Past and Eavesdroppers

After a while, the wooden door was slowly opened, and an old woman appeared behind it.

She was very short, even shorter than Sean when she was hunched over. Her knuckles, which were gripping the wooden door, were pale blue. Her whole face was wrinkled, and you could see the veins under her skin and the yellowish-brown age spots.

Bathilda squinted at Harry's face, which was covered in cloudy cataracts.

"Oh! Oh! Harry!" It took her a while to recognize him, and then she called out happily.

Harry nodded and said loudly, "Bathilda Bagshot, this is Daisy, you saw her last year."

Bathilda looked at Daisy again, then gave a dry smile, "Yes, yes, little Daisy, are you all better?"

Daisy nodded obediently. "Thanks to you, Bathilda Bagshot."

"That would be perfect... Oh, children, come in, come in quickly." Her voice was like a gear that had been rusted for decades.

Bathilda led the group into the house, which was dark and crowded, but there was no smell of decay or mold.

"My mom often comes over to clean the house for her and then chat with her," Harry whispered to Sean.

In the crowded Common Room, only one candle flickered. Harry was clearly not a first-timer; he took the trembling candle holder and matches from Bathilda's hand and lit the candle with practiced ease.

"Has she forgotten her magic?" Hermione asked in a very low voice, following behind Sean.

"It seems so, she's too old."

The Common Room finally brightened up, and Sean placed the cake on the coffee table and looked around.

There were many things piled up here. The wooden cabinets with peeling paint were crooked and crooked, with various silverwares and boxes on them. In the corner, there was a basket filled with ugly green fruit.

Inside a curved box, Sean saw something that piqued his curiosity.

There were two photos there. One photo showed a handsome young man smiling lazily at Sean, looking like a wild, untamed golden bird.

Another photo shows the young man and another young man together, their arms around each other, looking happy and intimate.

Grindelwald and Dumbledore ... Sean recognized them immediately.

Grindelwald's demeanor has never changed, whether he was young or old. Dumbledore, on the other hand, looked proud and flamboyant when he was young, unlike the gentle and steady headmaster of Hogwarts.

"Bathilda Bagshot, what's this?" Sean picked up the photo and looked at the old lady enjoying her cake amidst Daisy's smile.

Bathilda squinted at her, put down her fork, and stood up unsteadily.

"My grand-nephew, and his dearest friend," she said, taking the photograph with a nostalgic look on her face, "You should all know them, Gellert and Albus ..."

Hermione's eyes widened in disbelief, while Harry whispered to Sean, "Bathilda Bagshot is incredibly confused; she can't remember who's who at all."

Sean nodded. "It's fine to just listen to it as a story..."

Bathilda, holding the photograph, sat back down in his chair. "How long ago was that? Seventy years? Eighty years? Or even longer?"

"Do you remember what happened back then?" Sean moved slowly and discreetly to Bathilda's side.

Just now, Dave sent him a message.

"On the shelf, there is a comical brain."

On the way into Godric's Hollow, Sirius mentioned that a reporter from the Daily Prophet had recently come here, and Sean only remembered one reporter.

Now, Dave's brain scoring system issued a warning, and he immediately realized what was happening. Sure enough, there was a beetle perched on top of the shelf.

Sean pretended to be curious and picked up a silver cup. After fiddling with it for a couple of moments, he suddenly reached out and slammed the beetle into the cup.

"Sean?" His commotion was a bit loud, and Harry and the others looked at him with suspicion.

"I didn't hold it properly, sorry." He smiled apologetically.

Once the others had looked away, Sean covered the shelf and then secretly took out a glass bottle.

Naja the Occamy emerged from behind him, then shrank and slipped into the seam of the silver cup. It bound the beetle that was desperately trying to flap its wings and slithered back into Sean's hand.

Sean simply tossed the beetle into the glass bottle and then firmly sealed it with a cork.

After finishing all that, he lazily leaned against the shelf.

Bathilda showed no reaction to the commotion and continued her slow, deliberate narration.

"I remember vividly when the Dumbledore moved in. Kendra and the two boys all looked so gloomy. I welcomed them with a batch of homemade Cauldron Cake —no one can resist cake, right? But Kendra turned me away," Bathilda took a sip of the cream on his birthday cake. "But she needed someone to talk to, and I was a good candidate. I wasn't as old as I am now back then... That poor woman, before she died, I was the only person in Godric's Hollow she could talk to."

Kendra is Dumbledore's mother.

"After her death, Albus became the pillar of the family. Because we corresponded, we had a good relationship. I still remember Albus's amazing paper published in Transfiguration Today. He was a genius, wasn't he? Just like my grand-nephew..."

Bathilda was very talkative; she loved reminiscing about the past, but she would always forget some things and then spend a long time thinking about them.

She talked a lot about Dumbledore's youth, and only at the end did she mention the summer that Dumbledore and Grindelwald met.

Hermione looked doubtful, Harry was drowsy, and only Daisy was blinking curiously.

"... Gellert! Such talent!" Bathilda exclaimed in his aged voice. "They quickly became inseparable friends... They often gathered at my place, and I would tell them stories of History of Magic. They were both very curious about those ancient magical tales, and once they even pestered me to tell them many legends about Herpo ..."

The Herpo the Foul? Sean frowned. This was probably the first famous Dark Wizard in history. He invented many evil Dark Arts. There were rumors that he was the first Parseltongue and the first person to hatch Basilisk.

Dumbledore and Grindelwald also study the history of Herpo?

Bathilda continued, "Later, somehow, they seemed to have had a fight, and my grand-nephew left with a strange expression. Not long after, Dumbledore's family also moved away... It's such a pity, their relationship was originally very good..."

There's not much specific information... Sean thought with some regret.

At this moment, as if he had suddenly remembered something, Bathilda hurriedly stood up.