Chapter 443: A Sudden Urgency
Easter was a time for exchanging gifts. Around Sean, students were bustling about, trading chocolate frogs and candy eggs.
Owls were no different. They beat their wings frantically, clutching letters in their beaks and dangling gift-wrapped boxes from their talons.
Sean tucked his own gifts into his Wizard's Tome and instinctively glanced at the Daily Prophet that Snowy had delivered. Among the moving magical photographs on the front page, one headline seized his attention.
[Former Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Bob Ogden, passes away...]
Bob Ogden.
The name felt uncomfortably familiar. Sean whispered a few words to Snowy, and when the snowy owl returned, she clutched a Pensieve in her talons.
Sean flicked his wand, and a silver thread of memory drifted out, swirling into the basin.
But before he could discern who exactly Bob Ogden was, Justin Finch-Fletchley interrupted his thoughts.
"Sean, I can't shake the feeling that Professor Dumbledore is watching you," Justin whispered, his voice barely audible.
Sean looked up. Indeed, the Headmaster was winking at him.
The elderly wizard with the long, silver beard unwrapped a delicately packaged chocolate egg, revealing a pair of thick woollen socks and a pair of two-way mirrors. They didn't look like mass-produced items from a shop; the backs of the mirrors were adorned with intricate phoenix reliefs and bore the faint engraving: S.G.
Dumbledore's beard twitched. He winked at Sean once more before rising and making his way out of the Great Hall.
Sean thoughtfully pulled out a gift from his own pile—one that was not particularly elegantly wrapped.
"Very few wizards get to exchange gifts with Professor Dumbledore," Hermione's voice popped up from nowhere, her expression serious. "You know, while the Headmaster is always polite about receiving gifts, he rarely sends anything back. And the others never really expect him to..."
Sean turned his head, and Hermione immediately averted her gaze, feigning intense interest in a goblet of pumpkin juice.
While Hermione struggled to suppress her curiosity, Sean had already slipped out of the Great Hall.
Inside Dumbledore's chocolate egg, there was only a single slip of parchment:
[Come to my office, my boy. It seems we must continue those bold speculations of ours.]
Bold speculations…
Pondering this riddle, Sean arrived at the gargoyle statue and knocked.
"Come in," Dumbledore's voice echoed.
"Good evening, Professor Dumbledore," Sean said as he stepped into the circular office.
"Ah, good evening, Sean. Do sit down," Dumbledore said with a twinkle in his eye. "Before your pleasant Easter holiday truly begins, I wish to share something with you—a gift, of sorts."
"Bob Ogden," Sean murmured.
"So, you've heard? It seems we are neck and neck in our investigation of Tom Riddle… though, tell me, how exactly do the stars speak?" Dumbledore folded his fingers together, his eyes narrowing playfully.
"It's just a fairy tale, Professor. I imagine even in the wizarding world, the stars don't really have voices," Sean replied.
"Who knows?" Dumbledore teased kindly.
The circular office looked as it always did: slim-legged tables held delicate silver instruments that whirred and puffed small clouds of smoke. The portraits of past Headmasters and Headmistresses were dozing in their frames. Fawkes, the magnificent phoenix, sat on his perch behind the door, watching Sean with keen interest. It was hard to imagine that even though Sean managed to sneak a moment to pet Fawkes almost every week, the phoenix's affinity level for him remained stuck at [Apprentice]. Perhaps, as Dumbledore had said, phoenixes were creatures of extreme loyalty.
"Come now, my boy. I shall share what I know with you. Of course, I must warn you—my ears are eager to hear your own flights of fancy as well. They are getting old, but they still have some life in them…
"Though we have done this before, I shall repeat it: from this moment on, we depart from the solid foundation of fact. We must tread together through the dark, murky swamp of memory into the realm of complex, bold conjecture. In this regard, Sean, I am just as likely to make a tragic error as Humphrey Belcher, who once believed he could make a cauldron out of cheddar cheese."
"A guess isn't necessarily a mistake," Sean said quietly. "We will find the right path."
"I certainly hope so. But, as I have already demonstrated to you, we are just as prone to error as anyone else. In fact, since I am—if you'll forgive me—considerably cleverer than most men, my mistakes have a tendency to be all the more serious."
Dumbledore produced a crystal vial. Sean knew it was the memory of Bob Ogden.
The world seemed to go silent. Sean couldn't help but look at Dumbledore's left hand, letting out a breath of relief when he saw it wasn't the withered, blackened husk he feared.
Bob Ogden, a wizard who had worked for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. His memory was crucial to understanding Voldemort's origins—the decadence and cruelty of the Gaunt family and the early history of Marvolo Gaunt's ring, one of the Horcruxes.
Sean didn't know when Ogden had died or when Dumbledore had secured this memory. However, he was certain that in the original timeline, Dumbledore wouldn't have obtained the Gaunt ring until later. Now, whether it was the diary from the Chamber of Secrets, Ravenclaw's Diadem, or Slytherin's Locket that had led the Headmaster to track more Horcruxes, it was clear that Dumbledore had turned his attention to Ogden's memory much earlier than expected.
This meant Sean had to adapt; the plan was accelerating.
"Let us take a stroll down Bob Ogden's memory lane. We have an appointment with him today."
Dumbledore pulled the stopper from the crystal vial and poured the silvery substance into the Pensieve. It swirled slowly, emitting a faint, ethereal glow—neither quite liquid nor gas.
They exchanged a look, and Dumbledore's deep, penetrating eyes seemed to sense that something had shifted. He smiled, then watched as Sean plunged headfirst into the silver substance.
Sean's feet left the floor as he plummeted through the swirling darkness, falling, falling.
Suddenly, a harsh glare of sunlight forced him to squint. Before his eyes could adjust, Dumbledore landed beside him.
They stood on a country lane flanked by high, tangled hedgerows. Above them, the summer sky was as clear and blue as a forget-me-not. About ten paces ahead of them stood a short, stout man. He wore spectacles so thick that his eyes were magnified into tiny, mole-like dots.
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