{Thirty-Five Owls}

XVII

June 30th, 1957

Albus--

Oh, that last was unusually brusque for you. Do I detect a hint of annoyance at me? Have I upset you in turn? Or is it fear at these choices you must make? Such a bother it must be, after all, to be the self-appointed leader of the free wizarding world. Or fear of Voldemort? Or fear that I hit your nail on the head?

But never mind that. I want to tell you a story, Albus.

When I lie awake at night on my thin mattress, as I so often do, until the moon sinks behind the horizon or out of sight of my narrow window, until the witching-hour chill creeps along the floor of my cell like a living thing, I swim through memories. I have no Pensieve, of course--nothing magical in here but my trusty old watch--but I still have my mind. Often, of course, it is the little things that come up first--my old wand, before I found It, or the woodwork in the walls of a Muggle house I sacked years ago, or the toads I kept as a child. And often I relive particular things, to console myself.

I would like to think I have a good memory. But it is nothing compared to a Pensieve. Here we are again--all those little conveniences of the wizarding world, and how to do without them. There are some memories I sometimes imagine must be worn thin in my mind--and yet they say that constant reminders strengthen a memory. True, perhaps. And yet--I've forgotten something.

It is late June, here in this worn-out memory. Aberforth is inside with Ariana. We amble back out along the mill stream that the Muggles of Godric's Hollow use, ducking under the windows of our wizarding elders, deep in conversation about singlehandedly revising the conservation laws of blood magic. We sit side by side and strip off our boots and dangle our feet in the water, and you turn a silver knife over in your hand--beautiful hands, you have--and you mutter that we'll find the Stone, we have to.

How much magical power, we wonder, can we milk out of one drop of blood? You prick your thumb, and it beads, terrible rich red in the sunlight. The sight of it excites me. I let it stain the tip of my wand, and it wicks into the wood and vanishes and the thrum of power sets my hair on end. Scheisse--even more than the convenience, even more than the proper ways of controlling one's reality and destiny, none of this impotent Muggle nonsense, that's what I miss about magic. The visceral thrums and thrills of it. You, you must still have it, and you were always so strong, talent so bright. Magic burning in every fiber of your body, transcending flesh--do you still notice it after all these long years, the simple primal exhilaration of it?

But--the memory. We were there, with your blood in my wand, and I sliced a hollow log to ribbons with a flick of my wrist, so easy, so powerful. And then you went to hand me the knife, but I forced it back into your hand, leaned very close as you slid the blade across the pad of my thumb--must try it in reverse, after all.

You lit the water on fire with my blood. You were magnificent.

We laugh and take notes, then, and slowly tamp down the fire. I am already imagining that glorious amplification applied to the Darkest spells; I hum incantations under my breath. We are partners, after all, and we had never thought until now to tap into the massive resource of power latent within each other--blood, willingly given to another, you know what that can do.

We lie panting together on the riverbank. My head is in your lap, and you scruff my hair absentmindedly with one hand, twirling strands around your fingers. The sun is bright, the brush green and wild, the bloodstained knife glimmering on the turf. We patter on, vainglorious, and when I mention looking for the Hallows--

"The Stone first," you say.

I shift and look up at you, curious. "Why?"

"Because once we have that...even the shadow of them, even just the shadow."

I bat at dangling strands of your hair like a kitten. "Albus, you're not making sense."

You didn't explain. I suppose, thinking about it, that you wanted your parents back, to take care of Aberforth and Ariana, so you could run off with me?

How thoughtful. For once, I think, I'm not being sarcastic.

We spoke for a while after that, about nothing important. It's not why I think of that day. I think of it because you stood, suddenly, rolling me out of your lap, and paced a circle of concealing charms.

It seems so much longer and darker when one has to sit and write it out in full, doesn't it?

We had groped at each other like schoolchildren before then, if memory serves, but it was there by the stream, cloaked by magic, with the insects buzzing in the undergrowth and the sun making your hair like fire, that we first came together. I remember with perfect clarity, though find it difficult to describe, the sly half-smile you wore as you slipped off your little gold reading glasses, dragging one earpiece unconscious over your lips as you stared at me, beckoning and hungry. And then you were sliding off your robes, peeling back white cotton undershirt and drawers, and I remember laughing, startled and gleeful, and telling you it was too shallow for swimming.

You were beautiful then. So was I--I watched you drinking in the sight of me. We're both old and withered and unforgivable now, I suppose.

We fumbled idyllically near the rushes, laid out on our robes as the ants picked bewildered at their hems. You shook with joy, like you'd fly apart, when I touched you. We're both pale creatures, and flushed easy and hot with pleasure, and I remember holding your face very tight in my hands and staring as ecstatic arousal overwhelmed you, and feeling my heart banging like a banshee's against my ribs, because you were mine.

I took you in hand, do you remember? I tugged your head back by the hair with one hand and took you in the other, and you were perfectly, absolutely hard for me. I made you scream. Do you remember? Or are you still too ashamed?

You panted and rolled over and scrubbed the seed off in the grass, and came up green spattered and loose-limbed and laughing, and never did things by halves. I remember tumbling back amongst our robes into some sort of delicious oblivion as you bent over me, hair on my skin, ring of your fingers clamped down tight round the base of my prick as you slid your lips round--

Afterwards, sweaty and sun-kissed and seed-stained, we laughed and demurred and boggled like children. But there was this one moment--we were lying together, side by side on our backs, your head pillowed on my outstretched arm, and I said, "That cloud looks like a drunken hippogriff, and dear heavens am I glad Bagshot can't see us right now," and then you said--

I forget.

This keeps me up, Albus. This haunts me, naggles me. I seem to recall hearing a story once, of a ghost who forgot the last line of his favorite poem, could only be put to rest when a traveling scholar recited it. And you, old friend, have a Penseive.

I told you what I knew of the Voldemort lad. You owe me.

Regards,

Gellert