Reflections Pt. 2

Every year, since Harry was eleven, there had been something dangerous and life-threatening. Someone could, and usually would, die. And it was always nothing more than the result of a game the old man was playing, a game where he was the main pawn being played for a fool.

Risking life and limb for people who didn't even bother to say thank-you. Looking back, he could see just how easily he'd been played and manipulated into being the fool. With shame, he knew he'd allowed them to make a very big fool out of him.

His first year, the game had been disguised as a relatively harmless mystery that he and his friends could solve with no danger to themselves or anyone else if they solved it quick enough. It wasn't until they had solved it that the anything but harmless risk had become clear, a risk that could've been easily avoided.

But because Hermione had insisted they grab the reward just to have proof they had solved the mystery, Harry had found himself face to face with the threat to the safety of the school. All because a little girl wanted to prove she was smart.

Oh, she hadn't said that at the time. No, she'd claimed they couldn't let the bad guy get his hands on it. The treasure hidden in the school was too dangerous to let it fall into the wrong hands.

A bad guy, she believed, to be Professor Snape because all the clues said he was the bad guy in the school. Harry had tried to tell her it wasn't him. That he was too obvious. She wouldn't listen. Hagrid had even told her it wasn't Snape.

But she wouldn't listen to him either. She believed she was smarter than they were. That she understood human nature better than they did. And getting to the treasure before he did would prove it to everyone. So Harry had gone with her and his other companion to rescue the treasure.

But if she was so smart, why then hadn't she figured out if he wanted it, he could already have gotten it? He was, after all, one of the authors of the various traps protecting the stone which was the treasure.

The deadliest trap, as a matter of fact. The last trap before the room with the treasure stored in it. Which meant he had to know how to bypass all the other traps when he'd set up his own. And of course he knew how to go around his own trap. He designed it!

But even when they were standing in that room facing his challenge, which she freely admitted could only have been his, she still insisted he was the thief trying to steal the stone from the Headmaster. Which made no sense at all.

Especially since she knew without a doubt that stone didn't belong to the Headmaster at all. It only proved to Harry she only wanted to go after it so as to prove to everyone she'd solved the mystery. Like a real-world Nancy Drew. Facing real-life dangerous situations with her two faithful companions and coming out on top with the treasure safe and the bad guys caught.

Still, even after he had found himself in a life and death fight, Harry hadn't realized just how he was being played for a fool. He had blindly gone along with his friends to try and prevent the Philosopher's Stone from being stolen and used by Lord Voldemort to return him from the half-life existence he was living at the time.

Never once realizing even if the Dark Lord had known what was hidden in the mirror, all the traps that were guarding it and where exactly it was, -which, as things turned out, he did- he still couldn't actually get it.

Simply because he'd wanted to use it to his own benefit and the trap laid on the mirror was such that only someone who didn't desire to use it for their own benefit could claim it. Therefore, the Voldemort possessed Quirrel could never have gotten the stone out of the mirror. And the nature of the mirror itself would prevent them from denying what they wanted with the stone.

Nor actually could Albus Dumbledore, come to think about it, since he was using it to his own benefit at the time as well. Albus was using it as a lure to draw Harry into a face-to-face confrontation with the shade that was Voldemort at that time. Which meant he was intending to use it to his own benefit also.

Nicolas Flamel, who actually owned the stone, couldn't have gotten it either. Because of course, the Flamels intended to use the stone. That was why they'd created it to begin with.

Which was why Harry had remained in possession of the stone even after the event had concluded. How he had managed to hide it from Dumbledore was something Harry really didn't understand but he had. For some odd reason, Dumbledore hadn't been able to sense the stone on his person when he came upon Harry passed out from lack of oxygen in the mirror room and took him to the infirmary.

Voldemort had known he had it but Dumbledore had only suspected. Nor had he found it in Harry's pocket when Harry was unconscious, though Harry had no doubt he'd search him for it. Either that or he'd had Madam Pomfrey search him.

In any case, the stone stayed in Harry's possession for the rest of the school term. He had sent it back to its creator with Hedwig, his birthday present from Hagrid and best friend, once he had reached Privet Drive for the summer.

It had taken her two weeks to find them but she was a smart and determined bird who knew this stone didn't belong to her Master and did belong to the recipients she was to take it to. So she had persisted until she found them and got herself through their protections to deliver it.

Harry had gotten a letter back from them. It was unaddressed because Harry hadn't signed the letter returning the stone. So they didn't know who had rescued it or returned it. They'd been grateful since Dumbledore had reported the stone as destroyed during the thief's attempt to steal it.

They'd also revealed he didn't actually have his permission to remove the stone from Gringott's to begin with because they believed a school full of children was no place for the most infamous stone in creation.

Over the years since its creation, many lives had been lost by people seeking the stone and with the knowledge that the stone was being sought yet again by those who'd use it for ill purposes, they'd sent it to Gringott's in the hopes of preventing that eventuality.

Gringott's had let Hagrid take the stone from the vault because said vault belonged to Albus who told them Nicolas wanted him to store it for him when in reality Nicolas had said no such thing. So in effect, Albus had conned the goblins into letting him steal their stone from them.

Which they admitted was only a decoy stone for the true stone of immortality and not the actual stone at all. Though Albus hadn't known that went he conned it off the goblins. And Harry had returned it to them.

They were very grateful and wanted to know what they could do for him in return as this decoy stone was very useful to them in keeping thieves away from the true stone.

The letter was one of his greatest treasures but he hadn't sent a reply because there was nothing he wanted for his effort in restoring it to them. That hadn't been why he did it.