The slowly revolving Professor

The slowly revolving Professor Trelawney sank back into the silver mass below and vanished.

The silence within the office was absolute. Neither Dumbledore nor Harry nor any of the portraits made a sound. Even Fawkes had fallen silent.

‘Professor Dumbledore?’ Harry said very quietly, for Dumbledore, still staring at the Pensieve, seemed completely lost in thought. ‘It ... did that mean ... what did that mean?’

‘It meant,’ said Dumbledore, ‘that the person who has the only chance of conquering Lord Voldemort for good was born at the end of July, nearly sixteen years ago. This boy would be born to parents who had already defied Voldemort three times.’

Harry felt as though something was closing in on him. His breathing seemed difficult again.

‘It means—me?’

Dumbledore surveyed him for a moment through his glasses.

‘The odd thing, Harry,’ he said softly, ‘is that it may not have meant you at all. Sybill's prophecy could have applied to two wizard boys, both born at the end of July that year, both of whom had parents in the Order of the Phoenix, both sets of parents having narrowly escaped Voldemort three times. One, of course, was you. The other was Neville Longbottom.’

‘But then ... but then, why was it my name on the prophecy and not Neville's?’

‘The official record was re-labelled after Voldemort's attack on you as a child,’ said Dumbledore. ‘It seemed plain to the keeper of the Hall of Prophecy that Voldemort could only have tried to kill you because he knew you to be the one to whom Sybill was referring.’

‘Then—it might not be me?’ said Harry.

‘I am afraid,’ said Dumbledore slowly, looking as though every word cost him a great effort, ‘that there is no doubt that it is you.’

‘But you said— Neville was born at the end of July, too—and his mum and dad—’

‘You are forgetting the next part of the prophecy, the final identifying feature of the boy who could vanquish Voldemort ... Voldemort himself would mark him as his equal.And so he did, Harry. He chose you, not Neville. He gave you the scar that has proved both blessing and curse.’

‘But he might have chosen wrong!’ said Harry. ‘He might have marked the wrong person!’

‘He chose the boy he thought most likely to be a danger to him,’ said Dumbledore. ‘And notice this, Harry: he chose, not the pure-blood (which, according to his creed, is the only kind of wizard worth being or knowing) but the half-blood, like himself. He saw himself in you before he had ever seen you, and in marking you with that scar, he did not kill you, as he intended, but gave you powers, and a future, which have fitted you to escape him not once, but four times so far— something that neither your parents, nor Neville's parents, ever achieved.’

‘Why did he do it, then?’ said Harry, who felt numb and cold. ‘Why did he try and kill me as a baby? He should have waited to see whether Neville or I looked more dangerous when we were older and tried to kill whoever it was then—’