The moment the door clicked shut behind Lucien, the awake headmaster portraits exploded.
"Albus, aren't you being far too lenient with that boy?" A bearded wizard spoke first, his whiskers quivering with every word.
"In all my years of teaching, Hogwarts has never had a precedent for instructing students in Dark Magic!" a witch cut in, her pointed hat wobbling with indignation.
"Are you trying to fill Azkaban with even more prisoners? Or should we just build a whole new prison to stand alongside Azkaban and Nurmengard?"
"He's only twelve! A twelve-year-old saying he wants to study Dark Magic and curses—what's next? And you're actually considering teaching him?"
"Albus…"
The portraits talked over one another, voices rising until the once-quiet office sounded like the Leaky Cauldron on a Friday night.
Phineas Nigellus stroked his goatee, waiting for the noise to dip before adding his signature nasal drawl:
"And if the boy really does go down the wrong path, do you think you'll be able to stop him?"
The room fell into sudden, heavy silence.
Because that question carried real weight.
It was almost saying: once Lucien masters more powerful, more profound magic and truly comes into his own, he'll possess strength equal to—or possibly greater than—Dumbledore's.
At that point, if he decided to do something… who could possibly stand in his way?
They'd already had one Tom Riddle. One Voldemort. Wasn't that enough?
Just then, a cool, clear woman's voice drifted from the far side of the portrait wall.
"But a true Ravenclaw would never turn a blind eye to knowledge."
With the words came a beautiful witch wearing silver-rimmed glasses.
Sharon Windrian, the Ravenclaw headmistress, had appeared in front of her rows of bookshelves as if she'd been standing there the whole time—only no one had noticed until now.
The moment Sharon spoke, Phineas shut his mouth instantly.
He shot a quick glance her way, checking that her arms were empty—no massive book the thickness of castle bricks in sight.
Only then did he relax a fraction, though his fingers still tightened around his goatee.
Dumbledore finally spoke, his voice carrying a touch of weariness yet still gentle:
"Constantly blocking the path is far less effective than guiding it. Better that I keep an eye on him than let him fumble around in secret, experimenting alone."
He paused, looking at the portraits. "That would be far more dangerous, wouldn't it?"
The portraits fell quiet. Yes… leaving a prodigiously gifted boy to study Dark Magic unsupervised?
An average wizard who went astray might only kill himself. A genius who went astray could take half the world with him.
Hogwarts might not even survive until graduation.
Sharon nodded and pushed her silver glasses up her nose.
"The smarter the person, the less they can tolerate ignorance."
She added, "Albus, when you give him my Curses and Counter-Curses, make sure it's the original edition—not the revised one."
The revised version had been edited for general readership and cut out a great deal of the more dangerous Dark Magic material.
Dumbledore gave a small nod. "Already done."
Sharon said nothing more.
In her own way, she had just vouched for Lucien.
If the boy truly had ill intentions, he could have waited until he graduated safely, left Hogwarts, left Dumbledore's sight, and then traveled the world to study Dark Magic in secret.
No one would have known. No one could have stopped him.
That was exactly how Voldemort had done it, after all.
But Lucien hadn't.
He had chosen to be completely honest with Dumbledore, openly admitting he wanted to study Dark Magic and curses.
That honesty itself was a statement.
Dumbledore sat quietly in his chair, gaze resting on the empty teacup in front of him. Only a thin ring of tea stains remained at the bottom.
Moonlight slanted in through the window, filling the hollow cup with silver.
His thoughts drifted far away, and a new idea suddenly occurred to him—
Perhaps it was time for another visit to Nurmengard.
To ask him a few more questions.
About curses… about resisting the mental corruption of Dark Magic…
Dumbledore's eyes flickered.
And the boy had also shown a keen interest in fire magic lately.
Fire…