Shared Sadness

Shared Sadness 4

Sybil Trelawney's POV

I watched the events unfold around me as I sipped some tea. I had always known this day would come and, with it, the events that could shape the rest of our lives. If the right path was followed, our world could be rid of the dark clouds that had brought strife and danger to our lives.

If the wrong path was followed or if this was not the catalyst for bringing everything together, darker days were ahead. Much darker days. Surely, the first to fall would be the marked one--Harry Potter. It was simply a miracle that he had not yet fallen, crushed under the heel of darkness. I had predicted his demise many a time.

My eyes focused on the boys and then the ripple of magic that surely must be a concealing charm. One of the guardians had arrived to watch the beginning unfold.

"Indeed." I smiled in his direction and glided over to my crystal ball. I waved a hand over it and chanted softly. The visions had been with me for days now and had not faded. Their intensity comforted me. The sacrificial lamb would save humanity.

"Come to me, darlings..."

The orb remained dark and I turned to my tea and studied the leaves. "No! This ruins everything." My heart beat rapidly in my chest and my hands shook as I again tried to find answers. This development spelled disaster for us all!

I stepped away and meditated for so long that moonlight met my widened eyes when I again came to awareness. A helpful house elf had left me some food and I ate quietly, still trying to come to grips with what I had learned. It was incredible! It was impossible! I was drawn to my crystal ball once again. Further clarity might be found in its misty depths.

"Come to me. Show me the way."

I must have studied the cloudy crystal for hours again, but then the mists parted and I saw him. "Our savior... our sacrificial lamb...Harry." The poor boy looked injured but strong, grime-covered and shocked but still alive. Alive? It was impossible!

I began to rock back and forth, as images filled my head. Harry was there, of course. The other professors... a peculiar looking female and them. Six stood shoulder-to-shoulder, wands at the ready. I had suspected the end might be coming, but this prophecy was much more than I had expected. This was far from the fuzzy images and obtuse tealeaf readings that had pointed the way previously. This was a vastly different and darker future than I had just seen. How had my visions led me to this?

Words poured out of my mouth unbidden and I was chilled to the core when a prophecy I had

last spoken nearly a generation ago poured out. "Six souls to save the world. Fate keeps them apart. Destiny brings them together to save the world. The darkness will bring them to hell. Their love can bring them back. Six souls to save the world. The sins of the father will not prevail!"

~*~

Albus Dumbledore's Point of View

I felt the chill rush through us as we sipped our midnight spirits. Minerva reached for my hand as all of the candles in our apartments burned out.

Sybil Trelawney's voice boomed throughout the rooms and I sipped lightly, quirking an eyebrow in surprise, but remaining calm otherwise. I had heard this prophecy once earlier, many years ago, along with the rest of The Order. The six souls to save our world had never been identified, but we all assumed that Harry would be the focal point. After all, he had defeated Voldemort in the past. Once, a long time ago, we had hoped that James and Lily would be the saviors. I shook my head to dispel that thought. There was not time to mourn the forever lost.

"Albus? It is too soon. He's not yet fully grown, fully trained." There was an edge of uncertainty in her voice. I knew she was rather close to the boy. We all were. We owed him so much.

I rubbed Minerva's back and relit the candles with measured wave of my hand. "Don't panic, my dear. What was started this morning begins. The fate of our world rests in the six souls to save the world. Fate has put this into motion."

Minerva met my eyes for a long moment and I knew that she was making sense of the prophecy resurfacing. Such wisdom there. She knew what this meant and what was at stake. "Do you think...it has been so long and we've lost so many. Will they understand the summons? Do enough of them still live? Who are this mysterious six? And, Albus, it explains so little. How can we be certain that the prophecy will be fulfilled?"

I shook my head gravely. I did not have the answers she sought, not yet anyway. "We will just have to be patient and wait, Minerva. The answers will come to us in due time."