Chapter 21: CHAPTER - 20
"Harry! No, no, Harry. Wake up, wake up. Please wake up, Harry!" Lily sobbed. Oh, what would she do if anything happened. Would he ever wake up?
Sirius stood beside her, quivering. "I failed, again." He rasped, looking on as she shook Harry's body. His hands clenched into fists. "I'm an idiot, why did I leave him there? He was in the garden, playing. I thought he was safe." He wailed, throwing his hands over his head.
Kreacher ran about in a frenzy, handing tissue after tissue to Lily, however absentmindedly. "Harry fainted, Harry fainted, Kreacher's charms aren't working. Kreacher should have watched, should have watched." The muttering became faster and faster as he ran, his words almost unintelligible.
"Calm yourselves." Dumbledore said, and Lily felt some comfort return. "He is not dead, that much is clear. Voldemort came, and left. For what reason I cannot tell, but we can assume that he failed to kill him."
Lily stopped shaking her son with a groan. "How? How did he get inside?"
Sirius shook his head. "It was my foolishness. I should have watched him, guarded him. I should have known he could have gotten through the defenses." He said.
"You did not know he was back until today, Sirius. The blame is not yours. He is fine, don't you see? He lives, the scar is all he will remember of this day." Dumbledore said, gesturing towards Harry's head. Lily bit her lip as she saw it, a zigzag on Harry's head shaped like a bolt of lightning, splitting his face between the eyes. It stretched from his hair to his nose, and was glowing with a greenish light.
It seemed to hiss as she touched it, and her hands recoiled in a flinch. The scar seemed alive, burning with rage and power. No sooner than she had withdrawn her hand, Harry awoke with a scream. Lily gasped as she saw his eyes. They were green, but not like hers. They had the radiant glow of a star in the night sky. Like the killing curse, she realized with a gulp.
Behind those eyes she could see a void again, a man far older and stronger. A tattered mind which had seen too much, and a young soul which had known too little. Joined together in the body of a three year old child. Was it her paranoid self that was screaming at her? Or was what she saw true?
The green glow faded before the others could see, and Harry snapped awake. "Mommy?" He asked, his voice small and confused.
"Oh Harry!" Lily wrapped him in an embrace. He returned it, clinging on as tightly as she had the day of the fire.
"Mommy, was that man Voldemort? The one who killed dad?" He asked, his quiet voice hardly making him seem like a child at all.
She heard a gasp from Sirius. Dumbledore frowned, walking forward. "Yes, Harry. That was Voldemort, who killed your father. He came to kill you too, but you survived." He said, his aged voice echoing throughout the room.
"What do you remember?" Dumbledore asked, his blue eyes intense.
Harry looked up at the ceiling. "I saw him come from the forest. He was wearing a black cloak, and had red eyes. He said a few things, I'm not sure what they mean. He pointed his wand and shot something at me. Something about neither of us living. About a mark." He said. Lily felt a chill, it couldn't be that, could it?
"The dark lord shall mark him as his equal… Neither can live while the other survives." Dumbledore realized. "Do you remember anything else?"
Harry frowned. "Not really, he didn't say much that made sense." He replied.
Dumbledore nodded. "I see, so the prophecies are true after all." He said.
"No!" Lily shouted. "He's just a child, Dumbledore! A child of three! You can't do this to him!" Her heart pounded in her chest. Could she wait forever? Perhaps not, but she could wait. He was three, he had time. She had time, before the world took her son away from her.
His gaze was as cold as ice during the winter. "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches... born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies... and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not... and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives... the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies...."
Lily's screams were ignored as he finished, his eyes resting on Harry. "You are the one with the power to vanquish Voldemort, Harry. You are the boy who lived. You are the one he cannot kill. You are the last hope of wizardkind to defeat him." Her heart sank. Whatever came now, Harry would have the burden of the world placed upon his shoulders. How could a child handle it? How could anyone?
"I will need to train him, to prepare him for what is to come. I fear that we have very little time. Every hour he receives will be off the backs of Voldemort's countless victims, dead and dehumanized. We cannot afford to wait." Dumbledore said, his face like stone.
"No! I will not agree to this, I refuse! You will get him killed!" Lily screamed.
"Lily." Sirius tried, but she shook him off.
"One year, Albus. At least give me one more year, understand?" Lily rasped. "Try everything."
"Believe me, Lily. I will." Dumbledore replied.
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