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The room was round, with stone walls partially covered in detailed tapestries of battles fought in centuries long past. In the centre stood a large oval table that could have seated 20 people with room to spare. Next to the table were two comfortable sofas in front of a roaring fireplace, above which there was a detailed painting of a crest of a Gryffindor lion with a Slytherin snake wrapped loosely around its neck. A man lounged on one of the couches, languidly looking through some of the papers strewn on his lap and the seat next to him. A knock sounded at the door on the other side of the table to the seating area, causing the man to tilt his head towards the door in curiosity. black hair fell off his face as it moved to reveal a well known lightning bolt etched in the skin of his forehead.
“Enter.” He commanded.
The door opened soundlessly, and a woman with familiar brown hair, now tamed compared to the bushy mass it’d been 10 years ago, entered. She dropped a small curtsy, head bowed, before lifting it and regarding the man opposite with triumphant eyes.
“My Lord, we have him.”
Five simple words, but they filled him with such joy and satisfaction. Three years of searching finally bore fruit. Harry stood abruptly.
“Bring him here…” He all but hissed, triumph warring with hatred in his eyes at the thought of the reunion. Hermione bowed out of the room, but her subservience was at odds with the last exultant smile she shot him as she left.
Alone in the room, Harry paused to take slow breaths and centre himself. His magic, complacent before Hermione entered then tightly held whilst she gave her news, swept out in a controlled but powerful arc around him as he gave it free reign for a moment. The freedom he gave it now had a dual purpose: to calm him as he reminded himself of the power he had, both naturally and absorbed from Voldemort when he fell in the last of the Dark Battles 3 years ago, and so he would be able to restrain it more easily later, when he might be tempted to let it go and eviscerate those who dared defy him. Breathing with his eyes closed, he luxuriated in the feeling of pure magic, his magic, surrounding him for a few moments before opening his eyes again slowly, in time to hear another knock on the door.
“Enter,” he called again, tapping his hand against the wood of the table carelessly, I must not tell lies showing clearly in the light from the fire. Standing with his back to the fire, Harry’s face was in shadow as they brought in the prisoner, and he smirked as the man, encumbered by the numerous chains deemed necessary and draped all over his body, took in the sight of Harry in Darkness.
“Dumbledore.” Harry greeted coldly, holding back the snarl his lips wanted to form. He nodded brusquely to his two Equites and they bowed down and out of the room as one, leaving Harry with Dumbledore and Hermione. Hermione was regarding Dumbledore with a look of sheer loathing and Harry smiled internally, knowing the hate was all for what had been done to him and still rejoicing, even after 10 years of friendship, and the continued loyalty and love shown by those closest and most important to him.
“Harry.” The old man responded neutrally, blue eyes no longer twinkling but watching him cautiously. Harry waved a hand at one of the two sofas in front of the fire and smiled, though even the heat from the fire wasn’t enough to warm his glacial green eyes.
“Why don’t you have a seat?” He invited, though it was clearly an order. “You’ve been hiding long enough that I doubt you’ve enjoyed a comfortable sofa with a warm fire for a while.” He glanced at Hermione, whose face indicated clearly exactly how much she thought he deserved the warmth and comfort. He held out a hand, Potter, Peverell, Gryffindor and Slytherin rings all glinting and flickering on his fingers. She took it almost daintily as her face transformed easily into a smile just for him, and when they sat down together on the other sofa Hermione tilted her head towards him comfortably, looking for all the world like a relaxed and domesticated couple and not the Dark Lord and Lady they were. Their hands were still entwined as they faced Dumbledore, his shrewd gaze on them, calculating despite the magic-suppressing chains that dug into his neck, back and legs preventing him from getting comfortable as he sat down and reminding him of his hopeless situation. They regarded each other silently for a moment, the Dark couple and the fallen Light Lord and puppeteer.
“I will admit I’m impressed.” Harry broke the silence. “I expected you to last a year, maybe two.” Dumbledore remained silent. Harry continued: “though I have to admit some disappointment now. No last attempts at converting me? No ‘Harry, my boy’? No pleas for the Greater Good?” As he spoke, derision gradually filled his voice until the last was spoken with almost literal quote marks hanging in the air. Still, Dumbledore said not a word. “No? No response? Oh well. Funny, I would have thought you’d be wondering where you went wrong, or did you figure that out during your time hiding? I’ll be surprised if you actually did and got it right.”
Finally, Dumbledore opened his mouth.
“Tell me then. Tell me where I went so wrong, as to turn such a sweet boy into the man who betrayed his friends and murdered innocents.” His voice filled with regret and sorrow, but broke when Harry laughed.
“What friends? What innocents?” He hissed, leaning forward and eyes flashing. Beside him, Hermione’s hand had also tightened in outrage at the ex-Headmaster’s words. “If you refer to the youngest Weasley son, whom I shan’t honour by naming, I will take care to remind you that he betrayed me. His was never a true friendship - he was the Pettigrew of my generation, clutching the hem of my robes for the hope of some reflected limelight and all the while bemoaning that the light should fall on me first, despite never working for it to be otherwise. And then he had the gall to betray me. As for the innocents, the Ministry was hardly innocent. They had people like Umbridge in all the positions of power and influence." Harry's voice filled with vibrating rage, then fell abruptly into smooth dismissal as he continued:
"But then there is little point engaging on you with that one, is there? You shall insist as you like, and I shall ignore it. After all, the main thing is to evaluate what led to those events in the first place, is it not? Regardless of how right the events were?” Harry leaned back and Hermione relaid her head on his shoulder in wordless comfort. He squeezed her hand slightly in return as thanks, appreciative of the care shown in the knowledge he would have to relive all those past betrayals. He paused in contemplation of where to begin, then started in a reflective and thoughtful voice:
“You were good, I’ll give you that. Five years at Hogwarts and I trusted you. Your incompetence completely passed me by, right up until the death of Sirius. You do realise that was the turning point, don’t you? I could overlook Lord Voldemort controlling a teacher, using a school of children as a security device, failing to close the school when there was a basilisk loose with previous history of murder, allowing me to get attacked by Dementors, failing to notice your friend was being impersonated by a deranged Death Eater, allowing a 14 year old boy to enter a potentially fatal tournament that was intended for only adults, failing to give me any reasonable protection from the press or training to defend myself, allowing an illegal Dark object to be used on me by a professor, allowing another teacher whom you knew hated me to effectively mind-rape me in the name of training and allowing me to be abused by my relatives every summer, despite my pleas to stay anywhere else but Privet Drive,” Harry had to take a deep breath before continuing, exhaling both air and the urge to crush the man in front of him, “but I couldn’t overlook Sirius’ death. It was too pointless. You had the prophesy already, and if Voldemort wanted it and I could remove it then why was I not taken to it at the beginning of the year, when I was already there for my trial and I could remove it calmly and without fuss or deaths.” The last word was hissed malevolently.
“But no. That would have been too easy, wouldn’t it? You had a grace period granted to you because Voldemort was enjoying the Ministry’s stupidity and not attacking anyone, and you used it to see how much I could see in the Dark Lord’s mind and to further my hatred of the Ministry so I would rely on you for help to defeat him.” Fury burned in his voice as he spoke, fury and frustration at how many lives could have been saved if Dumbledore had acted the least bit like the leader he had portrayed himself, and focused on training and swelling his ranks instead of putting all his forces into secretly protecting a glass orb that didn’t even need to stay at the Ministry. Guard duty was hardly good training, and all his forces fell out of practice even if they’d been in practice to begin with. Harry took another breath to calm himself down, and glared at Dumbledore, before smiling at the thought of the next bit.
“But you underestimated me and my friends, my true friends and family. You saw Gryffindor and thought brawn not brain. You saw Dumbledore’s Army and relaxed in the name proclaiming allegiance to you, rather than looking at the independence and strategy the group showed. That was your failure, your hubris, your fatal flaw. Oh, I gave lip service to the loyalty you demanded for my last two years at Hogwarts. Hardly wise to do otherwise in a school you were Headmaster of. But I spent the last two years sounding out my classmates and members of the other years, carefully, Slytherin style, and I was pleasantly surprised with what I found. You see, despite your success at keeping your incompetence from the general Wizarding public, it was still noticed by the students, and if you failed to keep just a school safe, how on earth would you protect an entire country? By the end of my seventh year, I had almost 100 students' sworn loyalty and commitment to me and only me, a number to rival if not beat the number of members in your precious Order - and, even better, I had Hermione.” At this point, Harry broke off to glance sideways at said witch with a look filled with appreciation. Dumbledore continued to watch with no comment, and after a moment, Harry continued his narration.
“Of course, by that time you’d informed me of the Horcruxes, and together with my loyal students it took a few weeks to research all the possible places they may be and curses that could be used to destroy them. The mixture of purebloods and Muggleborns meant that we had access to both rare books on curses and protection spells that may surround the Horcruxes and also access to Riddle’s early records. The pureblood Ravenclaws were most helpful, but turning Malfoy was the coup we needed and Draco has been indispensable. Funny, how just an offer of a side that offers neither the Cruciatus for failures nor manipulations and ‘necessary’ sacrifices can seem so appealing.
But perhaps the biggest silent victory was our successful and mutually profitable relationship with the Goblin Nation, the first of many alliances with magical creatures both you and Voldemort seemed to overlook or dismiss. The Goblin Nation is after all, a warrior nation, and we were able to have over a hundred pieces of protective clothing made from the hide of the Basilisk I defeated, the destruction of the Horcrux in the Lestranges’ vault and an official alliance with the Nation in exchange for the return of the Sword of Gryffindor and a small percentage of the profits made from selling the bits of the Basilisk we decided not to keep for ourselves. And with the alliance came further training, as a warrior nation would hardly leave its allies unwillingly unable to fight. So I, Hermione and my select elite learned advanced hand-to-hand and weapons combat. It took us several months of intensive training of course, but the goblins were strict and effective teachers and I learnt as much, if not more, defence with them as I did in 7 years at Hogwarts. I’d also taken the time to investigate the Black library in Grimmauld Place with Hermione and the Weasley twins, who turned out to have more intelligence and loyalty than their younger brother and who had already investigated some of the Dark Arts as research for their products. By the end of the summer after leaving Hogwarts, I was the trained fighter you carefully avoided making me, independent, hardened and ruthless thanks to the goblins’ training and the loss of Sirius, and capable of fighting in unexpected ways both with and without my wand. After all, who would expect and defend against the Golden Boy knowing the Dark Spells that can be found in a library as Dark as the Blacks? And what self-respecting (read: lazy) pureblood does anything, like fighting, with his hands instead of his wand? I was completely unexpected - by Voldemort, the Ministry and you.
From there, it was a simple matter to destroy all his Horcruxes except Nagini, lure Voldemort into an open fight, give the Goblin Nation the honour they deserved by having them kill Nagini with the Sword stolen from them by another wizard, and defeat Voldemort with a nifty spell found in the Black library that imitates Expelliarmus in appearance and incantation but instead of summoning the wand, plunges it into the opponent’s chest. Voldemort, being a lazy, arrogant shit, only bothered to put up a shield that defended against Light curses, and was defeated conclusively within 20 seconds of the duel being. And that was when the trouble began - because you, after carefully raising me to kill the Dark Lord, then denounced me as a Dark murderer myself, and Ron, the back-stabbing bastard he is, presented evidence that supported your accusation.”
Again, Harry paused, because even 5 years later, the injustice still rankled. Not the betrayal, he’d expected that from both since the evidence of insincerity was there for anyone who looked and he hadn’t trusted Ron fully since the beginning of he was 14. Ron’s actions only confirmed how right he was not to include the redhead in his manoeuvring after Sirius’ death. But raising him, manipulating him since he was one year old to kill Voldemort then turning on him the minute he succeeded in doing so, well, the hypocrisy still infuriated him.
“So, seeing your intentions, and having previously experienced the Ministry’s fickleness when it came to power, Dark Lords and the Boy-Who-Lived, I stormed the Ministry. After all, I had just defeated Voldemort and saved the Wizarding World, I had as much support as I ever would and you were about to send me to Azkaban. It would have been bloodless, except the fools, who’d never raised so much as a finger during Voldemort’s reign of terror, decided now was the time to fight back. I don't regret those deaths. I regard it as a natural improvement of the gene pool as the genes for stupidity were reduced somewhat.”
Harry gave a cold smile of pleasure at the thought. Dumbledore shivered. He’d known by the last of the Dark Battles that Potter was not the pliable weapon he’d tried to raise from a distance, and that he was darker than Albus had intended, which was what had caused him to attempt to have Potter denounced rather than attempting to rule through him as the power behind the throne, so to speak. What was clear now and he hadn’t realised at the time though, was just how Dark Potter hd become before even defeating Voldemort. He still remembered that image of the boy standing on a windy cliff facing Voldemort and all the Death Eaters as the Dark Lord fell, wand jutting out the older man’s chest and a look of shock on his face. Potter’s face had been completely and utterly blank. Not scared, not defiant, not even triumphant when he won, just… blank. And then he’d twirled his wand in a pattern unknown to Albus, and all the dying eddies of magic around Voldemort had flowed through the air and gone into Potter, and he’d glowed with Dark Power. In retrospect, the Dark must have come not just from Voldemort’s just absorbed power, but Potter’s as well. With that, and Potter’s claim of conquest uttered in a calm voice (too calm considering he’d just claimed the Slytherin and Peverell Lordships, and over 500 Death Eaters as his own for defeating their Master), it was easy to suggest Potter intended to take the Dark Lordship for himself. And he had. What was unexpected about the whole thing was how powerless they were to stop him. His followers seemed to emerge out of nowhere, betrayals coming from all sides as his own students and several members of the Order turned to kneel before a boy he’d known with knobbly knees and glassses held together with sellotape. It beggared belief and yet, he’d been captured by Longbottom, Kingsley, Lupin and Rosier working together in unassailable harmony. Oh, he had a few who’d remained loyal - Diggle, Doge, Jones, but he lost most of them, including the teachers when they discovered the abuse he’d left Potter to. Even Severus, who’d had a profound hatred for the boy, did an abrupt turn around upon discovering the boy had not grown up a pampered Potter prince like Dumbldore had… encouraged… him to believe and had bought his way into the boy’s favour through photos and Pensieve memories of the boy’s wretched mother.
Harry watched Dumbledore carefully, his education on minute facial expressions (courtesy of Severus and Draco) allowing his to easily read the irritation and rage that flit across the old man’s face, gaunt now after three years hiding from his followers. Finally he shrugged the shoulder without Hermione on slightly, and finished his narrative briefly:
“After the fall of the Ministry, it was easy enough to establish my own Court as Dark Lord. My Elite, my knights, my Equites would protect me and the Court, some of them would be appointed the task of hiring and training those would maintain the peace across the United Kingdom, representatives and ambassadors from all intelligent and self-aware magical creatures would be elected to attend me at my Court and I would reign as a benevolent leader in the UK’s new autocracy. After all, the Wizarding population had only proven themselves incapable of governing themselves and as long as they’re given the illusion of choice and power they’re happy. The other magical species are happy simply because they have a voice and I’m listening.”
Beside him, Hermione gave a satisfied smile. When they’d caught Ron, after 4 days of searching, and even then not searching seriously, he’d asked her how she could still follow Harry when he was so Dark. And this was why. Because he’d saved the Wizarding World, staying true to the boy who rescued her when she was eleven, and then refused to allow it to need to be saved again by giving it his protection and preventing it from travelling down any dangerous paths. Some might call him a dictator but compared to the corruption and bigotry at the Ministry that preceded him, she preferred his rule by a long shot. Not only that, but he’d gained equality for all the magical species in one swoop, and maintained that. So he was Dark. So what? He was still caring, and affectionate, and passionate. He still listened to her counsel, and took it when she was right. He’d never crucio’ed anyone, or discriminated based on species, race, gender or pedigree, or anything else except intelligence and cunning. He was still, at heart, that same boy at eleven who believed in fighting against injustice and monsters who terrified little children, and then being a friend to a lonely little girl. He was still the boy she’d sworn friendship and faith and loyalty to, and in the end, he was the one who’d survived.
Dumbledore was led out by two more of Harry’s Equites, Susan Bones and Daphne Greengrass. He would be taken to one of the dungeons below Hogwarts, and effectively left to rot. A few cells over resided Ron. Ron however, was in a rehabilitation program to see if he could regret his cowardly actions or not. If he could regret them within 30 years, he would spend a further five years in prison from the moment of regret (and with Veritaserum brewed by Severus, they’d know if he truly regretted his betrayal or not) and then allowed to reenter society. If, after 30 years, he’d not changed, he’d suffer the same fate as Dumbledore: complete abandonment. The house elves would bring food, but apart from that, they’d remain forgotten about and ignored in the dungeons for the rest of their lives.
Left alone in front of the fire, Harry turned his head so his lips pressed against the top of Hermione’s head. They stayed there a while in that position, each ruminating in their own thoughts. Finally Harry moved again, tilting his head slowly down until he kissed his way to Hermione’s lips, her face moving up to aid him in his quest.
“I love you,” he whispered almost silently against her lips, a confession he’d always hated making in case it meant the person would get ripped from him straight afterwards. It was a confession and a plea not to disappear.
“I love you too,” she whispered back, and the small boy in the corner of Harry’s heart who still remembered only having drawings of parents or friends who’d say that, who’d love him, sighed in contentment. He’d survived, and was happy.