Fred and Blaise.
One Gryffindor. One Slytherin.
If Dumbledore had to abandon one of them, who would he choose?
Dawn watched the old headmaster with great interest.
He was absolutely certain—certain enough to wager against George all over again—that deep down, Dumbledore would choose to give up Blaise.
There was no doubt about it.
Not only because Gryffindor and Slytherin held different weight in the old man's heart, but because his personal fondness for Fred had already tilted the scales from the start.
Still—
What Dawn truly wanted to know was whether Dumbledore could actually say that answer aloud.
Just as Dumbledore had once questioned whether Dawn lacked a sense of security, Dawn was now asking him in return:
Can you truly uphold the fairness you speak of as headmaster?
Dumbledore remained silent for a moment.
"A good question," he said at last. "But Dawn, if your intention is to interrogate me, perhaps you should wait until such a choice truly becomes necessary."
The old man had clearly seen through his intentions.
"At the very least, while no one has died yet, I believe I can still keep the situation under control."
Dawn raised an eyebrow.
"But what about the worst possibility, Headmaster?"
He continued quietly, "You clearly understand what Voldemort's actions will lead to. Yet in order to avoid confronting your own personal desires, you're making this choice."
"No, Dawn."
Dumbledore shook his head gently.
"I'm not delaying the answer because I don't wish to respond. I simply believe that both Fred and Blaise are children I should protect."
Dawn merely laughed under his breath.
Really?
He didn't believe that for a second.
If the memories from the show in his head were accurate, then Dumbledore would one day place Harry's life upon the gambling table in order to destroy Voldemort, despite lacking complete certainty.
And yet now he spoke of protecting every student.
"You aren't very honest either, Headmaster," Dawn said softly.
"Responsibility. Authority. Self-restraint. The inability to be free."
Though phrased like a question, it sounded more like he was speaking to himself.
"You could choose the objectively correct answer, yet you allow false sentimentality to drag you down.
Headmaster... are your beliefs really more correct than mine?"
"Then what about you, Dawn?" Dumbledore countered calmly. "If one day you became the person chosen to be sacrificed, what then?"
Dawn fell silent briefly.
"...Sorry, Headmaster."
His voice was calm.
"But I would never give anyone the opportunity to make that choice. Just like when I left Hogwarts during first year."
The conversation had circled back to the same topic once again.
Silence descended over the dormitory.
Dawn looked toward the blood-covered wall, staring at the scarlet letters spelling Voldemort, while more and more thoughts churned within him.
He understood himself very clearly.
He was not a noble person.
To put it more bluntly, morally speaking, he had already dug himself a comfortable home at rock bottom.
If one day reality mirrored the stories where a single sacrifice was needed to save the world—Then he would absolutely applaud from the sidelines.
He might even personally throw the sacrifice onto the altar.
But—If the one being sacrificed was himself?
Then he would smash the skull of whoever proposed it into a dog's stomach and drag the entire world down with him.
He could never become someone like Harry.
Never sacrifice himself willingly.
So in the end, this truly had been a completely meaningless conversation.
Nothing had changed except proving once more that the two of them were fundamentally incompatible.
Dawn sighed.
"Sorry, Headmaster. The Ministry is probably about to arrive. I think I'll head back now."
Even if Dumbledore believed he could suppress the matter, Dawn didn't believe for a second that the students who witnessed everything would avoid writing letters home.
Rumors spread layer by layer.
Sooner or later, the Ministry—and Fudge in particular—would hear about this.
Dumbledore did not stop him.
Leaving the dormitory, Dawn cast a Disillusionment Charm on himself and returned to the Slytherin common room.
After slipping unnoticed into a corner, he canceled the spell and acted as though he had been there all along.
The Slytherin common room buzzed with noise.
Some students were writing letters. Others were discussing what had happened.
Before long, arguments began erupting over pure-bloods and half-bloods.
Or rather, from the way it looked, it was less an argument and more pure-blood students openly bullying the half-bloods.
Malfoy in particular looked unbearably smug.
His raised chin and curling smile resembled a peacock showing off its feathers, superiority practically radiating from him.
Dawn watched for a while before deciding it was painfully boring.
He withdrew his attention from Blaise's body and returned focus to Fred.
Fred was still in class.
The Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom looked just as familiar as ever.
Though now, it belonged to someone else.
At that moment, Professor Flitwick stood atop a chair, enthusiastically waving his arms as he explained the day's lesson.
"Though hags are classified by the Ministry as dark creatures, in truth they possess considerable intelligence.
They have social structures, division of labor, and even cooperate with one another.
They prefer living in caves and resemble twisted, hunched old women. Their skin looks like burnt tree bark, cracked all over.
While they can eat ordinary food, they greatly prefer raw human liver.
If they encounter a lone traveler, whether wizard or Muggle, they drag them back to their lair and devour them alive."
Flitwick truly was a veteran professor.
Even while teaching a newly inherited subject, he explained things vividly and naturally.
Still—
Dawn didn't think he had been any worse.
Looking down at the textbook spread across his desk—the very textbook he himself had selected while serving as professor—he suddenly felt rather complicated emotions.
Using his own textbook while attending his own class.
Headmaster, you've done well indeed.
Dawn's eyelid twitched.
Listening to Flitwick lecture, he tried to shake off the strange feeling, though his thoughts soon drifted elsewhere again.
Hags...
Come to think of it, Dawn's earliest impression of them had come from Lockhart's book Holidays with Hags.
Hmm...
He suddenly wondered where the famed Memory Charm master, whom he had personally exposed and prevented from becoming professor this year, might currently be.
While Dawn wandered through his thoughts, time slowly passed.
Eventually, the lesson approached its conclusion.
After finishing his explanation of hags, Flitwick moved on to methods of dealing with them.
"Although hags are vicious by nature, they display extraordinary gentleness toward children under the age of ten.
So if you encounter a hag, you may exploit this weakness by casting the Infantile Disguise Charm.
The incantation is Camouflage."
Flitwick traced glowing letters through the air as he explained further.
"This spell was designed specifically against hags. It is a variant of the Confundus Charm, but considerably easier to learn."
Though Flitwick taught earnestly, the students were clearly distracted.
Even those trying to appear attentive kept shifting nervously in their seats.
The incident in Slytherin had not fully spread yet, but the earlier shouting alone had already fueled endless speculation.
The students simply had no mood for class.
Dawn could sense the atmosphere clearly.
The classroom was restless and anxious. Every so often, hushed conversations broke out, all revolving around Slytherin.
And the moment Flitwick hopped down from his chair and exited the room after class ended—
The classroom exploded like boiling oil meeting water.
However—Having personally seen the scene already, Dawn had no interest in listening to the rapidly mutating rumors.
He simply left the classroom alone.
Rather than returning to Gryffindor Tower afterward, he headed downstairs toward the Hufflepuff common room instead.
He wanted information about Abel Davis—the student who might possibly return as Nicolas Flamel.
Along the way, the castle buzzed with noise.
Hogwarts had never once disappointed when it came to the speed of rumor spreading.
Every few steps, he passed clusters of students discussing the Slytherin incident in groups of twos and threes.
Fortunately, the blood-written message mentioning Voldemort had not spread yet.
Otherwise, the uproar would likely have been far worse.
Dawn frowned slightly at the thought.
Still, discussion alone did not necessarily mean people truly believed Voldemort would return.
For now, the situation remained manageable.
Perhaps before long, Dumbledore would organize another public speech to suppress the rumors.
Dawn silently hoped it would actually work.
___________
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