A Change of Heart

Chapter Seventeen

Harry could not sleep that night. He could understand why Dumbledore chose not to tell him this so far. But he was glad it was finally out in the open. He had to know. Perhaps he was not ready for it, but he had to know.

"Neither can live while the other survives," the final words of the prophecy sent a chill down his spine. Was this their destiny then? One of them had to die at the hands of the other? Dumbledore had told him that fate is not set, that not all prophecies are fulfilled.  But it seemed to Harry that this one was well on the way to being fulfilled. He had been born at the end of July, his parents had escaped Voldemort thrice and Voldemort had marked him by giving him that scar. Of course, Neville too had been born at the end of July, his parents too had escaped Voldemort thrice and Harry's scar hardly marked him as Voldemort's equal. And he could not think what was the power he had that Voldemort did not know. But still, enough of the prophecy had already come to pass.

"It doesn't have to be," Dumbledore had told him. "Not unless you want it to. Do you think the part of the prophecy that came true would have happened if Voldemort had chosen to ignore it instead of acting on it?"

Harry understood what Dumbledore was saying, but he was not reassured. And he was even less reassured by the fact that Tom was trying to hear the full prophecy. For, Dumbledore had told him that a record of the prophecy was kept in the Department of Mysteries, in the ministry. Perhaps, Tom was trying to get to that when he came for the hearing.

Harry had later asked Mr. Weasley about the Department of Mysteries, but he had not much idea of what went on there.

"I've seen the place only once," he had told Harry. "There are lots of locked doors there. But why the sudden interest in that place, Harry?"

Harry had mumbled something about being curious and Mr. Weasley had seemed satisfied. But Ron and Hermione had directed sharp glances at him. Harry knew he was not being fair to his best friends by keeping so much from them. But somehow, he did not feel he was ready to tell them everything.

It was so hard being a marked man. Harry did not want his friends to look at him like that. What if they became disgusted with him? Worse, what if they pitied him? He did not want to face that. A small part of him told him that he was being unfair to his friends. But he was not in an emotional state to think logically.

And now, Harry knew what the locked doors in his dreams meant. They were not his dreams. They were Tom's. Tom was dreaming about the place where the prophecy was kept, and somehow Harry was privy to those dreams.

The knowledge that Tom was seeking to know the prophecy in full had also been devastating. For, why should Tom seek to know it if he did not mean to harm Harry. Neither can live while the other survives. That was very straight forward. And Harry knew what was going to happen if Tom should happen to hear it. If Dumbledore was right and Tom was being nice to him not due to some spell, then all that would change once he heard his being alive depended on Harry not being alive.