The Other Potter

CLVIII. WOOL'S ORPHANAGE

✴ ✴ ✴ ✴

"Ah, Mia, Harry, you got my message. Come in."

It was evening a few weeks later and Mia and Harry were in Dumbledore's office after receiving a letter, requesting their presence in his office. The circular office looked just as it always did; the delicate silver instruments stood on spindle-legged tables, puffing smoke and whirring; portraits of previous headmasters and headmistresses dozed in their frames, and Dumbledore's magnificent phoenix, Fawkes, stood on his perch behind the door, watching Mia and Harry with bright interest. It did not even look as though Dumbledore had cleared a space for duelling practice.

"How are you both?"

"Fine, sir," the twins said together.

"Enjoying your classes?" he asked as Mia shrugged. "I know Professor Slughorn is most impressed with you Mia."

"I think he overestimates my abilities, sir," she said chuckling as Harry nodded.

"Do you?" he asked as Mia nodded.

"Definitely," she said chuckling.

"What about your activities outside the classroom?" he asked as the twins looked at each other confused.

"Sir?" the twins asked.

"Well, I noticed you spend a great deal of time with Miss Granger," Dumbledore said as he looked at Harry. Mia roared with laughter as Harry's eyes went wide. "I can't help wondering if. . . ."

"Oh, no, no," Harry said as Mia was still laughing, "I mean, she's brilliant, and we're friends, but. . . . no."

"Forgive me," he said with a kind smile, "I was mainly being curious."

He turned to Mia.

"And Mia?" Dumbledore asked as the ginger girl was still laughing, "Slughorn tells me you smelt nothing in the Amortentia." Mia nodded as she stopped laughing. "Are you sure you smelt nothing?" Mia hesitated as she looked at Dumbledore.

"You already know, don't you?" she asked as he nodded.

"I do," he said with a grin. "But don't worry, your secret is safe with me." Mia smiled as Harry looked confused.

"But enough chit-chat," he said, "you must be wondering why I summoned you here tonight. The answer lies here."

Dumbledore got to his feet and walked around the desk, past Mia and Harry, who turned eagerly to watch Dumbledore bending over the cabinet beside the door. When Dumbledore straightened up, he held a familiar shallow stone basin etched with odd markings around its rim. He placed the Pensieve on the desk in front of Mia and Harry.

"What you're looking at are memories," said Dumbledore, pulling from his pocket a crystal bottle containing a swirling silvery-white substance. "In this case about one individual."

"Voldemort," Mia said as Dumbledore nodded.

"Or as he was known then, Tom Riddle," Dumbledore said. "This vial contains the most particular memory of when I first met him. I'd like you to see it if you would."

The twins looked at each other and nodded as Dumbledore tipped the silvery contents of the bottle into the Pensieve, where they swirled and shimmered, neither liquid nor gas.

"After you," said Dumbledore, gesturing toward the bowl. Mia bent forward, took a deep breath, and plunged her face into the silvery substance. She felt her feet leave the office floor; she was falling, falling through whirling darkness and then, quite suddenly, she was blinking in dazzling sunlight. Before her eyes had adjusted, Harry and Dumbledore landed on either side of her. Her eyes adjusted and Mia found that she, Harry and Dumbledore were standing in a bustling, old-fashioned London street.

"There I am," said Dumbledore brightly, pointing ahead of them to a tall figure crossing the road in front of a horse-drawn milk cart.

This younger Albus Dumbledore's long hair and beard were. Auburn. Having reached their side of the street, he strode off along the pavement, drawing many curious glances due to the flamboyantly cut suit of plum velvet that he was wearing. They followed his younger self within a short distance, finally passing through a set of iron gates into a bare courtyard that fronted a rather grim, square building surrounded by high railings. He mounted the few steps leading to the front door and knocked once. After a moment or two, the door was opened by a skinny, harassed-looking woman. She had a sharp-featured face that appeared more anxious and unkind.

"I must admit to some confusion upon receiving your letter, Mr. Dumbledore," she said, letting him into the orphanage.

The twins and Dumbledore followed her and his younger self up the stone stairs, calling out instructions and admonitions to helpers and children as she passed. The orphans, Mia saw, were all wearing the same kind of greyish tunic. They looked reasonably well cared for, but there was no denying that this was a grim place in which to grow up.

"In all the years Tom's been here he's never once had a family visitor," she said as they turned off the second landing and stopped outside the first door in a long corridor. "There have been incidents with the other children. Nasty things."

She knocked twice and entered.

"Tom? You've got a visitor."

Mia, Harry and the two Dumbledores entered the room, and Mrs. Cole closed the door on them. It was a small bare room with nothing in it except an old wardrobe, a wooden chair, and an iron bedstead. A boy was sitting on top of the grey blankets, his legs stretched out in front of him, holding a book. He was his handsome father in miniature, tall for eleven years old, dark-haired, and pale. His eyes narrowed slightly as he took in Dumbledore's eccentric appearance. There was a moment's silence.

"How do you do, Tom?" said Dumbledore, walking forward and. holding out his hand. The boy hesitated, then took it, and they shook hands. Dumbledore drew up the hard wooden chair beside Riddle so that the pair of them looked rather like a hospital patient and visitor.

"You're a doctor, aren't you?" the boy said as Mia looked at him.

"No," Dumbledore said, "I'm a professor."

"Professor?" repeated Riddle. He looked wary. "I don't believe you. She wants me locked up." He was pointing at the door through which Mrs Cole had just left. "She wants me looked at, doesn't she? Tell the truth!"

He spoke the last three words with a ringing force that was almost shocking. It was a command, and it sounded as though he had given it many times before. His eyes had widened and he was glaring at Dumbledore, who made no response except to continue smiling pleasantly. After a few seconds, Riddle stopped glaring, though he looked, if anything, warier still.

"Who are you?" he asked again.

"I have told you. My name is Professor Dumbledore and I work at a school called Hogwarts. I have come to offer you a place at my school, your new school if you would like to come."

Riddle's reaction to this was most surprising. He leapt from the bed and backed away from Dumbledore, looking furious.

"I'm not mad!" he demanded as Mia looked at him, wanting nothing more than to strangle him.

"Hogwarts is not a place for mad people," Dumbledore explained, "Hogwarts is a school. A school of magic."

There was silence. Riddle had frozen, his face expressionless, but his eyes were flickering back and forth between each of Dumbledore's, as though trying to catch one of them lying.

"You can do things, can't you, Tom?" Dumbledore asked as Mia scoffed.

"Yeah, like destroy families," she muttered as she stared at the boy.

"Things other children can't," the young Dumbledore said.

"I can make things move without touching them," Riddle said, a flush of excitement rising his neck into his hollow cheeks; he looked fevered. "I can make animals do what I want without training them. I can make bad things happen to people who are mean to me. I can make them hurt if I want."

His legs were trembling. He stumbled forward and sat down on the bed again, staring at his hands, his head bowed as though in prayer.

"I knew I was different," he whispered to his quivering fingers. "I knew I was special. Always, I knew there was something."

"Well, you were quite right," said Dumbledore, who was no longer smiling, but watching Riddle intently. "You are a wizard."