The Christmas afternoon was pure joy. It was as if someone had cast a time-acceleration charm on Hogwarts Castle—one blink, and the sun had already slipped back behind the horizon, leaving nothing but a blaze of afterglow. The students, worn out from an afternoon of wild games, dragged their exhausted bodies back to the Great Hall for dinner. Most of the boys looked half-dead, all claiming that after they ate they were going straight back to the dorms to sleep—but everyone knew none of them would actually settle down tonight.
In the Gryffindor common room, mistletoe hung from the ceiling. Older boys and girls hid in corners, sneaking kisses. Hormones worked better than Amortentia; the holiday cheer was like a soft black blindfold over everyone's eyes, blurring the world right in front of them.
At least Ron was completely out of it. He'd probably gone too hard with the snowball fighting and had drunk too much pumpkin juice at dinner. He actually looked drunk. It took him a long time to realise Harry hadn't come back to the common room, wasn't at The Tower of Tomes, and wasn't answering his phone. Ron asked around, but everyone said they hadn't seen Harry.
"Maybe he's in the loo?"
"Anyone seen de Lin?"
"Haven't seen him since lunch."
"Where did they go?"
"Who knows. It'd be stranger if de Lin actually stayed put. As for Harry—if he's not back before curfew, that'll be trouble. Hope he still remembers the password."
Ron's eyes suddenly lit up. He remembered the Christmas present Harry had got today—an invisibility cloak. If Harry still wasn't back by then, Ron could use the cloak to sneak out and look for him.
Late in the year, the north of England was damp and bitterly cold. At night the wind had died down; the heavy snow drifting onto Hogwarts Castle looked like hundreds of millions of dandelion seeds falling every second.
Harry wandered to the quiet third floor of the Astronomy Tower and sat on the steps at the end of the corridor. On the far wall, high windows let in a faint wash of light, and a pale patch spilled down to illuminate the boy on the steps and the gaudily decorated Afu at his side.
It was clearly just a dog, yet Afu's back somehow looked like that of a world-weary old man.
As Harry undid the motley decorations on Afu, he poured his heart out.
He spoke of his miserable childhood, of living under the constant bullying and humiliation of the Dursleys. There had never been a single truly happy moment in those years. Any "pleasant" memories he had from that time were nothing more than scraps of self-comfort after he'd managed to dodge a beating, a fake joy left behind when the pain in his body and heart finally ebbed.
When Harry spoke of those things, his sentences broke apart. He couldn't give a smooth, complete account of the bullying. Doing so meant peeling open an old wound, and the pain itself refused to let him.
Fortunately, Afu was an excellent listener—because he didn't say a word. The dog's silence and indifference helped Harry slowly lower his guard. Looking back on his past self, he felt he'd been rather stupid: he hadn't even dared to fight back when he was bullied. Now, if it happened again, he could use magic to protect himself.
Afu's cold, expressionless dog face gradually softened. Harry felt that they were kindred spirits—both victims of other people's cruelty.
"Next time those girls come to mess with you, I'll protect you," he said.
Afu shot him a look of pure disgust.
Harry tugged on his ears and plucked off the last little butterfly pin. "There."
Just then, colour flared at the edge of his vision and a faint crackle sounded in his ears. Harry turned his head and saw, beyond the dark night outside the window, flowers of brilliant fireworks bursting open. They were like bursts of spring that could only last a few seconds, flaring and vanishing in an instant.
"Merry Christmas, Afu," Harry whispered, hugging him. The aloof Russian wolfhound stayed perfectly still—neither leaning into the hug nor pulling away.
Harry touched his chest. The Wizard's Field Guide usually rested inside his Tower Mark; whenever he needed it he could just call it out from there.
He opened the book, silently cast a Lumos with his wand, and began reading the knowledge that came from Voldemort.
As Voldemort's memory body continued to break down, more and more of its thought strings would seep into Harry's own soul consciousness. Whenever his self-awareness went quiet, those frenzied thought strings would make him dream—that was the process of two souls merging into one another.
The Field Guide was like a solid overcoat, a stabilised remembrance body that kept Harry's sense of self from slipping. At the same time, it recorded the thought strings, extracted precious fragments of knowledge, and stored them for Harry to study.
The collapse of the memory body would gradually speed up. If too many thought strings built up in the consciousness body, his dreams would grow even wilder and more unpredictable, and their impact on Harry would only increase. Even with the Field Guide keeping him from thinking he was Voldemort, dreams that vivid could still twist his personality.
If nothing at all were done, it was entirely possible that Voldemort would die one day—only for a cold, ruthless Harry to be born in his place.
There was no shortage of possible solutions.
Given Harry's current level of spellcasting and theoretical knowledge, the Guide suggested that he practise meditation or simply sleep a lot, to help release the thought strings. It also urged him to master Legilimency as soon as possible. That way he'd be able to actively draw the thought strings out, store them, and let them merge slowly.
Afu seemed very interested in the Field Guide. When Harry silently read through the practice method for the Killing Curse, Afu poked his head over. His long nose, like a white sausage, blocked the view of the page.
"What is it?" Harry asked quietly.
Seeing the Dark Arts entries in the Guide gave Afu a strange sense of déjà vu, and he couldn't help taking another, more careful look at Harry. Back when Afu had been a student at Hogwarts himself, he'd walked on thin ice, doing his best to maintain the image of a model pupil. In first and second year he wouldn't have dared to study Dark magic at all. The most he'd done was secretly poke at it now and then, always taking great care to clean up any trace afterwards.
Harry Potter, that brat—the saviour of the wizarding world—hadn't even finished his first term. He'd been learning magic for less than six months, and he was already digging into Avada Kedavra. Worse, he was openly recording it in his notebook.
Wasn't this the Death Eaters' saviour instead?
A complicated expression crossed Afu's dog face. If he could have spoken, he would definitely have said: "You're being a bit too extreme.jpg."
Harry pushed Afu's head aside. In his eyes, the way he looked at Avada Kedavra held a warmth and a gentle hope. "I'm going to master Dark magic," he said, "and then bring Mum back."
The Russian wolfhound with the world-weary back stayed silent for a long time. Then, slowly, he raised a paw and patted Harry on the shoulder in approval.
In all the years since, never had he felt so keenly as he did now how the times were leaving him behind. Voldemort, living inside that hound's body, had always seen himself as the one who commanded the age. But watching this boy who threw himself into evil for the sake of love, Voldemort couldn't help but sigh at how quickly the world moved on.
It was entirely possible that he would one day be resurrected, only to find the wizarding world already grovelling under the rule of a Dark Lord named Harry.
Kids these days were terrifying. Best to kill them early.
As Afu entertained that thought, the malice in his soul triggered the magic on Harry. A fierce burning pain shot up through the place where paw met shoulder, making Afu tremble. It felt as if a few more seconds would do irreparable damage. He yanked his paw back at once and shuffled a little farther away from Harry.
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