Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J.K. Rowling

J.K. Rowling
HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE
the top of his half-moon spectacles. “Or perhaps, to confess that you yourself
are worried and frightened? You need your friends, Harry. As you so
rightly said, Sirius would not have wanted you to shut yourself away.”
Harry said nothing, but Dumbledore did not seem to require an answer.
He continued, “On a different, though related, subject, it is my wish that
you take private lessons with me this year.”
“Private — with you?” said Harry, surprised out of his preoccupied silence.
“Yes. I think it is time that I took a greater hand in your education.”
“What will you be teaching me, sir?”
“Oh, a little of this, a little of that,” said Dumbledore airily.
Harry waited hopefully, but Dumbledore did not elaborate, so he asked
something else that had been bothering him slightly.
“If I’m having lessons with you, I won’t have to do Occlumency lessons
with Snape, will I?”
“Professor Snape, Harry — and no, you will not.”
“Good,” said Harry in relief, “because they were a —” He stopped, careful
not to say what he really thought.
“I think the word ‘fiasco’ would be a good one here,” said Dumbledore,
nodding.
Harry laughed.
“Well, that means I won’t see much of Professor Snape from now on,”
he said, “because he won’t let me carry on Potions unless I get ‘Outstanding’
in my O.W.L., which I know I haven’t.”
“Don’t count your owls before they are delivered,” said Dumbledore gravely.
“Which, now I think of it, ought to be some time later today. Now,
two more things, Harry, before we part.
“Firstly, I wish you to keep your Invisibility Cloak with you at all times
from this moment onward. Even within Hogwarts itself. Just in case, you
understand me?”
Harry nodded.
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