Entry 28
A hooded figure prowled the corridors of the Astronomy tower skillfully avoiding its occupants, both living and dead. It went straight for the stone gargoyle, which jumped aside with a terrified yelp, revealing a hidden door with a spiraling staircase that lead to the Headmaster’s office.
The current occupant of the said chamber had a reputation of being ‘somewhat of an eccentric’, the portrayal further accented by his penchant for imprecise monologues and a fashion sense of the post-Mungo’s Gilderoy Lockheart. One would have thought the twinkling eyes and tendency to indulge in barely coherent speeches should have been a dead giveaway, but there you have it… decades into his tenure as the Headmaster of Hogwarts, only a carefully selected few were privy to the truth: Albus Dumbledore was, slowly but surely, falling a victim of a wizard-type dementia.
Each year, several weeks before the classes started, Headmaster staged his own private version of Start-of-term Feast at The Hog’s Head. Each year the summit would start along the same venerable vein - accounts of old and new Order members being traded behind strong silencing charms, new tactics of fighting the Dark Lord discussed and the success rate of old ones reviewed – ending up on a slightly different note as Headmaster Dumbledore Levitated himself to the very center of the chamber and proceeded to sing rowdy wizarding songs...
It was during one of such performances, the last stanza of ‘The Lay of Blanche the Brave’ still echoing off the grimy walls, that the urgent missive from McGonnagal arrived. ‘News from the Ministry. Your presence urgently required.’ The Headmaster jumped to his feet in an attempt to Apparate… only to land in a crash barely three feet away from his original position, in his birthday suit and sans one of his limbs.
Predictable chaos ensued, with the more self-possessed members of the party rushing to aid the ailing wizard (those possessed of a sense of humor were rushing for the loo at this point), and our story of the great Albus Dumbledore would have met with an early end had it not been for the hooded figure.
“I’m fot… fotru… lucky I have you, Sev’r’s," Dumbledore burbled as his splinched right hand magically reattached itself, admittedly somewhat worse for the wear. His further attempts at gratitude were cut short by a distinctive swish’n’flick of a well-aimed Transfiguration spell.
“What will it be this time?” The perpetrator of the enchantment wondered idly as he pocketed a perfect white pawn. “A trumped up story of some life-threatening curse or other, no doubt…”
***
“What have you been doing all these years that you've lived in Dumbledore's pocket?” Bellatrix Lestrange glared at her host, who merely snorted in return.
“Trust me, ladies… you’d really rather not know.”
Hiding behind his glass, the Potions Master allowed himself a tiny smirk. Truth be told, he didn’t regret any of it: Minerva’s face after he presented her with the chess piece, whispering a quick ‘Finite’… was priceless.
Steps: 
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2 layers (background removed), 2nd picture used: HP6 Dumbledore promo.
Steps: backgrounds removed, pawn resized, Dumbledore resized, Dumbledore copied&pasted onto pawn, Dumbledore free-transformed, parts of Dumbledore layer deleted in stages, individual stages saved, gif animation compiled. | |