Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (150 page)

You are not meant to question that sort of thing (they know in some unspoken way). If the most terrible Dark Lord in history, confronts an innocent baby - why, how could he
not
be vanquished? The rhythm of the play demands it. You are supposed to applaud, not stand up from your seat in the audience and say ‘Why?’ It is just the story’s conceit, that in the end the Dark Lord is brought down by a little child; and if you are going to question that, you might as well not attend the play in the first place.

It does not occur to them to second-guess the application of such reasoning to the events they have seen with their own eyes in the Most Ancient Hall. Indeed, they are not consciously aware that they are using story-reasoning on real life. As for scrutinizing the Boy-Who-Lived with the same careful logic they would use on a political alliance or a business arrangement - what brain would associate to
that,
when a part of the legendary magisterium is at hand?

But there are a very few, seated on those wooden benches, who do
not
think like this.

There are a certain few of the Wizengamot who have read through half-disintegrated scrolls and listened to tales of things that happened to someone’s brother’s cousin, not for entertainment, but as part of a quest for power and truth. They have already marked the Night of Godric’s Hollow, as reported by Albus Dumbledore, as an anomalous and potentially important event. They have wondered why it happened, if it did happen; or if not, why Dumbledore is lying.

And when an eleven-year-old boy rises up and says “Lucius Malfoy” in that cold adult voice, and goes on to speak words one simply would not expect to hear from a first-year in Hogwarts, they do not allow the fact to slip into the lawless blurs of legends and the premises of plays.

They mark it as a clue.

They add it to the list.

This list is beginning to look somewhat alarming.

It doesn’t particularly help when the boy yells “BOO!” at a Dementor and the decaying corpse presses itself flat against the opposite wall and its horrible ear-hurting voice rasps, “
Make him go away.
”

Phoenix travel was a sensation entirely unlike Apparition or portkeys. You caught on fire - you definitely felt yourself catching on fire, even though there was no pain - and instead of burning to ashes, the fire burned all the way through you and you
became
fire, and then you went out in one place and blazed up in another. It didn’t sicken the stomach like portkeys or Apparition, but it was a rather unnerving experience nonetheless. If the underlying truth of phoenix travel really was becoming a specific instantiation of a more general Fire, then that seemed to hint you could potentially burn
anywhere -
even in the distant past, or in another universe, or in two places at once. You might go out in one place and blaze up in a hundred others, and the you who arrived at Hogwarts would never know the difference. Though Harry had read what he could about phoenixes, trying to figure out how to get one of his own, and there’d been no hint of anything remotely like
that
capability.

Harry caught fire and went out and blazed up somewhere else; and just like that he, and the Headmaster, and the unconscious form of Hermione Granger held in the Headmaster’s arms, were occupying another place; with Fawkes above them all. A calm, warm room of bright stone columns, skylit on all four sides, populated by white beds in long rows, four of which had silencing veils drawn around them, and the rest empty.

In one corner of Harry’s vision, a surprised-looking Madam Pomfrey was turning toward them. Dumbledore seemed to pay the senior healer no heed, as he carefully laid down Hermione on an unoccupied white bed.

From a distant corner there was a flash of green, and from out of a fireplace strode Professor McGonagall, brushing herself off slightly from the Floo ashes.

The old wizard turned from the bed and reached one of his arms around Harry again; and then the Boy-Who-Lived and his wizard vanished in another burst of fire.

When Harry had fully lit up again he was standing in the Headmaster’s office, amid the noises of a dozen dozen inexplicable gidgets.

The young boy took a step away from the old wizard and then turned on him, emerald and sapphire eyes meeting.

The two of them did not speak for a time, looking at each other; as though all they had to speak could be said only by stares, and not said in any other way.

In time the boy enunciated words slowly and precisely.

“I cannot believe that a phoenix is still upon your shoulder.”

“The phoenix chooses but once,” said the old wizard. “They might perhaps leave a master who chooses evil over good; they will not leave a master forced to choose between one good and another. Phoenixes are not arrogant. They know the limits of their own wisdom.” Stern indeed, that ancient gaze. “Unlike you, Harry.”

“Choose between one good and another,” Harry echoed flatly. “Like Hermione Granger’s life, versus a hundred thousand Galleons.” The rage and indignation Harry wanted to put into his voice wasn’t quite there, for some reason, maybe because -

“You are hardly in a position to speak to me of that, Harry Potter.” The Headmaster’s voice was deceptively soft. “Or what was that look of reluctance that I saw upon your face, there in the Most Ancient Hall?”

The sense of inward hollowness grew worse. “I was looking for other alternatives,” Harry bit out. “Some way to save her that
didn’t
lose the money.”

Wow,
said Ravenclaw.
You just told an outright lie. Not only that, I think you actually
believed
it for the seconds it took to say it. That’s kinda scary.

“
Is
that what you were thinking, Harry?” The blue eyes were keen, and there was a terrifying moment when Harry wondered if the world’s most powerful wizard could see right past his Occlumency barriers.

“
Yes,
” Harry said, “I flinched away from the pain of losing all the money in my vault. But I
did
it!
That’s
what counts! And
you
-” The indignation that had faltered out of Harry’s voice returned. “You
actually
put a price on Hermione Granger’s life, and you put it below a hundred thousand Galleons!”

“Oh?” the old wizard said softly. “And what price do you put on her life, then? A million Galleons?”

“Are you familiar with the economic concept of ‘replacement value’?” The words were spilling from Harry’s lips almost faster than he could consider them. “Hermione’s replacement value is
infinite!
There’s nowhere I can go to buy another one!”

Now you’re just talking mathematical nonsense,
said Slytherin.
Ravenclaw, back me up here?

“Is Minerva’s life also of infinite worth?” the old wizard said harshly. “Would you sacrifice Minerva to save Hermione?”

“Yes and yes,” Harry snapped. “That’s part of Professor McGonagall’s job and she knows it.”

“Then Minerva’s value is not infinite,” said the old wizard, “for all that she is loved. There can only be one king upon a chessboard, Harry Potter, only one piece that you will sacrifice any other piece to save. And Hermione Granger is not that piece. Make no mistake, Harry Potter, this day you may well have lost your war.”

And if the old wizard’s words hadn’t hit quite so hard, and quite so close to home, Harry might not have said what he said then.

“Lucius was right,” Harry ground out. “You never had a wife, you never had a daughter, you’ve never had anything but war -”

The old wizard’s left hand closed hard upon Harry’s wrist, bony fingers digging into the still-developing muscle of Harry’s arm, and for a moment Harry was paralyzed with the shock of it, he had forgotten what it meant that adults were stronger.

Albus Dumbledore did not seem to notice. He only turned, dragging Harry with him, and moved forward in hard steps toward the wall of the room.

“
Phoenix’s price.
”

Harry was pulled up along the black stairs.

“
Phoenix’s fate.
”

The room of black pedestals, silver light falling on shattered wands.

“You think,” yelled Harry, after his lips unlocked, “that you can win any argument, just by standing here?”

The old wizard ignored him, dragging Harry across the room. His right hand, no longer holding his wand, grabbed up a vial of silver fluid -

Harry blinked in shock; the vial of silver fluid had been standing next to a picture of
Dumbledore,
or so it had appeared to Harry in the brief moment before he was dragged past.

Past the end of all the pedestals, at the farthest part of the room, rose a great stone basin with runes carved into it that Harry didn’t recognize. The center was a shallow depression filled with transparent liquid, and into this the old wizard dumped the canister of silver fluid, which at once began to spread out, to swirl, to set the entire basin glowing eerie white.

The old wizard’s hand let go of Harry’s arm and gestured to the glowing basin, commanding harshly, “Look!”

As requested, Harry stared at the glowing water.

“Put your head into the Pensieve, Harry Potter.” The old wizard’s voice was stern.

Harry had heard that word before, but he couldn’t remember where . “What - does this do -”

“Memories,” the old wizard said. “You will see my memory. My oath that it is safe. Now look into the Pensieve, Ravenclaw, if you still care anything at all for your precious truth!”

That was a request that Harry could not deny, and he stepped forward and thrust his head into the glowing water.

Harry was sitting behind the desk in the Headmaster’s office of Hogwarts, and his wrinkled hands that clutched at his head were spotted with age and white hairs.

“He is all that I have!” wept a voice, very strange was Dumbledore’s voice as Dumbledore himself remembered it, from the inside it seemed far less stern and wise. “The last of my family! All that I have left!”

No emotion had been allowed to pass through the Pensieve, only the physical sensation of seeming to speak the words. Harry heard the utter desolation in Dumbledore’s words, the sounds that seemed to come from Harry’s own throat, but Harry did not feel it beyond the hearing.

“You’ve got no choice,” said a harsh voice.

The eyes moved, the field of vision jumped to a man that Harry didn’t recognize, in clothing tinged with Auror crimson but made of solid leather with many pockets.

His right eye was overlarge, with an electric-blue pupil that constantly darted and moved.

“You cannot ask this of me, Alastor!” Dumbledore’s voice was wild. “Not this! Anything but this!”

“I’m not asking,” growled the man. “Voldie’s the one who’s asking, and you’re going to tell him no.”

“For money, Alastor?” Dumbledore’s voice was begging. “Only for money?”

“You ransom Aberforth, you lose the war,” the man said sharply. “That simple. One hundred thousand Galleons is nearly all we’ve got in the war-chest, and if you use it like this, it won’t be refilled. What’ll you do, try to convince the Potters to empty their vault like the Longbottoms already did? Voldie’s just going to kidnap someone else and make another demand. Alice, Minerva, anyone you care about, they’ll all be targets if you pay off the Death Eaters. That’s not the lesson you should be trying to teach them.”

“If I do this I will have no one. No one.” Dumbledore’s voice broke, the world tilted as the outlooking head fell down into the ancient hands, and awful sounds came from not-Harry’s throat as he began to sob like a child.

“Shall I tell Voldie’s messenger no?” said Alastor’s voice, now strangely gentle. “You don’t have to do it yourself, old friend.”

“No - I will say it myself - I must -”

The memory ended with a shock and Harry ripped his head out of the glowing water, gasping as though he’d been deprived of air.

The transition between scenes, between decade-old reality and present moment, was another jolt to Harry’s mind; in some fashion his immersion in the past had unanchored him. The broken old man sobbing in his office had been another person in another era, Harry had understood that much; someone softer -

Before it had all vanished like dissipating smoke, returning the
now,
the present day.

Terrible and stern stood the ancient wizard, like he was carven from stone; beard woven of thread like iron, half-moon glasses like mirrors, and the pupils behind as sharp and unyielding as black diamond.

“Do you also wish to see my brother as he died under the Cruciatus?” said Albus Dumbledore. “Voldemort sent me that memory as well!”

“And that - ” Harry was having trouble producing a voice, for the growing sickness in his chest. ”
That
was when -” The words seemed to burn in his throat, as the awful knowledge dawned on him, the horrible understanding. “That was when you burned Narcissa Malfoy alive in her own bedroom.”

Albus Dumbledore’s gaze was cold as he answered. “To that question only a fool would say yea or nay. What matters is that the Death Eaters believe I killed her, and that belief kept safe the families of all who served the Order of the Phoenix - until this day. Now do you understand what you have done? What you have done to your
friends,
Harry Potter, and to any that stand with you?” The old wizard seemed to grow still taller and more terrible, as his voice rose louder. “You have made them all targets, and targets they will remain! Until you prove, the only way it can be proven, that you are no longer willing to pay such prices!”

“And is it true?” Harry said. There was a buzzing sensation filling him, his body growing more distant. “What Draco said, that Narcissa Malfoy never got her hands dirty, that she was only Lucius’s wife? She was an enabler, I get that, but I can’t back that deserving being
burned alive
.”

“Nothing less would have convinced them that I was done with hesitation.” The old wizard’s voice brooked no question and no refusal. “Always I was too reluctant to do as I must, always it was others who paid the cost of my mercy. So Alastor told me from the beginning, but I did not listen to him. You, I expect, shall prove better at such decisions than I.”

“I’m surprised,” Harry said, amazed that his voice was almost steady. “I would have expected the Death Eaters to go after another Light family and start a cycle of escalating retaliation, if you didn’t get them all with your first strike.”

“If my opponent had been Lucius, perhaps.” Dumbledore’s eyes were like stones. “I am told that Voldemort laughed at the news, and proclaimed to his Death Eaters that I had finally grown, and was at last a worthy opponent. Perhaps he was right. After the day I condemned my brother to his death, I began to weigh those who followed me, balancing them one against another, asking who I would risk, and who I would sacrifice, to what end. It was strange how many fewer pieces I lost, once I knew what they were worth.”

Harry’s jaw seemed locked, like it took a massive effort to make his lips move. “But then it’s not like Lucius was deliberately taking Hermione for ransom,” Harry’s voice said thinly. “From Lucius’s perspective, someone else broke the truce first. So with that in mind, how many Galleons
was
Hermione worth, exactly? Leaving aside the Danegeld thing, if it was just some ordinary threat to her life, how much should I have paid to save her? Ten thousand Galleons? Five thousand?”

The old wizard did not answer.

“It’s a funny thing,” Harry said, his voice wavering like something seen through water. “Do you know, the day I went in front of the Dementor, what my worst memory was? It was my parents dying. I heard their voices and everything.”

The old wizard’s eyes widened behind the half-moon glasses.

“And here’s the thing,” Harry said, “here’s the thing I’ve been thinking about over and over. The Dark Lord gave Lily Potter the chance to walk away. He said that she could flee. He
told
her that dying in front of the crib wouldn’t save her baby. ‘Step aside, foolish woman, if you have any sense in you at all -’” An awful chill came over Harry as he spoke those words from his own lips, but he shook it off and continued. “And afterward I kept thinking, I couldn’t seem to stop myself from thinking, wasn’t the Dark Lord
right?
If only Mother had stepped away. She tried to curse the Dark Lord but it was suicide, she had to have
known
that it was suicide. Her choice wasn’t between her life and mine, her choice was for herself to live or for both of us to die! If she’d only done the logical thing and walked away, I mean, I love Mum too, but Lily Potter would be alive right now and she would be my mother!” Tears were blurring Harry’s eyes. “Only now I understand, I know what Mother must have felt. She
couldn’t
step aside from the crib. She couldn’t! Love doesn’t walk away!”