After the meeting ended, the board governors emerged from the tower in twos and threes.
At the same time, in the Headmaster's Office on the eighth floor of Hogwarts Castle, Dumbledore received an official letter from Paris. It was written by Madam Maxime, Headmistress of Beauxbatons Academy of Magic. "...I hereby confirm that your former professor, Mr. Gilderoy Lockhart, has reached a preliminary agreement for cooperation with us. In view of his outstanding contributions to the field of Defense Against the Dark Arts, our school intends to invite him to serve as a visiting professor for next spring semester and explore deeper cooperation between our institutions in such areas as academic exchange and student swaps. We are writing to request your formal assessment of Mr. Lockhart's tenure at Hogwarts..."
Dumbledore set the letter on his desk, his fingers resting along the edge of the paper. He did not read it a second time. Fawkes tilted his head from the perch behind him, his red-gold eyes sweeping over the letter's seal—a Beauxbatons crest stamped in wax, its edges lightly heated and giving off the faintest trace of roses.
Dumbledore picked up a quill and wrote several lines in the blank space of the letter. His handwriting remained steady, but the ending of every stroke was slightly heavier than usual, as though he had added an imperceptible full stop to the end of each word.
He folded the reply and handed it to the owl waiting on the windowsill. As its talons took hold of the envelope, the edge of the paper scraped a hair-thin mark across the desktop.
He sat there, looking out the window. Night had already fallen, and a thin wash of moonlight lay over the lawns of Hogwarts like a sheet of flattened silver-gray cloth. Far beyond sight,