章 14: Dumbledore's Machinations
A few minutes after Nathan's story, Headmaster's office, Hogwarts; Dumbledore's POV
Dumbledore smiled slightly as Nathan left to free Dobby from Lucius's control. Lily and James followed him once he told him what he was planning to make sure Lucius didn't try to get revenge. He was certain Dobby would protect his savior, but a little extra protection never hurt.
Dumbledore internally winced at his thoughts as he remembered a missing girl who he thought needed to be protected more than she needed to be with her family. Young Jasmine paid for the folly of his arrogance and to this day, he still could not forgive himself for that fact that a child had to pay for it.
Albus plastered a smile on his face as he turned to the Weasleys and Minerva who were still sitting in his office. "I'm sure young Ginevra is tired from her experiences. Do not feel discouraged my dear. Older and wiser witches and wizards have fallen for his charms before. The fact that you did does not mean you are weak. Now, Minerva, can you take them to a guest room to spend the night? I doubt young Ginevra will want to be alone tonight."
Minerva shook herself from the shock she had entered from Nathan's tale and led the Weasleys from his office. Once he was alone, Albus sighed as he felt the weight of his years land on him.
Albus stood up and locked his office down and blocked his floo before stepping into his study that was connected to the office by way of a hidden door behind his desk. Albus sighed as he moved over to the far wall where a map in 4 different shades of color with red pins was hanging.
The map was a representation of the political and social influence of each of the four magical factions, the light, the dark, the neutrals and the sorcerers. Each country was colored in with the color of the faction with the most influence in that particular country. It was white for the light, black for the dark, grey for the neutrals and yellow for sorcerers. The red pins were general locations of people of importance in both the political and social arena and when touched by a wand, gave a brief overview of the person's political stance, opinions on major matters and probable long-term goals.
Albus's eyes softened in regret as they landed on a particular pin located over New York City. With a tap of his wand, the pin recited the known information in a monotone voice.
"Name: Jasmine Potter, last known location: New York City, status: unknown, political stance: unknown, goals: unknown."
Albus sighed as he was reminded of one of his greatest failures. He had thought that leaving young Jasmine with her relatives was what was best for all involved. Jasmine would grow up a normal childhood away from the pressures of being the Boy-Who-Lived's sister and be safe all at once. By the time she would attend Hogwarts, Jasmine would hopefully be mature enough to understand that it was necessary and while Albus knew she would probably be angry at her parents, he hoped she would be there for her brother for the trials ahead.
Albus never imagined that her own relatives would treat her like the Malfoys treated their house-elves. No, they treated her worse than that. At least house-elves found joy in their work. Young Jasmine did not have even that.
Albus couldn't help but sense the similarities in how young Jasmine was treated with her relatives to how another young boy was treated at his orphanage. Long investigation into the Dursleys memories showed him that young Jasmine was slowly gaining conscious control of her powers. This was both surprising and not so surprising. Albus well remembered some of the feats young Jasmine did with her accidental magic when she was still with her parents. Some of them didn't seem accidental at all.
Albus rubbed his temples as pondered on young Jasmine's status.
When and if she appeared, she would have a lot of influence over her brother's thoughts. They were, after all, twins and bonds like that are hard to break. No doubt that Nathan would be more than willing to listen to his sister's thoughts. Nathan had already shown himself willing to break childhood friendships in order to stand up for what he believed in.
While Albus was proud of Nathan for his standing up for himself and agreed in his thoughts that parseltongue was just another language and was not inherently dark, it set a bad precedent. Especially if young Jasmine turned out to be anything like Tom when he was a teenager. If Jasmine was like Tom and managed to influence Nathan into her beliefs...
No. No, he couldn't let it happen. He needed to find Jasmine in order to guide her on the right path. But if that wasn't possible and if young Jasmine turned out to be anything like Tom...then he would have to take care of her no matter how much it broke his heart. He didn't have much time left in his life and he refused to leave the world with another dark lord waiting in the wings. It would destroy both the elder Potters and young Nathan if Jasmine turned into another version of Tom. The world was bad enough as it is.
There was once a time where Albus believed that uniting the four factions and integrating our cultures with the muggles was one of Merlin's greatest works. By uniting the four factions together, he had created a sort of magical empire that was ruled by the Sorcerer Supreme and allowed the magical world to live in secrecy while still keeping up with the times.
Then his sister's accident happened.
Albus both blamed and didn't blame the Muggle boys for happened afterwards. His sister should have had someone watching her to make sure something like that didn't happen but at the same time, the idea of children being so cruel to each other was anathema in that day and age.
Albus didn't blame his father for his reaction and even understood it to a certain extent. Ariana was his only daughter and his little princess. Any parent would have reacted the same in his shoes.
No, what truly angered Albus was what happened to his father afterwards.
At that time, his father would have gotten off for his actions with a heavy fine and perhaps a day or two in Azkaban. However, this wasn't enough for the dark faction that insisted on his public execution in order to eliminate a powerful wizard in the light faction. The Dumbledore family always were a progressive one, leaders of the light, spreading their belief of cooperating with the muggles and the integration of muggleborns, to continue Merlin's noble work.
In order to placate both sides, the Ministry voted on giving his father life in Azkaban. This was basically a death sentence and placated the conservatives (dark faction) while saving Albus's family from the shame of a public execution.
To this day, Albus still could not forgive the dark for their hand in his father's disgrace and death. Because of them, his mother Kendra was forced to watch over his now sick sister by herself which led to her becoming bitter and hard instead of the kind and loving woman she was before. This also later led to her death due to one of his sister's tantrums and Albus subsequently having to take care of herself himself.
He also could not agree that cooperating with the muggles was the answer. What happened to his sister was proof. It would be better to have a complete separation of the two worlds. People always fear what they do not understand, and greed consumes the ones that do.
Perhaps if his father had been alive, Albus wouldn't have fallen in with young Gellert when he arrived. Then his sister wouldn't have died during his three-way duel with him and his brother Aberforth. Then he wouldn't have such an estranged relationship with his only living family.
Albus shook his head to rid himself of such thoughts. He would never know. However, Albus had lived his life trying to rid the Wizarding World of the dark's influence. The cold way they eliminate anyone who oppose them attacked Dumbledore's sensibilities. However, he always believed in the good in people and liked to give them a chance to redeem themselves. Severus and Mordred were perfect examples of people who had managed to change their ways despite their past crimes. Albus personally considered Mordred having helped young Nathan as her redemption and so allowed her to continue to socialize with Nathan. Her experience would only help Nathan in the coming years.
Even now, Albus' goal remains the same; the complete unification of the wizarding world under one banner. He would ensure complete separation from the muggles by ensuring that muggleborn children be taken from their parents to be raised in the wizarding world. The parents would be obliviated of course. He had hoped that no child should go through what his sister did. No child should fear their own magic. Magic is a thing of wonder and joy, not of pain and suffering. He had hoped to create a true magical utopia. Any magic that would cause harm would be destroyed. Only harmless magic would remain.
Albus's eyes transferred France, which was colored mostly grey. He had high hopes for this country when he won an apprenticeship with Nicholas Flamel in an effort to earn his favor. A way to find support from the oldest wizard alive. Unfortunately, his idea was dismissed when it was brought up, Flamel deeming it unrealistic and impossible due to the diversity in wizarding cultures.
Any opinion Flamel had on the matter was discarded when he found out he commonly used dark magic. An example was when Albus managed to discover the twelve used of dragon blood. One of those uses was a magical amplifier and when used in certain rituals. Albus had been horrified when he saw his master Nicholas using dragon's blood in a ritual to help an eleven-year-old boy awaken his family's magical gift, mage sight. The dragon's blood amplified the amount of magic that the boy's eye could use without damaging them, as well as giving the ritual much more of a chance to succeed.
To this day, Albus could hear the boy's screams as his eyes were bleeding.
Albus didn't try to listen to his master's explanations that the boy had asked for the ritual to take place and that it wouldn't be possible to awaken his mage sight when he got older. In his mind, no eleven-year-old was mature enough to make that sort of decision and they had basically forced him.
This day Albus decided that rituals would be banned in his utopian world, as well as any non-European magic. His research in magical cultures revealed how different magic was perceived around the world. The wandless magic in Africa, the paper seals in Japan, the magical bracelets in Brazil and the enchanted rings in China were examples of this difference. Worst of all, the dark arts exist in other forms as well. He would have to remove their cultures and reeducate them into using wands. Merlin used a wand after all, so it must be the superior focus.
His plan was created days after his defeat of Grindelwald. He noticed how international relations were better than ever after the war. For the first time in history, every European ministry was allied against Gellert and it was beautiful. Now, if he were to create a threat far more terrible than Gellert, a threat to every magical society, every ministry would oppose him. They would have to unite against their main enemy, thus giving him the opportunity to unite them permanently.
It was when he first saw Tom Riddle in an orphanage that he saw his potential to be this threat. So, he molded him slowly into becoming the darkest wizard in centuries and after Tom's defeat at Albus' hand, he would have become the true leader of the magical world. Unfortunately, the Potter incident occurred before Tom could start his conquest on an international level and so he would bide his time until his return.
Albus's eyes landed on the Americas which was almost entirely colored yellow, with a bit of white to show the sorcerer's influence there was prevalent, especially in North America.
The sorcerers were the one faction that Albus had no idea how to deal with. He found it offensive that the leader of the Magical World used to be chosen from just that faction and refused to believe that only a sorcerer could be chosen. In his mind, the sorcerers were just trying to maintain the status quo of them being the most powerful. The most worrying thought was the fact that they basically neutered the American magical world. They were in control of Ilvemorny, their academy of magic and forced the ministry to obey their rules. Frankly, the rules were a bit lax but if they wanted to, they could take over the entire wizarding world there. In his mind, the sorcerers were just trying to maintain the status quo of them being the most powerful.
After all, he was a wizard and yet he was a match for most the powerful sorcerer, Nicholas himself. Albus rubbed his temples as he remembered his latest talk with Nicholas three years ago.
Albus had originally planned to bring in Nicholas's Philosopher's Stone to Hogwarts during Nathan's first year. Despite what people thought, he didn't wish to test Nathan, that was just a happy coincidence. No, he knew that Nathan's reentry into their world would attract Tom's attention. In order to confirm Tom's existence and a theory he had; he had wished to bring the Stone in order to bait Tom into coming for it. He would, of course, never allow him to gain it but would instead set a trap for him in order to see how powerful he still was.
However, things were pushed back a year when Nicholas outright refused to listen to Albus's plan of using his Stone as bait. He suspected, rightfully so, that Albus would not return it if he did.
Albus, of course, never planned on returning the Stone once he had it. He would destroy it and say it was destroyed in the struggle against Tom and that Nicholas was already old anyway and should be glad for a chance to rest.
This would allow him to get rid of a major opposition to his plans, and get rid of something Albus considered an abomination. No one should live that long. The idea of the Stone falling into Tom's hands or someone like him was a horrifying thought. No, destroying the Stone would be for the Greater Good.
However, Nicholas didn't agree and outright refused to give up the Stone. He even had the gall of calling Albus a control freak that was getting too big for his britches. When Albus tried to insist, Nicholas handily defeated him and thereby proving that while Albus may technically be equal to him in terms of power, the Philosopher's Stone and his centuries of experience would always give him the edge.
Albus had been forced to spend most of Nathan's first year, rather than trying to help him fit in with his peers after years of isolation, recreating a cheap copy of the Stone that gave off the same aura as the real one, in order to lure Tom in during Nathan's second year. Thankfully, with the exception of the real Stone's destruction, everything else had gone as planned and he had even gotten the chance to see Nathan in action.
Albus was sure that Nathan's burning of Quirrell's body was due to the residual protection left over from that night. He had at first thought that it was due to the fact that Nathan's scar was a horcrux but that was quickly discarded when Albus checked him over afterwards. His scar, while a curse scar, was no horcrux. Jasmine's scar was also not a horcrux because Albus remembered that her scar had no dark magic radiating from it. As the journal that Nathan brought proved, horcruxes radiated dark magic in waves that could be sensed by those trained in sensing magic.
Therefore, Albus could only theorize that Nathan ability to love was so strong that it manifested in his power over flames. In made sense in his mind since love was always described as passionate and fiery. Albus could only hope that Nathan never lost that characteristic.
Albus's eyes landed on another red pin in New York City, this one showing the location of the probable future Sorcerer Supreme, Dr. Stephen Strange.
Albus had tried many times to have a meeting with Dr. Strange in order to feel him out and see if he could influence him into his way of thinking. However, all attempts had been rebuffed. It had probably been due to how new he was to his responsibilities and he didn't have the time. Albus could understand that since he remembered when he first started as Headmaster as well as Supreme Mugwump and later Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot that it took him a decade to get used to everything.
Not that it mattered much. The sorcerers always kept to themselves and rarely entered into their affairs. Albus was content to leave well enough alone.
Giving Jasmine's pin one last glance, Albus turned and walked to his bed to get some rest.
He just hoped that young Jasmine didn't believe differently than him. It would be a shame to have to get rid of someone he once considered his pseudo-granddaughter.
Suddenly, he got an idea, a great but terrible idea. The Potters have been drifting away from him and he needed to regain his influence over them to ensure Nathan fulfills his destiny accordingly. He searched for the last of the blood he still had taken from young Jasmine when she was born. It would take all of it but it would be worth it. The tri-wizard tournament is being held at Hogwarts next year and he asked to use the Goblet of Fire as a way to select champions. He wanted to use the event as a way to test Nathan's capabilities further but this was a better idea.
A little-known fact about the Goblet is that it can summon the person whose name comes out of the goblet if the name is written in blood. As for his plans for Nathan, He could still confound the Goblet to have four champions. Binding Jasmine into the tournament and offering his help would help him influence her into his line of thinking, and it would reunite the Potter family. Their gratitude will further increase his influence in young Nathan's eyes. Talk about two birds and one stone.
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