Chapter Text
"'First of all, Harry, I want to thank you,' said Dumbledore, eyes twinkling again. 'You must have shown me real loyalty down in the Chamber. Nothing but that could have called Fawkes to you.'
He stroked the phoenix, which had fluttered down onto his knee. Harry grinned awkwardly as Dumbledore watched him.
'And so you met Tom Riddle,' said Dumbledore thoughtfully. 'I imagine he was most interested in you ...'
Suddenly, something that was nagging at Harry came tumbling out of his mouth.
'Professor Dumbledore ... Riddle said I'm like him. Strange like- nesses, he said ...'
'Did he, now?' said Dumbledore, looking thoughtfully under his thick silver eyebrows at Harry. And what do you think, Harry?'
'I don't think I'm like him!' said Harry, more loudly than he'd intended. 'I mean, I'm – I'm in Gryffindor, I'm ...'
But he fell silent, a lurking doubt resurfacing in his mind. 'Professor,' he started again after a moment, 'the Sorting Hat told me I'd – I'd have done well in Slytherin. Everyone thought I was Slytherin's heir for a while ... because I can speak Parseltongue ...'
'You can speak Parseltongue, Harry,' said Dumbledore calmly, 'because Lord Voldemort – who is the last remaining descendant of Salazar Slytherin – can speak Parseltongue. Unless I'm much mistaken, he transferred some of his own powers to you the night he gave you that scar. Not something he intended to do, I'm sure ...'
'Voldemort put a bit of himself in me?' Harry said, thunder- struck.
'It certainly seems so.'
'So I should be in Slytherin,' Harry said, looking desperately into Dumbledore's face. 'The Sorting Hat could see Slytherin's power in me, and it –'
'Put you in Gryffindor,' said Dumbledore calmly. 'Listen to me, Harry. You happen to have many qualities Salazar Slytherin prized in his hand-picked students. His own very rare gift, Parseltongue ... resourcefulness ... determination ... a certain disregard for rules,' he added, his moustache quivering again. 'Yet the Sorting Hat placed you in Gryffindor. You know why that was. Think.'
'It only put me in Gryffindor,' said Harry in a defeated voice, 'because I asked not to go in Slytherin ...'
'Exactly,' said Dumbledore, beaming once more. 'Which makes you very different from Tom Riddle. It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.' Harry sat motionless in his chair, stunned."
"Sir, why do you think Riddle did such terrible things?" he asked, memory of Ollivander telling him of the great but terrible things his wands brother was used to accomplish flashing behind his emerald eyes. "Why did I choose differently from him if we are so similar?"
"Well, my boy, I imagine there are several reasons. Unlike Tom, you grew up knowing love. Love is a very powerful thing, Harry, and is the reason Tom cannot defeat you. Without it, Tom's heart grew cold, unable to empathize with other people. He lost his ability to care for other people before he even had the chance to develop it. In Slytherin, he was soon seduced by the dark and lost what little humanity remained. You were spared this fate because you knew how to love and you found friends you care for. I dare say it was rather a matter of unlucky circumstance that led Tom to become the Voldemort you know today."
Harry considers this for a while. Despite his frustration that the man still seems to believe the Dursleys care for him, he can understand where Dumbledore is coming from. Although he was never given love growing up, he saw it very clearly between the Dursleys. There were times when he felt himself growing cold and resentful of the love they shared, but that mostly went away around the time when he was seven and had decided that if he was a freak, he would just have to find another freak to love and be loved by. He had decided that one day his family would be made of freaks that need love like him and they would all be happy because they were all freaks so no one would be left out like he was.
The reminder of that promise that he made to himself and the knowledge that Riddle never got love growing up made him consider the fact that Riddle might just be a freak like him. If that's the case, he shouldn't be fighting him, because it will only make Riddle lonelier.
He is snapped out of his thoughts when Dumbledore speaks up again.
"'If you want proof, Harry, that you belong in Gryffindor, I suggest you look more closely at this.'
Dumbledore reached across to Professor McGonagall's desk, picked up the blood-stained silver sword and handed it to Harry. Dully, Harry turned it over, the rubies blazing in the firelight. And then he saw the name engraved just below the hilt.
Godric Gryffindor.
'Only a true Gryffindor could have pulled that out of the Hat, Harry,' said Dumbledore simply.
For a minute, neither of them spoke. Then Dumbledore pulled open one of the drawers in Professor McGonagall's desk, and took out a quill and a bottle of ink.
'What you need, Harry, is some food and sleep. I suggest you go down to the feast, while I write to Azkaban – we need our game- keeper back. And I must draft an advertisement for the Daily Prophet, too,' he added thoughtfully. 'We'll be needing a new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. Dear me, we do seem to run through them, don't we?'"