Dumbledore slowly opened his eyes to find himself staring at the ceiling of the Hospital Wing.
So he had been brought to the Hospital Wing. Grindelwald, perhaps?
Dumbledore tried to sit up, but the weakness in both body and mind left him feeling utterly drained.
Fortunately, Fawkes's phoenix fire continued to nourish his body, easing his condition considerably.
Once the pain had subsided, Dumbledore sat up and immediately saw Harry Potter standing beside his bed.
"Harry? You're all right?" Dumbledore asked in surprise.
He clearly remembered Voldemort taking Harry away. Could everything that had happened before have just been a dream?
No, that was not right. He really had been injured. That sensation of being eroded by the aura of death could not have been false.
So was he dreaming now?
Dumbledore almost felt like slapping himself just to confirm whether this was a dream.
"Headmaster Dumbledore, I'm fine," Harry said quickly. "Voldemort didn't take me."
"How is that possible?" Dumbledore asked, confused. "I clearly saw Voldemort take you away."
"The one he took was a double I prepared for Harry," Leonard said as he walked up to Dumbledore's bedside.
"Though it was only temporary."
Dumbledore's gaze instantly sharpened.
"You knew Voldemort was coming?" he asked sternly.
"Yes. It was intelligence Harris Raymons uncovered. The Gaunt family shack was destroyed, and the Horcrux kept there, the ring set with the Resurrection Stone, disappeared."
Leonard shrugged.
"If I were Voldemort, I'd do everything I could to gather the other Deathly Hallows too."
"You knew his goal, and after replacing Harry with a duplicate, you still didn't tell me. What exactly are you after?"
Dumbledore was unusually angry, so angry his eyes nearly seemed to blaze.
If Dumbledore had known earlier that the one in Voldemort's hands was only Harry's duplicate, Voldemort would never have managed to take the Elder Wand.
With the initiative and the Elder Wand in his hand, Dumbledore could have ground Voldemort into the dirt.
But because he had been afraid of harming Harry, Dumbledore had not only let Voldemort escape, he had also lost the Elder Wand.
"That's hardly my fault. How was I supposed to know Voldemort would find such a powerful helper?" Leonard said calmly. "I figured Voldemort wasn't your match anyway, so making sure Harry Potter was safe was more important. Wasn't it?"
Dumbledore stared at Leonard. His instincts told him Leonard was not telling the whole truth, but what he said did make sense.
Cappadocia's appearance had been a complete surprise. No one knew Voldemort had such a powerful subordinate, one strong enough to hold even Grindelwald back.
From that perspective, it really did not seem like Leonard's fault. It was as if he had only meant well.
But Dumbledore did not believe it. He always had the feeling Leonard was hiding something from him, plotting some scheme behind his back.
"Oh, right. One more thing." Leonard looked at the silent Dumbledore and continued, "Sirius Black was attacked. He was hurt pretty badly, and he's currently being treated at St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries."
"Sirius was attacked? By whom?" Dumbledore asked anxiously when he heard one of his key people had been injured.
"An Inferius," Leonard said.
"An Inferius? Just one?" Dumbledore looked at Leonard as if he suspected he was joking with him.
One Inferius taking on Sirius Black? What kind of joke was that?
"It wasn't an ordinary Inferius. Apparently it was Sirius Black's younger brother. Sirius didn't fight back at all. If there hadn't been Aurors nearby, Sirius Black probably would have been beaten to death."
Leonard spread his hands.
"They say that Inferius found something in the Black house and was about to take it away, but the Aurors who rushed over stopped it. Want to guess what it was?"
"A Horcrux?" Dumbledore asked.
"Correct." Leonard said, "Though as for Horcruxes... heh. Hard to say whether those things even still matter to Voldemort. Before long, he'll probably become an Eternal Wizard."
"An Eternal Wizard who has inherited Death's name."
Dumbledore felt a pain in his liver.
"So we'll soon be facing an Eternal Wizard?"
"Not necessarily." Leonard gave him a reassuring smile.
"What did you do to him?" Dumbledore sensed something immediately. "That fake Harry. You tampered with it, didn't you?"
Leonard would not do something meaningless. That fake Harry had to have had some special purpose.
Perhaps it could stop Voldemort from becoming an Eternal Wizard?
That was Dumbledore's guess.
"You're overthinking it. I don't have that kind of ability." Leonard waved it off. "I just gave him a scare. After some time, he'll probably figure out it was only a desperate way to buy us some time."
"I see. Even so, that may already be the best outcome we could hope for." Dumbledore sighed.
...
Leonard and Harry left. They still had classes to attend.
After changing Dumbledore's potion, Madam Pomfrey left the Hospital Wing. Not long afterward, Grindelwald appeared by Dumbledore's bedside.
"I've dealt with that Inferius's corpse," Grindelwald said as he sat down beside the bed. "Quite a troublesome thing. It was already not far from the level of an Eternal Wizard, and I could sense the age of its power. If it had really become an Eternal Wizard, I'm afraid even I wouldn't have been its match."
As a self-taught Eternal Wizard, Grindelwald felt rather stifled. He had thought he was unmatched now, only to run into a hard case the moment he came out.
Dumbledore looked at Grindelwald and asked, "Then if the target were Death, could you deal with it?"
"It would be difficult. And as for that Odin you mentioned, I doubt I'd be his match either." Grindelwald sounded helpless. "Those are all powers left behind by the old guard."
"Then why didn't you simply inherit Death's power back then? You had the chance," Dumbledore said.
He was talking about decades ago. Back then, Grindelwald had been the greatest threat in the wizarding world, and it was by defeating that version of Grindelwald that Dumbledore had risen to fame and been hailed as the greatest wizard of all time.
At that time, Grindelwald had wielded the Elder Wand and had been nearly unmatched in the wizarding world.
"Hah. Death's power..." Grindelwald said as he slowly peeled an apple he had produced from nowhere. "Powerful, yes, but the hidden danger is enormous. Don't forget, among the Eternal Wizards, only Death was killed by someone weaker."
"And besides... power that isn't your own is difficult to master. Once you take it, you'll never be able to grow stronger again. I have no interest in claiming that kind of power."