Minerva McGonagall felt an overwhelming fatigue as she slowly made her way to the hospital wing. It was about eight in the morning now, and she hadn't slept a wink the entire night. It had been the worst night she'd experienced in a very long time.
Guilt and shame swarmed her when she thought of the events of the past four years. In her estimation, she had been a horrible Head of House. She had vowed, when she had taken the position decades earlier, that she would take care of her students like they were her sons and daughters, that she would do all she could to protect them. And, looking back, she knew she had failed spectacularly.
When Harry had come to Hogwarts at eleven, she could tell from just one look at him that the past ten years had been rough on him. He was skinny, looked starved for affection, and his emerald eyes were duller than she'd like them to be. But after the dread of that first sighting, hope had burgeoned in her heart. With every day that passed, his eyes shone a little brighter, and his face filled with wonder as he discovered what Hogwarts and the wizarding world had to offer.
Then, at the end of the year, she had made an awful mistake. Harry had come to her, convinced that the Sorcerer's Stone was in grave danger of being stolen. Shocked and dismayed that he had found out about it as she was, she had still been under the impression that he was worried over nothing. The protections on the stone were very secure; she was positive that they could not be breached.
But, she had learned as that night drew to a close, she was severely mistaken. Harry, someone she was supposed to protect, had gone after the stone, along with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. The events resulted in Harry lying in the hospital wing for three days, extremely close to death due to severe magical exhaustion. In fact, he had almost not made it through that first night; it was a miracle he had survived, and it was only due to the expertise of Madam Pomfrey that he had done so.
The guilt had eaten Minerva up from the inside out. She had always prided herself on being the model Gryffindor, to show her lions that they could count on her, and she had failed. She had disbelieved Harry, sending him away and discounting his story because it came from the mouth of a child. She'd thought Harry was being too dramatic, that he didn't know what he was talking about, and her dismissal of him almost resulted in his death.
After the year was over, Minerva vowed to change. If she was going to look at herself in the mirror every morning without feeling disgust swarm her, she was going to do better. She thought of her prized students, Lily and James Potter, and cringed when she pondered on what they'd say to her if they saw her now.
But, she reflected as she came nearer the hospital wing, she knew she'd failed now more than ever. Over the next three years at Hogwarts, the danger Harry was in had shown itself over and over again, and Minerva had refused to see what was in front of her eyes every single time. Harry had gone into the Chamber of Secrets to rescue Ginny, and almost didn't live through that either.
Last year, the revelations regarding the true culprit of the Potters' deaths had come out. More self-disgust swelled in Minerva's stomach as she thought of the fact that she had believed, for twelve years, in Peter Pettigrew's hero status and Sirius Black's betrayal. After all, she had taught those two students for seven years, and had fought with them in the Order of the Phoenix. To put it plainly, minerva McGonagall had been a blind, gullible fool.
And this year ... when Harry's name had come out of the Goblet of Fire, she'd been frightened for him beyond anything she'd ever felt before. She had known, from the instant it had happened, that Harry had not entered himself. She was done with being a blind idiot, believing the masses who doubted him, and she had looked beyond the surface.
She was appalled at the members of the student body who taunted and jeered at him in the corridors, and muttered about him beneath their breaths. Her disappointment with Ronald Weasley was palpable as she saw how he reacted to Harry's becoming champion, but it cooled when she saw him come to the realization that he was wrong in his actions, and the two became friends again. Her pride in Harry multiplied as she witnessed him withstand the constant pressure and stress he had been under.
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