Dumbledore stared for a moment into the distance, then looked back at Harry and said, "Fifteen years ago you arrived at Hogwarts, Harry, safe and whole, as I had planned and intended. Well — not quite whole. You had suffered. I knew you would when I left you on your aunt and uncle's doorstep. I knew I was condemning you to ten dark and difficult years."
He paused. Harry said nothing although his mind was whirling. Ten dark and... Dumbledore had known, he had bloody well known...
"You might ask — and with good reason — why it had to be so. Why could some wizarding family not have taken you in? Many would have done so more than gladly, would have been honoured and delighted to raise you as a son.
"My answer is that my priority was to keep you alive. You were in more danger than perhaps anyone but I realised. Voldemort had been vanquished hours before, but his supporters — and many of them are almost as terrible as he — were still at large, angry, desperate and violent. And I had to make my decision, too, with regard to the years ahead. Did I believe that Voldemort was gone for ever? No. I knew not whether it would be ten, twenty or fifty years before he returned, but I was sure he would do so, and I was sure, too, knowing him as I have done, that he would not rest until he killed you.
"I knew that Voldemort's knowledge of magic is perhaps more extensive than any wizard alive. I knew that even my most complex and powerful protective spells and charms were unlikely to be invincible if he ever returned to full power.
"But I knew, too, where Voldemort was weak. And so I made my decision. You would be protected by an ancient magic of which he knows, which he despises, and which he has always, therefore, underestimated — to his cost. I am speaking, of course, of the fact that your mother died to save you. She gave you a lingering protection he never expected, a protection that might still flow in your veins to this day. I put my trust, therefore, in your mother's blood. I delivered you to her sister, her only remaining relative."
"She never loved me," said Harry at once. "She never gave a damn —"
"But she took you," Dumbledore cut across him. "She may have taken you grudgingly, furiously, unwillingly, bitterly, yet still she took you, and in doing so, she sealed the charm I placed upon you. Your mother's sacrifice made the bond of blood the strongest shield I could give you."
"I still don't —"
"While you could still call home the place where your mother's blood dwells, there you could not be touched or harmed by Voldemort. He shed her blood, but it lived on in you and her sister. Her blood became your refuge. You needed to return there only once a year, but as long as you called it home, whilst you were there he could not hurt you. Your aunt knew this. I explained what I had done in the letter I left, with you, on her doorstep. She knew that allowing you houseroom may well have kept you alive for all those years."
"Fifteen years ago, then," continued Dumbledore, "you arrived at Hogwarts, neither as happy nor as well-nourished as I would have liked, perhaps, yet alive and healthy. You were not a pampered little prince, but as normal a boy as I could have hoped under the circumstances. Thus far, my plan was working well.
"And then . . . well, you will remember the events of your first year at Hogwarts quite as clearly as I do. You rose magnificently to the challenge that faced you and sooner — much sooner — than I had anticipated, you found yourself face to face with Voldemort. You survived again. You did more. You delayed his return to full power and strength. You fought a man's fight. I was . . . prouder of you than I can say.
"Yet there was a flaw in this wonderful plan of mine," said Dumbledore. "An obvious flaw that I knew, even then, might be the undoing of it all. And yet, knowing how important it was that my plan should succeed, I told myself that I would not permit this flaw to ruin it. I alone could prevent this, so I alone must be strong. And here was my first test, as you lay in the hospital wing, weak from your struggle with Voldemort."
"I don't understand what you're saying," said Harry.
"Don't you remember asking me, as you lay in the hospital wing, why Voldemort had tried to kill you when you were a baby?"
Harry nodded.
"Ought I to have told you then?"
Harry stared into the blue eyes and said nothing.
...
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