Dumbledore's hand trembled slightly.
He had lived for more than a hundred years. He had seen dark wizards, dark magic, and things more terrifying than most people's nightmares. But at this moment, he found he truly did not dare think any further. He did not even dare ask Iain which row of graves those skeletons had dug themselves out of, or whose relatives and friends they had once been.
"Iain, what exactly are you doing?"
Dumbledore asked again. His tone was still gentle, but his voice was noticeably tighter than usual.
"Uh... please listen to my explanation. A small accident happened just now. Allow me to defend myself."
Iain sat cross-legged on the floor and patted the dust from his trousers.
Fawkes perched on top of his head, tilting his head and looking at Dumbledore with bright black eyes.
"Just now, a little girl came by selling bombs. She was dressed very thinly, barefoot in this cold weather, and carrying a basket full of all kinds of explosives."
"She said, 'Sir, won't you buy one? Today's bombs are especially big and especially loud.' I felt sorry for her, so I thought I'd buy one. She was so happy she said she'd let me inspect the goods first..."
"And then she blew up the second floor."
Iain spoke with very little confidence, his eyes darting away. At a glance, one could tell he had not yet grown into a qualified liar.
"..."
Dumbledore's gaze followed his line of sight and landed on the diary. His pupils contracted slightly, but no extra expression appeared on his face.
The old headmaster merely understood in his heart who had led Iain astray.
He said nothing. Instead, he immediately turned around and hurried out of the room, his steps quick as he made his way to the nearby church graveyard.
The gravestones stood quietly in rows, casting long shadows beneath the moonlight.
The oldest stones were already too weathered to read. Wind and rain had polished them smooth, like pieces of candy time had held in its mouth and licked for centuries.
"Merlin preserve us..."
Dumbledore passed between row after row of gravestones before his steps finally stopped at the last row.
That gravestone was very small.
Compared with the others, it was so small it looked like a forgotten footnote tucked away in a corner. A name and dates were carved into the stone, though the lettering had grown somewhat blurred.
But a little could still be made out.
My sister... something, something.
The earth before the grave showed no sign of having been disturbed. The grass still grew there, dew still clung to it, and it looked much the same as it had the last time Dumbledore came.
"Thank goodness. Thank goodness."
Dumbledore stood before the gravestone, looking down at that untouched patch of soil, and slowly breathed out a long, long sigh. The breath lasted a long time, as though he meant to exhale everything he had been holding in since the moment he stepped through his front door.
He bent and placed his hand on the top of the gravestone.
The old headmaster remained in that position for a long while.
Then he heard a string of footsteps.
"Professor, listen to me. Senior Sister insisted I show her my talent. She also tempted me into using collective labor to repair the second-floor room."
Iain walked over along the cemetery path.
Fawkes was still perched on his head, golden tail feathers hanging down on either side of his ears and glimmering faintly in the moonlight. Behind the young wizard followed a line of skeletons.
Those skeletons looked a little different from when Dumbledore had first seen them leaving the house. Some were wearing shirts. Some had trousers. Some had waistcoats. One skeleton even had a watch around its wrist bone, its face reflecting silver-white light beneath the moon. It was clearly something it had only just put on.
Driven by Iain's will, all the skeletons lined up and returned to their graves one after another, their movements orderly and unhurried.
Clearly, Iain had been trained. His control over this magic had already improved by leaps and bounds.
One skeleton walked up to its grave, turned around before entering, and even waved at Iain. Its jawbone opened and closed twice with a soft clack.
"Goodbye, Granny."
Iain waved back.
The skeleton lay down in the grave. Unlike the others, which had to bury themselves by hand, once this skeleton lay down, the soil rose from both sides and covered it over by itself.
The turf spread back like a carpet, and dew gathered once more on the grass. A few seconds later, that patch of ground looked no different from any other part of the cemetery.
"..."
Dumbledore had just personally watched his own mother return to her coffin. For a moment, his feelings were impossible to describe. His lips moved, but in the end, he chose not to get angry.
"You gave them your clothes and accessories?"
He asked only this unimportant question, his voice slightly hoarse from suppressing too much emotion.
Hearing this, Iain frowned. His expression looked as though he had been insulted. He felt Dumbledore might be prejudiced against him simply because his magical talent happened to be Dark Magic.
"What do you take me for? An entrepreneur? If you hire people to work, of course you have to pay them something. Even if the laborers are dead, they still deserve proper grave goods!"
"That is a basic rule of business."
Iain was an exceptionally principled person. His words landed with force, and his expression was so serious that he looked as if he were giving Dumbledore a lecture on labor law.
Only, such solemn sincerity paired with Fawkes clucking away on top of his head made the whole scene look absurdly funny.
Dumbledore stared at Iain for five seconds.
He did not know whether he ought to praise the young wizard for having a strangely upright moral compass while desecrating the rest of the dead. As for Iain's somewhat unusual way of thinking and logic, Dumbledore no longer knew where to begin.
After thinking for a moment, Dumbledore decided to change the subject.
"Why is Fawkes sitting on your head?"
His expression was slightly strange as he looked at his phoenix.
"He's helping me hatch bird eggs. Once they hatch, his children and grandchildren will be endless. We can sell them to people who like birds. Fawkes is contributing his skills and gets thirty percent of the profit."
"He's my business partner now! I persuaded him with my unparalleled eloquence!"
Iain had clearly not forgotten his dream of becoming a pet magnate. He reached up and stroked the phoenix on his head. Fawkes let out a soft cry and gently pecked his finger with his beak.
"..."
The corner of Dumbledore's mouth twitched.
In all these years, very few absurd things had made his control over his expression slip. The last time had probably been when Tom Riddle came to apply for the Defense Against the Dark Arts position.
And just as the old headmaster fell briefly into that memory,
"Huh? Where's the person from this grave? Senior Sister said the person inside was outstanding and told me to prioritize hiring them. Did my magic fail?"
Iain's gaze landed on the small gravestone. He tilted his head and looked at it for a while, but the writing was too blurred. He could not make out either the name or the dates.
"?????"
Dumbledore took a deep breath and finally focused his attention on what Iain was holding in his hands.
"It seems your mischievous tastes remain exactly the same after all these years, Senior Sister."
Dumbledore's words carried a tone that sounded both helpless and nostalgic.
It was not the attitude one would use toward a Dark magical object.
Iain finally let out a complete sigh of relief.
"What method did you use to make this child choose to trust you?"
Dumbledore took in Iain's reaction and looked curiously at the diary held in the boy's palms.
He knew that, given Iain's personality, the boy would not easily trust a mysterious magical object. This was also reflected in Iain's own work, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
I showed him my peerless brilliance, and also... agreed to teach him a formula for refining xxxx.
Words appeared in the diary.
However, the key information was immediately covered by the flustered young wizard's hand.
Iain was clearly trying to hide something.
However,
Gold Galleons. It was a formula for refining Gold Galleons!
Unfortunately, the witch's maliciously playful handwriting could continue appearing elsewhere on the page. The young wizard's two hands could not cover everything, so he could only force a dry smile and look at the stunned Dumbledore.
"It was purely technical curiosity... You know, before becoming a wizard, I was a scientist."
Iain's guilty eyes darted wildly.
Once again, he attempted to become a little liar.