy grow, to see that he didn't become conceited or develop Voldemort-like tendencies because of his celebrity status. Well, he was a little paranoid about the whole prophecy thing, and the fact that Lily Potter had often refused to tell him what it was really like that night added to his nervousness.
At least the boy looked good, happy, and not as dark as the young Riddle. Dumbledore, on one of his wanderings through the Muggle world, had discovered that they were the Psychologists. Had he known about them in his day, he might have given little Tom some good tutoring to at least change his ways.
That was water under the bridge, at least he had some ideas now. Although he didn't know what had happened that night, he noticed traces of a ritual when he went to investigate on his own, and although he also wanted to believe that Voldemort was dead, he had a strong feeling that he was not.
He did not possess the gifts of a prophet, soothsayer, or oracle. But he knew people who did. He went to ask Grindelwald about the matter, for it was a very interesting situation.
Grindelwald had made another of his attempts to guess who it was that had stirred the waters of destiny like a child stirring water in a bucket, creating a chaotic whirlpool that gradually shattered the immutable future.
Oh, he could feel it as a seer, Fatum, the embodiment of destiny, seemed to be sulking, trying to calm the whole mess down. But he didn't care about the trouble she was going through, no, he had to prepare for an interesting visit today.
Fatum acting like a spoiled child throwing a tantrum was better than when she got sadistic or heavy-handed with one of her true prophecies. How she loved to make prophecies that affected the whole world, but now many of those prophecies had gone down the drain.
He was content to see the various currents of the future, and with what he had been blinded with, something that might happen in some of the next few days, so he braced himself, he wanted to laugh very hard at his ex-partner.
As he had done the last few nights, he fixed her sparse hair, smoothed his clothes with his hands, and sat on his cot and waited. He was patient, very patient, and was grateful that he was not a prophet but a seer, for visions always had a certain range of occurrence, except for that distant, unchanging future that was now unfolding.
The silence, there were only a few sounds that adorned the suffocating silence, but he had become accustomed to it since soon after he was locked up here, he had learned how valuable this silence was, he even concentrated on many ideas and knowledge he had accumulated before.
With little ambient mana due to a Dumbledore ritual, his soul felt thirsty, a thirst that no drink could quench. How he longed to breathe fresh air, charged with mana so that his soul could filter it into magical power.
He sorely missed the feeling of power of his youth, but with the meager magical power he had... he could barely do a few things.
"Albus, you don't know what a terrible mistake you've made. You ruined a piece of land just to hold me back, and oh, Albus, that's like poking a giant's body and not expecting it to crush you," Grindelwald had realized certain truths from living in such a mana-scarce environment.
Dumbledore's ritual had taken its toll on the atmosphere near Nurmengard. He could feel it, twenty years after he had been imprisoned, life mourned for lack of mana. It was as if he had been cut off from a vital source of sustenance.
Grindelwald even realized that the Muggles he despised probably had some magic in them, and would probably die in such a mana-poor environment, as they usually do in mana-rich environments.
That's why wizarding houses and wizarding schools forbade Muggles to enter. Except for certain places like Diagon Alley, where Muggles lived very close to each other, any place full of mana was toxic to a Muggle, like radiation.
Interesting word, Grindelwald had heard that the United States had a secret project, and had even read about what they were doing to Japan, but his knowledge of those subjects was scarce, he only knew that the area had become toxic even to wizards.
Just as he was planning to investigate this phenomenon, the duel with Dumbledore happened, and well, he lost. Deep down, he was thankful that he lost, his plans were very radical, driven by the fear of that unchangeable future, he just wanted to prepare his method for what was to come, although it seemed that nothing like that would happen soon.
"Loneliness and isolation have made me much wiser," Grindelwald muttered, knowing someone could hear him.
"I hope so, Gellert, I hope so," Dumbledore entered the room, keeping his distance from his former partner, seeing the emaciated state he was in.
This state was to be expected, Gellert was currently the person alive who had spent the longest time in an almost sterile environment of magic. He felt uncomfortable in this place, but Grindelwald was there, with a twinkle in his eye and a smile on his face.
"Have you calmed down?" asked Dumbledore, and his words caused Grindelwald to burst out laughing without any politeness or modesty.
Ignoring the grumpy face the bearded old man made, Gellert continued to laugh, pointing at Dumbledore as if he were watching something funny. And yes, to Grindelwald, Albus was funny at the moment.
"What are you making fun of, Gellert?" asked Albus with a hint of annoyance in his voice.
Even he, who had to put up with the stupidity of the purebloods of the British wizarding world, was losing his patience with Grindelwald's unscrupulous laughter, which did nothing to hide the fact that he was making fun of him.
"Oh, sorry, it's just that you just said the stupidest thing I've ever heard, I didn't even laugh that hard when that waste of a Muggle named Adolf tried to recruit me with his stupid ideas," Grindelwald was being hypocritical at this point, but no one would tell him that he was technically a magical Nazi in the past.
"I only asked you if you had calmed down, you had gone mad and wreaked havoc across Europe, all because of a dream that was more the wish of inexperienced and immature teenagers," Dumbledore said, but the laughter threatened to break out again from Grindelwald, but that annoyed the Headmaster even more.
Dumbledore then raised his wand, creating terrible magical pressure and pushing Grindelwald.
"As impulsive as the Gryffindors you loved to teach, Albus, you never change, which has led you to me now," Gellert barely managed to say, which made Dumbledore stop.
"I want to know something you can tell me, Gellert, is Voldemort alive?" asked Dumbledore, that was his purpose for being here.
Grindelwald stared at Albus, noticing some details that simple visions could not show. The man before him was already a tired old man, stressed and obviously with a lot on his mind. Gellert then closed his eyes for a few seconds before opening them again.
"The one you call Voldemort is in a strange state, he has not gone to the afterlife, but he is not a ghost, he is less than that. Something is holding him back, not his desire to stay, which is high, but something more physical, more earthly.
It's like he has chains that keep him from dying completely, but don't panic, he's not alive, right now he's more like that Muggle scientist's cat. Alive, dead, I don't know," Grindelwald's reply was merely a confirmation of what he had been feeling for a long time.
But what could keep someone in such a strange state as Gellert had mentioned? It seemed that he would have to immerse himself in the Hogwarts library again, an idea that didn't seem very welcoming to him given how busy he was.
"Thank you, it was nice to see you, Gellert, but I must go now," as Dumbledore headed for the door, Grindelwald's sinister voice echoed.
"Albus, your plans will not withstand the maelstrom of destiny, do not mess with the magically chosen of this age, they are not children to be manipulated at your whim, for you have already transgressed against nature once by imprisoning me here.
Believe me, you don't want to make another mistake, because unlike you, magic doesn't give you another chance, once it's tainted you, another time... well, you'll understand where we know hell from," Gellert's warning weighed heavily on his heart, but he didn't respond and left the room with a clouded expression on his face.
When he returned to his office to reflect on what had happened that day, he was finally able to connect some dots. He now understood why his condition was so... deteriorated. He wasn't even 120 years old, but he already felt like 190, probably the punishment of magic, the stain on him caused by what he had done.
Yes, in a way, he regretted performing the ritual to imprison Grindelwald. There were better options, but he wanted something quick and final that would allow him to rebuild the magical world to his standards of the time.
He knew when he noticed the accelerated aging that he had paid a much higher price for that ritual, which was one of the reasons he had banned it until he realized that it was unnecessary and that many of his actions were doing more harm than good in the magical world.
The material for the Ritual class was written by him and Flamel, choosing the right rituals and eliminating the inappropriate and useless ones. Adding serious warnings, their risks, their consequences. He wanted to leave a useful legacy, a successor, but neither Hadrian nor Neville were within his reach, his past actions caused repercussions.
One of the actions that caused Lily's anger against him is that he had realized how special the Potter Cloak was, and wanting to somehow delay its aging, he asked James for it, supposedly to study the wonders of a cloak that did not lose its invisibility.
The cloak refused, working only as a normal cloak for him, and even seemed to be losing its power. It was only when it returned to the hands of Lily and her son that the cape regained its 'power', so to speak.
Even the elixir of life, which he bought from Flamel after paying a high price, did not help. Then he understood that magic refused to give him a long life, a life he would not be able to extend in any way and that his life would be limited to the life a Muggle could live.
"I'm not going to mess with these children, I'm not the manipulative young man you knew, Gellert. But I can give them little nudges to prove what they're made of, and I can prove some things that deserve a better check.
Tom is sure to go after the Philosopher's Stone if it is known to be at Hogwarts, security may not be impossible, but it is not something a first year can solve either, knowing Lily, young Hadrian is sure to be steps ahead of his class," Dumbledore said aloud to himself as he tossed a distinguished red gem into his hand.
But was it a real Philosopher's Stone? No, for a master alchemist and master transformer like him who had seen the aforementioned stone, replicating it wasn't that complicated.
Only... our parasitic dark lord wouldn't just want to steal this treasure.
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AN: Writting this at 1:35 AM, loool
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