{Thirty-Five Owls}

V

August 4th, 1952

Dear Gellert,

I know it would be better for me to wait for you to contact me. I'm afraid I'm at quite a disadvantage--Nurmengard is rather out of range for Legilimency. I can only guess at the best way to approach you now.

I remember your sulks, in those weeks we spent together. The way you'd leave abruptly if offended, cut yourself off, radiate darkness, come back a few hours later as if nothing was wrong. Hours have turned into months, I suppose? Time in isolation can stretch so, and I have experienced it only briefly, compared to you. And I do not say this to mock you. I found even your sulks intriguing--your wild flights of emotion were part of your charm.

And I know it would be better for me to leave you to it, but I cannot bring myself to simply let you be. It is one of my failings, I suppose, the tendency to over-stretch myself and meddle. And now, were we face to face, I suppose you would snap at me for mock humility and leave...

I come begging back to you, yes. Not as a famous wizard, not as a Hogwarts Professor, not as anything in which I might have pride. Merely as a man, for that is all we are in the end. You once called this old man friend. And you wrote me seeking, I can only imagine, simple correspondence. I would like that very much. And I speak in plain honesty, and you have every right to be angry with me.

I do not hate you. Could you bring yourself to believe that, to judge me fairly for it? Could you bring yourself not to hate me?

Regards,

Albus