Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

strong leader; that is my desire. As for my reasons why," Professor Quirrell smiled without mirth, "I think they shall stay my own."

"The sense of doom that I feel around you." The words were becoming harder and harder to say, as the subject danced closer and closer to something terrible and forbidden. "You always knew what it meant."

"I had several guesses," said Professor Quirrell, his expression unreadable. "And I will not yet say all I guessed. But this much I will tell you: it is your doom which flares when we come near, not mine."

For once Harry's brain managed to mark this as a questionable assertion and possible lie, instead of believing everything it heard. "Why do you sometimes turn into a zombie?"

"Personal reasons," said Professor Quirrell with no humor at all in his voice.

"What was your ulterior motive for rescuing Bellatrix?"

There was a brief silence, during which Harry tried hard to control his breathing, keep it steady.

Finally the Defense Professor shrugged, as though it were of no account. "I all but spelled it out for you, Mr. Potter. I told you everything you needed to deduce the answer, if you had been mature enough to consider that first obvious question. Bellatrix Black was the Dark Lord's most powerful servant, her loyalty the most assured; she was the single person most likely to be entrusted with some part of the lost lore of Slytherin that should have been yours."

Slowly the anger crept over Harry, slowly the wrath, something terrible beginning to boil his blood, in just a few moments he would say something that he really shouldn't say while the two of them were alone in a deserted warehouse -

"But she was innocent," said the Defense Professor. He was not smiling. "And the degree to which all her choices were taken away from her, so that she never had a chance to suffer for her own mistakes... it struck me as excessive, Mr. Potter. If she tells you nothing of use -" The Defense Professor gave another small shrug. "I shall not consider this day's work a waste."

"How altruistic of you," Harry said coldly. "So if all wizards are like You-Know-Who inside, are you an exception to that, then?"

The Defense Professor's eyes were still in shadow, dark pits that could not be met. "Call it a whim, Mr. Potter. It has sometimes amused me to play the part of a hero. Who knows but that You-Know-Who would say the same."

Harry opened his mouth a final time -

And found that he couldn't say it, he couldn't ask the last question, the last and most important question, he couldn't make the words come out. Even though a refusal like that was forbidden to a rationalist, for all that he'd ever recited the Litany of Tarski or the Litany of Gendlin or sworn that whatever could be destroyed by the truth should be, in that one moment, he could not bring himself to say his last question out loud. Even though he knew he was thinking wrongly, even though he knew he was supposed to be better than this, he still couldn't say it.

"Now it is my turn to inquire of you." Professor Quirrell's back straightened from where it had leaned back against the glacier wall of painted concrete. "I was wondering, Mr. Potter, if you had anything to say about nearly killing me and ruining our mutual endeavor. I am given to understand that an apology, in such cases, is considered a sign of respect. But you have not offered me one. Is it just that you have not yet gotten around to it, Mr. Potter?"

The tone was calm, the quiet edge so fine and sharp that it would slice all the way through you before you realized you were being murdered.

And Harry just looked at the Defense Professor with cool eyes that would never flinch from anything; not even death, now. He was no longer in Azkaban, no longer fearful of the part of himself that was fearless; and the solid gemstone that was Harry had rotated to meet the stress, turning smoothly from one facet to another, from light to darkness, warm to cold.

A calculated ploy on his part, to make me feel guilty, put me in a position where I must submit?

Genuine emotion on his part?

"I see," said Professor Quirrell. "I suppose that answers -"

"No," said the boy in a cool, collected voice, "you do not get to frame the conversation that easily, Professor. I went to considerable lengths to protect you and get you out of Azkaban safely, after I thought you had tried to kill a police officer. That included facing down twelve Dementors without a Patronus Charm. I wonder, if I had apologized when you demanded it, would you have said thank-you in turn? Or am I correct in thinking that it was my submission you demanded there, and not only my respect?"

There was a pause, and then Professor Quirrell's voice came in reply, openly icy with danger no longer veiled. "It seems you still cannot bring yourself to lose, Mr. Potter."

Darkness stared out of Harry's eyes without flinching, the Defense Professor himself reduced to a mortal thing within them. "Oh, and are you pondering now, whether you should pretend to lose to me, and pretend to humble yourself before my own anger, in order to preserve your own plans? Did the thought of a calculated false apology even cross your mind? Me neither, Professor Quirrell."

The Defense Professor laughed, low and humorless, emptier than the void between the stars, dangerous as any vacuum filled with hard radiation. "No, Mr. Potter, you have not learned your lesson, not at all."

"I thought of losing many times, in Azkaban," said the boy, his voice level. "That I ought to simply give up, and turn myself over to the Aurors. Losing would have been the sensible thing to do. I heard your voice saying it to me, in my mind; and I would have done it, if I had been there by myself. But I could not bring myself to lose you."

There was silence, then, for a time; as though even the Defense Professor could not quite think of what to say to that.

"I am curious," said Professor Quirrell at last. "What do you think that I should apologize for, precisely? I gave you explicit instructions in the event of a fight. You were to stay down, stay out of the way, cast no magic. You