Murder of Crows

11.00 PM, 31ST OCTOBER, 1981, BLACK LAKE'S SHORE, HOGWARTS

ALBUS DUMBLEDORE GAZED at his serene surroundings, drinking in the splendour of nature. The moon shone softly upon the earth below, the lake reflecting its benevolent light. The light rustling of the leaves and lapping of the water against the lake shore calmed his mind. This was why he liked to come here to think. The Black Lake's beauty and tranquillity always had a way of clearing his mind.

He needed that clarity now more than ever.

Dumbledore knew he had done many reprehensible things in his life. Things that made him lose sleep sometimes. Things that would make the Devil blush. He did everything he could to minimise the consequences of those actions, but he wasn't always able to stop people from getting hurt. The world, after all, was strange and chaotic, and in such a world, no one short of a god could be perfect.

The question still remained, though. Perfection was impossible at the moment, but even so, was he doing the right thing?

He wore masks to hide the monster within, the monster that he believed he had to be. A friendly smile here, kind words there. A demeanour and personality of a senile old yet well-meaning and humble coot. As he liked to tell others, he could act like a 'batty old codger' at times. This ploy was something he had mastered in his time, the art of acting, of smokescreens.

The simpler people who wanted to believe that the world was not as bad as it seemed to be always lapped it up, following blindly like sheep. The simple commoner who wanted nothing more than to be provided with his very simple, very basic needs. Such people always wanted someone to follow, someone to take care of problems for them.

Even easier to manipulate were the politicians, the bureaucrats. Those corrupt and inept people that gained power though lies, bribes, and all manner of fraudulent deeds. Those people knew that their power was shaky. They manipulated the sheep, but did it so bluntly and lazily that it was shocking how they managed it.

Dumbledore found that, for that reason, they could be easily swayed. They wanted power quickly, and weren't willing to put in the work to earn it or maintain it. As such, they looked for shortcuts. Dumbledore merely provided them, holding up the illusion that they were the ones running the show. They barely saw further than their stinking coffers. Dumbledore used this to his advantage.

In a nutshell, his act enabled him to further his ambitions with little resistance from most people.

However, there was a minority that remained immovable. He rarely had cracks in his pretence, yet there were always people that had their suspicions, people that saw through some of the veneer he had set up. People like Alice Longbottom, Amelia Bones, Lily Potter, James Potter, Sirius Black, Alastor Moody. People that knew the games of real power. They were just some of the people that he always had to be wary of.

Such people were the cleverer ones, the ones who truly threatened his plans for the wizarding world. Most people were content with living like cattle, letting themselves be milked for all they were worth in return for the most basic and bland of needs, but not them. They were people with ambitions far greater than merely surviving the bureaucracy.

Then came the single greatest threat to his plans, Arcturus Black.

The old fox had quite the résumé. The third great genius of the old generation, and the only man who had ever truly come close to challenging Dumbledore and Grindelwald. Sure, the man might be magically weaker, but he was definitely powerful in his own right, and his cunning was on a level that might be considered divine.

Dumbledore had always valued cleverness, even brilliance. But he also knew the danger that came with people who were too capable of seeing beyond the surface. People like Arcturus had a knack for peeling back layers of any argument, any idea, until they were left with the raw, unembellished truth, doing so in seconds.

That was something Dumbledore found difficult to tolerate, for it was far harder to shape someone who constantly saw through the façades. It wasn't that he minded the Black family's ambition or their intellectual pursuits—it was the defiance that came with it. Arcturus, in his own way, had always seen through Dumbledore's rhetoric.

The old wizard could feel it, a subtle but unmistakable resistance whenever he spoke to him. Arcturus didn't merely listen; he calculated, he compared, he searched for inconsistencies. That was the real threat, not the grandstanding of dark wizards or the superficial rebellion of teenagers barely experienced in the real world's problems, but the quiet suspicion of a mind that refused to bow.

For all his kindness, his love of knowledge, and his desire for peace, Dumbledore knew the truth: control could never be secured without trust. And trust was something that people like Arcturus never offered willingly. They made their own judgments, formed their own paths, and Dumbledore—well, he had always been uncomfortable with that. He needed followers, people who believed, who could be led.

Basically, the biggest problem that his plans for a utopia faced was the independent thinkers.

He worked tirelessly for the wellbeing of everyone, yet such people simply doubted him and always got in the way of his plans with their skepticism. He was willing to shoulder the burden of watching over the wizarding world, yet they still got in the way of that. Did they not see how he was their saviour? Did they not understand his suffering? Did they not realise how much he sacrificed?

Why, why, why could they not just see things from his perspective?

He was willing to be the monster, to be the one to sacrifice, and they still wanted to be enemies of the utopia he was crafting. The only one who ever really understood was Grindelwald. The only family he ever really had. The brother that the world forced him to sacrifice as a scapegoat. Did they not see his suffering?

No, they just had to make things more difficult!

As his rage surged, Dumbledore felt his magic beginning to build uncontrollably. Quickly composing himself, he tried to calm his mind, his magic slowly settling once more. He couldn't allow himself to break. Not now, not when he was at last at the cusp of finally creating his utopia. He had done so much to ensure that all the conditions were optimum for what was coming, what he had carefully crafted to happen.

Tonight, he would make the last great sacrifice he needed to realise his dream of a magical utopia. Tonight, he would usher in the new era in the magical world's history. Tonight, he would need to be a monster one last time, for the greater good of mankind. Yes, tonight would be the last. All he had to do was make sure that everything ran smoothly.

So yes, he was doing the right thing.

He had prepared as best as he could. He had played all his best cards and was now on the edge of realizing his dream, of making his ambitions a reality. All he needed was to be patient. In just an hour, all the sacrifices would pay off, and he would finally be able to laugh in the face of those that dared get in the way of the greater good.

The world would thank him for everything he had done when his plans would finally come to pass, and he would finally be at rest.

Then, a stray thought wormed its way into his head. A thought that he had been attempting to keep off for a long time now. The thought that the poor Potter twins would never be able to see and appreciate the beauty of the world. The poor children were just infants, barely three months into their second year of life. They were just children. Did they really need to die for a world that they barely knew? His doubt increasing, Dumbledore felt the maelstrom in his mind pick up momentum once more.

No! He could not lose focus now.

At the very least, he had made plans for Lily and James to survive. As for the twins, he would honor their sacrifice. He would make sure that they were not forgotten. He would make sure to have monuments commemorate their role in bringing about the new era of mankind. Too much had been set in motion to turn back now. The family would get over the grief. They would find solace in the utopia he was building. More children could always be had.

He winced at that last thought. It was a callous and cruel statement. He may not have had children of his own, but he knew the bond that was shared between a parent and their child. After all, he had a student that was like a son to him once. A son that also had to be sacrificed for the cause, for the greater good. He had felt unimaginable pain having to do so.

That poor boy was so full of potential and life, with a cunning that Dumbledore truthfully admired. Dumbledore had indeed seen the ambition burning in the boy's eyes ever since he first met him at the orphanage. He saw the boy's talent first-hand. He had wanted to make the boy into his successor, into a great wizard that would be at the helm of the wizarding world someday.

That dream was broken after Dumbledore found out about a crucial detail; the boy's strong ties to Fate. It was this revelation that made Dumbledore realise that the boy would have to be sacrificed eventually. It was truly unfortunate that he had to be fattened up like a lamb for slaughter, to be manipulated and turned into a monster that would become the new scapegoat in Dumbledore's plans.

The new era depended on this sacrifice, more than any other that Dumbledore ever made. Dumbledore thus had to do what was necessary. And so, he subtly led the boy to the dark path that he now walked as the Dark Lord Voldemort. Yes, the Dark Lord that had plagued the wizarding community, causing fear and chaos untold, was a result of Dumbledore's machinations.

No one could know. No one needed to know. No one would ever know. As far as anyone knew, the boy had simply gone down a dark path, fuelled by pride, greed, and ambition. No one knew that it was in fact Dumbledore that put him on that path, always observing, scheming, carefully pulling the strings, crafting the narrative.

No, no one would ever know. They wouldn't need to.

He could not be blamed. Just as others lost loved ones because of the consequences of what he did, what he caused, he had lost too. He lost people he valued greatly. Riddle, Aberforth, Gellert, Arianna. He did not want to suffer like that again. He did not want anyone to suffer like that. Was that not noble? Wouldn't the greater good would benefit everyone for that reason?

A world without suffering? A world of peace? A world of love? A paradise? Was that not a goal worthy of any sacrifice?

He knew that when that paradise came to be, everyone would let go of the pain of what had to be lost. Everyone would be grateful. He would make sure it came to be, even if it meant that he would have to use every last ounce of power he had. He had poured everything he had into this, and he would do so again any number of times even if he were to turn back time.

The reward, the coming paradise, would be worth it in the end.

Snapping out of his thoughts, he cast the Tempus charm to check the time. Fifteen minutes past eleven. He looked at the lake once more and sighed. His gaze was imploring, as though asking for a sign. Off in the distance, the Giant Squid that inhabited the lake surfaced, its majestic form silhouetted in the moonlight.

As it dove under once more, a large tentacle rose as though waving once, before the massive creature disappeared into the depths once more. Dumbledore's face broke into a small smile. His gaze lingered on the lake for a moment, then he turned and headed back towards the castle, his face morphing into a look of determination.

For him, that alone was a sign from the heavens blessing his endeavour.