"That's because it is a very advanced charm, one I suggested to your parents and one preformed by your mother." Dumbledore replied. "You should speak to Professor Flitwick about her, she was a genius at charms. Anyway, the Fidelius charm is an immensely complex spell involving the magical concealment of a secret inside a single, living soul. The information is hidden inside the chosen person, or 'Secret-Keeper', and is then impossible to find — unless, of course, the Secret-Keeper chooses to divulge it. Say if I were to use the charm to hide the location of my bowl of lemon drops and made you the secret keeper, if that happened then only you could know where the bowl is or even see the bowl. And then the only way I would know is if you told me, are you with me so far?"
"I think so," Harry nodded. "but what does that have to do with Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew?"
"Near the end of the war your parents hid in a house that was placed under a Fidelius charm," Dumbledore began explaining. "they made Sirius Black the secret keeper as he was your father's best friend. Though he was unfortunately not as loyal as everyone thought. It turned out that he was a traitor, he gave Voldemort the location of your parents, after Voldemort's defeat he ended up killing Peter Pettigrew along with twelve muggles before he was finally caught and sent to Azkaban prison."
"That doesn't sound like a nice place." Harry idly commented as he digested the information he was given.
"It's not," Dumbledore shook his head. "it is as cold as you can imagine and the prisoners are guarded by dementors."
"Dementors?" Harry repeated.
"Horrible, horrible creatures." Dumbledore replied in a disgusted voice. "I have never supported having them, even to guard prisons. They are not things I would wish even on my worst enemy, a dementor is an incredibly dark creature, widely considered to be one of the foulest to inhabit the wizarding world. Dementors feed on human happiness and thus generate feelings of depression and despair in any person in close proximity to them. They can also consume a person's soul, leaving them alive but lifeless, little better than a vegetable."
"Hmm." Harry hummed but didn't say anything, truthfully though he was rather glad that Sirius Black was with the dementors, if the bastard had betrayed Harry's parents then as far as Harry was concerned he deserved whatever suffering he was going through. "What about my mother? Surely she had some friends?" Harry asked.
"She did, however she only had a few, most of them had left the country or were killed in the war. The only one who wasn't was Alice, Alice Longbottom."
"Longbottom?" Harry echoed. "As in the mother of the Longbottom in Gryffindor?"
"The very same," Dumbledore nodded. "she and her husband were also living under a Fidelius charm. Their secret keeper was captured and tortured until he gave up their location, the Longbottoms were then attacked."
"So...Neville's an orphan, like me?" Harry asked, wondering why Neville hadn't spoken to him yet if both of their mothers were supposed to be friends.
"No," Dumbledore said in a sad voice. "both parents survived but...something very horrible happened to them."
"What?" Harry asked.
"I fear it's not my place to say, if you truly wish to know then I advise asking Neville." Dumbledore responded, Harry was tempted to press but knew he wouldn't get anything more out of Dumbledore on that particular subject. "Neville now lives with his grandmother since Alice and her husband are unable to look after him, therefore..."
"They are unable to look after me." Harry sighed.
"Exactly," Dumbledore spoke. "I could not look after you myself, were it possible then I would but between my two jobs in the Ministry and my fulltime job as Headmaster, I felt I wouldn't be able to look after you. And even if I did, it would bring more attention to you. So I put you with the Dursley's." Dumbledore stopped talking, he looked at Harry who looked quite calm, though the tense posture of Jet and the stiffening of Harry's shoulders gave away his true feelings.
"You...are the one responsible for leaving me at the Dursley's?" Harry spoke, his voice slow and cold.
"Yes," Dumbledore replied, his voice quite and pained. "when Voldemort attacked your parents your mother sacrificed herself to save you, in doing so she used very powerful magic which protected you. I took advantage of this to create 'blood wards', these wards weren't exactly legal but they would have been impenetrable. If a wizard or witch intended to harm you then they would have never gotten past the 'front door' if you understand my meaning.
Your aunt was your mother's last remaining relative, if the blood wards were to continue to work then you would have to stay with her. At the time it made so much sense to put you with them. You would be in the muggle world where people couldn't influence or harm you for their own goals, you would be protected from any remaining followers of Voldemort and you could live a normal life until you came back to wizarding world. However the one thing I didn't take into account was the possibility of the Dursley's treating you like they did." Dumbledore admitted, tears silently falling down his face. "I knew they did not like magic but I didn't think it was bad enough to abuse you, especially after all the money I had given them to look after you."
"Wait what?" Harry blinked. "What money?" Harry all but growled.
"I am a fairly rich man, Harry. I gave the Dursley's yearly payments for you, to be spent on clothes and food and so on. When I read that article I realized how big of a mistake I had made. I am not perfect Harry, nor will I ever claim to be. I like others make mistakes, though mine appear to be larger than others. I promise you that by the end of the year I will have the Dursley's brought to justice, and you should hopefully be moved into a nice and caring home." Dumbledore finished, he didn't say anything more, he simply looked at Harry who looked back at him. In that moment Dumbledore felt like Harry's green eyes were piercing through his soul, Dumbledore registered the fact that Jet was hissing at Harry but he couldn't really understand what the snake was saying.
"I want to hate you," Harry said after a very long and incredibly uncomfortable silence. "I really want to hate you."
"I understand," Dumbledore gulped as he wiped his tears away. "if you hate me then I understand."
"I want to hate you, but I don't." Harry said as he rubbed his eyes. Anything that Harry was about to say was cut off as Fawkes began trilling into the air, it sounded to Harry like he was trying to sing. "What the hell?" Harry muttered as he suddenly felt a wave of calmness hit him.
"Ah, one of Fawkes's abilities is his singing voice. It has many effects, including the ability to calm people down." Dumbledore explained. Harry looked unsure about how he should react to that, but eventually settled for a short nod towards the red bird before turning back to Dumbledore.
"Like I was saying, I want to hate you but I don't. I understand, you made the decision that you felt was best at the time." Harry spoke. "I...know I shouldn't hate you, I know you have good reasons for what you did but that doesn't mean that I'm happy about it, even if it was the best thing for me."
"I understand, words cannot express how much I regret putting you there, Harry."
"If you want my forgiveness then you have it, but I don't really know how I'm supposed to feel about you. Part of me wants to thank you and part of me wants to punch you," Harry admitted. "so if you don't mind I want to leave now and just think about this, I need to sort out my thoughts."
"Very well," Dumbledore nodded as if he had expected that response. "if you ever feel like you wish to talk to me then please do not hesitate."
Harry nodded before getting out of his chair, he gave one last nod to Fawkes before he walked out of the office and began walking towards the Slytherin common room.
"Are you alright?" Jet asked.
"I don't know." Harry admitted. "I'm confused, I want to hate him but he had good reasons for what he did, I don't know if I could do better in his situation. I understand that, I do but my emotions aren't being very logical at the moment. I need to go and calm down or do something to relieve some stress." Harry was about to say more when suddenly he heard a low musical tone, Harry quickly reacted and flicked his wand into his hand.
The thunderbird part of the wand caused it to suddenly fire and Harry watched as a spell from his own wand collided with another spell in midair. Harry looked in the direction the spell came from and saw Ron Weasley gawking at him gawking at him while holding his own wand in his hand.
"Stress relief?" Jet hissed.
"Stress relief." Harry grinned.
"Headmaster." Professor McGonagall said as she entered Dumbledore's office about half an hour later.
"Professor McGonagall, may I help you?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes, Mr Potter has put Mr Weasley in the hospital wing." Professor McGonagall replied, causing Dumbledore's jaw to drop.
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