He looked at his reflection, at those eyes turned blue by the lamplight—those eyes that had gone still for an entire minute in Slughorn's garden today because of a question he could not answer.
One minute. On a chessboard, that was enough time for an opponent to kill the game.
Dumbledore drew his gaze from the windowpane and returned to the warm yellow glow of the fireplace, to the spinning silver instruments. He sat down, interlacing his fingers on the desk as he always did.
When his gaze fell upon the invitation list in the center of the desk, marked over and revised again and again, he saw fresh ink beneath the red annotation that read "respectfully declined." Professor McGonagall had added it that afternoon, in blue ink, her handwriting slightly more hurried than usual: "The tenth candidate signed another cooperation agreement today."
There was one name left on the list. There was no annotation beside it. Dumbledore knew that the person behind that name would refuse him, because three years ago, that person had told him to his face that he would "never again take part in anything related to Hogwarts."
Yet he still turned the list to that page and looked at that name for a long time.
The fire in the fireplace flickered and gave a soft crackle. Fawkes tucked his neck in on his perch and buried his head beneath his wing. Night had fully fallen.
"Due to Professor Lockhart's resignation, for the remainder of this school year, Professor Snape will... temporarily take over Defense Against the Dark Arts." When Dumbledore announced the news publicly during dinner, the uproar burst forth at once, like a spark thrown into smoldering ashes.
At the teachers' table, Snape sat in the third seat to Dumbledore's right. The hem of