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The Serpent's Gaze, Book Four: Betting On Blood	By : DictionaryWrites Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male Views: 3021 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: The world of Harry Potter and the characters therein belong to JK Rowling; I'm playing in the sandbox, as it were, whilst claiming no ownership and making no money.

Chapter List
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It is 7pm, and Harry steps over the threshold of Dumbledore's office, the gargoyle grinding closed behind him. Professor Dumbledore is sat at his desk, neatly dipping his quill into a pot of blue ink and writing in his neat, fluid handwriting on a long piece of parchment. As Harry steps forwards, he finishes his signature with a flourish, and after blotting the page, he rolls it neatly and sets it aside. Dumbledore's phoenix, looking bright and new with florid shimmering in its feathers, greets Harry with a cheerful caw, and Harry gives it a nod.
"I don't want a lesson tonight," Harry says. Dumbledore looks at Harry from behind the clear glass of his half-moon spectacles, quietly expectant. He doesn't seem annoyed or angry at what Harry has said, and for some reason, that grates on Harry. He wishes the old man weren't so calm, weren't so accepting. He's wearing a set of deep, flagrantly orange robes decorated with yellow and red flowers, and the outfit is so loud Harry can almost hear it: it doesn't entirely mesh with the old man's calm demeanour.
"Professor Snape informs me that you visited the Hall of Prophecies today, Harry. A prophecy was made about you this morning by Professor Trelawney, was it not?" Dumbledore's voice is quiet and reasonable, calming. Harry doesn't feel like being calm, but nor does he have enough energy left to be angry.
"Professor Dumbledore, I'm really tired," Harry says. He's completely honest as he slumps into the seat across from Dumbledore's desk: "Please don't condescend to me and pretend like you haven't already found out exactly what the prophecy said." Dumbledore's wrinkled lips twitch in the nestled white of his beard, and he leans back in his seat, steepling his ancient fingers together. He looks at Harry with something in between sadness and amusement twinkling in his blue eyes, and Harry meets his gaze without worrying about Legilimency. "You had the prophecy about me told to you, and you didn't say a thing. And don't tell me you were going to tell me tonight, because I know you wouldn't have. I don't know if Keats would have if Snape hadn't already gone to it."
"Did Professor Snape tell you anything of the prophecy, Harry?" Dumbledore asks, not with any specific accusation, but Harry clucks his tongue.
"He just showed it to me while we were in the Hall of Prophecies," Harry says. "Why didn't you tell me?" Dumbledore looks at Harry's face, tilting his head slightly to the side and looking thoughtful. He examines Harry as if he's looking at something on a chess board, and it makes Harry feel like the room has grown a degree or two colder, just for a second. The phoenix steps down from his perch, landing on Harry's shoulder, and Harry is surprised by how light of a weight the bird is as his feathers brush Harry's cheeks. "What's his name again?" Harry asks.
"Fawkes," Dumbledore answers quietly. He's smiling again, now, the analytical look gone, and he folds his hands in his lap, watching Harry carefully before he says, "I didn't tell you, Harry, for a few reasons. I wished for you to feel safe, without the pressure of a prophecy bearing down on you. I didn't wish for you to worry over something that might never truly matter."
"That prophecy is why Voldemort killed my parents, isn't it?" Harry asks. "Born to those who had thrice defied him..." Harry closes his eyes, breathing in, and he thinks of Sirius and Remus. Harry would still have parents if it weren't for the damned prophecy, and they would still have friends, and Harry wouldn't have lived with the Dursleys, and everything, everything would have been different.
"At the time," Dumbledore murmurs, leaning forwards slightly and looking at Harry gravely. "We did not know of the prophecy's focus. There were two young boys born at the end of July, to parents who had three times defied Voldemort. Those were you, and a young boy named Neville Longbottom." Harry's lips part, and he stares at Dumbledore, thinking about Neville, Neville with his plants and his devoted loyalty to his friends, and his inability to cast so much as a spark out of his wand under pressure. "What Voldemort did not know was that when he chose one of these children, he would be imbuing them with the power to defeat him. Lord Voldemort did not hear the prophecy in its entirety - a servant of his listened at the door when it was told to me by Professor Trelawney."
"Who?" Harry demands. Dumbledore unlinks his fingers, spreading his hands and displaying his palms.
"Does it truly matter, Harry? Will it change what has happened?" Harry sighs, leaning back, and Fawkes' beak draws gently over the side of his temple, pecking gently at the base of his hairline. Fawkes' beak is much warmer to the touch than Hedwig's, and he's surprised by the difference in the sensation - Fawkes' beak is smoother, longer, and slightly sharper. "And now that you are in possession of the power that the Dark Lord knows not, only you can defeat him."
"After I'm dead, you mean?" Harry asks pointedly. "The Boy Who Lived, now Dying?"
"Prophecies have been known to contradict themselves, Harry," Dumbledore says, his tone delicate. "And moreover, no time is specified. Even if this prophecy is more true than the first, Harry, it might not come to pass for decades or more."
"Is that better?" Harry asks. "If Voldemort's still walking free, killing people?"
"It is rare, Harry," Dumbledore says in an exceedingly quiet voice, "that any eventuality is entirely positive, or entirely negative. It is up to us, the beholders, to make what we can of what we see, and hold a candle to the shadowed corners."
"It's not a shadowed corner, sir, it's a Seer saying I have to die for Voldemort to die. What sort of fucking candle is going to lighten that up?" Dumbledore's stare becomes so abruptly icy and stern that it actually makes Harry falter. "Sorry, sir," Harry mutters. He shifts back in the seat, dislodging Fawkes slightly and prompting him to hop lightly to Harry's other shoulder, wing curling against the back of Harry's head. "You knew about this. All this time, when- When Quirrell... That's the power you talked about? When I burnt Quirrell?" Dumbledore gives a small nod of his head.
"I shouldn't have liked for you to have learned about these truths in this way, Harry. I would have avoided it, were it possible." Harry leans to the side in his seat, drumming the fingers of his right hand on the arm of the chair. He thinks about the two prophecies, and about the difference between them, and he squares his jaw slightly, tapping his fingers just a little bit harder.
"I'll see you tomorrow," Harry says stiffly, and without saying anything else, he pushes Fawkes off his shoulder and heads out of Dumbledore's office, down the stairs, and towards the base of the Astronomy Tower.
---
George nods his head, thoughtfully, and strokes his chin. Fred, who had been drawing a messy, somewhat violent diagram of Harry's plan, is looking down at the page and nodding his own head. "And you're sure this is how you want to approach this?" George asks, glancing over the plan. Harry hesitates, and then he gives a murmured affirmation.
"I think it's the only way I can approach it," Harry says, shoving his hands in his pockets and trying not to pace. He's printed in neat letters on two separate pieces of parchment the two prophecies, and he's compared them side-by-side. One of them is already in amongst the Divination students, and he has no doubt it will be in the Prophet by Friday even without him writing them a letter himself.
"Shame Skeeter's gone missing," Fred mutters. "It'd be great to get her for the job, but I don't think she'll work..."
"Seamus Finnegan," Hermione says quietly from the corner of the room. She's stiff as a board, counting out coins into the Gringotts moneybox, and she doesn't look at any of them as she talks. "Fred, George, if you have it up in the common room... Harry, you said the first prophecy could have referred to Neville, right? Use him. Leave the prophecy, and then get Neville downstairs - Seamus will pick it up. His mum does horoscopes for the Prophet, and she can't stand you, Harry. Seamus is always reading her criticisms of you from her letters in the common room."
"And you guys think it will work?" Harry asks, one last time. George and Fred share a glance, and then they incline their heads together. Hermione stays quiet, and for a long few moments, all Harry hears is the clink of coins dropping into the box in front of her. Then, resolved, she glances up from the box again, and she meets his gaze.
"It will work better than the alternative," she says, her voice slightly steely. "I'll help you draft the letter to the Prophet."
---
Dear Madam Editor,
I took a long time yesterday trying to put pen to paper, as I knew about the death of Chad Arnett, a follower of Gilderoy Lockhart's. It is my honest belief that Arnett was killed not because he murdered Belle Rosier, but because he was considered to be an enemy of [You-Know-Who], and so he was murdered by Death Eaters. The placement of his corpse in Hogsmeade was a strong statement on their part, and the only reason no Dark Mark was cast was because Arnett wasn't considered important enough to warrant it.
But I, Madam Editor, have a strong statement of my own to make.
Yesterday morning, Professor Sybil Trelawney, a known Seeress, made a prophecy - since recorded in the Department of Mysteries - and I feel it is my duty to have it published here, in the paper, for all to read it. It predicts me dying, I guess, but that's not the important thing. The important thing for you and for all the readers of the Daily Prophet as they read the contents of this prophecy is that they keep in mind what it means.
[You-Know-Who] is relentless and petty. If I've defied him, he'll want me dead, and I have defied him.
But I don't matter in the scheme of things. As soon as [You-Know-Who] comes for me, that will be the end of him - just like it was the first time. And in this time of great fear, as people are worried about him and his followers rising again, I just want people to keep that in mind. This prophecy has predicted [You-Know-Who]'s end, and we know it's coming.
Yours honestly,
Harry James Potter
Editor's note: in the case of You-Know-Who's name being used in its entirety during the process of this letter, we have redacted it.
Printed below, in bold, is the prophecy Harry had heard yesterday. Someone in the paper's typography department had chosen to animate all the 'S's to look like snakes, and they shift and move slightly in the early morning light. Harry glances up as Fred and George come down, and they look at him and smile. It's not really something to grin over, so the smiles are small.
"You did it?" Harry asks.
"Seamus took the bait," Fred murmurs, picking up a kipper and setting it on his plate.
"I said to Neville that you weren't going to tell him about it, but that I thought he deserved to know, given that it could have been him in your place." George says before stuffing his mouth with a toasted soldier dipped in egg.
"Pointed out that he wouldn't have been a Slytherin about it, trying to wriggle out of dying," Fred agrees, waggling his eyebrows. "Neville would have been brave."
"He was very understanding about it, actually," George says. He sounds slightly disappointed. "Let's hope your gentle public aren't nearly as kind-hearted." Harry smiles wryly, and he takes a small bite of his breakfast as he listens to the twins tell him the rest of it.
The split between the prophecies is simple. According to the plan, Fred and George had implied to Neville that the second prophecy, whilst having been recorded in the Hall of Prophecies, was something fake - thought up to fool the system by Sirius Black. After all, the man had escaped Azkaban - of course he could think up something like that. And the point of that second prophecy, to say that the death of Harry Potter will cause the death of Voldemort?
"Well, it's obvious, isn't it, Neville? They thought it up so that You-Know-Who would change his mind about killing Harry. Oh, the letter to the Prophet tomorrow is going to be all strong words, but You-Know-Who's not stupid. He'll never kill Harry now, he'll just keep him alive..."
"And obviously, Neville, we wouldn't be telling you this if you didn't have a stake in it."
"No, obviously not!"
"It's just that, well, Neville. It could have been you."
"Could have been!"
"And we know you wouldn't be like this."
"So sneaky about it. So... Slytherin. Because the thing is, Neville, killing Harry wouldn't really stop You-Know-Who. No, no, there was a real prophecy made years ago, legitimately - the reason You-Know-Who went for his parents in the first place, when he could have gone for yours."
"Harry's meant to be the only person who can kill Voldemort, you see. This fake prophecy, it gets him off without a worry!"
"And we have the first one. We just thought you deserved to see it, since it could have been you..."
Harry can hear the imaginary voices of the twins going back and forth in his mind, can see Neville's earnest, nervous expression, can see his horror, can see his forgiveness. This isn't something pleasant to think about at breakfast.
"And Seamus took it," Fred says with a stout nod of his head. "He was heading out to the Owlery as we came down the stairs." Fred's expression isn't joking any more: it's serious, and grave. George's expression is equally devoid of any good humour.
"Harry," George says quietly. "The point of this... It's so he'll still come and kill you, isn't it? It's like an invitation - a failed attempt to put him off the job, by acting like this new prophecy is fake, and he'll come and kill you."
"And what if it's bollocks?" Fred demands. "He'll kill you for no reason. What's that worth?"
"He would have tried to kill me anyway," Harry says quietly. "Where's Hermione?" Fred and George exchange a look.
"She's not coming down. Staying in bed, so she told Lav Brown."
"She has a bit of a problem with this suicide by bastard thing," Fred mutters.
"Ditto," he and George say at the same time. "This isn't the Triwizard Tournament, Harry. This is getting Voldemort and waving a red flag in front of his face." Harry wonders, vaguely, whether the tournament actually has to kill him - will Ludo Bagman still win his money if Voldemort kills him instead of a dragon or something? Does it still count?
"Speaking of the Triwizard Tournament," he says, "me and Cedric are scheduled to train together today. See you later." As he leaves the great hall, Seamus Finnegan is just entering, and he shoots Harry the dirtiest look Harry's ever seen. There's nothing worse to a Gryffindor, after all, than a coward.
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The Serpent's Gaze, Book Four: Betting On Blood