Chapter 157: Grindelwald's Prophecy
Crack.
Porcelain shattered in the quiet of the Nurmengard cell.
"Gellert!"
Dumbledore cried out. Grindelwald had suddenly crushed the teacup in his hand. Blood ran down his fingers, mingling with the spilled tea.
Dumbledore shot to his feet, closed the distance in a stride, and seized the injured hand to inspect it. At the same time, he drew the Elder Wand and cast a rapid healing charm. Soft white light blossomed at the tip.
Grindelwald said nothing. His eyes were shut, lids trembling faintly.
Even without looking, he could feel Dumbledore's alarm and haste. His mouth almost twitched into a smile.
Such a little cut was something he could have mended himself in a heartbeat, but he let Dumbledore fuss over it and finish the spell.
"I am fine, Albus," he said at last.
Dumbledore, watching his closed eyes, felt his own sharpen.
"Gellert," he said quietly, "you Divined Leonardo, did you not?"
He knew Grindelwald's gift. Those mismatched eyes could see "visions" unbidden, and sometimes by will.
The people and events that appeared in them were never trivial. They heralded upheavals large enough to shake the world.
Grindelwald did not answer at once. After a long moment, he opened his eyes.
The dull one was bloodshot now. The bright blue still gleamed.
"You know my Sight has two modes," he said. "Passive and active. When it stirs on its own, the vision is of something far in the future, and more complete…"
Dumbledore did not interrupt. He waited for the rest.
Grindelwald pursed his lips when he realised he would get no prompting.
"I just cast twice," he said. "The first was passive. And…"
"I saw nothing."
Dumbledore's brows drew together. He knew Grindelwald well and had never heard of such a thing.
A passive prophecy, which should be richer and clearer than any other, yielding nothing at all?
"So I tried again," Grindelwald went on. "This time, I aimed it at that boy, Leonardo.
"Would you like to guess what I saw?"
Dumbledore played along. "What did you see, Gellert?"
Grindelwald smiled, satisfied, but his tone turned weighty.
"A vortex," he said. "An endless, all‑devouring vortex."
That was all.
Dumbledore knew that was likely the whole of it. Active visions were usually brief and fragmented.
He was only half right.
The second Divination had indeed been incomplete, but only because Grindelwald himself had cut it off.
At the first glimpse of that whirling abyss, a crushing pressure had fallen on his mind.
His instincts had screamed that if he tried to look deeper…
But he would not admit fear in front of Dumbledore. So he left that part unsaid.
For the first time in many years, a strange, almost unfamiliar curiosity stirred in his chest.
"That child is far too unusual," he murmured. "Fascinating…"
That admission alone was enough to make Dumbledore ask, "What do you make of it, then?"
Seeing the vision was one thing. Interpreting it was another.
Grindelwald met his gaze, interest bright in his eyes.
"That boy will have an immense impact on the wizarding world," he said. "On the whole world, in fact. I cannot tell whether it will be a blessing or a calamity.
"Albus, you are his Headmaster. He is your student. You must know him better than I."
Dumbledore thought of their year together. Of Leonardo's hungry, unwavering pursuit of knowledge. His easy kindness to his classmates. His quick mind when solving problems.
At last, his memory settled on a night in the Forbidden Forest.
On the newborn unicorn pressing its horn to Leonardo's hand.
"He is a good child, Gellert," Dumbledore said softly. "Did you know he saved a young unicorn? He won the unicorn's blessing."
Grindelwald was content to listen to him reminisce, but as the details mounted, something in his expression turned odd. His face went a little stiff.
"So," he said at length, "another young man with a talent for winning over magical creatures."
Silence dropped between them.
The air grew awkward.
Unwilling to waste the rare chance to talk, it was Grindelwald who broke it again.
"So," he said, "what do you intend to do with such a prodigy? A boy whose gifts are great—perhaps terrifyingly so?"
The question sat Dumbledore back in his chair. He sighed.
How had he treated the last prodigy?
With suspicion. With watchfulness. With restraint.
Voldemort's nature had never been gentle. Yet sometimes Dumbledore wondered whether all his choices back then had been right.
He had gone to the orphanage himself to bring Tom to school. When he heard what the boy had done, how had he responded?
With a burst of fire that set Tom's wardrobe blazing. He had not truly destroyed the cupboard where the boy hoarded his stolen trophies. The flames were only a demonstration.
But they had lit something in Tom that never went out—his hunger for power, his lust to dominate.
Dumbledore sometimes wondered: if he had not chosen intimidation, had not forced Tom to return what he had taken and apologise by sheer pressure, but used a gentler, truer method instead… would anything have changed?
He looked at Grindelwald across the table, and the bitterness in his heart deepened.
Back then, he had had little patience and even less tenderness left for Tom Riddle. He had been too consumed by other, older pains.
"Leonardo is a good child," he said again.
"This time, I must not teach him wrongly."
They talked on a while longer, from the great matters of the day—how one Eastern Ministry had split into a dozen little ones—to the trivial, like a toilet seat that had gone "missing" from the school.
As the last light of the sun faded, Dumbledore rose to go. He was almost at the door when he heard Grindelwald's murmur behind him.
"I would like to meet this Leonardo boy someday," he said. "It sounds like it would be interesting. It is dreadfully dull here…"
"Oh, and I am out of parchment. Send some with your next letter."