Yellow turned green.
Dumbledore left behind the roar of the fire and stepped into the noise of chatter happening around the bar floor of Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade. He looked around the most popular inn in the village, which remained festivous round the year regardless of the season or time.
He stepped away from the fireplace and was immediately greeted by the sweet smell of butterbeer that lingered in the air, among other things that made the bar smell like a bar. He made his way to the bar with the occasional nod of the head accompanied with a smile to those who greeted him along the way.
"Dumbledore!" greeted the inn's hostess, Madam Rosmerta, from behind the bar. "You should've told me you were coming down; I would've booked a room for you. Give me two minutes; I'll have one readied for you right away."
"No, it is fine, Rosmerta. I'm meeting someone today." He looked around the bar, searching, "Do you know where I can find Quinn West?"
"Ah, so you're the one he's meeting," said Rosmerta, smiling. "Quinn said he was meeting someone. He's such a kind and charming young man, I offered him a room, but he declined," she sighed. "Are you meeting him to offer him a job, Dumbledore? If so, you should ask him if he wants to shift to a room."
Rosmerta pointed out a table in the seating area. Dumbledore followed her direction and found himself staring at a table right in the middle of the room, surrounded by other tables from all four directions. There he saw Quinn sitting with a plate of fries and a drink in front of him as the young man had his eyes reading a book in hand, unbothered by all the racket around him.
"Quinn," said Dumbledore as he approached the table.
Quinn looked up at Dumbledore, then his eyes moved around the bar, seemingly checking if Dumbledore had brought company. He closed his book and made it disappear inside his coat-jacket.
Quinn asked Dumbledore to sit down.
"What is this meeting all about, Quinn," asked Dumbledore. "If it is what it is I think about, then it would be better for us to shift to a private setting; Rosmerta has offered to clear a private room. . . if that is not alright with you, we can go to my office."
"Here is just fine."
Dumbledore pursed his lips behind his beard and looked around the bar before sitting opposite Quinn, who at that moment snapped his fingers for a thick blanket of magic to cover them.
Dumbledore observed the spell with a critical eye, but as he was doing so, he heard Quinn, "I hope you didn't want to order something."
"A private room is better than a privacy spell," and he could sense something mixed in, "and a confusion element to keep people away."
"If you say so," said Quinn. "Moving on, I called you here for a point, so let's get to the point. . . . You're not going to exploit my grandfather for anything. We are going to forget about the previous conversation and pretend that you never know that I was the Invisible Vigilante."
Dumbledore sighed, "This is why you called me here? Quinn, I'm the Headmaster of Hogwarts, among other various duties which keep me busy. I do not have time to take part in needless conversations." He stood up and turned to walk, but as just as he was about to exit the boundary of the magic. . .
"I guess you don't want to know about the Dark Lord's Horcrux."
Dumbledore's foot froze halfway outside the boundary. He slowly turned back to Quinn, who picked up his glass and sipped on his straw while maintaining eye contact with Dumbledore.
". . . What?" asked Dumbledore, but he didn't take a seat just yet.
"You heard me; if you walk away right now, you won't get to know what I have to say about the Dark Lord's Horcrux," said Quinn as if he didn't care.
Dumbledore looked around the room.
"You're insulting my magic by looking around, Dumbledore," said Quinn, his voice distorting akin to the Invisible Vigilante.
Dumbledore wrinkled his brows and took his seat. Talking about the Invisible Vigilante and especially about Voldemort's Horcrux in such a densely populated setting wasn't something he appreciated. "There are no more of those, Quinn; the one you destroyed was the only one. And I'm working hard to remedy Harry's unfortunate situation."
Quinn shrugged, "Then why did you sit down? Do you take everyone other than yourselves for a fool, Dumbledore? Is it not enough to threaten my family, but you also undermine me by such a poor excuse of a bluff."
". . . You are angry."
"Excellent guess. Do you want me to give you some sour candy for it?" said Quinn, almost snarling. Dumbledore stared as Quinn's eyes burned a violent purple. "I had to tell my grandfather that I'm a cold-blooded killer. How do you think that affects a relationship? Because I don't know; I had to leave my home before getting to experience it!" He slammed his fist on the table. "Now, my family will know the ugly truth about myself that I have for obvious reasons though I would take to the grave. . . and if that was not enough, I have the great Albus Dumbledore trying to reveal it to the entire damned world! So yes. . . I am furious."
Quinn backed away with his eyes fading back to their original black. He picked up his glass; it developed a layer of white condensation as the carbonated drink cooled down inside before Quinn took a big sip from it.
Dumbledore stayed silent. It was clear that today Quinn wasn't going to be happy with him speaking anything that he didn't want him to speak, so why agonize the young man by speaking the words that could be done without.
"Here's the deal," Quinn cleaned the corner of his mouth with a napkin. "I hold one of the Dark Lord's Horcrux, and if you don't agree to my demands, I will hide it, and you or anyone will never see the sight of it. So if you want to keep an undying maniac hanging around, then you can go ahead and walk away and blab your mouth to anyone you want to."
"I don't believe you," said Dumbledore. "How do I know you're not lying about possessing one. I don't think you have one, and this is just a desperate attempt disguised as a one-sided negotiation."
"Between the two of us, who do you think is more of an authority on Horcruxes," said Quinn. "Let me clear that up," he pointed towards Dumbledore, "you have destroyed zero Horcruxes," he pointed at himself, "I have destroyed two of them."
"Two of them?" Dumbledore wrinkled his brow.
"You already know about my work with the Diary, but did you know about the Marvolo Gaunt's Ring in the Gaunt Shack in Little Hangleton."
"That. . . that was you?"
"Of course, it was me. Who do you think is the authority to destroy immortality-granting soul containers between the two of us," Quinn scoffed condescendingly. "I'm not a one-trick pony who just destroyed the Diary by chance. I dug deep and went down the rabbit hole, and found a second one, destroyed it. . . and then found a third one, so Dumbledore, tell me do you believe me now?"
That was a surprise. Dumbledore didn't think that Quinn was the one who destroyed the Ring he found in the Gaunt Shack. When he had called Quinn to talk about the Diary, he hadn't expected him to know about the Horcruxes, and after he had let out the secret to the Potter family, he hadn't anticipated that Quinn was still hiding another secret. After spending years not knowing who destroyed the Ring, the discovery of Regulus Black, and the fake Slytherin's Socket, he assumed that it was the younger Black brother who had gotten to the Locket as well. . . though inside, Dumbledore always knew that his theory had holes because of the discrepancies between the notes. He simply didn't care about who destroyed the Horcrux, just that they were destroyed.
Looking at Quinn's mocking face, Dumbledore only had one question. "Why haven't you destroyed it yet?" With the small sample to draw from, Quinn had destroyed two of his two Horcrux finds; it was a statistics-driven assumption for him to assume that the third find would have the same fate. "You're saying that you will hide the third one away. . . but what if you have already destroyed it. . . what if you don't have anything in your hand."
Quinn's response was a small curl of his lips that stretched into a smile that opened up to a wide grin. "Do you want to risk that, Dumbledore?" asked Quinn, his voice backed by magic. "I may have already destroyed the Horcrux, I may not have destroyed it. . . or I may not even have it— but do you have the liberty of testing lady luck; can you know for certain that my threats are bogus— because if you're by chance wrong, and in future have this one chance where you can kill the Dark Lord, and you miraculously succeed." Quinn chuckled, "All that for him to return. And maybe by then, you're dead; who among your cohort do you think will kill the Dark Lord. . . who Dumbledore has enough magical prowess other than you. Even if you're alive, Dumbledore, you're not growing younger, and with every passing year, your magic grows weaker, but the Dark Lord stays as powerful as he is—" he pointed near Dumbledore's waist "— and as powerful as that wand is. . . isn't all-powerful, so think about it. . . do you want to take the risk?"
The privacy spell dulled the incoming voice, but right now, it was as if the magic had sucked all the voice, leaving behind a vacuum between Dumbledore and Quinn.
". . . Why are you doing this?" Dumbledore asked, his voice laced with disappointment. "You have done some misdeeds, but I don't believe you to be a bad soul, Quinn. So why would you do something so important that it concerns the people of not only this country but many others as well? I don't believe you want to see people die. Do you know how I see you? I remember the young man passionate about magic; someone who wanted to pursue the depths of magic. . . Yes, I understand all of this is because of me pressurize you for the support I need to battle Voldemort, but for you to threaten so many lives to oppose this. . . why?"
Quinn turned his eye away from Dumbledore and fixed them towards a window that let in warm rays of sunlight that illuminated the specks of dust in their glow. "If there's something that can sway me away from magic, then it is the people I'm close to. For them, I'm willing to deviate from my goals. From all of those people, my family is the closet, and you threatened them. . . . I'm not a person with a just moral campus, Dumbledore. I'm willing to risk the lives of thousands, even millions, for my loved ones. . . . Will I be able to sleep at night with it. . . No, I think it will change me forever. But now with my family, I shall make it right.
I am a terrible person and a hypocrite at that, so don't put me in that category, Dumbledore. When I put my mind to a thing, I end up working towards it until I complete."
Quinn stayed silent and continued to stare at the window. It was clear that he was going to say another word without listening to the speaker.
"I agree; I shall not threaten your grandfather to go public," said Dumbledore, "How're you going enforce it?
"Easy, you will sign a magical contract."
Dumbledore pursed his lips, but after a lengthy back-and-forth he came to an agreement; he agreed as long as he was given a chance to read and question Quinn on it along with the legal counsel.
Quinn chuckled, "Very well, I shall guide, and you can take a thorough look before finally submitting it."
". . . What is the Horcrux's identity?" asked Dumbledore.
"It is the Hufflepuff's Cup, of course."
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Quinn West - MC - I have other plans.
Albus Dumbledore - Headmaster - Not how he saw the meeting going.
FictionOnlyReader - Author - No, Quinn hasn't gotten that one yet
