If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
I would like to thank my beta, Awdyr, for his help in this chapter.
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23rd October 1995, Hogwarts (Earth 2)
The world was going to shit. At least that was what Severus Snape was thinking as he brewed a bubbling potion in his office. It was a variation of the Wiggenweld potion that should be far more potent and heal very major wounds, even limiting certain magical effects from spreading, like a jinx or a curse. It would have probably been worth its weight in gold if he sold it to Saint Mungo's. Healing Potions were very varied, but they were also horribly expensive to make, in terms of both time and ingredients.
Nicholas Flamel's equally miraculous and mysterious Elixir of Life aside, the most potent healing potion in history was the famed Panacea, which was regarded as a myth until its discovery a couple of centuries back by a curse breaker in an expedition in Ancient Greece. They had only been able to get mere droplets, but merely touching the potion was enough to regenerate limbs.
No one knew how it was made, and potion masters spent almost two centuries studying it, unable to make heads or tails of the droplets that they were allowed to study, let alone replicate the feat. Still, it created an arms race of some sort towards healing potions, which still continued till now due to the heavy demand.
The issue was never if a potion could be brewed to get a certain effect, it was mostly about if it was even worth brewing. A potion that took a year to brew, whose effect faded away a few days after it was brewed, and cost thousands of Galleons in terms of ingredients alone to make, was simply not worth making. A complex potion that didn't take long was always preferable to a simple one that wasted too much time. It was the same in spell crafting. Most spells could theoretically be created, but if the magical cost exceeded most people's magic, then it was a pretty useless spell to make.
Severus had gotten his potion mastery by creating a variation of the Wiggenweld Potion that staved off the spread of dark magic. It was an invention that was used almost entirely in Europe and that had gotten him a fair bit of gold, as it was commonly used in law enforcement. It was funny, as much as everyone kept calling him a Death Eater, he had probably saved more Aurors with his invention than all the members of the Order combined. If he wasn't chained in this war between Dumbledore and Voldemort, he would have retired happily, investing his gold into creating more potions. Now, he was trying to modify it further to remove all magic, which would make this potion far more useful in a hospital and would certainly net him far more gold.
It was a project he'd been working on for a couple of years, which he used to calm himself from the antics of the useless dunderheads he had to teach. Now, he was using it as a distraction from the way the world was slowly going to shit.
The Dark Lord became far more short-tempered after the Gringotts robbery. Severus could still hear Lucius' screams as he was tortured, almost to insanity, because he gave him the news. For some reason, the Dark Lord became increasingly insistent on breaking his loyal followers from Azkaban, so he guessed that he was afraid that someone had robbed something that he entrusted to one of them. It was probably one of the Lestrange brothers or Bellatrix. They were the ones that were the most devoted to his cause, instead of using it as a way to indulge themselves or as a way to gain more power.
Of course, if Dark Lord's temper was a fire after the robbery, it became an entire inferno when the news of Gellert Grindelwald's escape reached him. Everyone was forced to work to their bones organizing forces, training what was essentially an army, just in case Grindelwald came to Britain.
Thankfully, Severus' role as a spy spared him from much of the Dark Lord's mood. His position, as dangerous as it was, granted him an odd form of protection, with both Voldemort and Dumbledore wanting to protect him as their prized asset.
The only silver lining was the fact that the Umbridge woman was gone and wasn't that a relief. It had Smith's fingerprints all over it, and Severus was glad that he didn't antagonize the boy too much. He was certainly a ruthless one. Nevertheless, the woman's absence was very well received by students and staff alike. The idea of this useless woman judging his skills as a potion master and a professor grated on his nerves.
So far, there haven't been any replacements for the post of Defence Professor or the High Inquisitor position. Dumbledore was still looking for one, and Fudge was obviously trying to find his own candidate to push as well. Both of them had a hard time finding any. For some reason, people didn't want to be in the middle of a spat between the ministry and the headmaster, while also staying in a cursed position.
Anyway, Severus was using one of his few moments of privacy and calm to relax and work on his own potion. Imagine his surprise when Dumbledore appeared in his office with a loud crack and raised his left hand at him. He whispered in a rough but pained tone, "Severus!"
Any reply he had was stifled by the sight of the man's hand. He was wearing an odd ring, obviously cursed, and the flesh around it was slowly shrinking and turning black. A withering curse, then.
He tried casting a counter curse and blanched as he realized that it wasn't working. This must not have been a usual withering curse. Damn, he'd need to analyse it quickly. As a quick measure, he grabbed some of the potions that staved off the spread of dark magic and pushed it into the headmaster's mouth. He quickly summoned his dragonhide gloves and carefully grabbed the ring from the man's finger.
The blackened flesh had thankfully stopped spreading when he removed the curse, and the potion had worked enough to buy him some more time. Severus then took a deep breath and waved his wand, trying to detect what it was.
What he saw made him shiver. This wasn't a normal flesh-withering curse, but an ancient Egyptian variant that was created before even wands were created. He had read about it once, out of curiosity, when he was allowed access to the forbidden section of the library after he became a professor.
It was based on a ritual that required a human sacrifice, and the spell did not act as a physical spell would, but actively infected the user in a metaphysical manner. The hand was dead. If Albus had somehow grown a new one, it would have also had the same curse. Even if he used a prosthetic, it would wither and die as well. It was a form of magic that Severus frankly didn't understand and the only reason the potion even worked was because the curse was using Dark magic to spread.
Severus gave the headmaster a pitying look, "There's not much I can do about this, Albus. I definitely can't heal what's already been damaged, only delay the curse's spread. You must have realized by now what this curse is."
"The Curse of Anubis. It's very different to experience in person, I have to say."
"What possessed you to put on the damn ring? You must have known it was cursed. It wasn't exactly hard to figure out."
Dumbledore sighed, a faint smile tugging at his lips despite the grim situation. "Curiosity, my dear Severus, and perhaps a touch of arrogance. I thought I could handle it, that I could unravel its secrets without consequence. I underestimated its power, and now it seems I must pay the price." His eyes, usually twinkling with mischief, were dull, reflecting the weight of his burden. "Can you help me hold it at bay long enough to… take care of some unfinished business?"
"You'll need to take my potion regularly, but the curse will start adapting to it. It's hard to make an estimate, but if I don't figure out another potion that works of different principles that would stave off dark magic, I don't see you lasting more than a year. Even if I do figure something out, I'll need to keep looking at new ways of stopping the curse since it would adapt to anything over time. It'll be a race against time, until the rest of your days."
"An apt punishment, don't you think?" A voice answered from behind them.
With blinding speed, Albus jumped and cast a white spell that Severus had no idea what it was, towards where the voice was. His eyes widened as he recognized that it was Harrold Smith, the resident seer that he had tricked.
The spell was about to hit the boy, only to go through him. The headmaster's eyes widened as he felt his wand fly from his arm, thanks to a spell from his back. Severus also noticed that he couldn't move either of his arms or legs. Damn it, he hadn't even felt a spell.
Was the boy using an illusion there too?
That theory was proven to be incorrect as the boy casually grabbed the wand from the air. For some reason, Dumbledore looked shocked at that, "What have you done?"
The boy looked smug for a fraction of a second as he touched the headmaster's wand, "I have to say, I kinda understand now why people have fought wars over this thing. So much Death, for this little thing here. Now, don't worry, I'm not going to attack you; I just assumed you'd come to see me in the future, so I decided to get through this early. So, Dumbledore, how was your trip?"
"You knew that the ring was cursed. You knew that I would be drawn to it, that I wouldn't try to resist the compulsion charm. You knew that this ring would be my end."
"I did," the boy agreed but did not give him any justification.
"And yet, you let it happen. Why?"
Smith snorted at that, "Let it happen? I warned you not to trust prophecies foolishly. I warned you not to meddle and that it wouldn't end well. It's not my fault that you ignored them, after all. But don't be too heartbroken about it. I didn't exactly kill you. If I hadn't said anything, you would have found the ring somewhere in June all on your own. All I did was give you a little push. Even then, you were practically asking for it, getting Snape of all people to steal my journal."
Severus couldn't help but ask, "But why? Why do any of this? Why kill the headmaster?"
"That's the thing, I didn't do anything. You were the one who stole my diary. Dumbledore was the one who took the prophecies inside as gospel. I also didn't make him go get that ring and I definitely didn't make him put it on. His current state is nothing but the results of his decisions after all. I didn't choose any desired outcome, it was all you. I just knew what was going to happen before it did and didn't stop you."
"Who are you to decide who lives and who dies?" Severus growled visibly getting angry at the boy's nonchalance over killing him, "Who do you think you are? You're no god, just a brat who sees the future."
"And what right did Dumbledore have when he meddled in Harry Potter's life? What right did he have when he left him with those horrible people, where he was treated like trash? What right did he have when he raised him as a lamb for slaughter, a martyr that would die at the proper moment?"
"It was the best out of far more horrible options. I had no choice but to do that. I didn't want to, but the boy must die either way. The prophecy says so, and you see yourself what his scar is. My choices, as difficult as they were, always were made with the greater good of the magical world in mind. It is my burden because no one else wants to do it."
"And what makes you think that what happened today isn't for the greater good?" Smith retorted, actually causing Dumbledore to freeze and gape.
"You're joking right?" the potion master retorted, "You doomed us all with this. Without Dumbledore, no one would be able to stop the Dark Lord. He will take over this country and maybe even start a war with the continent."
"Now, now, Professor Snape, there's no need to be so defeatist. I told you that Dumbledore was always going to die anyway. You were going to be faced with the exact same dilemma in a year, I just made it happen a bit sooner. Who knows, maybe the power of love or whatever would kill Voldemort accidentally. Or maybe, this would get the man's ass into gear, and he'll actively start to fight Voldemort. People tend to get things done when they're dying."
The boy looked at their incredulous faces and smiled in amusement, "Don't worry, I don't expect you to understand, not for a little while, at least. Although I have to say, you're taking this remarkably well. Sure, your song is ending, but at least you won't be alone. You'll have them to speak to, and I think deep down, you think that your dying in exchange was a worthy trade. Now, I came here to give you a few simple answers. No, you won't be able to be cured of this curse, not ever. You will also find no comfort in the stone, even if it's something you think you crave. My advice to you is to make a choice on how to spend the rest of your life. You could retire and do something you enjoy for once without catering to other people's expectations or you could do your best to save this nation from Voldemort. Choose one, you don't have enough time to make compromises and do it decisively. Try to die without regrets."
Dumbledore nodded solemnly even if his eyes were very focused, "I see the wisdom in that. No one knows something's true value until it's gone forever. What of my wand?"
"I think I'll keep it. One Hallow for another. It seems like a justified trade, isn't it?"
"This wand will cause you nothing but sorrows and death," the headmaster commented.
"I know, but I'll take my chances. Anyway, live your life Albus Dumbledore, and live it well. After all, you know what they say; to a well-organized mind, Death is but the next great adventure."
And with that done, he simply left, leaving a perplexed potion master who barely understood half of the conversation and a solemn Albus Dumbledore who was preparing himself for the inevitability of his death.
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AN: I'm not really sure about this one. I don't know if I characterized Dumbledore and Harry well enough. I wanted the headmaster to be solemn but not afraid of dying, a bit like how he was in Canon. As for Harry, he was laying one of the last parts of his plan, even if it wasn't shown. As usual, please let me know what you think and if you have any suggestions. I don't mind rewriting this one if you don't like it; like I said, I'm not entirely sure about it either.
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If you want to support me check out my patréon at https://www.patréon.com/athassprkr
I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them so you can read up to 20 chapters ahead as a bonus.
Thank you guys for your support in these hard times.