The fire in Dumbledore's office burned low, casting ribbons of gold across the floor. The silver instruments whirring softly on their shelves gave the impression of quiet breathing — as though the room itself were alive, listening. Fawkes dozed upon his perch, feathers muted to embers, and every so often, a spark fell from his tail and vanished before touching the desk.
Alden sat stiffly in the high-backed chair opposite Dumbledore, staring into the fire as if he might find an answer there. The bandages beneath his shirt still pulled tight where Madam Pomfrey had mended him, though the ache felt less physical now, and more like it lived somewhere deep under his ribs.
Dumbledore watched him over the rim of his half-moon spectacles. There was no twinkle tonight, only the calm heaviness of an old man who had seen too much.
"You've been through a great deal," he said gently. "I imagine your mind must feel like a battlefield at the moment."
Alden gave a short, humorless laugh. "It's been one since the fourth year, sir."
"I daresay it has," Dumbledore replied, folding his hands atop the desk. "Still, a battlefield is not a place one should live forever."
For a long moment, the crackling of the fire filled the silence. Alden's jaw clenched. He looked down at his hands — pale, knuckles still faintly bruised from where he'd snapped his quill in Umbridge's class.
"Why me?" he said suddenly, the words spilling out before he could stop them. His voice was quiet, yet fierce with something old and wounded. "Why is everything always aimed at me? What did I do wrong, except try to understand things differently?"
Dumbledore did not answer right away. Instead, he turned his gaze toward the fire, as if the flames might help him choose his words.
"You did nothing wrong," he said at last. "Curiosity is not a crime, Alden. But in a world afraid of its own shadows, even light can look like danger."
Alden's throat tightened. "Danger. That's all they ever call me. A threat. A mistake waiting to happen."
The bitterness in his tone startled even him. He pressed his palms against his knees, trying to steady the shake in them. "I tried to prove them wrong. I thought if I showed people there wasn't such a thing as 'dark' or 'light' magic — that it's the wizard who decides what it becomes — they'd see. They'd understand."
"And yet," Dumbledore said softly, "the world rarely rewards understanding."
"No," Alden muttered. "It rewards fear." He lifted his gaze, eyes sharp with pain. "You know, I didn't enter that tournament to play hero. I entered because I wanted to show them. I wanted to prove that I wasn't a monster. But all I did was make it worse. The graveyard, the duel, the blood — and now the Ministry thinks I'm the next Dark Lord because of who I'm related to."
He laughed again — the sound low, cracking around the edges. "It's almost funny, really. I faced Voldemort, and somehow I'm still the one they're afraid of."
The firelight flickered against Dumbledore's face, deepening the lines carved there. "It isn't fair," he said quietly. "And I am sorry, Alden. I am sorry for the part I played in it."
Alden blinked, startled. "You… what?"
"You should never have stood in that graveyard," Dumbledore said, voice grave. "It was not your burden to bear. Nor your fight to fight. You were there because I believed I could control events that were never mine to control. My choices placed you — a child — against a Dark Lord."
He exhaled, weary and human in a way Alden had never seen. "That is a mistake I will carry with me to my grave."
The words sat between them, heavy as stone. Alden stared at him — at the man the world called the greatest wizard alive — and saw, for the first time, someone who looked as tired as he felt.
Dumbledore's gaze drifted toward the window, where the faint glow of the moon trembled on the glass. "And when I spoke at Harry's hearing," he continued, "I thought I could shield both of you with the truth. But in defending you, I only drew sharper eyes. The Ministry's fear of me became their fear of you."
"So what am I supposed to do now?" Alden asked. His voice cracked, the anger and exhaustion bleeding together. "Just let them destroy me? Let them call me dark, or cursed, or whatever suits their agenda this week? Why do I always have to take the high road?"
The fire popped sharply, scattering sparks into the air. Alden's hands trembled against the arms of the chair. "Why can't I fight back, just once?"
Dumbledore leaned forward slightly, his tone gentle but unyielding. "Because the high road, however lonely, is the only one that will leave you standing at the end."
Alden let out a sharp breath, shaking his head. "Crix warned me not to come back this year," he muttered. "Said things would only get worse. Guess he was right."
A small smile tugged faintly at Dumbledore's lips. "Crix is a wise elf," he murmured. "But even wisdom can underestimate the necessity of hope."
Alden looked up, meeting his eyes. "Hope doesn't change anything."
"On the contrary," Dumbledore said softly, the candlelight glinting off his spectacles. "Hope changes us. And that is where all change begins."
The words sank into the quiet like pebbles into water.
Alden sat back, staring once more into the fire — the reflection of its flames dancing in his pale grey eyes. For a long time, neither spoke. The castle seemed to hold its breath around them.
And in that stillness, for the first time in years, Alden felt the faintest echo of something he'd forgotten — not peace, not even comfort, but the fragile possibility of understanding.
The fire had burned lower, leaving long shadows that stretched across the floor. Dumbledore had fallen quiet, his gaze fixed on the dying embers, as though he could see another time flickering there — one that existed only in memory.
When he finally spoke, his voice was softer than before, lined with something that was not quite sorrow, not quite longing — but both.
"Do you know," he began, "that your great-grandfather's brother was not always a name to fear?"
Alden's head lifted slightly. "You mean Gellert Grindelwald."
Dumbledore nodded, the corners of his mouth turning faintly, almost wistfully. "Yes. When I first met him, he was brilliant. Terrifyingly so. He saw the world not as it was, but as it might be — and he believed magic could fix everything broken in it."
He turned toward the fire, the reflection of the flames dancing in the half-moon lenses of his spectacles. "He spoke of harmony, Alden. Of a future where Muggles and wizards would live side by side, not separated by fear or secrecy. He believed that with enough wisdom, enough compassion, we could end suffering — that hunger, war, and ignorance were all problems that could be solved if only those with magic chose to share their gifts rather than hide them."
Alden sat motionless, watching the old man's expression shift between warmth and grief.
"He was… intoxicating," Dumbledore went on, the words falling like the slow unraveling of a memory. "To hear him speak, one almost believed the world could be remade in a summer. He had a charm, a certainty that made you forget how dangerous certainty can be."
He reached absently for a silver instrument on his desk — one of those curious contraptions that whirred softly and puffed a single ring of golden smoke. He turned it between his fingers like a habit, his eyes distant.
"But dreams," he murmured, "are fragile things. When they are touched by loss, or anger, or ambition… they twist. He wanted unity, but he began to mistake unity for control. He thought peace could be forced, that people could be compelled to understand what they refused to learn. And when you force understanding, Alden, you do not end fear. You become the thing that causes it."
Alden's chest tightened. The firelight drew sharp lines across Dumbledore's face — the proud nose, the wearied eyes. The great wizard looked older than Alden had ever seen him, the light of memory making him seem at once ancient and human.
"So that's how it happened," Alden said quietly. "He believed something good, and it turned into something monstrous."
Dumbledore's eyes flicked toward him, and there was no reproach in them, only the faintest ache of recognition. "Yes. As do most tragedies."
He sighed then, long and slow, as though the weight of a lifetime sat behind that single breath. "I tried to stop him. Too late, of course. I thought I could reason with the boy I once admired. But Gellert was already too far gone — he no longer heard the language of friendship. Only that of conquest."
The fire popped softly. Alden's hand tightened around the armrest. "People say he wanted to enslave Muggles."
"For a time, that was true," Dumbledore said. "But it did not begin that way. It began with wanting them to live. To be protected, even from themselves, from the cruelties of their own kind. Gellert thought that wizards, in their wisdom, should guide them. It is an easy lie to believe when one possesses power." He smiled faintly, sadly. "And one that is terribly difficult to unlearn."
Alden's eyes dropped to the desk between them, tracing the grains of dark oak beneath the glinting instruments. "You cared for him," he said quietly.
The old man's shoulders stiffened, then softened again. "I did," he admitted. "Too much, perhaps. Enough to blind me to what he was becoming. And enough to recognize pieces of him still, in those who carry his blood."
Alden looked up sharply, meeting the old wizard's gaze.
Dumbledore smiled gently, though his voice trembled at the edges. "Do not mistake that for an accusation, my boy. You are not him. But you stand where he once stood — between understanding and fury. Between wanting to change the world and wanting to make it pay for not listening."
Alden swallowed. "And what if I fail? What if I become just like him?"
Dumbledore shook his head slowly. "Then you will not fail, because you ask that question. Gellert never did."
He rose from behind his desk and walked around to stand beside Alden, the firelight catching in his silver hair. "Your ancestor wanted to build a world where people like us were no longer feared. You want the same thing — only your weapon is not domination, but understanding. It will be harder, slower, lonelier… but it is the only way the world will truly change."
Alden's throat felt tight. "And if the world doesn't change?"
"Then endure," Dumbledore said softly. "Live long enough that it has no choice but to see you for who you are."
He looked down at him with something that was neither pity nor command — only the quiet affection of a man who had once believed the same dream.
"Do not let the fear of others twist you, Alden. That is how good men become legends — and how legends become monsters."
For a long time, neither of them spoke. The fire crackled, the old instruments ticked on, and outside, the first traces of dawn began to brush against the edge of the sky.
And in that stillness, Alden realized that Dumbledore was not warning him of Grindelwald's path — he was trying, desperately, to save him from repeating it.
Alden sat quietly for a moment after Dumbledore finished speaking, watching the fire gnaw its way lower in the grate. The words endure, live long enough that the world sees you for who you are, echoed in his mind like the toll of some distant bell. He wanted to believe it — he truly did — but belief and hope were not the same thing, and he was running short on both.
At last, he said, barely above a whisper, "I'll try, Professor. But I'm not perfect. I don't… I don't know who I'll be when I'm older. Maybe I'll become like him. Maybe I'll end up a mix between Gellert and Mathius. I don't know." His voice roughened, the truth pressing its way out. "All I know is I'm tired of everyone deciding for me what I am."
He lifted his eyes, the firelight catching in them, and Dumbledore saw the storm there — all that anger, all that brilliance, all that fear. "I just want people to understand," Alden said. "To stop hating what they don't even try to know. Every corridor I walk down feels like another accusation. Every whisper, every glare — I hear it before they even open their mouths."
Dumbledore regarded him for a long while. "I understand," he said quietly. "And you have every right to feel that way." Then, more firmly: "But listen to me, Alden. Whilst you are here, within these walls, you need not fear Dolores Umbridge or her Commission."
Alden's head lifted sharply. "You know about the L.I.A.?"
"Of course," Dumbledore said, with the air of one who had known long before anyone else. "The Lineage Integrity Commission will arrive next week, yes. They will bluster, they will pry, and they will attempt to parade their authority before impressionable young minds. But there is nothing—" he paused, eyes glittering—"absolutely nothing saying that you must be anywhere near them."
The old wizard leaned forward slightly, his voice dropping to something like a confidant's murmur. "You are a student, Alden. Not a statesman. Not a soldier. And certainly not a criminal. You are a boy who deserves to learn, to laugh, and to live without the weight of other people's sins pressing upon your shoulders."
Alden blinked, as though the words struck somewhere deep; he didn't realize still hurt. "But that's just it," he said quietly. "I'm not sure I remember how to be any of those things."
Dumbledore's smile was faint, but full of that old, unshakable warmth. "Then perhaps it is time to relearn. Spend your days with those who see you as more than a name or a headline. Mr. Nott, Mr. Malfoy, Miss Davis… and Miss Greengrass." His eyes twinkled, just for a heartbeat. "I rather think she thinks very highly of you."
Alden felt an involuntary heat rise in his face. "She's… she's a friend."
"Indeed," Dumbledore said mildly, though the corner of his mouth twitched. "A good one, I should hope. Such things have more power to steady us than most spells ever could."
Alden hesitated, then asked the question that had been gnawing at him since the infirmary. "And Umbridge? What about her? We both know she won't stop. She cursed me on the first day, sir. If that's how she begins, I'll be dead by midterm."
The room seemed to cool slightly at that word. For a long moment, Dumbledore said nothing, only drummed his fingers once, twice, against the edge of the desk. Then, softly: "Yes. She overstepped. And she will do so again."
He rose, moving toward one of the tall windows. The moonlight fell over him in thin lines, silvering his hair. "I will not allow her to harm you, Alden. I cannot remove her — not yet — but I can ensure you are not left alone with her. You will continue your Defence education, just… not in her classroom."
Alden frowned. "Then where?"
"I will speak with Professor McGonagall," Dumbledore said. "She has a more pragmatic understanding of protection than most realise, and her loyalty to her students is unwavering. Between her, Professor Snape, and myself, I dare say your education will not suffer for it."
He turned back toward Alden then, his blue eyes clear and ancient and kind. "You must trust us, my boy. You are not as alone as you feel. Every member of this staff sees what the Ministry is doing — and not one of us agrees with it."
Alden looked away, trying to swallow the sudden thickness in his throat. He didn't trust easily, not anymore. But something in the old man's tone — the quiet conviction of it — eased a weight he hadn't realised was crushing him.
Dumbledore reached into his robes and withdrew Alden's wand, holding it by the polished ebony handle. The firelight slid along its length, catching for a moment on the thin line of silver that spiralled near the tip. "This belongs with its master," Dumbledore said, placing it gently into Alden's hand. "You will need it — though I hope, for better things than duels and curses."
Alden curled his fingers around the wand. "Thank you, sir."
Dumbledore inclined his head, that faint smile still ghosting his lips. "You are very welcome. And now…" — he gestured toward the door — "I think you should go to dinner. You'll find it difficult to endure anything on an empty stomach, and I suspect your friends are already defending your honour at the Slytherin table."
Alden hesitated by the doorway, his wand resting at his side, and looked back once more at the old wizard. "Professor?" he said quietly. "You really think things can change?"
Dumbledore's gaze returned to the fire. "They always do," he said softly. "The question, Alden, is whether we let them change us — or whether we choose who we become in spite of them."
Alden nodded slowly, then stepped out into the corridor. The door closed behind him with a gentle click, leaving Dumbledore alone in the flickering light.
For a long moment, the old man stood there, the fire reflected in his glasses — and in the silence that followed, Fawkes lifted his head and gave a low, mournful trill, as though echoing the thought neither of them dared to speak aloud.