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People liked to say that Albus Dumbledore was a calm man—the sort of man that wouldn't react if someone fell dead in front of his eyes. Aberforth would have muttered something about cold, heartless brothers, but wouldn't disagree in principle. That was a pity because Aberforth was otherwise very good at seeing through his brother's masks. Only one man alive could perhaps surpass him: a man Albus Dumbledore suspected he would be seeing rather shortly. Which brought him back to the problem at hand: he was anything but calm.
Perhaps if it had been someone else who had managed to corner him last night at his sister's grave, he wouldn't have lost control so badly. Perhaps he wouldn't have even needed to use a wand at all; merely his words and reputation were enough to subdue all but the most ambitious of dark wizards. Alas, it was not to be.That had been his first mistake. Silent casting so he could yell at Gellert Grindelwald for the betrayal of Ariana's memory on the anniversary of her death was his second. And the third? Well, that belonged to the fool Gellert Grindelwald for ever thinking anything could mend the death of his sister.
He might not be calm, but that was fine. He was ready.
When the door of the cell was abruptly shoved open, Albus felt his anger rise unexpectedly, the sheer nerve of the man to meet him today of all days. Did he not have anything better to do? No urgent extrajudicial killings to take care of? No prisoners to torture that he had to make a point of visiting him today—the day she died?
He turned to the window, a narrow panel of glass some three feet above his head, and looked out at the dark gray sky—a cheerier notion than Grindelwald's face. He stayed frozen in place as though lost in thought while the other circumvented the room's enchantments to conjure chairs. Grindelwald's magic swirled around the room, powerful and exact in his superfluous display. Then again, no one had ever claimed the aspiring emperor was humble.
"I apologize for your accommodations, but the circumstances being as they may, have made things rather difficult."
Albus didn't bother to reply, his eyes still locked on the sky. It seemed to go on forever, as though if he looked long enough, he could find the patch of sky home to a happier place—filled with complete families and children who knew no pain. He had never found that sky, not in all those years, but he could wish. He could dream. Today of all days, he could imagine, giving breath to all those thoughts he normally kept far away.
"Oh, so now you're quiet. You had quite a lot to say to me yesterday. You seemed really determined I hear it with all that yelling," Grindelwald snapped. No one had ever accused him of being patient either.
Albus Dumbledore turned around and looked Grindelwald in the eye. "If there was anything in the past you could have changed, anything at all, what would it be?"
Grindelwald didn't look thrown off; on the contrary, he seemed to regain his youthful vigor, as though his face had gained an inexplicable light. "If I could change something, anything at all," he began softly, his voice filled with remorse, "I would have stopped her death."
"Liar." Albus's voice was low and soft, dipped in a long-ago tragedy. "If there was something you could have changed, it would have been my refusal. Case in point: it's been almost forty years and you haven't left me alone. If you cared about me, if you cared about her," his voice broke, displaying dangerous vulnerability before his greatest enemy, "you would have chosen any other day, Grindelwald."
Grindelwald spoke slowly, as though physically weighing each word. "I admit I took advantage of your grief, and I'm not proud of it, but that doesn't make me remorseless. I never meant for her to die—none of us did. It was a terrible mistake that I'll regret till the end of my days. But life has continued. So yes, I see a brilliant man stuck in a castle due to his regret and it bothers me. It hurts me, Albus, what you've done with your life. You could be brilliant. You are brilliant. Why do you insist on hiding in the shadows?"
He spread his arms wide, finishing off with an impassioned plea. "Join me, Albus. Make the world a better place for her sake, for her memory. She would want you to live for the future, not the past."
His words echoed in the stone cell—a cacophony of appeals to forgive the past and step into the future.
The noise faded—smoke like all Gellert Grindelwald's golden words, smoke like that cracked mask of calm he had worked so hard to maintain. "And who gave you authority over the dead as well as the living? How dare you? Ariana is not some blank slate you can use to push your beliefs onto me. Do you remember her, Gellert? Do you truly remember her? Do you remember her yellow daisies and white dandelions? Do you remember her stutter and her laugh? Did you ever even inquire about her day, ask her about her favorite color, or help her find her missing doll? No, you didn't. You don't know her. You don't know what she would have wanted, but I can say for certain it's not the empire you're trying to build—where little girls are persecuted for being born wrong because their magic isn't right, because they're Muggle. I'm living the life she would have wanted—caring for others as I should have cared for her. I don't care if it's not what you call brilliant; you corrupted your judgment long ago in the blood of young girls like her."
His eyes were on fire as he stared the cruel apparition of utilitarianism down. "And if you won't let me go, the least you could do is leave me in peace today and give me a chance to honor her memory."
The man's face was stony as he vanished the unused chairs and walked out. He would be back shortly, Albus Dumbledore was sure, but for today—today he could have one day to himself, limited as it were by the dimensions of his cell. A day of mourning for a life extinguished early, for a tragedy he had caused, for his sister—dead but not gone.