"I couldn't do anything to him. I'm no match for him," Harry admitted, angrily.
                              
      "Not yet, Harry. That-that is why it wasn't time. It will come Harry... the moment. F-Focus. L-Learn to close off your mind completely. T-Tom knows what you are thinking. You have to-to use his intrusion against h-him..." Dumbledore whispered.
                              
      "I tried..." Harry started to say.
                              
      "I know... I know... try again. Y-You have to-to practice m-more...." Dumbledore shuttered.
                              
      Harry watched him uncertainty. Madam Pomfrey had saved him so many times, why couldn't she save Dumbledore? Snape's lessons brought the hurtful truth. Voldemort did not use Avada Kedavra. He wanted Dumbledore to suffer.
                              
      "He knows the prophecy," Harry confessed.
                              
      "It was an e-eventuality. What is done is done. He now knows... that-that he must... focus all of h-his attention... on y-you," Dumbledore said, meekly. 
                              
      "I couldn't stop him..." Harry said, still ashamed of himself.
                              
      "Tom knows m-many ways... to-to... g-get... information... out of-of people..." Dumbledore said, his breathing becoming heavier.
                              
      "I'm sorry," Harry said again, as time seemed to have come to a grinding halt.
                              
      "H-Harry... you did w-what you had to... y-you s-survived. You are the last hope everyone has.... I h-have always believed in y-you... H-Harry.... You can win... you are the one...you will..." Dumbledore started, but he did not say anything more. His eyes closed, though his chest was still moving. Harry could not believe it. Dumbledore cannot die.
                              
      "No... don't..." he started and went to shake him, but Snape was suddenly behind him and put his hand on his shoulder to stop him.
                              
      "Let him go," Snape whispered, sorrowfully. 
                              
      Harry did not try to wake him. Nothing else was said. Harry held Dumbledore's cold hand. His raspy breathing was decreasing and then stopped all together. The light in Dumbledore's eyes went out and his eyes slid back into his head. He was gone. Harry turned and cried into Snape, who said nothing and was beyond tears. The numbness Harry had was gone. All the pain was coming back. He was still bleeding freely out the wound on his back, and he did not have any energy left. He did not see Madam Pomfrey come back, but she slowly pulled tall curtains around Dumbledore's body. 
                              
      "Come on, Harry," Snape said, softly and pulled him over to another bed. 
                              
      Harry wiped his eyes, sat down and met Snape's dark eyes. He realized that was the first time Snape had called him by his first name. Neither one of them said anything else, but when the sniffling Madam Pomfrey came over to examine him, Snape swept off to the door. He beckoned Ron, Hermione and Ginny inside. 
                              
      They walked cautiously pass the high curtains that surrounded Dumbledore. Ginny hugged him gently, as Madam Pomfrey mended the cuts on his back and did not object to their presence. Ron and Hermione were quiet as he held her tightly.
                              
      "Here drink this. It's a Blood-Replenishing Potion," Madam Pomfrey said and he drank it. "And you'll need to change," she added, indicating his blood-soaked robes. She set some pajamas on the bed and pulled the privacy curtains around his bed. Ron had to help him pull off his torn robes.
                              
      "Well, you have some pretty cool scars now," Ron said jokingly, though his voice was shaking slightly and flat. 
                              
      "Yeah... I think the first one was enough," Harry said, hoarsely, his voice gone from Voldemort's Cruciatus Curses.