Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality

Hermione, unable to help herself, glanced at Professor McGonagall and saw that Professor McGonagall was giving her an encouraging smile - or she was giving the two of them some kind of smile, anyway - so Hermione looked back at the Headmaster and said, the small quaver in her voice a little larger now, "Since you became Headmaster forty years ago, there've been eleven students to graduate Hogwarts who became heroes, I mean people like Lupe Cazaril and so on, and ten of those were boys. Cimorene Linderwall was the only witch."

"Hm," said the Headmaster. There was a thoughtful expression on his face; he at least seemed to be thinking about it. "Miss Granger, I have never been one for tallying such numbers. Often it is too much easier to count than to understand. Many good people have come out of Hogwarts, witches and wizards both; those famed as heroes are only one kind of good person, and perhaps not the highest. You did not include Alice Longbottom or Lily Potter in your reckoning... But leave that aside. Tell me, Miss Granger, did you tally how many heroes came out of Hogwarts in the forty years before me? For in that time I can recall only three now called heroes; and among those three, no witches at all."

"I'm not trying to say it's just you!" Hermione said. "Only I think maybe a lot of people, like the Headmasters before you too, maybe even your whole society and everything, might be discouraging girls."

The old wizard sighed. His half-glasses eyes looked only at her, as though they were the only two people present. "Miss Granger, it might be possible to discourage witches from becoming Charms Mistresses, or Quidditch players, or even Aurors. But not heroes. If someone is meant to be a hero then a hero they will be. They will walk through fire and swim through ice. Dementors will not stop them, nor the deaths of friends, and not discouragement either."

"Well," Hermione said, and paused, struggling with the words. "Well, I mean... what if that's not actually true? I mean, to me it seems that if you want more witches to be heroes, you ought to teach them heroing."

"Many boys and girls are heroes in their dreams," Dumbledore said quietly. He did not look at any of the other girls, only at her. "Fewer in the waking world. Many have stood their ground and faced the darkness when it comes for them. Fewer come for the darkness and force it to face them. It is a hard life, sometimes lonely, often short. I have told none to refuse that calling, but neither would I wish to increase their number."

Hermione hesitated; there was something in the lined face that stopped her, like a hint to all the emotion that wasn't being displayed, years and years of it...

Maybe if there were more heroes, their lives wouldn't be so lonely, or so short.

She couldn't bring herself to say that, though, not to him.

"But the point is moot," said the old wizard. He smiled, a bit ruefully she thought. "Miss Granger, you cannot teach heroism like you would teach Charms. You cannot assign twelve inches on how to carry on when all hope seems lost. You cannot rehearse students on when to stand up and tell the Headmaster he has done wrong. Heroes are born, not taught. And for whatever reason, more of them are born boys than girls." The Headmaster shrugged, as if to say that he was helpless to do anything about that.

"Um," Hermione said. She couldn't help it, she glanced behind her.

Professor Sinistra was looking a bit indignant. And it wasn't true that everyone was staring at her like she'd just been silly, the way she'd started to imagine while she was listening to Dumbledore.

Hermione turned back to face Dumbledore again, took a deep breath, and said, "Well, maybe people who are going to be heroes, will be heroes no matter what. But I don't see how anyone could really know that, aside from just saying it afterward. And when I told you that I wanted to be a hero, you weren't very encouraging."

"Mr. Potter," the Headmaster said mildly. His eyes didn't leave hers. "Please tell Miss Granger your impression of our own first meeting. Would you say that I was encouraging? Speak the truth."

There was a pause.

"Mr. Potter?" said Professor Vector's voice from behind her, sounding puzzled.

"Um," Harry's voice said from further back, sounding extremely reluctant. "Um... well, actually in my case the Headmaster set fire to a chicken."

"He what?" Hermione blurted, only there were several other people exclaiming things at around the same time so she wasn't sure anyone heard her.

Dumbledore went on gazing at her, looking perfectly serious.

"I didn't know about Fawkes," Harry's voice said rapidly, "so he told me that Fawkes was a phoenix, while he was pointing to a chicken on Fawkes's stand so I'd think that was Fawkes, and then he set the chicken on fire - and also he gave me this big rock and told me it had belonged to my father and I ought to carry it everywhere -"