The silvery light from the Pensieve illuminated Dumbledore’s face, and it struck Harry suddenly how very old he was looking. He knew, of course, that Dumbledore was getting on in years, but somehow he never really thought of Dumbledore as an old man.

“So, Harry,” said Dumbledore quietly. “Before you got lost in my thoughts, you wanted to tell me something.”

“Yes,” said Harry. “Professor—I was in Divination just now, and—er—I fell asleep.”

He hesitated here, wondering if a reprimand was coming, but Dumbledore merely said, “Quite understandable. Continue.”

“Well, I had a dream,” said Harry. “A dream about Lord Voldemort. He was torturing Wormtail . . . you know who Wormtail—”

“I do know,” said Dumbledore promptly. “Please continue.”

“Voldemort got a letter from an owl. He said something like, Wormtail’s blunder had been repaired. He said someone was dead. Then he said, Wormtail wouldn’t be fed to the snake—there was a snake beside his chair. He said—he said he’d be feeding me to it, instead. Then he did the Cruciatus Curse on Wormtail—and my scar hurt,” Harry said. “It woke me up, it hurt so badly.”

Dumbledore merely looked at him.

“Er—that’s all,” said Harry.

“I see,” said Dumbledore quietly. “I see. Now, has your scar hurt at any other time this year, excepting the time it woke you up over the summer?”

“No, I—how did you know it woke me up over the summer?” said Harry, astonished.

“You are not Sirius’s only correspondent,” said Dumbledore. “I have also been in contact with him ever since he left Hogwarts last year. It was I who suggested the mountainside cave as the safest place for him to stay.”

Dumbledore got up and began walking up and down behind his desk. Every now and then, he placed his wand tip to his temple, removed another shining silver thought, and added it to the Pensieve. The thoughts inside began to swirl so fast that Harry couldn’t make out anything clearly: It was merely a blur of color.

“Professor?” he said quietly, after a couple of minutes.

Dumbledore stopped pacing and looked at Harry.

“My apologies,” he said quietly. He sat back down at his desk.

“D’you—d’you know why my scar’s hurting me?”

Dumbledore looked very intently at Harry for a moment, and then said, “I have a theory, no more than that . . . It is my belief that your scar hurts both when Lord Voldemort is near you, and when he is feeling a particularly strong surge of hatred.”

“But . . . why?”

“Because you and he are connected by the curse that failed,” said Dumbledore. “That is no ordinary scar.”

“So you think . . . that dream . . . did it really happen?”

“It is possible,” said Dumbledore. “I would say—probable. Harry—did you see Voldemort?”