Truth Unmasked
4th June 1993
St Mungos, London.
Harry had a quick look up from a copy of last week's Witch Weekly a mediwitch had given him from the break room to try and pass the time until Andromeda could hopefully bring something to read he was actually interested in and looked at the clock. His visitors had only left 16 minutes ago and it already felt like a lifetime ago, his thoughts turning to Andromeda again. Harry had already decided he liked her, and Nymphadora who’d been convinced after much cajoling and arguing with her mother to let him call her ‘Dora’ instead of Tonks was one of the most interesting people he’d ever met, even if she did take great fun in teasing him.
Harry was interrupted in his thoughts by a soft knock at the door echoing through the room, the door opening before he could answer and call for whoever was there to come in. The figure of Albus Dumbledore stepped into the room, his bright blue hat held under the crook of his armpit, his eyes scanning the room with a spark of anticipation before offering Harry a small smile.
“Headmaster”
“I’m told you had quite the adventure Harry.” visible mirth on his face as he let out a small deliberate groan and settled into the visitors chair beside the bed. In spite of this show of age Harry could feel the air shift slightly at the intensity of the presence of Dumbledore's magic, something that he’d never felt around any younger wizard no matter how much younger and more spritely. Although Harry did think that he didn’t know that many adult wizards so it might be more common than he thought.
Harry fidgeted with the edge of his quilt cover under his gaze, “Professor, it just sort of… happened. I swear I didn’t mean to this time; You were gone and Ginny had disappeared and, well, you know how things go for me." His eyes met Dumbledore’s, searching for a sign that he was disappointed in him.
Dumbledore just beamed at him “Yes, Alric as well as the young Mr and Mrs Weasley have already told me most of the details. From there telling it would seem the most fitting punishment would be to present you and Mr Weasley an award for Special Awards for Services to the School.” Allowing a small gap for effect his expression changed and he was left displaying a playful mischievous twinkle in his eyes, “However, I thought I’d come and get your version of events. Fill in the gaps before making any final decisions on the issue.”
Harry finally relaxed, releasing some nervous tension in his body language before scrunching his face up again in confusion “Alric?”
“He always is disappointed that so few students think to ask him his name, and no doubt Mrs Granger would be disappointed that you’ve not read ‘Hogwarts: A History’ despite her repeated recommendations.”
Albus left a significant pause hoping Harry would puzzle out the riddle himself. Just as he was about to continue Harry looked up “The Sorting Hat sir?”
“Yes, one of the ghosts tells me Godric would have thought it quite rude, almost disrespectful not to name something you could hold a conversation with.” Sensing that the topic was getting away from them and the possibility of being interrupted by those he’d rather keep unappraised increased as time went on he asked Harry to tell him his version of events.
Harry started, he told him about Dobby warning him of danger before the start of the year, hearing voices coming from inside the walls, Hagrid mentioning offhandedly about dead roosters, how Hermione had realised the creature was a basilisk just before she was attacked and finding the note, Hagrid mentioning to follow the spiders during his arrest, Aaragog telling him and Ron about the last victim and about discovering the chamber.
“You’d think Myrtle would have noticed a basilisk appearing in there a few times over the year considering she spends all her time in the bathroom refusing to leave her toilet” Harry broke in his finger tapping his chin.
“Another side road that is best not to travel down Harry, but it wouldn’t be unkind to say death has not suited Mrs Warren and she’s not quite the astute and discerning Ravenclaw she was in life.”
Harry carried on, telling Dumbledore about how he and Ron got separated, meeting Tom, Tom’s monologue and reveal as Lord Voldemort, Fawx's sudden arrival, the battle in the chamber, the death of the basilisk and his miraculous survival, the defeat of Tom and then feeling like he was getting a headache before ultimately collapsing.
Dumbledore rocked back into the chair, his hands steepled and fingers wiggling in a repeating wave pattern as he thought adding some gravitas to his demeanour before saying in a low voice “It is interesting…as my sources tell me Voldemort is currently hiding in the Albanian woods. Perhaps even Dark Lords require a Mediterranean holiday after decades of plotting evil.” He looked pleased with his own joke.
“Sir it was the Diary Riddle wrote when he was sixteen…” Harry burst out in explanation.
“Yes. Mr Weasley showed me a diary he found in the chamber once he finally made his way past the rockfall. A brilliant if terrifying piece of magic, especially at such a young age.” he said softly. “Of course, he was probably the most brilliant student Hogwarts has seen in centuries.”
“Very few people know that Lord Voldemort was once called Tom Riddle.” Harry couldn’t help but show his curiosity when hearing this. “I taught him myself about fifty years ago during my time as Hogwarts transfiguration professor. He was a natural talent. Combined with a relentless curiosity that made him one of the brightest minds in the field. Most of the other staff at the time had even loftier assessments than myself; it was clear to everyone that his future prospects were limitless. Only for him to fall into a menial job far below his ability after leaving the school then disappear completely only a few short years later.” Dumbledore sighed taking his glasses off and rubbing them on his robe before putting them back on, “Of course I know now that he travelled far and wide, sank deeply into the Dark Arts, consorted with the very worst of our kind then underwent so many dangerous magical transformations that when he resurfaced as Lord Voldemort, he was unrecognisable. Hardly anyone connected Lord Voldemort with the clever, handsome boy who was once Head Boy.”
“Professor Dumbledore.. Riddle said I’m like him. A strange likeness, he said...”
“Did he, now?” said Dumbledore, looking thoughtfully at Harry from under his thick silver eyebrows. “And what do you think, Harry?”
“I don’t think I’m like him!” said Harry, more loudly than he’d intended. “I mean, I’m… I’m in Gryffindor, I’m...” But he fell silent, a lurking doubt resurfacing in his mind.
“Professor,” he started again after a moment. “The Sorting Hat told me I’d… I’d have done well in Slytherin. Everyone thought I was Slytherin’s heir for a while… because, because I can speak Parseltongue…”
“You could speak Parseltongue, Harry,” said Dumbledore calmly, “because Lord Voldemort - who is the last remaining descendant of Salazar Slytherin - can speak Parseltongue. Unless I’m much mistaken, 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...”
“Harry, you are very different from Tom Riddle.” Dumbledore peered at Harry with a more serious expression and tone to his voice than his usual grandfatherly demeanour. “You’re courageous Harry, stepping into the path of danger without hesitation for those you care for and sometimes even for those you do not is not something that some of the many brave witches and wizards I’ve encountered would jump into with such relish. If I may be so rude as to say so, your sense of self preservation is sorely lacking in comparison to Tom who’s greatest fear was death and would not have risked his own safety for his friends had he had any.”
“It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.” Harry sat motionless in his chair, a feeling of reassurance at what he’d been told
The thought about risking himself for people who weren’t friends or even friendly made Harry's thoughts drift, “What happened to Professor Lockhart?”
“He got out of the chamber. In fact he’s just down the Hall in the Janus Thickery ward, a few gobstones short of a game currently. Someone to visit and investigate once the boredom of being trapped in the hospital sets in no doubt.” He gave Harrys a knowing look.
Privately Harry couldn’t think that there was no amount of boredom that could overcome how much he didn’t want to spend any time with the man.
“All the other victims of Slytherin’s monster are awake and Madam Pomfrey has even seen fit to let some of them leave the hospital wing. I’m told she ran out of calming draught when one of them managed to get their hands on the newspaper from the day before they woke up and saw the headline.” A smile returned to Dumbledore's face.
“Many wanted to meet and thank you, and I suppose I should be grateful too, I’m quite sure if you hadn’t acted I'd be enjoying the horrors of an early retirement and Hagrid's fate doesn’t bare thinking about.” he took a bag of sherbet lemons out of his pocket and popped on in his mouth before proffering the bag to Harry who accepted.
“Speaking of the paper Harry…” Dumbledore paused for a second, wary of his wording, worried about unduly causing worry. “It would be - inadvisable to let the public know about Voldemort's involvement. If they suspected he was alive, the true believers, those who felt marginalised by society who think they could use him to gain power. They would flock to his banner…”
Harry looked down at his bed in trepidation before raising his head and looking directly into Dumbledore's eyes and nodding “Okay sir.”
Dumbledore slapped his thighs with his hands “Right, I have a few meetings to attend, another Defence teacher to find, however I was wondering if I could get your permission to take a look at your scar before I leave. Give an old man some peace of mind.”
“Yes professor,” Harry nodded, “although I think everyone in the hospital has had a look at it the last few days.”
Dumbledore did a series of wand movements that Harry had come to recognise over dozen or so checks he received in the last 24 hours before a few flurries and a brief incantation over his scar that Harry didn’t recognise. Harry thought he saw a brief moment of victory at whatever information he’d gathered from it as Dumbledore's composure momentarily broke before he regained it only a couple of seconds later.
“Harry I would like to do an experiment”, ‘Serpensortia’ a small conjured grass snake appeared in Dumbledore's left hand. “Could you try and speak to the creature”.
Harry nodded before looking at the snake and concentrating, the snake turning to face him in expectation. ‘Hello, can you understand me?’
‘Speaker!’ The little snake hissed back before suddenly disappearing.
Harry felt a slight sense of loss as it disappeared and tilted his head up to look at Dumbledore who had a look of genuine surprise that Harry had never seen on him before.
Sensing Harry's curiosity he broke the silence “That was quite surprising Harry.” he pulled his hand through his beard a half dozen times lost in thought. ‘Maybe it’s innate’ Albus thought, ‘that he’s a mirror of him, similar but the complete reverse. After all, while magical traits often run in bloodlines they can appear spontaneously as well. They’d heard stories about the chaos a muggleborn metamorphmagus had made for a week that almost collapsed the statute of secrecy in Indonesia during 1988.’
“Sir, what's surprising? What were you expecting to happen with the snake? What's made my scar go away?”
“Nothing Harry, nothing. Never worry! You’ll soon be better and we can get you out of here. Get home and enjoy some of your summer at your Aunts.”
Harry couldn’t help but frown, as much as he hated being laid up in a hospital bed talking to Andromeda or Dora was far better than being at his relatives.
“Sir, I don't think I’ve ever enjoyed any time spent living with my relatives...” Harry said quietly.
“Harry your mother was Petunia's sister too, I’m sure when she finds out you’ve stood up to her murderer and prevailed, yet again might I add, she’ll be beaming with pride.”
“Proud? Sir, all those times I could have died and I didn’t manage it they’ll be furious. They’ll be even worse if they find out I had to be removed from school because my magic was so unstable it wasn’t safe for other wizards to be around too.”
Dumbledore ignored his protests “Before I go, you need to return this to Professor McGonagal by the end of the month.” He handed Harry an envelope before hurriedly making his way out of the room.
~~~~~~
Harry heard the muffled sound of voices from outside his door just before it opened and Andromeda walked in leaving the door open so he could see a tall brown haired woman wearing a monocle with an authoritative voice talking to a man with a wooden peg leg and visible scars across his face with a madly spinning eyeball. “I’m just pointing out Moody that some would say you're a very senior aurour to be posted on guard duty.”
“Switched shifts with the person who was supposed to be on duty, Amelia…”
The woman, Amelia, levelled a stare at him and he spoke into the pause “Just making sure my apprentice hasn’t been picking up any bad habits from the less competent the week she’s been here. Couldn’t have her standing about here forgetting all her training. That it coincides with you meeting Potter just happens to be very serendipitous.” He grinned.
“Yes, I’m sure it’s quite the coincidence the first time you wound up here is the day I’m here for meeting no one else was supposed to know about beforehand.” She said pointedly while looking at Tonks who had a slightly guilty look on her face before she broke into a slight smile and waved for them to follow as she finally walked into the room.
She started talking as she kept taking strides over to his bed with her hand out “Hello, Mr Potter I’m Amelia Bones head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement.”
“Erm, hello, I’m Harry.” He shook her hand.
The man Amelia had called Moody's eye was moving but Harry could only see the whites of it, then he turned suddenly. Spinning about he pointed his wand towards an empty space in the corner of the room, “You can come out now or I can stun you both.” Nymphadora followed his motion pointing her wand in the same direction but with an obvious look of confusion seeing only a blank wall.
“Should have known.” Two people appeared in black cloaks, hoods drawn and faces obscured by something that was like a blur Harry had seen occasionally on TV shows when they didn’t want to show someone's face. “Should never have pointed you in the direction of that eye Alistair.” The one that had been speaking lowered his hood his face becoming visible as he did before putting his hand out and walking towards Harry. “I’m director Croaker, head of the unspeakable department.” He pointed at the other unspeakable. “You can’t know their name, against department policy. He was the cursebreaker called to help your treatment.”
Harry was surprised at the lack of reaction from the other adults at the appearance of two strangers in the room followed by their wincing at being told the Unspeakable who’d helped him was a cursebreaker and tried his best to appear nonchalant but failed. “H…Harry.” he stuttered.
Amelia was holding the bridge of her nose muttering to herself phrases like “Operational Security”,“Terrible”,“Waiting disaster.”
Everyone had started conjuring themselves somewhere to sit when one of the two Unspeakables whipped out what looked like a small stone baptismal font covered in weird markings scratched into the bowl from under his cloak before he tapped it with his wand and it expanded in size until it was slightly over a metre in diameter.
“Oh good, that’ll make things easier.” was all Amelia said as she nodded at it before turning again to face Harry.
“Harry, I'm here to find out what happened last week at Hogwarts. There have been some rumours that the Department wants to investigate.”
Harry swallowed nervously “Am I in trouble?”
Amelia looked at him out of her monocled eye not answering his question, “Last week I received a letter from my niece claiming you’d fought and killed a basilisk. I had been about to ignore it as ridiculous, the Hogwarts rumour mill gone wild until reports of you being here suffering serious injuries including acute poisoning surfaced.”
“Niece?”
“Susan Bones.”
Harry gulped nervously again, Susan had been one of the people actively avoiding him in the halls after Justin had been petrified.
She withdrew a piece of parchment and quill from inside her robe, “I had been about to question you about exactly what happened, Susan says you saved everyone in the school.” Harry couldn’t help being caught off guard with surprise at hearing that. “We can’t get to the crime scene and we’ve only two second hand reports of the area and who witnessed the basilisk's corpse…” She nodded in director Croaker's direction.
“Mr Potter, do you know what a pensive is?” He pointed at the odd font in front of him.
“Ermmm. No.” Harry let out a long drawl as he shook his head.
“It shows you your memories back to you or any others you let view it in third person at roughly the same speed they happened. Absurdly expensive but incredibly handy. Only a few in the country. Not technically admissible as evidence in court because of the ubiquity of memory charms but more than enough for this.” He pulled his wand out and stood up pointing it at Harry who just stared at it worriedly. He assumed if he was in any real danger that Dora or Andromeda would be outraged but they hadn’t moved.
“Close your eyes and think of the memory of whatever happened from the start until the end. Try and include any relevant information then nod when you’ve done it.”
Harry nodded after half a minute thinking back on the details as the side of his head began to feel slightly light, like he was falling out of bed in that direction.
He opened his eyes to see Coraker putting a silvery thread on the tip of his wand into a glass vial.
Andromeda put a comforting hand on his shoulder, her and Amelia noticed that he jumped slightly as she did it. “Harry, we're going to watch your memory, you can join if you want.”
Harry shook his head again and she lifted her hand off his shoulder before patting it twice and giving a reassuring smile. “We’ll talk about what happens after.”
The adults began moving to the font and dipped their fingers into a clear liquid in expectation. Croaker looked around to make sure they were all ready, dropping the memory into the bowl, the liquid turning silver and the adults stilled.
Harry wasn’t sure if he was terrified or fascinated but he looked at the clock and thought it’d be at least two hours. He’d included one or two other memories but started the main event with Aaragog and now he thought about it he could probably have trimmed that off. Two hours of nervous expectation.
Eventually he caught Tonks' turn to look at him, mouth open and flapping as she thought of something to say in his peripheral vision. As he moved his head to look at her he noticed Amelia, Croaker and the Unknown Unspeakable talking in hushed tones over the top of the pensive. The two Tonks slipped down into their seats again stunned, staring at Harry like he was a spectacle in a zoo.
“That house elf, it was a Black house elf. The one Narcissa was lent for life as part of her wedding dowry.” He faintly overheard Andromeda saying to Nymphadora while Moody stood in front of him giving Harry an appraising look, “You’d make a mighty fine Aurour lad. Good instincts like your father… Although I never had to tell him how stupid it was to let his wand out of his hand when you're in danger.” The other three began making their way towards their seats. “When you get out of here go get yourself a new wand holster… or grab one out of your vaults.”
Harry had been about to ask what he meant when Croaker spoke, “I need everyone to give a vow that they won’t speak about anything seen or spoken about in this room today between lunch and dinner with anyone not present unless myself, Amelia or Harry gives permission.” Dora had been about to question him but he raised his hand “I’m giving you the illusion of choice but if you refuse I’ll obliviate you until you forget so much you don’t remember how to chew food.”
Amelia had never seen the usually sarcastic and irritable Croaker so serious which unsettled her almost as much as the revelations so far. She couldn’t help but feel a foreboding that worse was to come.
Andromeda grimaced and gave the vow, the others following. When they were done Amelia looked at Harry and began to speak, “Mr Potter you are very much in the opposite of trouble. How you got out of that… If I’d put every aurour we have down there we’d have lost dozens.” she tapped her quill off the bottom of her chin. “We’ll have to redact all the Voldemort parts but I imagine once you sell the corpse and people see the size of it Fudge will try to give you an Order of Merlin.”
Harry grimaced noticeably so Amelia turned to the room, “Not too often I come out of an investigation with more questions than I did before we started. Any thoughts?” then looked around the circle.
Moody blew out some air “I remember Tom. Graduated a year below me. Brilliant. Incredibly bright. Went missing not long after he graduated if memory serves me right. Always thought he’d managed to get himself killed.”
“If only we’d been so lucky.” Amelia sighed.
“It’s not the first time I’ve seen him.” Harry spoke up.
“What do you mean?”
Harry launched into an explanation about Quirrell and the Philosopher's Stone. Croaker and Amelia had asked him to stop after a few seconds and repeat himself when they’d set up Dicta-Quills.
“What is happening in that castle!” A visibly irate Andromeda blustered at the end, her calm demeanour starting to break.
After a few seconds as she calmed Croaker nodded at the unknown unspeakable who began to speak. “Unfortunately Mr Potter you’re going to have to sit this part of the conversation out.” Harry frowned and began complaining that it was hardly fair he did all the fighting but the unspeakable just carried on and waved his wand putting the adults behind a bluish red shield Harry couldn’t hear any sound coming from.
Behind the shield Croaker continued “We believe we have an idea how he survived after that night in 1981. It’s why we made you all take the vow, think of it as a state secret. Are any of you aware of what a horcrux is?” Andromeda gasped and put a hand up to cover her mouth in shock while the rest shook their heads or said no. “A horcurx is a vessel created by a ritual that ends with a premeditated murder that tears the soul in half before hiding the torn half outside the body in a vessel or phylactery.”
“And how does that keep him alive?” Amelia asked.
“It makes the individual impossible to kill as long as the Horcrux remains intact as part of their soul still remains anchored to this plane even if their body is destroyed. Although there are massive downsides, it should have weakened him but the battle reports during the war don’t seem to indicate that.” Amelia had a grim look on her face as she remembered any battle he turned up too. Often when they were winning, he appeared turning the battle and leaving devastation behind him. “but it does explain why he became so unstable towards the end of the war. I imagine he was ignorant of the effects or he wouldn’t have bothered.”
“Why wouldn’t he have bothered? What's a bit of madness to that psychopath when immortality is the prize?”
“It doesn’t grant immortality, there’s a reason you’ve never met a 4000 year old Egyptian despite them creating the practice. However… I doubt he knew that before he made them. The soul is finite, the only exception we know to this is ghosts who can’t touch this plane, the individual parts will still eventually wear thin and he’d die of natural causes. Doesn’t help us though if he manages to become embodied again, he could live another century or more. If he was to discover a method of immortality, the combination… well it’s a truly terrifying prospect. Mr Potter has already indicated he’s made a play for the philosophers stone without any of us having the faintest idea, if he’d succeeded it would have been a disaster that doesn’t bare thinking about.”
Tonks who’d been waiting for him to end finally spoke up “Them?”
Croaker's seriousness broke slightly and he reverted to his usual sarcasm, “Yes, them. Shame you picked brawling in alleyways instead of my department.”
Amelia looked up from her notes ignoring the attempted poaching of one of her best new auror candidates “How can you be so sure?”
“Because the diary he used isn’t the only Horcrux we know about.” He pulled out a jar of sludge.
Andromeda let out another gasp of shock, Dora thought she’d seen that face more today than she had in the last decade combined, “But that came out of Harry the day he arrived here!”
Croaker nodded, “Yes, we call it Soul Ichor, unknown to magic before last week and it has only reinforced our view that Mr Potter is the single most interesting person alive to the Department. We speculate that it was his intention to create a Horcrux using Harry’s death and this was an unintended consequence of the curses failure. It contained, from our guess between zero and 5% of Voldemort's soul.”
“How though. He’s had that for over a decade. It should have been able to possess him when he was younger.” Andromeda’s rearing as part of the House of Black giving her a firmer understanding than Amelia or Moody in the uncommon and esoteric intricacies of the Dark Arts.
“All we’ve been able to do is speculate.” The unknown unspeakable took over from Croaker “We think it has something to do with whatever his mother did that let him survive a decade ago. We had wanted a bit of his blood to study as reinvestigating the cottage yielded no new evidence, but between the venom and tears we couldn't get any good readings to review. The one thing we can say confidently is that the combination likely weakened the horcrux enough so that Harry could fight it off. The boy has been embroiled in a battle for his own mind since he was 15 months old. I’m pretty sure Albus could cast an imperious at him and he’d shrug it off like a leaf hitting off a building in a storm.”
The gravity of the situation settled in and the circle was quiet until the healer in Andromeda kicked in “Will it have any lasting effect on him?”
“No, but again we have some theories, the effort put into fighting the horcrux likely required the continuous use of part of his magic which should be freed up for casting now. The sudden expansion is probably the main cause of what made his core so unstable… I’ve no evidence to back this up it’s purely theoretical but there's a chance he absorbed whatever magic it was using to sustain itself too which would be a further if very small boost however I’m less certain of that.” He had left out his and Croaker's private speculation that Voldemort had bolstered the power he’d lost from the creation of the horcruxes by syphoning small amounts of power from his marked followers. They’d learnt more about the dark mark in a week from the Soul Ichor than they had in two decades of previous study. They were hoping they could make estimations of how many marked followers he’d had at his fall from some assumed parameters in conjunction with testing Harry's magic once it settled again.
Andromeda turned at hearing a tapping at the window, the conversation continuing on around her as she noticed Harry laying on his bed pointing at his chest then the owl so she pointed her wand at it and opened the window.
She followed the owl as it glided across the room landing on his chest, a golden glow began to light up the room stopping the conversation and drawing everyone's attention. Eventually as the light gradually got brighter the adults all had to turn their heads slightly to avoid looking directly at it. Moody kept his magical eye on the spectacle only able to pick out what looked like an irate owl cuffing Harry around the head with her wings as he covered his head with his arms through the glare.
Moody slapped Nymphadora on the back hard enough that she rocked forward slightly on her chair before he threw back his head and laughed “Full of surprises that boy!”